not anymore im afraid and its kinda sad, gone are the days of waiting 12-24 months for a european version of something that you heard in the playground is cool, although trusting the playground was hard as i cant remember how many times a so called reliable source (usually an uncle who apparaently lives in japan) has given great information on the next installment of a gane to be released 2 years away in 1991, only to find out that said uncle was either non existant or liked bullshitting to his newphew, in fact i believe this japanese uncle actually owned a Snes 2! at one point which according to the source had graphics like a real film and he had a new super mario bros game where mario and peach had baby marios!

ahhh i miss the playground of yesteryear, but back to japan centre of gaming, i thkn the problem stands now that while the Japanians made excellent games its the fact they still make those same games, the likes of Squeenix and Namco while need to continuemaking Tales of and Final Fantasy i think they need to take a new direction, perhaps the Temco deally thingy will help on that but maybe they should take a leaf from nintendo and change there genre direction, although not like Sega did :)

Square are confirming what many of us have seen for some time now. This is why I never purchased FFXII, because the japanese developers are falling into the rut of conplacency and mediocre ville.

If you compare the Square of the PS1 days to the SE of now, their output was much more varied and wishing to try new things. These days its too much FF games, and while they are good I have really bad FF fatigue.

I think the real danger for japanese developer is that while the western developers have learned from the japanese in the past, many of them have trouble doing the same. Failaure in the development of 3D tech or adoption of outside tech like Unreal 3 engine has also hampered them, leaving many PS3 games looking like PS2 efforts.

Its possible this is a very japanese thing, that they take so long to adjust. Take a look at Nintendo for evidence of this one step behind attitude. Perhaps this is why those few japanese developers that are thriving are the likes of Mistwalker, Sega, Capcom, Atlus, who pay more attention to their fanbase, in and outside of japan and take more chances. All of them have a very forward thinking attitude and adjusted well to global market conditions.

I used to have a lot more faith in SE, but I don't think they are talented enough to lead the games industry, and I totally now understand why Sakaguchi left them. Games like Lost Odyssey, Fable 2 and Mass Effect have shifted the bar high for rpgs, and SE still are not taking the hint.

My advice to japanese developer.
1: Try something new and don't be afraid to experiment. While development costs are high for modern games, the likes of XNA, WiiWare and PSN give all developers a cheaper option, to try out new ideas on the cheap.

2: Invest in developing and using your own 3d graphics engines, to help push the limits of your games, or invest in outside engine licenses.

3: Don't get complacent and draw series out for too long. If you find a successful series to be selling, always strive to do better than your last game, as well as different where possible. We can only stomach so much FF, Square.

To all Japanese game companies, please ignore whatever square-enix says and keep pumping out those funky punk games that no western developer has been able to reproduce *loving glare to suda51*.

Also, please do not listen to Joji because i don't want any of them go pull a Capcom or SEGA and go entirely retarded and just copy wetern games (hello Resident Gears of Evil War 5!) that only the pseudo-hardcore go bonkers over.

I would like to take Treasure as a fine example of a japanese team that keeps pushing itself in making the most kick-ass games they can with a very small team, all with their very own quirks and unique feature sets. Now if only they would make Sin of Punishment 2 on the Wii...just announce the damn thing, we all know you're making it!!!

Thank god the Wii exists to give all those independent punk japanese teams a chance to release complete bonkers games to a huge market. Just don't do anything retarted and make Xbox360 or PS3-versions because they will bomb so hard on those two.

Was it really ever? Pity England is no longer ;) .

They are really a bit market compared to the world, that have their own gaming desires and publishers.

Sure they gave money to buy Japanese hardware, but look at the amount of PC hardware bought for games.

while i do agree that there are too many final fantasies et al that are being thrown at us these days. i dont completely agree with some of your points.

they have tried some new things, look at the world ends with you, or the wiiware version of crystal chronicles.

final fantasy 13 uses their own engine, though as you mentioned, they are NOW going to be using the unreal engine for the next installment. lame. but hey

final fantasy 12, was actually really good btw, very very different from any other game in the series, but still very final fantasy. the best gameplay mechanics in the series, and a storyline that wasnt all about a moody protagonist that falls in love at some point, even though it has nothing to do with the story.