Microsoft has perennially struggled in Japan in the console market. The original Xbox did miserably in Japan and for the first year of its launch it seemed like the Xbox 360 was going to follow in its footsteps. However, the past few months have seen some fairly high profile titles hit the console along with some extremely aggressively priced hardware and software bundles. Gamasutra is reflecting on these releases to try and determine if Microsoft has indeed turned things around in that territory.

The site looks to the recent launch of Blue Dragon and its related hardware bundle as well as the release of Gears of War in Japan to try and find out where the truth lies. Blue Dragon was probably one of the strongest releases, but after the initial release spike, the game dropped off the sales charts fairly quickly. Similarly, Gears of War broke the top ten in sales for the week it was released, but very next week had the game dropping off the top 30 entirely. Reports in Japan had Microsoft badly undershipping the title, which would effectively kill sales, if true. But overall this seems to reflect on efforts by a company that still doesn’t really understand the culture, and this is quickly killing any temporary successes. Much of the feedback that Gamasutra received for their article seems to show a company that is badly out of sync with their target market, putting marketing money into badly conceived campaigns that fail to reach the consumer.