Shogun: Total War is still one of my favourite games. I would love to play a game in a samurai-based virtual world similar to Japan's Sengoku period. I would definitely subscribe to that (especially one that was created by a Japanese games studio, seeped in the culture).
Imagine that you, too, loved such a game. How would you feel if, after playing it for several years, the publishers announced that the next expansion would be set in a world like medieval Europe. Only, because they're a Japanese gaming house, it isn't like the Europe that you know. Instead it's full of Japanese stereotypes of medieval Europe, where people wander about, intoning to you "Priests, pilgrims, pastries. These are what matter most."
Yeah. Now you've got it. You bought the game for its samurai milieu, now you've got samurai wandering around medieval France.
The Chinese subscribers to WoW were originally joined because they were interested in a high-fantasy medieval european-style world. Otherwise they'd have taken up any of the other Asian MMOs. They don't want a Chinese-as-imagined-by-Americans MMO, with a side order of Japanese Pokemon. No wonder they're off to League of Legends.
GDC talk: Revisiting Fun
-
My GDC 2024 talk Revisiting Fun: 20 Years of a Theory of Fun is now posted
here. Once again, I had a lot of fun drawing cartoon heads of lots of
people wh...
7 hours ago
I've been thinking the same thing. Even I can see that there's a bit of a mish-mash in the cultures being referenced, and I'm no student of Asian history.
ReplyDelete