The juxtaposition between the article and these comments is hilarious.
During the week, a total of 235,000 video games were sold in Japan at retail. That’s a 60 per cent drop in retail game sales from the previous week. Worse yet, it’s a 61.93 per cent drop for the week when compared to the same time last year.
Yeh I can't see an agenda here.
So let's look at the comments.
I'm glad they're doubling down on this right before E3, they're in for a surprise
What how? How does reporting a shit week in sales in Japan have anything to do with E3. Clearly there must be a large conspiracy.
This seems to be making the rounds in both the Gawker and NeoGAF circles. But it looks like Kotaku's Brian Ashcraft is sounding the alarm on what's titled "The Worst Japanese Sales Week For Games In A Long Time."
And while this attempt to jolt the narrative against Japanese gaming is largely presented in a matter-of-fact manner, even the effort to sound neutral fails when it comes across instead as a bit smug and chiding:
That's quite a leap there. Apparently, Kotaku hates Japenese gaming so they posted an article that cites statistics and doesn't say anything negative about japanese video games whilst giving clear and unbiased reasons "Media Create explains that the reason for this huge sales stumble was a dearth of completely new games.". It's one hell of leap to think that reporting a week of poor sales in Japan is part of an anti-japanese gaming narrative.
Well it certainly was a shitty week for sales, but it's hardly worth doom saying over. Unless it's 6 months in a row or some shit, it's just a week of sales. Nothing major released.
The article isn't doomsaying though is it. The writer didn't link the article into an editorial about a decline in Japanese video games.
What do you want Kotaku to write about this? Leave out that it was the worst week of sales in over a decade? Make a small side note about it?
It's just a fact and the author even explained that A) this is often a slow week and B) that there are not a lot of new titles. Yes, it is kind of gloomy news and was presented as such, but he also gave some speculation on why it might have been a bad week.
I think some common sense needs to be used before you jump down someone's dickhole, even if they are writing for Kotaku.
Finally, a voice of reason. Yet this submission is on the front page simply because the title sounds scary. Ironically, the OP is linking an innocuos article into their scary anti-gaming narrative lol.