History of the Japanese Video Game Industry

This book is the first one to describe the entire history of the video game industry in Japan. The industry consists of multiple marketsfor PCs, home consoles, arcades, cellular phones and smart phonesand it is very difficult to see the complete picture. The book deals comprehensively with the history of the Japanese game industry from the beginning of the non-computer age to the present.

The video game industry in Japan was established in the arcade game market when Space Invaders was released by Taito in 1978. Game markets for both PCs and home consoles followed in the early 1980s. The platform that occupies a central market position started with the arcade and shifted, in order, to the home console, handheld consoles, and smart phones. In the video game industry in the twentieth century each platform had a clear identity, and the relationships among platforms were "interactions". In the twenty-first century, with the improvement of computer performance, the platform identity has disappeared, thus the relationship among platforms is highly competitive. Since the "crash of 1983" in the United States, the Japanese game industry has one of the largest market shares in the world and has developed without being influenced by other countries. It reached its peak in the late 1990s, and then its relative position declined due to the growth of foreign markets and the failure of emerging markets such as online PC games. Even today, Japan's gaming industry holds a dominant position in the world, but it is not the superpower it once was.

Since the beginning of the twenty-first century, game research has become active worldwide. Among game researchers, there is a large demand for research on games in Japan, but there is still little dissemination of research in English. The original version of this book published in Japan is highly regarded and received an award for excellence from the Society of Socio-Informatics in 2017.

Describes for the first time the history of the game industry in Japan from its early days to the present Provides a comprehensive view of the Japanese game industry by researchers referring to original Japanese material Covers, as no other book has, the industry's history in arcades, in homes, for PCs, online, in mobile phone markets

Autorentext

Yuhsuke Koyama is a professor at Shibaura Institute of Technology where he teaches economics and social survey. He is also a member of the IGDA (International Game Developers Association) in Japan, and vice chair of the Indie game group. His original major is economics, and his current analysis focuses on the content industry, particularly the video game industry in Japan. He published a book about the history of the Japanese video game industry in 2016, which won the Excellent Literature award in the society of socio-informatics in Japan in 2017. An expanded and revised edition was also published in 2020. His recent work is "Evolution of a Genre: Dragon Quest and the JRPG", in Racheal Hutchinson and Jérémie Pelletier-Gagnon, Japanese Role-Playing Games: Genre, Representation, and Liminality in the JRPG, Lexington Books, 2022.

Inhalt
Chapter 1 Outline of the book: A perspective on the history of the game industry.- Chapter 2 The Birth of Computer Games:Prehistory of Japanese video game industry.- Chapter 3 Arcade Games (1) From Ele-mecha to Video Games: Birth of Space Invaders and Establishment of the Arcade Game Industry. Chapter 4 PC game (1) Establishment of 8-bit trinity.- Chapter 5 Home Games (1-1) Beyond Atari Shock: Birth of Family Computer.- Chapter 6 arcade game (2) revival from the shock of Businesses Affecting Public Morals Regulation Act.- Chapter 7 PC game (2) long-term administration of PC9801 and long stagnation.- Chapter 8. Home consoles (1-2) Family Computer and its successors.- Chapter 9 Drastic Change of Environment: Technological Revolution and Business Revolution.- Chapter 10 Arcade Games (3) The Impact of Virtua Fighters and Ridge Racer: Arcade Games Last Shine.- Chapter 11 PC Games (3) Birth of Windows 95, Recession of Domestic PC Game Makers, Birth of Online Games.- Chapter 12 home game(2) 3 big hard era.- Chapter 13 Home Game (3) Decline of Japan in game industry.- Chapter 14 PC games (4) Portable game consoles.- Chapter 15 Mobile Phone Games: The Growth of Social Games and Rapid Market Maturity.- Chapter 16 Now.