Kotaku East

Japan’s Ugliest Console Game Delayed. Again.

There are three things you can count on: Death, taxes, and Daisenryaku Perfect: Ruler of the Battlefield being delayed. A real Japanese game studio with a real office and real desks and real computers is developing this absolutely crappy-looking game. The game is slated to be released on the Xbox 360 and the PS3 for…

A Bastion for Bigots and Shameless Racists

Yesterday in London (early this morning in Japan), the US women’s soccer team played against Japan for Olympic gold. It was a squeaker, but America won 2-1. While the Associated Press interviewed Japanese fans who said things like, “Given that the United States is such a good team, the result is not surprising” or that…

Koei Tecmo Boss Kind of Sort of Announces a New Game

Tecmo Koei CEO, Yoichi Erikawa recently said in an interview with Weekly Famitsu that the alpha version of the long-missing game, Ni-Oh! was complete and that work on the game was continuing. But that wasn’t all. The interview between Erikawa and Enterbrain CEO, Hirokazu Hamamura, mainly covered the growth of Tecmo Koei since the two…

Attention All Comic Market Fans, Knock Off the Sexualized Bags. Thanks!

This Friday, the summer Comic Market (aka “Comiket”) steamrolls Japan. There will be tons of self-produced manga from famed artists and new talents on sale. A big chunk of it is sexy stuff, and so are the free bags that attendees get from game companies, retailers, manga makers—you name it. No wonder one illustrator is…

What Created this Chinese Ghost Town? A Crackdown on Fake Goods.

On August 6 in Shenyang, shops shuttered. Merchants vanished. On their shops, there were signs like “temporarily closed”. Online, people said parts of the city were nearly ghost towns. Many of the shops carried fake goods of one kind or another, and the rumor was that Chinese authorities were going to crackdown on these gray…

Over 10 Billion Coins Have Been Collected In New Super Mario Bros 2…

New Super Mario Bros 2, the latest game in the Mario Brothers franchise was released in Japan on July 28th and already players are chugging away, gathering coins, coins, and more coins. One of the side objectives/achievements of the game is to collect a million coins, and it looks like hundreds of people have already…

This Robot Restaurant Review Doesn’t Answer This: How’s The Food?

Whenever some new wild restaurant opens in Japan, there’s a flurry of attention online. And then? Then, these one-trick-pony restaurants often just fade away. But before that happens, somebody needs to take one for the team. Website Yattar News did just that. The site checked out the Robot Restaurant, which is less a restaurant and…

“Huge Boob” Producer Hopes For Interactive Hologram Technology. I Wonder Why…

Continuing its interview series with various game creators, this week Weekly Famitsu sat down with Kenichiro Takaki of Marvelous AQL to talk about his thoughts for the future. Takaki is famous for his hand in busty babe-featuring games like the Battle Vixens series, and the Senran Kagura series, as well as the non-busty babe-featuring Half-Minute…

DmC‘s Puzzling Use of the Words “Obesity” and “Stupidity”

The latest DmC: Devil May Cry footage shows off some of the game’s platforming as well as the giant wall-crawler, Succubus. That’s not all. In the trailer, words like “die”, “obesity”, “stupidity” flash in the background. “Kill Dante” also appears. Subtle, no? (Then again, when has Devil May Cry been subtle?) Not subtle, sure, but…

Why a Chinese Reporter Was Tied Up During a Typhoon

Mother Nature is dangerous business. Weather reporters in Asia (and elsewhere) are often sent into the eye of a storm—if anything, just so they can show how severe the weather is. And a typhoons are pretty dang severe. On August 8, typhoon Haikui hit Hepu County in China, sadly leaving two dead in its wake.…

Yakuza 5 Is Like Inception. A Video Game within a…Video Game.

It’s not uncommon for video game companies to reference their own games in…their own games. But Yakuza 5, never one to turn down a tie-in, has something else: Yakuza 5 features another company’s game. Namco’s Taiko no Tatsujin appears in Sega’s upcoming gangster opus. When you visit an arcade in Yakuza 5, you can play…

The Return of Japan’s Creepiest Action Figure

You know him, you love him, he’s creepy. That’s right, the infamous “hentai” (perverted) Woody figure is back. Kaiyodo’s Sci-Fi Revoltech Series No. 10 Woody figure has returned to retail. This month, the figure re-launched, going on sale again in Japan. With creepy Woody back on the prowl, no plastic figurine is safe. Geek site…

PlayStation All-Star Battle Royale supports arcade sticks. How original.

Chinese Sitcom Can’t Stop Copying, Well, Other Sitcoms

The IT Crowd. Friends. How I Met Your Mother. Even in the West, these popular sitcoms have influenced other shows. But in China, one show isn’t exactly “inspired” by these programs. The Shanghai television program in question is Ipartment (which loosely translates as “Love Apartment” in Chinese). It features a couple of guys, a couple…

This Japanese Celebrity Knows How To Help the PS Vita (Hint: Final…)

Sony’s PS Vita sure is struggling! Launching new hardware isn’t easy—just ask Nintendo. But while Nintendo was able to turn the 3DS around, Sony hasn’t done that yet with the Vita. Japanese celebrity and Pokémon queen Shoko Nakagawa might have the logical answer. Nakagawa, who has done Zelda commercials for Nintendo, recently seems to have…

The Disgaea Team’s New, Non-Disgaea RPG Is for the PS3

As previously mentioned, the Disgaea Team’s newest role-playing game is not a new Disgaea, but The Paradox of God and the Fate Revolution. The game follows a high schooler who suddenly turns into God. He, along with the seven angels, makes people’s wishes come true. When the game was first shown last month, game maker…

Why the Old Lady Tied the Sex Doll to the Tree

This isn’t a joke. It’s a true story. Late last week a photo of a lady binding a sex doll to a tree appeared online. Info was scant, but now reports out of China state that the woman, who lives in the city of Shangdong, was fed up with cars speeding through a pedestrian crossing.…

Years in Development, This PS3 Game Still Lives. Well, Apparently.

Back in 2005 (2005!), Koei revealed Ni-Oh! for PS3. The game was supposed to be based on an unearthed script from Akira Kurosawa (Yojimbo, Seven Samurai). But it was never released. Ni-Oh! just…vanished. In a recent interview with Famitsu, Tecmo president and co-founder Yoichi Erikawa confirmed that the game still existed. “We just finished the…

New BlazBlue arcade game is getting a PS3 version in Japan. And Xbox 360? Um…no word yet.

Making Dragon Quest into an MMO

Dragon Quest X is the newest game in the immensely popular Dragon Quest series. It is also the series’ first MMORPG. While the prologue of the game (the first two hours or so) is a strictly single player affair, the game soon opens up into a massive online world. But as Dragon Quest X is…