chat

Debt of Honor (1994)

Rising Sun (1992)

hmmmmm I wonder

Tomorrow, When the War Began (1993)

ha

monkey paw curls

Here is your viking/nordic mythology game!

The reason why there's so much Japanese or Japanese-flavoured media is that the Japanese government has actively funded their media sector for decades with the explicit purpose of swaying people to hold pro-Japanese views as a kind of political soft-power. These efforts have been broadly successful. The material conditions that facilitated these efforts (allowed to gain from the spoils of imperialism to serve as a buffer against communism, a one party state allowing long-term planning, no official military with which utilize hard political power) are largely due to the US-shaped sociopolitical situation that emerged out of post-WWII Japan.

Consequently, many pieces of Chinese/Korean media actively copy the (now-popular) anime aesthetic partly because it's known to succeed, and partly because of the effect.

A pair of (rather long, admittedly) videos on the subject. Disclaimer, the presenter is somewhat of a lib and also a lawyer, but makes a convincing case imo:

Anime, Propaganda, and Soft Power Politics

Why Do So Many Gacha Games Pretend To Be Japanese?

I'm hinestly surprised we aren't seeing more Chinese-themed things. It's been a niche fandom in the west for a while now, but with China being what they are today, I'm surprised they aren't more prominent in media, whether made in China or elsewhere

I'd be cool to see some middle eastern stuff that isn't just a backdrop for another "war on terror" fps game.

I think just being willing to be critical instead of fetishize goes a long way. Seven Samurai is an all-time great film for several reasons, but one of them is that it challenges the mythology of the samurai in several ways and, despite the title, the only literal samurai in the narrative are people killed off-screen at an indeterminate point in the past because they were terrorizing peasants.

Edit: Also, Jojo has an extremely Japanese inflection, but only parts 4 and 8 are set in Japan (and 3 starts in Japan but by episode 2 they leave and don't come back until basically the epilogue).

I was reading a blog post where the author was specifically going off about how media perception skews so much towards major areas, that whole nations (in the specific case, Greece) are reduced to the major areas (Athens) and this erases smaller regions and their cultures (e.g. Peloponnesus). What I’m saying is, if they are going to do Japan again, I’d like a Kagoshima walking simulator pls

make all genre media Bulgaria-themed

I get sad about this a lot. Like in the wasted human potential sense, thinking about all the cool artistic aesthetics and stories we're missing out on because other cultures don't get fostered with the same kind of media budget.

Joke answer: My Summer Car

Real answer: Never Alone (Kisima Ingitchuna) is based on Inuit lore.

I realize it's not exactly leaving the hemisphere, but I've always thought Thai culture is way underused in games

Honestly I'd just like something other than the fucking Warring States era or Meiji Restoration.

Give me a lavish prestige rendition of Tales of Genki. Or something about the formation of Japanese culture via trade with China in the 700s. Anything but fucking Samurai slop.

I can’t get extra mad at all of those Tokyo games when there’s also all of those goddamn New York and LA games. I wish studios would set their stories somewhere that isn’t the same four or five places over and over again, but a big corporation isn’t going to subvert the forces of cultural imperialism. Quite the opposite, really. This is all part of the cultural industries reinforcing the global cultural hegemony.

After all, many of the big games set in versions of US cities aren’t even made by US studios (eg GTA, Cyberpunk). Just like how many of the films set in the US are actually made in Canada. This is all part of cultural production under capitalism. The market logic says that people already watch films and tv shows and play games set in New York, LA, Tokyo, and London, so therefore all films and shows and games must be set in New York, LA, Tokyo, and London. You want to set your story in Tonga or Malaysia or Chile? No, that’s not allowed, it must be in New York or LA or etc etc.

I want more games and shows about Japanese culture, but more specifically modern day salarymen in Shinjuku. Those guys rock.

If I can't play as the drunkest middle manager to ever exist, what's even the point?

Pop culture produced absurd books about Japan taking over the US, and people literally feared it happening.

I was a weird nerd as a child (still am I guess) and read my dad's tom clancy novels. I read debt of honor in grade 4 or 5 not long after it came out. my teacher at the time would sit down with us and talk about books we read as we finished them. that's how I accidentally spoiled jack ryan becoming president to a 40 year old man when I was 11.

!noyank@lemmy.ml has pretty good variety. It's an internationalist culture comm.

I would love more Indian media but I don't like Bollywood and someday soon I'll run out of left-wing Bengali directors.

Tales of Kenzera: ZAU is a metroidvania set in an African-themed world, although I don’t think it’s historically or mythologically any one specific place in Africa. Fantasy-world Africa as it were.

I want an Ogre Battle game set in a "bronze age" based on the work of Marija Gimbutas (gynocentric protocommunists vs patriarchal marauding invaders)

people ask me, Giorgio, have you seen Shogun? you gotta see it! have you seen blue-eyed samurai, I think you'll love it! I say, please stop I am so done with Bushido

Related gripe: I simply don’t give any breakcore album with a young, anime girl on the cover a spin at this point. It’s just a red flag as usually that means mediocre and/or “atmospheric DnB at 160 BPM with minimal edits on the break beats calling itself breakcore.”

I'd just like to play a game, once, that doesn't have samurai and geisha. It would be neat to learn about another culture that isn't Japan. Maybe go to another continent.

monkeys paw curls: you will now get South African pro apartheid games