This is English version of Japanese blog media "vsmedia". About Japanese Social Games & Apps, Augmented reality, Virtual Worlds, Avatar, Virtual Goods, Social Media, Fab Culture...etc...
Live2D Cubism is a high-end tool for professionals. Live2D has been used for some smartphone apps and avatars in Web sites until now in Japan. However, they started in earnest at last. Furthermore, they release English version in this summer. The overseas companies which are interested in this tool, please continue checking them.
Characters of popular smartphone game Puzzle & Dragons become the premiums of the lottery. We pull a lottery for 500 yen once and can get these.
We can pull such a lottery in the Japanese convenience stores. Those most do not have a loser lottery, so we can get something. Probably it will be Japan's original marketing and promotion technique. Many contents such as comics, animes and games distribute original prizes to people by a lottery. In addition, Angry Birds enforces similar technique.
SEGA's smartphone game subsidiary SEGA networks released social game Puyo puyo Quest for iOS. It broke through 1 million downloading from release in 10 days.
Well..., You would think "This is Puzzle & Dragons!". Of course many Japanese of game clusters think so, too. SEGA networks announced the information of Puyo puyo Quest progressively before released it. And it was under fire. Many people blamed that SEGA ripped off Puzzle & Dragons. However, it broke through 500,000 downloading from release in 3 days and broke through 1 million downloading in 10 days.
Why? I think that it is the result of the brand power of Puyo puyo. Puyo puyo is a Japanese puzzle game of the 23rd from release in this year. Video game, arcade, PC, online, mobile etc ... It has been published in every platform. There are not the people who do not know Puyo puyo in Japanese gamers. On the other hand, Puzzle & Dragons was a totally new game. Puyo puyo Quest surely resembles Puzzle & Dragons. However, Puyo puyo is Puyo puyo.
In addition, SEGA networks releases the Android version of Puyo puyo Quest in a few days.
Alpaca Nisan is the smartphone game that is the most weird and bizarre in Japan now.(iOS/Android) However, it broke through 4M downloading from release in 3 months by word-of-mouth.
What kind of game is Alpaca Nisan? It is very difficult to explain it. It may be a creature growing SLG game.
This is a start screen of the games. Some of alpacas appear in the ranch at first. However, when we tap a screen …
One alpaca attacks the other alpacas suddenly and begins to eat them. Well, the main work of this game is cannibalism.
To the alpaca which ate other alpacas, strange mutation happens in sequence.
There are innumerable patterns of the mutation, and the ending has 3 patterns. We can enjoy(?) those differences whenever we play this.
Many people say, "Weird", "Ugly", "We must never play this alone at night". On the other hand, there are the people saying "Kimokawaii(Grotes-Cute)". Anyway, this became the topic. And developer COCOSOLA of this starts the merchandise development of Alpaca Nisan.
Probably this is only in Japan.
Japanese Buddhism temple Ryohoji in Hachioji, Tokyo, releases a social game for smartphones. The title is "Welcome to Ryohoji!"(iOS/Android).
You may not believe it. However, this is really official contents of the Buddhism temple, and GMO Game is in charge of the publishing.
"Welcome to Ryohoji!" is a general J-style card battle social game. Players have an adventure in all over Japan with character of Ryohoji "Torobenten", fight against Yōkai, make Yōkai a friend and grind Japan peacefully. However, the design of Yōkai are cute all(those most are beautiful girls).
Originally Ryohoji is known as Moe-temple(萌え寺). It is the venerable temple which opened in 1489. However, the chief priest installed the signboard of the beautiful girl illustration in the entrance of the temple suddenly in May, 2009.
The chief priest asked his friend for a signboard design for the making of atmosphere that is friendly of the temple. The chief priest was surprised to watch the design first. however, his families and believers agreed to the design "Cute!". And worshipers increased remarkably since they installed a signboard. Since then the temple performs every media mix development.
