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Japan Documents Handbook titles
This series focuses on the broad field of Japanese Studies, aimed at the worldwide English language scholarly market, published in Tokyo in English. Each Handbook contains an average of 20 newly written contributions on various aspects of the topic, which together comprise an up-to-date survey of use to scholars and students. The focus is on Humanities and Social Sciences.
Handbook of Japanese Games and Gameplay (Edited by Rachael Hutchinson)
New
The Handbook of Japanese Games and Gameplay showcases the rich variety of games in Japan, placing them in the context of industry, development processes, and a broader media ecology. We trace Japanese games through history, including card games, board games, pachinko and digital games, as well as how games are connected to toys and animation, and how analog and mechanical games connect to the virtual world. Analyzing some of the largest and most successful games ever published, including Final Fantasy, Nobunaga’s Ambition, Virtua Fighter, Resident Evil and Animal Crossing, we see how different audiences have interpreted them around the globe. We follow players from the living room to the arcade, into online spaces, escape rooms and themed cafés to see where gameplay happens. Entering the offices of some of the world’s leading videogame development corporations, readers can follow the production process from initial design and development decisions through localization, adaptation to different hardware systems, marketing and distribution. Comparing the Japanese game industry to its overseas counterparts, we examine its labor practices and legal obstacles to innovation in areas like esports. Niche markets and indie games are also considered, as vital spaces for expression outside the mainstream. Overall, the Handbook of Japanese Games and Gameplay offers the reader an exciting glimpse into Japanese games from a wide variety of perspectives.
March, 2025, 378p. Hardback
ISBN: 9784909286529
¥28,875 (tax included)
Editor: Rachael Hutchinson
Rachael Hutchinson is Elias Ahuja Professor of Japanese and Game Studies at the University of Delaware, where she teaches Japanese language, literature, film and videogames. Her work on games appears in Game Studies, Games and Culture, Loading…, Japanese Studies, Replaying Japan and other journals, as well as in Made in Asia/America: Why Video Games Were Never (Really) About Us (Patterson and Fickle, Duke University Press, 2023), Well Played Retrospective: The Past, Pandemic and Future of Video Games, Value and Meaning (Davidson et al, ETC, 2021), Gaming Representation: Race, Gender and Sexuality in Video Game Studies (Malkowski and Russworm, University of Indiana Press, 2017) and others. Books include Japanese Culture through Videogames (Routledge, 2019) and Japanese Role-Playing Games: Genre, Representation, and Liminality in the JRPG, co-edited with Jérémie Pelletier-Gagnon (Lexington, 2022).
Contributors
Nathan Altice, University of California at Santa Cruz; Keiji Amano, Ritsumeikan University; Bianca Chui, Nara National Museum; Amy Dawson-Andoh, University of Michigan; Sarah Christina Ganzon, Simon Fraser University; Rachael Hutchinson, University of Delaware; Akira Igarashi, Foundation for Multimedia Communications; Björn-Ole Kamm, Kyoto University; Yuhsuke Koyama, Shibaura Institute of Technology; Drisana Misra, Cornell University; Hitomi Mohri, Ritsumeikan University; Frank Mondelli, University of Delaware;
Keita Moore, Ohio State University; Akinori (Aki) Nakamura, Ritsumeikan University; Víctor Navarro-Remesal, Tecnocampus, Universitat Pompeu Fabra; James Newman, Bath Spa University; Tsugumi (Mimi) Okabe, Baruch College; Mattias van Omme, Doshisha University;
Jérémie Pelletier-Gagnon, Université de l’Ontario français; Beatriz Pérez Zapata, Tecnocampus, Pompeu Fabra University; Geoffrey Martin Rockwell, University of Alberta; Martin Roth, Ritsumeikan University; Satomi Saito, Clemson University; Ryan Scheiding, Georgia Institute of Technology; Susana Tosca, University of Southern Denmark / Ritsumeikan University; K.T. Wong, Cornell University.
Table of Contents 目次
(Editor, Rachael Hutchinson, 編)
Introduction (Rachael Hutchinson)
Part 1—Analog and Mechanical Games
Chapter 1: The Virtuality of Japanese Playing Cards: Immersion and Transgression in Early Modern Material Culture (Drisana Misra)
Chapter 2: Eating Your Way through Sugoroku: Imaginary Travel in a Japanese Board Game (Bianca Chui)
Chapter 3: Three Studies for a Material History of Japanese Board Games (Nathan Altice)
Chapter 4: Participatory Storytelling as a Media Platform: TRPGs, Gamebooks, Readers’ Columns, and Play-by-Mail in Japanese Analog RPGs (Satomi Saito)
Chapter 5: On the Play of Yakumono: The Evolution of Audiovisual Effects in Pachinko (Keiji Amano and Geoffrey Rockwell)
Part 2—Gameplay Spaces
Chapter 6: Embodied Play in Japan: From Escape Rooms to Larp (Live Action Role-Play) (Björn Ole-Kamm)
Chapter 7: Cabinets in the City: Game Centers, Street Gamers and Urbanity through Virtua Fighter (Jérémie Pelletier-Gagnon)
Chapter 8: Why has Japan’s Esports Development Been So Slow? (Akira Igarashi and Yuhsuke Koyama);
Chapter 9: Convergence and Cosmopolitanism in Online Games: Non-Japanese Players on Japanese Final Fantasy XIV Servers (Mattias van Ommen)
Chapter 10: Playing with Animal Crossing: New Horizons in the Japanese, Korean and Chinese YouTube Space (Martin Roth)
Part 3—Game Analysis
Chapter 11: Salarymen, Samurai, and the State: Masculinity at Play in Feudal Era War Games (Keita Moore)
Chapter 12: Othering Masculinity: Disability and Chivalry in the Yakuza Series (Frank Mondelli and Rachael Hutchinson)
Chapter 13: The Flavor of Late Shōwa: Coziness, Food, and Nostalgia in Gagex Games (Víctor Navarro-Remesal and Beatriz Pérez Zapata)
Chapter 14: The Destruction of Raccoon City (again): Japanese Collective Memory Discourse, the Atomic Bombs, and Resident Evil 3 (Ryan Scheiding)
Part 4—Game Industry
Chapter 15: The Dawn of Videogames in Japan as Viewed from the Toy Industry (Hitomi Mohri)
Chapter 16: Ladies, Leave, and Corporate Liability? Personnel Policies in the Japanese Game Industry (Tsugumi (Mimi) Okabe)
Chapter 17: Restructuring and Redeveloping Final Fantasy: Square Enix’s Strategic Survival in a Tumultuous Industrial Landscape, 2000-2020 (K.T. Wong)
Chapter 18: The Gundam Games Ecology in a Media Industry Perspective (Susana Tosca and Akinori Nakamura)
Part 5—Game Mediations
Chapter 19: Music on the Edge (Connector): Demixing the Sound of the NES and Famicom (James Newman)
Chapter 20: Changing the Game to Keep it the Same: The Paradox of Localization (Amy Dawson-Andoh)
Chapter 21: Playing at Romance: Otome Games and Fan Cultures (Sarah Christina Ganzon)
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