SN Systems Japanese studio to offer unique service for developers and publishers

6th April 2005 . Bristol , UK . SN Systems, the leading independent producer of software development tools for the video games industry, today announced a unique service being offered by it's Japanese office – the Match-Making of Japanese developers with western publishers.

The Match-Making service is a reflection of the how much the Japanese video game market has changed in recent years. Japan has traditionally been a very insular market for both cultural and economic reasons – historically the majority of Japanese game developers sell few games outside of Japan and western publishers have sold few western-developed games into Japan. Until recently sales of Japanese developed games within Japan were more than enough to sustain good businesses, however, sales have decreased whereas the Japanese consumer's appetite for all things western has increased.

In the past there have been very few independent game developers as the majority of all games have been created in-house by publishers who have specialised in creating titles specifically for Japan. But in the past couple of years some key Japanese development teams have set up their own studios and are keen to work with western publishers to sell more of their games to western consumers. Conversely, western publishers are keen to break into the Japanese games market are and more likely to succeed by using local talent for complete or partial development of their games.

Tomo Ohno, VP of Business Development at SN Systems UK, CEO of SN Systems Japan commented 'We have recently noticed a big change in Japanese game development – the developers here want to work with western publishers and western publishers want to work with Japanese developers. This was almost unheard of until a few years ago. The development scene is Japan is becoming more like that of the west with developers offering to develop complete games or work on a specific part of a game e.g. Animation, FMV, storyboarding." He continued, "SN are in an ideal position to know what teams are available and what levels of expertise they have. The service we are offering is unique and believe that by making introductions we will see some truly innovative and creative games made for east and west."