Shinka Labs x Creative Tokyo Event Review
Live and In Person!
Aaron (Shinka Labs, CTO) speaking at Monstar Lab, Shibuya
After a few months of planning, Shinka Labs’ founder and CTO Aaron Randall spoke to the public about the opportunities that Shinka Labs sees in Japan’s aging, and failing, IT sector. The event was put together by Creative Tokyo and was hosted at Monstar Lab in Shibuya, Tokyo.
Aaron touched on a number of topics, including:
the missteps of some of Japan’s greatest names like Nintendo and Square Enix, and the successes of international game companies in the Japanese market miHoYo (Genshin Impact);
the logistical complexity of game development team management
But there was a whole lot more to cover, and in only about an hour’s time! The main crux of Aaron’s presentation was that, like it or not, there are major cracks in the Japanese gaming industry’s business practice. But instead of fretting over this, Aaron argued, if we simply reframe the situation it becomes one with massive potential, especially for those working with independent firms that aren’t beholden to the traditional mindsets of Japan Inc.
Following the formal presentation, he also fielded a Q&A session with the audience, and got some very precise questions from all across the realm of IT. Best ways to market test AR/VR games in the Japanese market? How much localization is too much? How do modern UX practices work with traditional game design? The audience really came hungry, and Aaron did his best to give them informative responses.
If you’d like to see the whole presentation, you can watch that here
Finally, after the Q&A, drinks were opened (free for those that filled out Creative Tokyo’s survey, and freely available at the Lawson on the 1st floor to those who didn’t) and the rest of the event was spent throwing ideas back and forth, sharing experiences in the IT industry, and, happily enough, discussing venues for the next event.
We don’t have specific details just yet on when we’ll be throwing the next party, but it’ll be soon and we’ll be sure to let you know what the deal is.