right.
not stopping me from buying Japanese magazines.
Specifically, videogame
magazines.
If I wanted to get
up-to-the-minute info on the gaming scene in Japan I could use webistes. But
without any knowledge of Japanese, they’re next to impossible to navigate.
Magazines, on the other hand, are a breeze. I can go to whatever page I want and
not have to worry about remembering what part of which site it was on if I want
to see it again.
True, I can’t run the
magazine through Babelfish and get a (poor) translation, but I can take it to
work and ask the kids what something means. (Double bonus if I do that – I get
information
and cool
points!)
As with some other magazines,
I’m not buying these things for the articles. It’s all about the pictures.
(Well, the release dates are handy too.) I get to find out about games I’d never
hear of otherwise. My kids can’t really tell me what games they’re into, since
most of the time they can’t explain them well enough in English. But I can
puzzle out a lot of info from screenshots and
whatnot.
So that’s all well and good
for me, but what keeps Japanese gamers buying the magazines? They can go to the
websites with no problems. The don’t need anything translated and can dig up
every little bit of information online they could ever want. So why do they buy
them? It’s quite simple,
really.
Lots of free
shit!
They can’t really compete
with the internet when it comes to up-to-date information, but they’ve got to
keep their readers happy. If they can’t, then sales will go down, and
advertising revenue will go down, and before you know it, they’re out of
business. So readers get all kinds of bonuses to keep them
buying.
I picked up a copy of Famitsu
Cube + Advance (the Nintendo magazine from Famitsu – the most respected name in
Japanese gaming
magazines)
this
weekend, mostly to see if they had any new info about DS stuff. This is the
January 2005 issue, and right by the date you can see the price – 590 yen. Not
too bad (especially considering what they charge for US magazines here) for a
nice, thick (146 pages) magazine. Given what stuff tends to cost in Japan, I’d
figured on that being decent for just the magazine.
Then I opened it
up.
Not only do you get the
magazine, but lots of free
goodies.
First up: bonus
magazines!
On
the left is the first issue of Famitsu DS. On the right is a strategy guide for
Pok?mon Emerald. The DS mag is 36 pages and the Guide is 52. Not too shabby
for full-color freebies. They’re smaller than the main magazine, about half its
size. And if those aren’t enough to keep a gamer happy there’s
this:
Free Pok?mon trainer
wristband!
(Front
and back views of the package.)
One of
my students has been wearing one of these the last two days. I saw hers when she
got on the bus yesterday morning and said, “hey! I’ve got that same one!” Of
course, she wanted to know where mine was, and I told her it was at home. She
wore hers again today and again asked where mine was. I promised her I’d wear
mine tomorrow. I don’t think I’ll have to dye my hair silver like the guy on the
package, but that might look pretty cool.
But I’m drawing the line at
the bandana.
Believe it or not,
there’s still more free stuff.
Do you
own a Gameboy Advance SP? Ever thought it might be looking a little dull?
Perhaps not quite as Pok?riffic as it could
be?
Well, your worrying days
are
over!
Enough
free stickers to choke a moose! You can dress your SP up with two preset sticker
options (the large ones with cutouts for the buttons), or just go crazy with all
the little ones.
I played it
cool, only using the Plusle and Minun stickers to gussy up my DS.
^.^
This stuff is cool and all, and
it’s nifty enough to keep me buying the magazines. Whatever I don’t keep, I can
give to my students, so it’s all good. But the question it raises in my mind is
this –
Why do American gaming
magazines suck so hard?
Is there no
competition for readership? Do they just not care? Are they more concerned with
satisfying the advertisers than increasing readership? (That would satisfy the
advertisers, but it seems most US mags are happier to whore themselves out,
trading positive reviews for advertising
sales.)
If American magazines worked
this hard to attract readers, they’d have no problems increasing circulation.
But I guess creating a good product month to month that people consider a
trusted resource (and worthy investment) is just too much for
them.
Pity,
really.