Nikkei Shimbun: Japan's Gaming Industry "Melancholy"

Gloom and doom! It's not only Japanese game developers who are saying Japan's days as gaming's dominant force are over, but so is the mainstream Japanese media. An article in Japan's Nikkei Shimbun, the country's equivalent of The Wall Street Journal, entitled "The Melancholy of Cool Japan" portrayed Japan's declining domestic game industry. As the article pointed out, the top two game companies in the world are no longer Japanese but American: EA and Activision Blizzard. According to the piece, Japan's sagging game industry is the result of the country's declining birth rate. Another reason is apparently that 30-something-year-old gamers are busy with their families and jobs and have less time for gaming. The Japanese companies that should pull through this shifting and troubled market? Nikkei Shimbun says Square Enix, Tecmo and Konami. Huh, because we've heard that Capcom and Nintendo do okay outside Japan. Apparently. Japan Cool-ing Off? [AltJapan]