Or why you have to grind in Japanese RPGs.

I was asked in our "Ask the NWR Japan Crew" forum thread about why certain Japanese games tend to emphasise monotonous game elements such as grinding and fetch quests.

This got me thinking that a lot of people might be interested in why that is the case and because I've lived in Japan long enough, I think I can take a shot at giving everyone a decent answer.

The Director gives us his random musings on the non-first day of the show.

So I'm checking my email on Monday morning, waiting for anything important to come across the wire in terms of our L.A. team getting into the EA, Ubisoft, or Activision events that day. Karlie sends me a random missive with the subject, "No time to crop, and no words reqired". I notice that there's an image attached, so I download it and behold...

Our intrepid band of adventurers will have all the E3 coverage you've come to expect!

E3 is upon us, and I just wanted to lay out who's going to be there for Nintendo World Report. Our official crew this year is:

Neal Ronaghan

James Jones

Karlie Yeung

Jared Rosenberg

Michael "TYP" Cole

Jonathan Metts

Aaron Kaluszka

I am unable to attend this year, but there's... Read more...

Jon visits GameStop in search of a free disc and gets more than he bargained for.

Late last week I stopped in at a GameStop at a local mall to pick up Capcom's free Monster Hunter Tri demo disc. I stopped in on my lunch break, and thanks to several nearby schools the place was, predictably, a zoo. A large crowd is something I can handle, but what I have a harder time stomaching is the chain's borderline dishonest customer service.

We grows up, and we grows up, and we grows up.

Would you let this man run your website?

Is it March 7th again already? My, how the years fly by. Why it seems like only yesterday we were celebrating the 10th anniversary of the site, and here it is the 11th anniversary already. And of course, Nintendo World Report just keeps chugging along.