Kinda curious, is Japan also all about subscription services?
Has stuff like music and TV also predominantly shifted over to subscription servives a round there?
Video subscription services, like Amazon prime and Netflix has become popular here overtime. Amazon prime especially because the price here is incredibly low compared to the rest of the world. There’s also a growing number of anime services that are popular, music services and more. However it’s still a growing market.
As for video game subscription services, I don’t see a large excitement over playstation now at the moment for instance, Nor for Xbox game pass. Simply put there is no excitement here for Xbox series X or s at all. However there are good signs, the systems have sold out of pre-orders but the thing is who knows how many systems have been put up for pre-orders. Plus 100% sure those pre-orders are all by super hard-core gamers, and not any casual or regular gamers. And they’ve definitely done some promotion in famitsu. However if you just go online and look at peoples comments about Xbox, Japanese gamers still are not happy with the system or with the strategies that Microsoft have done recently. There’s simply no promotion no excitement nothing at all. Only very hard-core gamers would know about Xbox game pass and Xbox in general. I expect after the first week sales the numbers will drop substantially to very low levels.
On the other hand, people are really frustrated about the lack of availability for PlayStation five pre-orders here people really want to pre-order it and they can’t. The promotion here has been pretty good as seen by the using of popular YouTube stars to get the word out on social media. But yeah if they’re not getting systems out like the article says, and it seems like it’s true, there’s gonna be a lot of disappointed gamers this week no matter what system they choose. It’s really sad seeing how After the American Play station department took over that they have in many ways given up Japan lately.
honestly, I’ve seen Xbox try to enter the market here from day one of the original Xbox. I’ve seen every system launched here, and seeing the steps in Microsoft Japan and Microsoft in the US try to make to get the system noticed. They at least tried with the original Xbox and even more so with the 360. They didn’t even move a finger for Xbox one here. And while they’re getting articles in famitsu, A magazine I love but is dying to be honest, they simply are not doing anywhere close to enough to Make any sort of impact in Japan. Honestly it’s kind of embarrassing I think. For all of Phil Spencer’s comments about how he is talking to Japan and trying to do better here, it’s one of his absolute biggest failures, bar none.