Took em a while to figure out consoles just don’t deliver the good anymore
If only we could finally convince Vanillaware to release for the Steam Deck!
Net cafes are already a thing there, but personal gaming at home has always been dominated by the portable market or consoles, partially because Japanese companies are the ones making 2/3 of them, but also because the majority of the “gaming” demographic are younger people who live in small studio apartments in Tokyo, and would opt to have a TV with cable television and consoles in their living rooms.
With streaming becoming a big thing, at home media centres are slowly shifting to personal laptops (especially during the pandemic). I have maybe seen two actual gaming PC towers when I lived there (because again, you can go to a net cafe/PC bang for that), but a lot of the gamers I knew were slowly shifting to modest gaming laptops for their at home setups.
I don’t know how much this form factor is catching on over there, but there’s also a mini PC category these days. For $500 and change, you can have a gaming PC that fits in the palm of your hand and is more powerful than a PS4 Pro.
I have no doubt there is at least one small, enthusiastic group in Tokyo dedicated to building/promoting miniPCs lol. That city has a niche for EVERYTHING that has penetrated Japanese social consciousness.
