"Man, Japan is over. We're done. Our game industry is finished."

[Bacon McShig]

Also of note: That new Castlevania is being made by a Spanish developer, not a Japanese one.

[Yoshi]

Good point.

[Cheebs]

Looks to me that Sega, Namco, Technos, Enix, and Jaleco are either dead or irrelevant now. Konami has slowed to a snail's pace. The best thing they did this gen was let WayForward make a game for them. Square hasn't done anything I've cared about since Chrono Trigger. Nintendo won't try and stop me from winning any of their games. Capcom is hanging in there...

Seems pretty "over" to me.

[MarsKitten]

I concede Castlevania. Namco still develops (Xenosaga), Enix merged with Square are now the same. Sega has been more or less irrelevant except for their past titles and Jaleco has been off it since the Snes really.

[FuryFox]

Still can't seem to get a decent fighting game from anywhere but Japan. They're not as important nowadays as they were, but the major titles are still big sellers.

[Bacon McShig]

Namco still develops (Xenosaga)

The last Xenosaga came out, what, three years ago? Also, Xenosaga sucks. All they've been up to lately are by-the-numbers fighting game sequels, flogging a dead horse named Katamari, and making creepshow anime games that are ponzi schemes for shilling a cornucopia of grossly overpriced DLC. They showed some promise with Pac-man CE, but dropped that direction all too swiftly when Galaga Legions didn't get similar returns.

[Frogacuda]

I blame it largely on the hardware rift created when MS entered the hardware market. Forced to succeed without strong support from Japan, they pushed more and more western games to the forefront.

Then, this generation, Nintendo decided to recycle the GameCube with a peculiar controller, further isolating themselves from cross-platform development. Meanwhile, PS3 lagged so far behind for so long that Japan virtually ignored the HD market. Now they're a generation behind, design-wise and unable to compete in the world market.

[mollipen]

Which one out of curiosity?

So that I don't directly mention it by name (since the company behind it have been utter douchebags about who can say what when about it), I'll just say it takes place in a town and it's probably the first upcoming game you'd think of when you think of me.

[Chux]

Is it in your location?

[mollipen]

I have absolutely no idea why the place I state myself as currently living would have any connection at all to a video game I'm playing. That's just nonsense.