Business & Marketing : How can a Western studio reach Japanese gamers?
Masahiko Murakami (Japan)
Masahiko Murakami is the organiser of BitSummit, Japan's most important indie games show. Masahiko will be present the local indie game market and advise Western studios interested in distributing their games in Japan. After graduating from a Japanese design college in 2002, he moved to the United States, where he graduated from the San Francisco Academy of Art University Illustration Department in 2007.
He was involved in multiple game titles as a concept artist before moving back to Japan in 2009. From there, he joined VITEI as an artist, and went on to become CEO of Vitei BACKROOM in 2015. The year after, he created Skeleton Crew Studio,an indie game studio in Kyoto. With game development technology at its core, he is currently developing VR/AR and other content while taking on new challenges in various fields such as urban development and event production.
Japan is known for its famous studios and their cult games, but more and more smaller creators and studios are producing innovative and original independent games. They are following a trend in the Japanese public, which can also be seen elsewhere in the world, in search of new gaming experiences. This trend is also an opportunity for international independent studios to find a new audience, but only if they take into account the characteristics of the local market.
For his second participation in Meet & Build, Masahiko will be presenting Project 404, a centre for video game creators which opened in July in Shibuya / Tokyo. Located in the new Sakura shopping mall, the centre showcases Japanese independent games and their creators, as well as those from other countries. Wallonia, thanks to its partnership with WALGA, was the first to present non-Japanese games at the inauguration.
