The “chinification” of anime and video games

2025 is confirming something that was intuited last year. Among the people who It arrives in Japan To stay, China carries the lead. First he was moving to do not return to the nationthen the phenomenon has been extended by areas, where the proliferation of “new chinatowns” was giving rise to neighborhoods with Chinese than Japanese. They are now replacing one of the national bastions: pop culture.

“Chinification”. It Nikkei had A few days ago. Some of the most emblematic neighborhoods of contemporary Japan are living a silent but radical transformation, driven by the growing commercial, visual and demographic influence of China. Places like Akihabara in Tokyo, Ameyoko in Ueno either Dotonbori in Osakafor decades considered symbols of Japanese popular identity, they are adopting an aesthetic and a dynamic that they refer more and more in the Chinese style.

The anime In Akihabara, a nerve center of the otaku universethe usual iconography of Kawaii characters The landscape continues to dominate, but many of those characters no longer come from Japanese studies. Companies like Yostar Games, based in Shanghai, have taken control of key spaces such as the main access of the train station, exhibiting campaigns starring their characters with anime aesthetics that have achieved resounding success among the local public.

To this is added the constant presence of titles as Genshin Impactcreated by Mihoyowhich also occupies prominent advertising fences. These companies not only precisely reproduce the Japanese narrative and visual formulas, but also hire Japanese personnel and local voice actors to ensure An aesthetic fidelity almost absolute. Much of the Japanese creative talent has migrated to these studies due to its best salary conditions, which has generated concern in the national industry, where even veterans of video game development openly speak of a loss of competitiveness.

Akihabara (Tokyo)

Change in traditional markets. The transformation is not limited to digital culture. In Tokyo, the historic AMEYOKO MARKETknown for its sale of fish and products for New Year celebrations, has experienced an almost total replacement of its commercial fabric. According to estimates of local merchants, approximately 80% of business They are now in the hands of Chinese citizens.

Chinese food. Restaurants, imported ingredients and supermarket stores focused on the consumption of Chinese visitors have replaced the old traditional establishments. In Osaka, Dotonbori has become the most frequented tourist destination by Chinese citizens in all Japaneven surpassing historical areas of Tokyo such as Ginza or Asakusa.

With an influx of More than 13,000 visitors Chinese daily, the area has modified its visual, linguistic and gastronomic offer to adapt to its new users. Mandarin posters, menus with Dalian -native dishes and businesses operated by Chinese citizens have become an integral part of the urban landscape. In the neighborhood neighborhood of Shimanouchithe growing Chinese population has generated a own commercial ecosystemwith supermarkets, pharmacies, restaurants and tourist accommodations managed almost entirely by migrants.

Boom in depressed areas. In the district of Nishinaritraditionally associated with urban poverty and population aging, the phenomenon has taken A different dimension. Over there, Nikkei had that Chinese businessman Lin Chuanlong has economically reactivated a dying area by opening more than 170 Karaoke type barsoperated by Chinese women known as “breasts.” These premises, of affordable prices and festive aesthetics have returned the nightlife to a quiet neighborhood.

Nicknamed now like Karaoke Pub Townthe neighborhood has become a new reference of affordable nightlife in Osaka. Lin, who arrived from Fujian more than thirty years ago, has also founded a real estate and plans to build a Chinese neighborhood in the area that, in His own wordsbe more attractive than those of Yokohama or Kobe. Although some places admit their confusion in the face of the speed of change, many others recognize that the transformation has revitalized spaces condemned to abandonment.

A blanket About Japan. In the background, an idea that already stretched weeks ago. This process does not respond to an invasion or abrupt substitution, but to a Paulatine reconfiguration in which Chinese investment, its power of commercial attraction and its Adaptation capacity They seem to be reformulating the forms, functions and senses of the urban in many parts of Japan.

In these areas, the “Japanese” is no longer defined by its national origin, or not in its entirety, but by its ability to survive, live together or integrate into a New regional aesthetic Asian where the distinction between the own and the alien has become diffuse. The ongoing transformation not only affects facades, posters or languages, but the very memory of what these places meant. A “Chinification” silent of the Japanese culture that, far from disappearing, is being found unexpected ways of continuing to exist, although it does not do so exclusively.

Image | Iqremix, Jpellgen (@1105

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