Regionality & Gaming

Have you ever noticed that gaming has a lot of different companies but not a lot of truly global ones?  This probably bears some explanation.  Gamesetwatch recently had a link to an article arguing that globalization in gaming was largely illusory - that globalization is simply a code word for the imposition of Western preferences on other cultures.  I tend to disagree with that theory, simply because the ascendance of Western developers was preceded by a long period of Japanese dominance that seems to belie it.  That said, I do think there’s an important observation being made indirectly here.  

In short, gaming has been characterized by eras of imitation, where one region’s preferences have tended to dictate the general style of games for a majority of the world.  This started with Nintendo in the 80s and has shifted westward, but in general has tended to have one of two effects on “foreign” developers - either they imitate the trend (often slavishly) or they fight to differentiate themselves and remain largely marginal players in the industry for some time.

My point is that even now, though, there are very few companies that sell globally but design their products regionally… at least, beyond some basic localization around languages and naming conventions.  Look at the gaming titans of today, Activision and EA: although they certainly do sell their games worldwide, the number of titles that are uniquely tailored to specific markets is highly limited.  For example, they have few titles targeted towards the eclectic Japanese handheld markets of today.  Rather, the model is to export homegrown titles and hope they find an audience overseas.  Similarly, in the past, the JRPG was the standard RPG model for years.  Clearly, based on the rise of Fallout-style or Dungeons-and-Dragons role-playing games, there was a substantial market for different types of titles, and they were often seen on the PC.  Yet until the locus of development momentum shifted to the Western developers, they didn’t see a huge number of console releases relative to the Final Fantasy style.

I have to wonder if there’s an opportunity here for game companies to become more localized in some markets and thus sell more games to more people.