It is no secret that Japan is one of the main gaming nations of the world. From video arcades (Game Centres) to the wave of well-known Japanese gaming companies (Nintendo, Capcom and Sega, to name a few), to modern-day console gaming, there is little doubt that, if you are serious about your games, Japan is one of the countries in which you will want to spend some time. As a game enthusiast myself, I am firmly of the opinion that gaming is one of the coolest things about Japan.
Game Centres, or video arcades as they are known in other countries, have had a pretty interesting history worldwide. They were all the rage in the 1970s and 1980s, particularly in America, Europe, and Japan. This was before console gaming had started to really develop. When consoles took off in the 1990s, game centres lost their popularity in America and Europe. In more recent times they have made something of a comeback, offering newer and more diverse types of arcade games, but they have never returned to their former 1980s glory. In Japan, however, there was no such 1990s downfall. And to this day, game centres, like karaoke, are a much-favoured (and incredibly cool!) way to spend an afternoon with friends (or by yourself, if you are that way inclined) for men and women of a variety of ages.
A standard modern Japanese game centre has a few different styles of game. There are the traditional arcade-style sit-down or stand-up games, like Street Fighter or Mario Kart Arcade. There are the rhythm-based games like Drum Master and Dance Dance Revolution. There are the prize-winning games, where you try to grab prizes with claws (also called UFO catchers). There are medal games, which are like slot machines, except you have to use special medals that you buy at the counter instead of real money. And then there are photo booths, which the Japanese have made into something truly spectacular with the development of purikura.
Game Centres, or video arcades as they are known in other countries, have had a pretty interesting history worldwide. They were all the rage in the 1970s and 1980s, particularly in America, Europe, and Japan. This was before console gaming had started to really develop. When consoles took off in the 1990s, game centres lost their popularity in America and Europe. In more recent times they have made something of a comeback, offering newer and more diverse types of arcade games, but they have never returned to their former 1980s glory. In Japan, however, there was no such 1990s downfall. And to this day, game centres, like karaoke, are a much-favoured (and incredibly cool!) way to spend an afternoon with friends (or by yourself, if you are that way inclined) for men and women of a variety of ages.
A standard modern Japanese game centre has a few different styles of game. There are the traditional arcade-style sit-down or stand-up games, like Street Fighter or Mario Kart Arcade. There are the rhythm-based games like Drum Master and Dance Dance Revolution. There are the prize-winning games, where you try to grab prizes with claws (also called UFO catchers). There are medal games, which are like slot machines, except you have to use special medals that you buy at the counter instead of real money. And then there are photo booths, which the Japanese have made into something truly spectacular with the development of purikura.
Traditional arcade-style games are probably what most people think about when they think about game centres. These are the games that people play by sitting down or standing up, inserting 100yen and playing for several rounds, until the game says that you cannot play any more without putting in more coins. Fighting games and racing games are probably the most popular of these. Pinball machines and shooting games are also pretty popular. These games tend to target the people that many would assume are the most hard-core gaming audiences – young men from the ages of around 13 to 30.
Rhythm-style games are a more recent invention, but fall into the same sort of genre as traditional arcade games. The player puts in 100yen and plays through as many rounds as they can before they either fail, or their credit runs out. All of these games follow the basic principle of making some sort of action in time with the rhythm of a song, but this relatively simple principle comes in an astonishing variety of formats. Guitar Hero style games have you pressing buttons on a fake guitar in time with the guitar in a song. Dance Dance Revolution has you moving around a button-pressing device on the ground, stamping on arrows that correspond to the arrows on the screen, which appear in synchronisation with a song’s melody. Drum Master and Drummania have the player hitting fake drums in time with the percussion or the beat of a song. Rhythm games are a lot of fun, particularly if you are playing against somebody else. These games also target the young male demographic, although many young women, including me, will often play them as well.
In big multi-level game centres, prize-winning games normally take up the entire ground floor. These games are generally of the UFO-catcher style variety, where the player inserts 100yen and navigates a grabbing device (as the aliens in Toy Story call it, “The claaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaw!”) as well as they can towards a bin of prizes. These prizes include soft toys, lollies, other snack foods and electronic items. The bigger a prize, the more difficult it is to grab, so it might be further down in the bin, or there might be fewer big prizes than smaller prizes, etc. These games, with their strong emphasis on soft toys, are aimed more towards children and young women. Or, to boyfriends trying to win prizes for their girlfriends.
Gambling in Japan is generally illegal, according to Chapter 23 of the Japanese criminal code. There are some exceptions to this rule, including horse and motor-racing bets, but for the most part gambling as it is known in other countries is not allowed. But many people, particularly the middle-aged to elderly demographic, enjoy gambling, so the Japanese have come up with several ways to work around this law. One well-known method is utilised by the ever-popular pachinko machines, where a person buys the balls with which one plays pachinko at the counter and uses them at the pachinko machine. If the player wins, they are awarded with more pachinko balls, which can then be exchanged at the counter for prizes. These prizes can then be “sold” at neighbouring shops for cash. Another method is with the medal games in game centres. With these games, the player must buy tokens, or “medals” at the counter, and use these instead of coins to play the machines, which bear a striking resemblance to western-style slot machines. You can win more tokens with these games and trade them in for prizes, which you can again exchange like with pachinko. These games are aimed towards older audiences.
Finally, there are the photo booths. Photo booths have been around for over 100 years, but the Japanese game centre style of photo booth, called purikura (a shortened version of purinto kurabu, which is how “print club” is said using Japanese pronunciation) has only existed since the mid 1990s. With these booths, people go in, pay 400 yen (which seems expensive until you consider how in countries like, say, Australia, they charge $12, or three times as much, for the same thing), pose for a series of shots with different borders and backgrounds, then spend some time customising the photos with a touch-screen that offers pens, stamps and borders. The photos are then printed, cut up, and split evenly among friends. These photos are printed on special sticker paper, so after they are printed out, you have the option of sticking them on whatever valued possession you own. Many Japanese people collect their photos and keep them in albums, and many stick the photos on their mobiles, electronic dictionaries, laptop computers, diaries, etc. Photo booths are probably the only type of arcade game that is aimed almost exclusively towards women.
It is hard to say why game centres have remained so popular in Japan, despite their dwindling in other countries. Perhaps Japanese people enjoy gaming as a type of social outing more than other people. Or maybe the Japanese prefer this more casual style of gaming (although, considering the skill with which many of the people you see in game centres play some of the games, you would be forgiven for saying that these games are not played casually by everyone). Personally, I believe that the secret behind the success of Japanese arcades lies in how many of the games have been marketed towards wider audiences, and by “wider audiences” I mean “women, young children, and older people”. Not everybody who plays games will want to play traditional arcade-style games all the live-long day, and Japanese game centres must have understood that earlier on and started providing games more suited for women and older people just as home console gaming was starting to take off in Japan. As a result, game centres are still big in Japan, and will hopefully continue to be as big as they are for a long while yet.
So if you are coming to Japan and are looking for a fun afternoon to spend with friends, I can highly recommend a decent-sized game centre to you. Provided that you have 1000yen or so to spend, game centres will definitely be able to provide you with some of the most fun you will have in Japan, and they are definitely one of the coolest things Japan has to offer.
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