Rising Star Blog

Some things don't change, even when you move to Japan: the shops over here started pushing Halloween to sweet-hungry kids back in the middle of September, and I noticed that some of them started celebrating Christmas before it was actually Halloween (even though Christmas isn't an official holiday over here - just an excuse for young couples to spend a romantic evening together, or young parents to spend money on toys for their kids). But it's surprising to see the shops just as eagerly punctual for the latest videogame blockbuster.

Back in August, when I arrived in Japan, you had to look hard to find it, but you could still find signs that Final Fantasy was coming: tucked away in the corners of 7-11 combinis (the ubiquitous Japanese reinvention of the convenience store), you could find empty DVD cases advertising pre-orders. But in the past few days, a good month and a half before the game comes out, my local 7-11 has actually put up flags outside the store to let everybody know that they will be selling Final Fantasy when it is released next month.

Now, flags aren't entirely unusual in Japan. Sometimes you see them along the side of the street, reminding you to put on your seatbelt or telling you that there's a festival taking place nearby. At football matches they seem to have a whole section of the crowd equipped with flags, and they don't stop waving them for the duration of the entire match. Even so, it's an impressive demonstration of videogaming's popularity that you can find them this soon, outside such a mainstream establishment, just for a game.

Like I said before, sometimes it's easy to forget you're living in videogaming's very own Mecca: reading about the way Britain gave the full, celebrity-studded red carpet treatment to the launch of Modern Warfare 2, it's easy to get a little bit envious when it seemed like all we get in Japan are a few ads on the telly. But then 7-11 wheeled out its Final Fantasy flags and everything was okay again: who needs celebrities when you've got flags?

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