Japanese mobile game company Colopl developed a game for Oculus Rift

Colopl is one of the Japanese representative mobile game companies. They developed geolocation social games for future phones at first, and they are known by releasing cool game apps for smartphones now. Furthermore, they seem to be interested in VR. They released game apps for Oculus Rift "Kuma's Festival Marksman" this week.

This is a shooting game about the fairs of the Japanese style festival. Players can shoot various goods on the shelf in toy guns.

This originally released as a smartphone game called "Pop Cork!", and has been redesigned to be played with the Oculus Rift. This has new charm. You can enjoy not only the shooting game but also the atmosphere of the Japanese festival. This is the first time that a Japanese mobile game company released games for Oculus Rift.

Tragedy: Mobile game developer SummerTimeStudio in Okinawa had a game stolen by someone

SummerTimeStudio is a mobile game developer based in Okinawa of the southernmost prefecture of Japan. They were local developers, but they developed a lot of cool 3D mobile games using Unity and cooperated with Glu Mobile in March. However, they were hit by terrible tragedy recently.

Now, they push forward preparations to release their games for Amazon App Store. However, they found that an account named "SummerTimeStudio" had been already made in Amazon App Store. Of course this is identity theft. Furthermore, this pretending stole their game and released them for a fee in Amazon App Store.

As of August 26, seven games were released for 103 yen without permission by someone(All their games are originally F2P). Hirotsu Takeyasu of the SummerTimeStudio CEO sent this matter immediately in his Facebook page and warned that malware or spyware might be hidden in these.

Fortunately, Amazon deleted these immediately. However, this is the case that is really terrible for a small developer. Hirotsu asked for cause investigation and repeated crime prevention for Amazon.

Puzzle & Dragons developer GungHo danced a samba in a local festival

Samba carnival is held every year in Asakusa, Tokyo and it is a traditional local festival lasting 33 years. GungHo, the company of popular mobile game Puzzle & Dragons is participates in this from last year. Their Samba team is GungHo Amigos.

GungHo Amigos was formed in the establishment tenth anniversary of the company.

They did Cos-Play of characters of the games which they ran, put on dress, T-shirt and paper crown of the Tama-Dra, the character of Puzzle & Dragons, and got on float with the logo of their games.

Of course GungHo CEO Kazuki Morishita  participated, too. He woar Tama-Dra hat and clothes with puzzle gems.

(Pfotos via Famitsu. They have more photos. Check it!)

Furthermore, GRASSHOPPER MANUFACTURE CEO Goichi Suda participated. They are subsidiaries of GungHo from February, 2013.

In addition, in commemoration of holding of the Asakusa samba carnival, players were given the samba ver. dragon in Puzzle & Dragons.

Stella of Angry Birds becomes Manga in Japan

I already wrote that Rovio Japan performs various measures to let Angry Birds be popular in Japan.

See Also:
Rovio Japan held a clay sculpture lesson for kids in Tokyo

This is one of them, too. Pink small bird Stella of Angry Birds becomes Manga from next month.

The title is "Stella～ナナと魔法の英単語～(Stella~Nana to Maho no Eitango~: Stella~Nana and magical English words~). This is a complete original story made separately from a story of conventional Angry Birds. The main character is Nana of the small Japanese girl. She moved to abroad for the business of parents, but she can't make friends because she can't speak English. Therefore Stella teaches her English words and helps her. Well, it may be said that this makes lower Japanese English ability and high Finnish English ability a motif. The writer is Hiyoko Hatano of the Manga artist and this is published serially in monthly Manga magazine for girls "Nakayoshi" released on September 3.

【１０月号】月刊少女漫画雑誌「なかよし」で、大人気アングリーバードのキャラクター「ステラ」の漫画【Stella～ナナと魔法の英単語～】の連載がスタートします！詳細はこちらから：http://t.co/AlhPoJP7P5 pic.twitter.com/MJ3feqR7rL

— Angry Birds Japan (@AngryBirds_JP) August 14, 2014

Nameko cooperated with a supermarket in Japan

Japanese mobile game superstar Nameko cooperates with a large shopping building for youths, convenience store, railroad and fashion brand in Taiwan and Hong Kong.

See Also:
Nameko cooperates with a convenience store in Hong Kong
Nameko multiplies in Hong Kong
Nameko cooperated with a Taiwanese fashion brand

However, how about in Japan?  Nameko cooperated with a small inexpensive supermarket. You may wonder, but this may be a tie-up appropriate for Nameko. Because many foods including mushrooms are sold there and people come every day.

Photos via Nameko official site Namepara

Summitstore is local supermarket chain unfolding only in the Kanto area of Japan. They held various events with Nameko on August 13 - 17. The fruits and vegetables floor was decorated in banner and pennants of Nameko, quiz rally and art exhibition for children are held, participants of art exhibition were given an original sticker.

Furthermore, Nameko visited some stores and held the Meet & Greet.
We can check a event and the store in this video.

Popular mobile game Rage of Bahamut becomes the anime in Japan

Mobage's popular mobile card battle game Rage of Bahamut(developed by Cygames) becomes anime in Japan in October. The title is "Rage of Bahamut GENESIS".

A complete original story is expressed in the world same as a game in Rage of Bahamut GENESIS. MAPPA, the anime studio is in charge of the production, and the director is Keiichi Satou(TIGER & BUNNY, Saint Seiya: Legend of Sanctuary, Karas).

Anime is broadcasted in TOKYO MX, SUN-TV(Hyogo, Kobe), KBS Kyoto, TV Aichi, BS11 from October.

The Japanese personifies everything, even heavy equipment

Battleships, samurai swords, castles, sushi...I wrote various articles about the personification in the Japanese games(Please search "personifies" in this blog). However, a newer personification game came up. DMM(they publish personification sea fight simulation game Kan Colle) and Marvelous announced the new PC browser game "Ole Tower ～Over Legend Endless Tower～"(俺タワー ～Over Legend Endless Tower～).
*Ole Tower(俺タワー) means My Tower

Ole Tower is tower construction simulation game. Players collect various heavy equipments and tools, and build a own tower with them... but all of them are cute girls. For example...

She is a Crawler crane.

She is a Loader.

She is a Dump truck.

She is a mini-Excavator.

She is a Hammer.

Now, They accept pre-registration and Forklift truck is given as a privilege to players who pre-registered.

Rovio Japan held a clay sculpture lesson for kids in Tokyo

In Japan, a lot of various homework are imposed on children in summer vacation by a school, In them, there is the homework to make a handmade work. Therefore Rovio Japan held a new event this month.

It's clay sculpture lesson. They held this in App Bank Shibuya of the smartphone goods shop on August 9 and 10. In other words, children can complete one of the homework of the summer vacation by participating in this. This is a good idea to get a viral effect in the school(or kids community). Leevi Lankinen of the sculptor came in Tokyo from the Rovio head office for this event.

今日は新宿AppBankでアングリーバードねん土教室。 一番右はオレ作、真ん中は息子作（ほとんどオレ）、一番左は妻作。 妻作は個性的ですね。 pic.twitter.com/4a5n1UzBeX
— ふふふbot (@ummmummm) August 10, 2014

アングリーバード作った！！うまく作られなくて悲しんでいるの図 pic.twitter.com/oewlzzr8S2
— りおなり (@rionari) August 10, 2014

影から顔を出すレッドバード #アングリーバード pic.twitter.com/xNTdYLORCh
— としくん (@toshism0331) August 10, 2014

Photos via Rovio Japan's Twitter

Participants seemed to enjoy an event. Rovio Japan held an illustration event for children to collaboration with Puzzle and Dragons in last November.

See Also:
Rovio held a drawing event of Angry Birds in Tokyo and it was popular among kids

They continue holding original events from now on in Japan, and hold the music event with KORG on August 31.

The Japanese site of Angry Birds is here.

Japanese mobile game giant DeNA personified samurai's swords to cute girls

The Japanese personifies everything. DeNA is no exception. Japanese mobile game giant DeNA is no exception.

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The Japanese personifies everything, even samurai swords

"Youtou Arashi to Fubuki -Sword of Twins-"(妖刀 あらしとふぶき -Sword of Twins-: Mysterious Sword Arashi and Fubuki -Sword of Twins-) is a new native app game of DeNA. In ancient Japan where Youkai(妖怪: supernatural creatures in Japanese folklore) threatens the world peace of human beings, Arashi and Fubuki of the brother of a mixed blood of human being and Youkai have an adventure by the help of swords fairies.

At first the player chooses either Arashi(brother) or Fubuki(sister). Both have voices by voice actors.

Well, you may notice. This is a 3-match puzzle RPG such as Puzzle and Dragons. But this has some elements evolving than Puzzle and Dragons. The graphic is a horizontal scrolling action style, own's character moves and talks at every attack and the expression of finisher attacks are showy.

In a process of the adventure, players can get fairies of various swords. All of them are cute girls and real existence swords. This resembles popular sea fight simulation game for PC Kan Colle(艦これ).

See Also:
"Kan Colle" --- simulation game that personified battleships of the Japanese empire navy as girls

For example, She "Ōshū Aizu-jū Kanetomo(奥州会津住兼友)" was the sword which Yahachirou Ozaki(尾崎弥八郎) of the member of the Shinsengumi(新撰組:  special police force organized by the Bakufu  during Japan's Bakumatsu period in 1864. Wikipedia) used habitually. Real she is...

By the way, I noticed a serious thing. This does not have all social elements and players can play only a single play mode. This is exceptional in DeNA which is the giant of the Japanese mobile social game. I do not know why they did so it. However, reviews of App Store and Google Play are not bad. The social elements may be already unnecessary for Japanese mobile F2P games.