Tabletop, DnD, board games, and minecraft. Also Animal Crossing.
3rd International Volunteer Brigade (Hexbear gaming discord)
Rules
In the sense that nothing about the architecture or art really evokes Japan at all other than that it looks vaguely Asian. (Some bits feel more Chinese than anything.) This is a big budget 2020 game with art done by contracted artists from all over the world, you'd think they'd be able to get a little closer than this, especially with how overexposed Japanese culture has been for a long while now
Orientalism. That's the word you're looking for. The game was made by orientalists.
It's just wild to me that a game this modern would fall back on generic vaguely Asian slurry. I'd expect this from a game from the 90s but even the China levels in Crash 3 felt more like China than this does Japan
It's just wild to me that a game this modern would fall back on generic vaguely Asian slurry. I'd expect this from a game from the 90s but even the China levels in Crash 3 felt more like China than this does Japan
With the rise of LLMs and assorted treat printer gimmicks, I expect this problem to get even worse, especially for background and filler imagery but eventually entire games at this rate.
Ironically, an LLM would probably make something that would look more convincingly Japanese at a glance
You may be right, though from what I tried to get out of them for cover pictures, the first few attempts would have unprompted waifu tits on buildings. 
had words to say about how copy of a copy art from people that don't observe actual things but just consume products and want to make more products lead to really bleak and bland products.
This just feels really lazy and clueless to me, like how a comic from the 1970s would depict an Asian country
I used to think bandicoots were made up for the game
look how cute they are
90 percent of kids in the 90s just thought he was a fox
That is about the bare minimum for having assets in the level...
This was from a level intro before crates and enemies were spawned in, so it's not quite this barren when you're playing
But is it worse than the Crash 3 China levels
hey I loved riding a tiger along the great wall
They at least read as "China," same with the Arabian, ancient Egyptian, etc levels
Honestly I wouldn't have even guessed this is supposed to be Japan. I think the wonky towers in the back look kind of neat.