Gaming in the Orient

[DragonLancer]

Ok, this is something I'm curious about after it popped into my head last night. Does Roleplaying exist in Asia?

On ENWorld and other gaming forums I've seen posters from the US, UK, Europe, Australia and even South America, but I have never (that I remember) seen a post from someone in China, Japan or there abouts. So, I am wondering do RPG's not go down well over that side of the world, am I not looking hard enough, or something else?

 

[Mark Hope]

I gamed when I was in Japan (fave gaming memory of those days was running Palace of the Silver Princess on a bullet train to Hiroshima). There used to be a store that sold gaming supplies at Yokohama Station and I also recall finding another one just down the road from the Oriental Bazaar in Harajuku, Tokyo.

 

[Aikuchi]

I think I've seen quite a few ENWorlder RPGers posters from Japan! (China too!)
Not sure, if they're stationed there, live there or moved there or temp'ing in the course of work, studies or otherwise, but I'm positive about their posts!

I just cant remember who explicitly was :/ .... I know at least questing_gm and Xenoflare are from my part of the world (South East Asia)

Just be rest assuredly, the resources are probably a little more strained when it comes to RPG products. Western RPG tabletops are rather expensive and few can afford it (ori in my case, we ALL chip in for a stack of book or two over time till be becomes a "stacj" of books) ;p

Not to mention, it disqualities me alot of times from pariticpating in smaller contests to win stuff from other ENWorlders and other RPG forums because of "shipping" prices and costs (LOL) but its all good ....
mostly ...

(grinz)- i cant for the life of me get a decent WW gaming group!

Do you know how hard it is to conver the MMO gamer thinking out of the computer and onto the table! (lol) without it turning into a hack,kill and loot game

now I feel more like a minority (lol)!

 

[shilsen]

As far as I know it's next to impossible to get tabletop gaming products in India.

 

[DragonLancer]

As far as I know it's next to impossible to get tabletop gaming products in India.

Really? How come?

 

[shilsen]

Really? How come?

No clue. I don't think anybody's really tried to market tabletop games there and I think it's a pity, since there's a potentially good market not being tapped.

 

[Alzrius]

I've been to a gaming store in the Shinjuku district of Tokyo, so there must be at least some gaming there.

 

[Dragonbait]

I game mastered a D&D adventure for a large group from Japan (they visited CA for a few days). I think they called their group ADDA or something. They are located in Tokyo, and they gather in a very large group, divide up by level and play for the day/night. Once a year they gathered all PCs for one session, kind of like a raid on an MMO. I met them through a friend who gamed with them for a year, so I don't know all the details, personally. The group I GMed for had 8 people, and I know that was just a fraction of the club. They were, in general, older than the groups I gamed with (they were typically in their early 30's). They did not roleplay as much (I thought it was because of the language barrier, but apparently they just don't) but MAN they were great with teamwork. Much better than any US group I've seen and gamed with. They played in Grayhawk, and were pretty strict with the rules, and what plays could play (core rules with some splat books, at that time).

I also know that there is gaming on the US bases in Asia. You just need to know where to look.

 

[questing gm]

Hey !

I have to agree that table-top gaming is really hard to compete with MMORPGers and other computer games (even if they are not online)... RPG = hack&slash + farming...(in malaysia at least)

In my side of the world (same country with Aikuichi but just across the south china sea), i think one of the major probelm is that we don't even have a LGS (let alone one wif a F) so our supplies come from mail order and even so our only supplier has refused to mail order anymore stuff from WoTC because he said it was not profitable. Can't really blame him, the only ones coming up with orders in where i live in is probably just our gaming group anyway.

We had a gaming store way back but it eventually got swallowed by magic dudes and the D&D line of products just died off (or more like never started off in the 1st place). Soon after, the shop died too...

And with the exchange rate and all, books are VERY costly and my group (and i guess almost anyone if you add up the postal...) are almost unwilling to buy any of them unless they are very useful (like Spell Compendium which we haven't been able to get our hands on till now). Which is kinda sad since it makes me sigh everytime a new book is released and saving for them is going to take a long time...(that's if i wanted to buy them in the first place).

I think somebody needs to get over here and kickstart the whole RPG thing going on...but then i guess its not a very potential market unless you're bringing in magic or pokemon...

But all in all, we exist but not popular which can sometimes be cool cause we get these stares from people when we are flipping through the books in public as if we emenate (sp) some kind of mysterious aura around us...

 

[Drowbane]

Doh! I thought this was going to be a thread about the difficulties of running asian-flavored Campaigns...

As to the Op's question, I recall seeing a number of posters with Japan (and a few with Singapore, China, Vietnam, etc) in thier location over the past few years.

Edit: I love the idea that I could travel anywhere in the world and hope to gather together a few players...