Japan surpassed by West - Kojima

By Tom Bramwell Published 14 May, 2008

"Sad as it may be, it's the truth."

Hideo Kojima believes that the Japanese games industry has been surpassed by Western developers.

"Unfortunately, overseas game production companies, which are well-funded and extremely skilled, have surpassed us by a couple of steps," said Kojima, who was speaking at an event to mark the completion of Metal Gear Solid 4's development, in comments reported by GameSpot.

"It was once said that Japan molded the world's video game [industry], but that's becoming a thing of the past. Sad as it may be, it's the truth."

Kojima also said that while casual games "have become mainstream", developers mustn't forget about hardcore gamers and he's been putting his back into making sure they have at least one more blockbuster to look forward to next month.

"I wanted to remind those gamers about the fun of video games. I know that we're going against the trend, but we've been working hard for the past four years so that the fire [of hardcore games] won't blow out," he said.

Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots is due out on PS3 on 12th June. Check out our recent hands-on to see how it's shaping up.

Picture of Tom.

About Tom Bramwell

Tom is Operations director of Eurogamer Network and Editor-at-Large of Eurogamer.net. He joined the company in February 2000. Follow him on Twitter.

Read more articles from Tom by visiting the Tom Bramwell archive page.

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Comments (38) Latest comment 4 years ago

Comments for this article are now closed, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • prettyboytim #1 4 years ago

    Damn straight. Er.. Woo! or something like that.

  • Vice.Destroyer #2 4 years ago

    Don't cry for me Argentina.

    Competition is alwas good.

  • MENTAL1ST Verified Senior Software Engineer, Picsel UK Ltd. #3 4 years ago

    We beat 'em in World War 2, and we've beaten 'em again in, err, a subjectitive view of dominance in the videogames industry...

    Hoorah! Lets have another VJ day!

  • miiiguel #4 4 years ago

    I said that here, nobody believed me though... lol.

  • BiscuitBase #5 4 years ago

    Has he never heard of the Nintendo?

  • wobbly_Bob #6 4 years ago

    but we will go crawling back when the aliens invade and we need their mecha driven by jap school girls!

  • Metalfish #7 4 years ago

    What'd you expect? This is the comments section, where you're unable to convice anyone of anything they didn't already beleive.

  • AcidSnake #8 4 years ago

    He doesn't really believe that, he just doesn't want to brag...It's a cultural thing...

  • Xerx3s #9 4 years ago

    Erm? I can't think of a time when Japanese developers where superior. Equal perhaps but better, no.

    "Has he never heard of the Nintendo?"

    We are talking games not hardware.

  • miiiguel #10 4 years ago

    Metalfish, what you just said my friend, is a fact.

  • DDevil #11 4 years ago

    Statement to declare this quote was another mis-translation in 5... 4... 3...

  • captaineurogamer #12 4 years ago

    He must have just played Grand Theft Auto online

  • MightyMouse #13 4 years ago

    Hooray for diversity!

  • bad09 #14 4 years ago

    He does have a point I find less and less in my collection from Japan at the moment, but there is plenty coming from them that I want. Silent Hill Homecoming, Resi 5, MGS4, GT5, SC4, Tekken 6, SF4, SSF2 HD, Siren, NG2 (and surely another DOA game, PLEASE!), the list goes on.

    Plenty of good games on offer from Japan for me!

  • anomagnus #15 4 years ago

    for the most part, Japan has been left in the dust by the west.

    you can point to a few first party titles by nintendo, and one or two flag ship titles from capcom, but other than that, their output is inconsistent, and marked only by occasinal flares of brilliance.

    For the most part, the quality of the games pouring out of Western Studio's is pissing all over the Japanese houses

    Nintendos QA is a shambles, sega has taken a nose dive, konami has one game in its stable capable of being called next gen, all of them are struggling.

  • Xerx3s #16 4 years ago

    "Exactly. They make better games than the West."

    Heh, funny. It did make me chuckle there, the thought alone.

  • Camorrista #17 4 years ago

    Bald space marines triumph over spiky-haired amnesiacs.

    I wonder if the Eurostandard multi-ethnic female lead will ever take the spotlight.

  • mcmonkeyplc #18 4 years ago

    Boo YA!

  • Xerx3s #19 4 years ago

    "He does have a point I find less and less in my collection from Japan at the moment, but there is plenty coming from them that I want. Silent Hill Homecoming, Resi 5, MGS4, GT5, SC4, Tekken 6, SF4, SSF2 HD, Siren, NG2 (and surely another DOA game, PLEASE!), the list goes on. "

    Nobody is saying that Japan doesn't make good games, it's just that western games are good as well and there are tons more of them.

  • hybridial #20 4 years ago

    Honestly I don't think there's been a true surpassing. Japan isn't a big country and it's videogames industry can't stand up to the collective might of North America and Europe's, it's a rather unfair comparison to make.

    If you split it into individual countries, then US is probably first, Japan second, UK third and France fourth. But there's not even a whole lot in it anymore as all of those countries have big, big videogames industries.

  • timpig #21 4 years ago

    oh god i hope he's wrong. otherwise we're all fucked, and doomed to play games made by redneck geeks for redneck teenagers about killing arabs and going 'whooah dude' a lot. or something.

    please no.

  • GamesConnoisseur #22 4 years ago

    Sure there are great Japan developed games such as Super Mario Galaxy, Resident Evil 4 and so on, I think a good litmus test of where the great games are coming from is to look at gameranking/metacritic and see greater share of the 'AAA' games are western developed compared to decade or two ago.

    Again we need to keep in mind the target audience of the games being international or aimed at a specific market, but even so we are happy with what we are playing and not tearing our hairs out at missing out the occasional Japanese release only.

    Also the international market of the games in West are still expanding on a large scale whilst Japan seem to be fairly flat.

    With more money pouring into Western devs, then the quality will occasionally shine through! Still going to anticipate Resident Evil 5, Ninja Gaiden 2 etc and hope we will continue to play quality Japanese games for years to come.

  • Xerx3s #23 4 years ago

    "Western and Japanese games have been equally awful in the last couple of years."

    Yeah but you have been great so that makes everything oke. :D

  • MENTAL1ST Verified Senior Software Engineer, Picsel UK Ltd. #24 4 years ago

    "Would a title like Silent Hill (not counting 4) ever be made by a Western dev?"

    Isn't Silent Hill just an entry in Survival Horror genre created by the French in 1992?

    Unless I'm forgetting some, in the past year we've had a load of 10/10 games:

    GTA IV (Europe)
    Mario Galaxy (Japan)
    Bioshock (US)
    Halo 3 (US)
    The Orange Box (US)
    Okami (Japan / US Wii Conversion)

    And I'm fairly sure if we took 9s into account we'd have an even greater Western bias.
    Edited by MENTAL1ST at 14/05/08 @ 11:46

  • Pulsar_t #25 4 years ago

    The Japanese game market is to blame really, and this newfangled hardware that caught Japanese devs practically off guard. Japanese gamers are into the casual gaming fad, and in a recent survey regarding what games they want remade, the top entries were mostly JRPGs! Western gamers aren't exactly appreciating of quality either, and abysmal sales of topnotch titles like BG&E and Psychonauts prove this..

    Well at least we can still look forward to Yakuza 3 and Resi 5!

  • Grayvern #26 4 years ago

    Silent hill and other survival horror games aren't being made because its a mostly stale genre apart from Resi 4 but thats not really a survival horror game is it.

  • m0thr4 #27 4 years ago

    "Unless I'm forgetting some, in the past year we've had a load of 10/10 games:

    GTA IV (Europe)
    Mario Galaxy (Japan)
    Bioshock (US)
    Halo 3 (US)
    The Orange Box (US)
    Okami (Japan / US Wii Conversion)

    And I'm fairly sure if we took 9s into account we'd have an even greater Western bias."

    So you're saying... what exactly? That European/US games journalists tend to favour European/US games? Well, fuck me... I never would have guessed.

    EDIT: I wonder how well those same games scored in Japan?
    Edited by m0thr4 at 14/05/08 @ 12:10

  • MENTAL1ST Verified Senior Software Engineer, Picsel UK Ltd. #28 4 years ago

    True, there was a time when western devs were innovative and original, but as budgets and time needed to develop a game have increased massively as well as the financial risks involved, originality and innovation fell by the wayside a long time ago.

    For Western, replace Japanese and you have an equally true statement. Aside from perhaps Wii Fit and Mario Galaxy how many original, innovative games have come out of Japan lately? Is it enough to combat the gameplay and storytelling innovations of Portal? The open-world coop structure of Crackdown? The free-flowing control system of Assassin's Creed? Any of the myriad little innovations that propelled GTA IV back to the top of the open-world game genre, and 10/10 scored across the board?

    To cap it all the last couple of versions of FIFA are being lauded as as-good-as or better than Pro Evo! The Rising Sun isn't shining as brightly as it used to.

  • GamerG #29 4 years ago

    If Kojima really wants to support Hardcore gamers he'd have worked on a 360 version of MGS4.

    The 360 is the true hardcore gamers console of choice, with its integrated on-line, friends list, achievements, cross game chat and invites it really is made for hardcore gamers. It is diametrically opposite to the Wii which is for Grannies and babies and the PS3 which is for casual mongs who no further than the Playstation brand.

  • Quint2020 #30 4 years ago

    All the casual vs hardcore bollocks aside i think it's fairly obvious that western developers have stolen the crown from the Japanese a bit.

  • Rash' #31 4 years ago

    Cultural tastes evolve over time, Japan's legacy on the other hand is undeniably important.

  • MaxiSleep #32 4 years ago

    The Western developers might be making more money, but as far as quality titles go, Japan still destroys Western developers.

    We'll never see the likes of Bungie making a title like Metal Gear Solid. It just isn't possible.

    System Shock CD version was out I recall at the same time as MGS and that beats the living crap out of it.

  • Rash' #33 4 years ago

    "The 360 is the true hardcore gamers console of choice, with its integrated on-line, friends list, achievements, cross game chat and invites it really is made for hardcore gamers. It is diametrically opposite to the Wii which is for Grannies and babies and the PS3 which is for casual mongs who no further than the Playstation brand."

    How many stereotypes do you need to make a sound point?

  • Marshall2008 #34 4 years ago

    Japanese games are becoming more niche games.

    JRPG's, Gay action games with guys in skin tight suits with ass cleavage and lots of cock grabbing, Virtual dating games and provocative images of underage schoolgirls. that's the majority of stuff that comes out of Japan these days.

    I suppose they should track sales of these games in the west and use it for profiling pedophiles (and Ginger's).

  • MENTAL1ST Verified Senior Software Engineer, Picsel UK Ltd. #35 4 years ago

    Japan is at the edge of innovation, creating genres regularly, and just being generally weird

    Bollocks. Japanese games manufacturers are more hidebound by genre and convention than any other country in the world. How many Western franchises have got to number 13 so far, not counting spin-offs expansion packs and handheld remakes? And up until 12, all Final Fantasy games had essentially the same turn-based, menu option picking gameplay.

    This whole 'Japanese are innovative' received wisdom is nonsense. It is perhaps fair to say that of Nintendo, especially now (although their level of innovation in the gamecube years was considerably weaker), but of japan as a whole? Beat-em-up after beat-em-up, Dynasty warriors after Dynasty warriors, awkward-to-control survival horror after survival horror (until RE4), RPG after RPG after RPG...

    We'll never see the likes of Bungie making a title like Metal Gear Solid

    [cough] Splinter Cell [cough].

  • MasterGrief #36 4 years ago

    Comparing Splinter Cell to MGS is like comparing Maetroid Prime to Counter Strike (since they're bothe first person) - they're both stealth games that's where the similarity ends



  • Madlax #37 4 years ago

    I do kind of agree with him, not entirely though. and i mostly blame japanese gamers if anything for not embracing HD gaming.

    Also, the 'west' isnt a single entity, its more than a dozen countries each having its own developers and are massively funded, Japan is just one country, while i dont think they are on the edge of technology when it comes to creating games, the most unique and imaginative games still come from japan though.

    If you look at the western production in the last 2 years, you will see lots of technologically impressive games with no real innovation in them, in fact the only innovative western game i,v seen till now, is little big planet and thats an unreleased product.

    Howoever, if you look at the current situation worldwide, the industry leader system (the Wii) is still japanese, many of the best selling games are still japanese, so its not all doom and gloom Kojima-san yet. ;)

    If the PS3 manages to gain ground in japan, then this may encourage japanese developers to jump on the HD wagon, this would mean more japanese games for the PS3 and even the 360.

    As far i know, the Wii isnt really a 3rd party developer dream, it seems most software sales are from nintendo itself. i dont think 3rd party japanese devs are loving that.





  • VMerken #38 4 years ago

    I'm still waiting for a western game even close to the gameplay depth and perfection of, say, Devil May Cry 1 or Resident Evil 4.

    On the other hand, I'm also waiting for a Japanese RPG even close to the atmosphere and storytelling of, say, Fallout or Planescape: Torment.

    There's balance in my world.