I don’t always wear gaming-themed clothing, but when I do, I like to do it in style! I kid, but when it comes to gaming threads, there’s a fine line between “wink nod” game references on trendy clothing and obnoxiously obvious tees that proclaim your love for all things nerdy for the world to see.
I love Gackt. I imagine a lot of people who got into Japanese culture in the late 90s and thought themselves to be somewhat alternative love Gackt. But, you know, my love with the somewhat-infamous singer isn’t the kind of all-encompassing love a lot of young girls express for their male idols, it’s an ironic kind of love. Yes, I love(d?) his music, but after seeing him on Japanese television and watching the film he wrote and starred in with fellow singer Hyde (Moon Child), as well as his international debut in Bunraku (with Josh Hartnett), I can conclude he is completely nuts. And I kind of love him for it.
In fact, the guy who once proclaimed he was an immortal vampire is turning 41 tomorrow, so happy birthday, Gackt! But that’s not what I’m here to celebrate today… Instead, I want to talk about the new Let’s Play series Gackt has launched in collaboration with Nestlé Japan. Every day for a whole year, videos of Gackt playing various retro video games will be posted to Nestlé Japan’s YouTube channel in what might be the strangest collaboration I’ve heard of in quite a while!
Does Gackt even like video games? What does this have to do with Nestlé? Well, they’re giving away some Nescafé coffee machines signed by Gackt, so there’s that… What we do know about this new series is that the episodes will be posted every day at 7 pm Japan time and will last between 5 to 10 minutes. He’ll also be playing between 5 and 10 different titles a month. So far he’s played Mega Man 2 and Super Dodge Ball and… he’s not very good at it. Nor does he look all that amused. Ah, Gackt, you’ve finally started to age… There’s something oddly charming about his nonchalant manner and the fact that he doesn’t ever take his sunglasses off despite all the weird mood lighting going on in the room they have him playing these games in.
Unfortunately the series is currently only available in Japanese, but some zealous fan might subtitle them à la Game Center CX. Still, I think it’s amusing enough to watch even if you don’t know what’s being said. I’m cheering you on, Gackt!
Now, you may not have heard (because I somehow completely neglected to blog about it), but I completely and utterly loved Journey. In fact, it’s the first game I’ve given a 5 out of 5 score over at VGW!
One thing I’ve found really intriguing about Journey is how positively it’s been received in Japan. A quick search for Kaze no Tabibito (the game’s Japanese title, literally “People of the Wind,” often shortened to Kazebito) on Google brings all sorts of discussion and fanart for the download-only title. I’m not aware how popular thatgamecompany’s previous games were in the land of the rising sun, but download-only titles generally never really gain a very high following due to the fact that Japan just hasn’t jumped on the online gaming bandwagon in the same way the rest of the world has.
Journey, however, appears (at least from a fan standpoint) to be changing that. There’s been a huge surge of fanworks for Journey from Japan in the recent weeks. Isn’t that fabulous? Now prepare to feast your eyes on some of the raddest Journey fanart around:
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The above artist does the funniest illustrations! These selections are actually from a long strip of various images, and I highly recommend taking a look at the rest of them. You also need to take a look at the artist’s awesome Journey-themed Twitter page, even if you can’t understand Japanese. Too cute!
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People who have played the game are probably wondering who on earth that bigger wanderer with the black robes is. Unless I’m missing something huge, he does not appear in the game anywhere, and is a product of fan imagination. What’s interesting about him is how popular he’s become, with various artists all over the internet depicting him as a sort of fatherly figure for the two, smaller wanderers. I don’t know about you, but I get a huge kick out of the above picture.
Update: Apparently the black and red wanderer is actually based on the game’s initial art from a series of prototypes released early on in the game’s development. The more you know!
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I love how creative the fans are being with making new designs or imagining new scenarios for the wanderers. Did you see the Christmas-themed wanderer at the top left of the above image? Adorable!
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Of course, I’m not discounting the amazing Journey fanart out there by artists who do not hail from Japan. I woudn’t have enough space to post all of the great work I’ve seen, even if I wanted to! But I think it’s worth highlighting how this title has really taken off in Japan. I hope we see much more love for download-only games in the future. But before I end this post, here’s one of my favorite pieces by a western artist (just so you all don’t think I’m playing favorite too much):
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Have any Journey fanart you’d like to share? Feel free to do so in the comments!
Anyone that has ever been to Japan, and probably a few who haven’t, will tell you that Japanese cell phones are pretty much as awesome as they come. They’re always at the forerunner of the latest and greatest technology, with high-quality cameras and music downloading sites that made listening to music on your phone easy and fun even before the iPhone was released. Nowadays, “cell phone novels,” or keitai shousetsu are increasingly popular, and boys love/otome (for girls) titles are coming out left and right (ok, I admit my knowledge of how popular cell phone novels are is a bit dated, but I’m pretty sure their popularity hasn’t gone down in the past couple of years, anyway).
Well, famed BL game company Nitro + CHiRAL (why they keep the “i” lower case I’ll never know) is capitalizing on Japan’s mobile phone culture with its new cell phone site, called “CHiRAL MOBiLE.” You can click the link to view the PC site, which details the various downloads the site will offer, but the whole thing won’t be up and running until December 16th. Or you could just stick around here and I’ll detail all the cool stuff us non-Japanese residents are missing out on, since it only works on Japanese phones!
First of all, Nitro + CHiRAL announced, along with this service, an entirely new cell phone novel called World’s end Nightmare that will launch the same day as CHiRAL MOBiLE, with new chapters coming out every week on Tuesday and Thursday for an estimated total of 30 chapters. There isn’t much about the novel’s story available yet save the tagline “––A poor soul that has never known love. Let’s give him one more chance––” and a very short, vague description stating that the protagonist, Itto, was supposed to have died, but reawakens in an unfamiliar world. Below are the characters that have been revealed so far, from left to right: Itto, Faceless, Siegfried, Kai, and Baron. The story will feature at least some boys love elements, to be sure.
Nitro + CHiRAL will also be releasing a mobile version of their popular game Togainu no Chi, as well as a visual novel version of a boys love CD drama titled Itsuwari no Alkanet.
But even these 3 new releases aren’t what gets me really jealous of Japan today–it’s all the downloadable goodies from Nitro + CHiRAL’s three big boys love games that really make me wish I had a Japanese cell phone and lived in Japan. Check this out:
What you see before you is an array of “accessories” you can download at CHiRAL MOBiLE for Togainu no Chi and Lamento-BEYOND THE VOID-. The top left image is a wallpaper, while the top right is a menu screen, and then you have a text sending icon, signal bar, and battery display. So, if you’re big on BL and live in Japan, you can have your entire phone decked out with your favorite game or series! I’m sure they have things like this for all sorts of other famous games and anime, as well.
The service does cost a monthly fee of about $3, but for the amount of free downloads you get with the subscription, including World’s end Nightmare, I’d say it’s a pretty good deal! Too bad cell phones in America and Australia don’t offer awesome services like these…
For those of you interested in World’s end Nightmare, I’d be more than happy to do translations of the character descriptions posted on the CHiRAL MOBiLE website… Just let me know if you’d like to see them and I’ll dedicate a post to it! I won’t bother doing the work unless there’s someone out there who will actually read them (or if I get a burst of idle creativity, but don’t count on it).
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| A humanoid interpretation of Amaterasu from the game Okami, with the Medicine Seller from the anime Mononoke |
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| Fan art of the game Prince of Persia (2008) |
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| Beautiful stylized Revolutionary Girl Utena fan art |