The Escapist Bulletin: Lessons we can learn from Japan

It's not every game that comes with a large pair of fake breasts, but when one does, common wisdom is that it will come from Japan.

And the commonly wise would be correct in this instance as the game Huge Breast Fantasy - a no-nonsense title if ever there was one - is indeed from Japan, and comes with two sizeable fake boobs and, perhaps even more bizarrely, a G-Cup bra to put them in.

Are you rolling your eyes yet?

The games that Japan produces for itself are notably different than those it produces for an international audience and sometimes it's hard to believe the same nation that produced Metal Gear Solid or Super Mario Brothers could also come up with Huge Breast Fantasy. To an outsider, or gaijin, Japan often seems like a strange and baffling place.

But that's not their fault; it's ours.

While we in the west are re-enacting D-Day for the hundredth time in another painfully generic World War II shooter, you know what the Japanese are up to? They're playing at being mosquitoes, or hummingbirds, or they're touching witches or getting their rocks off with ridiculously large breasted and utterly fictional women.

We have a very narrow view concerning what topics are appropriate for a game, whereas the Japanese seem to be willing to give anything a go at least once, resulting in a much wider range of software.

Now, it would be foolish just go on an import binge just for the sake of playing something obscure. Not everything is going to be a enjoyable because somethings are simply going to be too culturally rooted to export well, while others - like rape games - will clash at a deeper moral level.

But in terms of what a gaijin would describe as weirdness in games - that's something we should be embracing.

You just have to look at how publishers are running scared of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 to see where we're at.

Is CoD: MW2 going to be a good game? Almost certainly, but is it going to be so good that all other games will seem like pale imitations?

Almost certainly not, but we're in danger of making imagination a liability rather than a strength. Why would a publisher take a risk on a new IP when an established brand is so much more profitable?

The only way gamers are going to correct this is with our wallets. That doesn't mean we shouldn't buy games like CoD: MW2 ,which would be cutting our noses off to spite our faces, but if you see some crazy game that piques your interest, then buy it and let publishers know you're willing to take risks if they are.

Occasionally we'll suffer for it - Stalin Vs Martians springs to mind - but it's a small price to pay if it means we get quirky, interesting and above all else, original games to play.