世論 What Japan Thinks

I haven’t seen anything on SNS for a while, so I was pleased to see japan.internet.com report on a survey conducted by Point On Research into mobile Social Networking Services.

Demographics

On the 8th of June 2009 exactly 800 people successfully completed a private mobile phone internet-based questionnaire. 50.0% of the sample were male, 25.0% in their teens, 25.0% in their twenties, 25.0% in their thirties, and 25.0% in their forties. Note that because this is a mobile phone-based sample, which judging by previous surveys means there will be an over-representation of heavy mobile users, so the absolute percentages of mobile SNS users should be viewed in that light; the original text does indeed describe the sample as being “heavy users”.

GREE especially is heavily-advertised on television, and it is the game aspect that they push, not the social aspect. However, the games they show (mostly a fishing one and some ugly virtual pet) are particularly off-putting to me and make me want to avoid the place! I’d normally add in a link to the adverts on YouTube, but for some reason I cannot find them!
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I’m still looking for a survey on the hottest topic these days, the disease formally known as swine ‘flu, but with no luck yet, so instead you’ll have to make do with a look at an update on last year’s pandemic of mass hysteria in this survey from iShare on the Apple iPhone’s image in Japan.

Demographics

Between the 13th and 16th of April 2009 342 members of the CLUB BBQ free email forwarding service who had a mobile phone for personal use completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 55.3% of the sample were male, 36.8% in their twenties, 29.2% in their thirties, and 33.9% in their forties.

In Q2 it is interesting that nearly all of the series mentioned are RPGs, but given the lack of an external keypad, I’m not really too sure how well they would play. As I suspected, if you have a jailbroken phone, the MAME emulator can be downloaded to give access to the older titles, and the touchpanel controls look nice.
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It’s been a while since I’ve looked at the console market in Japan, so I’m glad to have the chance to present the rather surprising results of a survey conducted by RealWorld RealResearch and reported on by japan.internet.com into home gaming consoles, a survey explicitly excluding portable devices.

Demographics

Over the 4th and 5th of March 2009 1,040 members of the RealWorld RealResearch monitor pool completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 54.9% of the sample were male, 5.1% in their teens, 17.9% in their twenties, 22.3% in their thirties, 22.7% in their forties, 16.3% in their fifties, and 15.7% aged sixty or older.

I keep saying “I have to get a Wii!” every time I cover consoles, yet I never get round to actually parting with the cash, so without any further ado:

I have to get a Wii!

It feels a bit odd to refer to the Wii, Playstation 3 and Xbox360 as “next generation” even after about two years on the market, but that’s what the survey uses so I’ll use it too.
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I’ve not been to an arcade myself for ages, nor have I really had the time (or quite frankly, the inclination) to play any games recently. To see what the Japanese are doing, MyVoice took their second look at game usage, although I’m not sure when the first look took place!

Demographics

Over the first five days of May 2008 14,373 members of the MyVoice internet community successfully completed a private on-line questionnaire. 54% of the sample were female, 2% in their teens, 15% in their twenties, 37% in their thirties, 29% in their forties, and 17% in their fifties.

The last two times we were in arcades (or game centres, as they are known in Japan), we spent all our cash on the UFO Catchers with nothing to show. That falls under the category of “prize games” in Q6, and before I next go I’ll be sure to study this video on how to win at them!
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< ?PHP
include "/home/whatjapa/public_html/libchart/libchart.php";

$chart = new PieChart(400, 200);

$chart->setTitle(“Have you played online games on your home PC?”);
$chart->addPoint(new Point(“Yes”, 43.9));
$chart->addPoint(new Point(“No”, 55.1));
$chart->addPoint(new Point(“Don’t know”, 1.0));

$chart->render(“/home/whatjapa/public_html/image08/online-gaming.png”);
?>
I’ve not played anything online for years but perhaps I am missing out on something, judging by this survey reported on by japan.internet.com and conducted by goo Research into online gaming.

Demographics

Over the 13th and 14th of March 2008 1,096 members of the goo Research online monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 53.6% of the sample were male, 17.6% in their teens, 19.4% in their twenties, 16.1% in their thirties, 17.0% in their forties, 18.4% in their fifties, and 11.5% aged sixty or older.

Note that Q1 means computers only, not consoles or handheld machines.

In the comments for another article I got wind of a new (currently in closed beta) MMORPG, Hello Kitty Online, apparently a mix of RPG-type quests and guilds, puzzles, virtual property development, and an SNS.
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One online game I see heavily advertised in Japan is a free online RPG Maple Story, although I’ve never actually played it myself, and I take no responsibility from any addiction caused by clicking through that link! To see what the average Japanese person plays at online, MyVoice performed a survey on online games.

Demographics

Over the first five days of February 2008 15,447 members of the MyVoice internet community completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 54% of the sample was female, 2% in their teens, 16% in their twenties, 37% in their thirties, 28% in their forties, and 17% in their fifties.

I used to play online games, starting with the sadly departed Meridian 59, then beta testing Ultima Online, Everquest as both a beta and a paid-for player, then finally Asheron’s Call for quite a bit until I found out that being an anti-social git meant I didn’t get very far ahead. I still miss Meridian 59, as it was small enough to form real friendships, in fact even leading to a real-life meeting with a bunch of other people once. I don’t think I’d ever do that again as there seems to be far too many weirdos about these days, or maybe it’s just I’m a bit older and less naive.
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Well, it’s not really a competition of one against the other, but instead a cross-reference of awareness of Sudoku amongst console and computer gamers. japan.internet.com recently reported on a survey by JR Tokai Express Research Inc into sudoku.

Demographics

On the 26th of October 2007 331 members of the JR Tokai Express Research monitor group employed in either the public or private sector completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 81.0% of the sample was male, 14.2% in their twenties, 37.8% in their thirties, 34.4% in their forties, 12.1% in their fifties, and 1.5% in their sixties.

This survey doesn’t use sudoko, however, as the primary name for the puzzle; that seems to be ナンプレ, nanpure, an abbreviation of number place, or so my dictionary tells me.

If you want to get hold of some sudoku puzzles, one cheap way in Japan is to go to Daiso, the big 100 yen chain store, and pick up one or more of the eight volumes they have on sale, each with over 100 puzzles inside. The books also have below the puzzles small bits of trivia; one of my volumes has proverbs, the other four-character kanji phrases.

Oh, and today I received a prize after doing the Sudoku in my wife’s newspaper – it was just a boring old eco bag, however.
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japan.internet.com recently published the results of a survey conducted by goo Research into studying English conversation. The column they published, however, concentrates on the computer-related aspects of learning.

Demographics

1,079 members of goo Research’s online monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 24.1% were in their twenties, 22.7% in their thirties, 21.8% in their forties, 20.8% in their fifties, and 10.6% in their sixties. 51.8% of the sample was male.

Last month I presented another survey concerning Second Life (hey, that headline’s wrong – a majority don’t want to try!) that showed that almost half the sample wanted to try out Second Life; add the results here to the previous survey and we see that over three in five potential Second Lifers may be on the lookout for English lessons!

The article also mentions cafetalk.jp offering Second Life English lessons, so if you fancy getting involved as a tutor through Skype on your PC, feel free to have a look at what they offer, as there does seem to be a significant number of Japanese looking for on-line English.
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japan.internet.com recently published the results of a survey conducted by goo Research into
awareness and use of Second Life. Over three days in the middle of February 1,073 people from goo Research’s online monitor group successfully completed a private internet-based questionnaire. Demographically, 51.5% were male, 13.0% in their teens, 23.1% in their twenties, 21.6% in their thirties, 21.4% in their forties, and 20.8% in their fifties. Note that at the time of the survey there is no Japanese language version of Second Life, and I am unsure as to even how well it supports Japanese language, but the launch of a fully localised version is not far off at all, it seems.

I get most of my information regarding Second Life from first The Register (possibly NSFW material) and second Something Awful (definitely NSFW!), so my view of it is, shall we say, rather skewed. I have no intention of taking part myself, as I’ve never been much for socialising in my First Life, let alone the Second. Quite frankly it all sounds too scary!

Coincidentaly, I also got my very first Japanese Second Life spam last night advertising the chance to meet some bored housewives for virtual rumpy-pumpy in a virtual manshon. The advertisement featured photographs of real-life women and a real-life block of flats, which seemed rather much like it was designed to entice you into the real world via the virtual.
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[part 1] [part 2]

With the Christmas present season upon us and New Year sales soon to come, DIMSDRIVE Research took a timely look at ownership of portable games machine. Over a week in the middle of November 7,508 people from their monitor group successfully completed an internet-based questionnaire. 44.8% of the sample was male, 64.9% married, and 51.7% had children. By age, 1.1% were in their teens, 16.6% in their twenties, 37.1% in their thirties, 27.7% in their forties, 12.7% in their forties, and 4.8% aged sixty or older.

Talking of wireless, when I visited the Pokemon Centre in central Osaka recently there was an awful lot of people sitting around outside playing on their Nintendo DSes, presumably with whoever was around.

Note that the survey was conducted before the release of either the PS3 or the Wii, so for the last question, no-one already owns either of the machines.
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