Obviously we're kidding just a bit here but you have to admit that the games you mention are much more simple in nature than what has been popular here. Most of those games have only the basic trappings of a story (if they have one at all) and are based on fairly simple time tested gameplay mechanics.
Many of the games you mention are also easy to play in quick doses.
yomi_basic
I think that Japan has seen a market shift to portables for the time being at least. To understand it you have to have some context of the japanese market, said to be flagging for many a year. With PS3 and Wii delayed, they had nothing but handhelds to plug the gaps and revitalise the market. Or keep buying PS2 games, whose releases scaled down as developers switched resources to PS3/Wii and 360 even.
Now the DS has essentially sold more in japan than the gba lifetime total. Iwata called it a social phenomena, the theory that DS is selling to the same gba audience has (in Japan at least) been totally shattered because of it.
Games that are easy to play in short doses are symptomatic of handheld consoles, you need to be able to stop and start, save whenever you want and shut down the system. It doesn't neccesarily mean that a game is less complex. For the system these games are on and in the st-yle their in (2-D mostly) they are indeed full blown games and for me don't fall into mini-game category at all. I know we talk in broad strokes most of the time in relation to trends but if you actually take the time to look at individual titles in the DS or even Wii library, not many could be penned in as mini-games.
With the games I mentioned that were listed in Japan's top 20 we had full blown RPGs, 2-D platformers, racing games, educational software, a graphic adventure, puzzle games and an online life-sim. In japan, for years now you could find titles that puzzled us westerners, dating games, horse racing simulators, gambling and cookery games, anime tie-ins. These things aren't anything new. Games like Katamari in the past would have been bizaare to our tastes.
Then you have to look at what japanese developers are making or have already released in regard to the games you want or expect recentely: Dead Rising, Ninety Nine Knights and Lost planet, DMC4, MGS 4, The Last Remanant, FFXIII, Mario Galaxy, Super Smash Brothers, Okami, Fire Emblem, Blue Dragon, Lost Oddysey, Shadow of Colossus, Umbrella chronicles, Barboros Treasure and many more that I probably don't know about or can't remeber off the top of my head. Â
Log in to comment