10 Best Games Released in Japan

There are thousands of games released in Japan that have become popular all over the world, some of these games you may know and may have even played. The development of games in Japan has always been thriving, competing with other major game-developing countries.

Japan is well-developed for game creation as it has already produced games that are famous to this day. The countries leading game development are: China, the United States, and Japan. The gaming market is growing more and more; in 2020 alone, the gaming market generated over $128.5 billion.

To give you an idea, the gaming market generates more revenue than the music industry and more than the film market, and 28.4% of the world’s population plays games. So it’s clear that this is a gigantic market. In this article, we will show you the 10 best games ever created in Japan, which is the 3rd country in the game development ranking.

1st Nioh

This is a great action RPG game that became very famous in the gaming world, released in February 2017. The project’s inception began in 2004, and the game tells the story of a mysterious magical stone and the protagonist William Adams. This magical stone is capable of granting mysterious powers to the person who finds it and transforms that person into a Yokai. Yokai are beings that are half demon and half human in Japanese folklore.

This is a great game for those who want to have fun and learn more about Japanese culture, such as folklore and many other aspects. It became very famous worldwide in a short time and is available on all platforms; this game took years to develop and features many details.

2nd Street Fighter

This is one of the most famous games in the world; Street Fighter is a fighting and action game that earned the title of the best-selling game during the arcade era. This game was developed by Capcom and was released in 1991; it is a great competitive game featuring the stories of various characters fighting against each other. Street Fighter was considered the best fighting game of its time, played by over 25 million people just in the United States; moreover, the game sold over 15 million units worldwide in software alone.

There is an estimate that this game managed to earn over 10 billion dollars in sales. The game available for Super Nintendo sold over 6.3 million cartridges, making it the most profitable game of all time until 2017. Additionally, the game was one of the best-selling fighting games until 2019.

3rd Super Mario

The Super Mario game is one of the most well-known games in the gaming world; even younger players know this incredible game. Super Mario was developed by Nintendo and has sold over 20 million copies worldwide.

The game features a storyline involving the character Mario and his brother Luigi; the main mission of the game is to rescue Princess Peach, who has been captured by the character Bowser. To restore the land of dinosaurs, the brothers must embark on a mysterious and risky journey with various enemies along the way, completing several missions in 7 regions. The game includes various abilities that Mario acquires throughout his journey and has incredible gameplay, making it a great 2D game.

4th Donkey Kong

Donkey Kong is also a game developed by Nintendo. The game is a classic and was launched in the gaming market in 1981 with the aim of entering the U.S. gaming market; it is a great game that became famous worldwide.

The game has great gameplay and features many competitors worldwide, with Billy Mitchell holding the top score of 1,050,200 points, achieving the record in June 2007, being the player with the most points in this game.

5th Space Invaders

This game was released in 1978 and was designed by Tomohiro Nishikado. It is a great and famous game with the objective of destroying enemy ships while controlling a human ship and shooting at enemies, thus earning points. The game was inspired by War of the Worlds and Star Wars.

6th Resident Evil

This game is known as Biohazard in Japan; it is an incredible survival, third-person shooter, and action game. This game was released in 1996 and is still famous today; it is a survival horror genre game.

Resident Evil is one of Capcom’s best-selling horror genre games, with over 117 million units sold worldwide. It boasts a beautiful game franchise. Currently, they are set to release the film Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City, inspired by the game.

7th Final Fantasy v

It is an action RPG game developed and published by Square Enix. It was globally released on November 29, 2016, and is available for PlayStation 4 and Xbox One. It is the 15th masterpiece in the “Final Fantasy” series and is part of the sub-series “Fabula Nova Crystallis.” It consists of games with the same mythology. It was originally a derivative game called “Final Fantasy vs. XIII” specifically for PlayStation 3. Developed, it is considered very different from previous games in the series, and its atmosphere focuses on a real environment and more human characters.

8th Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice

It is an action-adventure game developed by FromSoftware and published by Activision. It was released on Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One on March 22, 2019. The game takes place in a magical and fictional version of the Sengoku period in Japan and follows a ninja trying to avenge the samurai family that attacked him and kidnapped his master.

9th Tales

It is a series of RPG games released by Namco. The series is very popular in Japan; some games are released in North America, while only four are released in Europe.

Fantasy Legend was developed by Wolfteam in 1994 and released in 1995 for SNES video games. Most of the participating development teams left Telenet Japan after the game was released and formed Tri-Ace. They were responsible for developing the Star Ocean and Valkyrie Profile game series released by Square Enix.

10th Judgment

It is an action-adventure game developed by Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio and published by Sega. As a spin-off product of the Yakuza series, it was released in Japan in December 2018 and on the PlayStation 4 platform in June 2019. The remake of the game, subtitled in Japan and Asia as Remastered [a], was released on PlayStation 5, Google Stadia, and Xbox Series X and Series S in April 2021.