Craziness

This from a man who's country refers to "making out" as "Snogged?"

Its called slang and every country has it. And what is wrong with "beating" a game? Don't 99% of games have a final boss to "complete"?

Anyways, is everyone forgetting the PacMan comment? Pacman was a commentary on obesity? Sorry, you lose all credibility in my eyes after that comment.

Maybe he's just pissed, because he's EA's bitch.

The truth is that you have talented developers all over the world. But you have to see it from his perspective. 10-15 years ago, Japanese developers were the absolute cream of the crop. If it didn't come from a Japanese developer it wasn't worth mentioning.
But now, Western developers from the US and Europe are consistently out peforming most Japanese developers. (from a sales standpoint)
All of this combined with rising development costs and the fact that the Japanese console market has been declining for a few years, and he probably has an "end of the world" scenerio playing out in his head.

@12 - Dev life sucks all over, but did you have bathroom breaks at set times at EA? Because, most Japanese companies have set bathroom breaks. (And other far dumber rules and regulations) I know you had it rough, but you didn't have to work while holding your piss for 30 minutes. :)

Sorry guys, but Digital Distribution is the future!

-How many Media Plays or Virgin Records do you have in your town?
-How many Blockbusters do you have in your town??

I think the age of the physical format is winding down. Of course there will be a successor to DVD, but neither HDDVD or BR will have anywhere near the success of DVD.
Back to the Blockbuster analogy. Average people probably only buy 10-5% of the movies they watch. The other 95% are either rentals, free on TV, or at the theatre.
That whole "people want something physical to own" is just damn retarded. Ever heard of MP3 players? CD sales are steadily decreasing while digital sales are rapidly increasing. What makes video any different? (And don't give me that 50gb crap, we all know a movie doesn't require 50gb)
Sorry, but all physical formats will be niche players in the future.

I don't know where the author gets 5% drop. I've been reading it was a 15% drop a Yahoo news.

The last time I was in Japan: All of the cars and homes had locks. Businesses had security and I even saw police walking down the street in Tokyo.

Ever heard of Yakuza? You know, that organized gang of DS returners.

I will say that the streets in Tokyo are extrememly clean. But, stray off the tourist hot spots and you'll see that Japan is just the same as every other country in the world.

PS I've had my wallet returned (money and cards intact) and my pager returned and this was in the USA.

I find those undertones in the article to be offensive as well.

The fact is an "honest" person found the DS. There are actually honest people outside of Japan.
If an honest person found the DS in the USA, England or anywhere else, the story would've ended the same.