BUSINESS WEEK: Twenty-four-year-old Zhu, a banker in southwestern China, took time Tuesday out of his busy schedule working for one of China’s leading banks and playing five to six hours of video games a week, to share his gaming ambitions. He loves the multiplayer online game World of Tanks—which has 45 million registered users worldwide—plays mostly alongside close friends, primarily uses his own laptop, and usually commands digital armored vehicles on weekends.
However, he wasn’t all that excited about rumors that the Chinese government might lift a ban on legal imports of video game consoles—a tidbit first attributed to an unnamed source in the state-run and sometimes unintentionally hilarious China Daily on Monday, and subsequently picked up by Reuters and other Western outlets. It’s not clear there’s anything to the chatter, as a second culture official denied the report to Reuters. Still, the news item did give an apparent next-day boost to the Tokyo-listed stock prices of Nintendo and Sony (SNE), which make the popular Wii and PlayStation game consoles (a rare instance of state-run Chinese media helping Japanese companies).
Gary Green said: You’ll be forgiven if you haven’t heard of the Ar Tonelico trilogy. The previous two games arrived so late in the PS2’s life-cycle that they simply went unnoticed. While most were tinkering with their shiny new PS3s, Ar Tonelico: Melody of Elemia and Ar Tonelico II: Melody of Metafalica were being ‘returned to sender’ by your local Game stores. Luckily, you won’t need to have played them to understand and appreciate this third and final chapter, Qoga (pronounced k-yoga) tells the story of a racial war between humans and Reyvateils, a breed of biologically produced female cyborgs capable of reproduction, while still having a digital mind.
Oh my god. I kinda wish this would get a remaster on PS5, it would be awesome. One of my favorite games on PS3.
That and 3D Dot Game Heroes. It's a shame that some stuff is stuck on PS3.
Ar Tonelico 3 is good I still prefer the first AT game. The music is solid in all the games and Akiko Shikata is a very talented singer bringing life to the game. Only annoying part is well I find is Saki I always choose Finnel or Tyria. KOEI so needs to HD remaster the franchise along with Ar Nosurge and Ciel Nosurge since it never came to North America. I would day one the Ar Toneliceo games and Ar Nosurge if they were remastered.
I still have the limited edition of Qoga unopened. Unfortunately it never went up in value like I had hoped all these years.
This could be fun as they make great tables. Go big or go extinct. Prime your senses for a neural handshake and step into the cockpit of a Jaeger. It is on you to cancel the apocalypse when Pacific Rim Pinball comes to Pinball FX on May 16.
Gary Green said: We have a juxtaposition of 2D and 3D visuals, flashy turn-based combat, quirky anime characters with cheeky dialogue with plenty of partial nudity; Yes, this is a Compile Heart JRPG. Whilst the engine is borrowed from Hyperdimension Neptunia mk2, Mugen Souls is more of a Disgaea spin-off. It’s not a strategy RPG as such, it merely sits within Disgaea’s ever-expanding universe (Multiverse? Netherverse? Your guess is as good as mine). You won’t find cameos though, since Mugen Souls is a franchise which aims to stand on its own two feet.
I'm sure it would sell a few consoles, but overall I'm sure it would go un-noticed by the general population. They seem to be more into PC gaming there, the PS3 may not even sell well there... who knows unless they lift the ban.
Their probably already consoles on the black market all over china.
They are so many that a few milions is possible but will not compete with Pc Gaming there...
There´s a game in China that has over 300 milion people playing it or registered idk... Some game about Dragons.
They probably already have local versions of consoles named EXBOX360 and Playsaton3.
Before this article starts a flame war, its not talking about just the xbox or which console will see more success, it deals with a a problem all console makers will face trying to penetrate into the chinese market. Piracy inforcement is lax in China which is a problem for console makers (Microsoft, Sony, Nintendo) since nearly all their revenue is from software sales. Games that are popular and profitable in China (mostly MMO's) overcome this obstacle by having a subscription model, which is quite different from what console gaming is about.