Why are Koei Tecmo games so unknown?

[BlazeNinja22]

Koei Tecmo is a Japanese game studio most known by the Dynasty and Samurai Warriors games - if people actually knew them, that is. Even though they put a lot of effort into most aspects of their games, there are very few people who even know about them outside Japan and China. It's a bit like my YouTube channel (I swear it's not a promotion attempt) - the content itself is decent, but not enough people know about it, so not enough people care. You can't say they really have active communities here, and even when people like them, they just play them as they are and barely try to have ideas for any fan content (unless it's about shipping characters of the same gender).

It's not fair that their games' quality is somehow not enough to make them stand out. I guess some of them have themes that don't appeal to the international market, like Asian history and mythology, but they deserve more attention from the west. The Toukiden series was the only one I really stuck with, but if the other Koei Tecmo franchises are made just as well as this one, someone should like them too. I'm not saying all of them have to be the next internet sensation like Friday Night Funkin' 2 years ago, but they shouldn't be the complete opposite either. Let me know in the comments if you know what makes these games so underrated and unknown.

[Shagger]

I've played a handful of thier games over the years, usually the more obscure ones as it turns out.  It's just another developer/publisher to me in the end.  And to be honest, I'm not sure that they have really earned more good will and success because they have been known for dodgy DLC practices, poor ports (Especially on PC) and a general decline in the quality of thier games in recent years.

 

I do find the comment you made about same-sex shipping in fan fictions written about thier games, well, let's say "interesting".  First, Koei Tecmo has no control over that and why would that a be problem anyway?  Koei Tecmo has actually been behind a number of games themed around same-sex romace such as Nights of Azure and Blue Reflection (The Atelier series may have dealt with similar themes before as well, but I'm not 100% sure), so I don't see Koei Tecmo taking issue with that anyway.  I just thought that was a really weird detail to bring up and focus on.

Edited July 9 by Shagger

[BlazeNinja22]

34 minutes ago, Shagger said:

I do find the comment you made about same-sex shipping in fan fictions written about thier games, well, let's say "interesting".  First, Koei Tecmo has no control over that and why would that a be problem anyway?  Koei Tecmo has actually been behind a number of games themed around same-sex romace such as Nights of Azure and Blue Reflection (The Atelier may have dealt with similar themes before as well, but I'm not 100% sure), so I don't see Koei Tecmo taking issue with that anyway.  I just thought that was a really weird detail to bring up and focus on.

What I meant with that is since there is almost no one playing these games, there are even less people who share their ideas and fan content. Here I was specifically talking about Toukiden fan fiction on Archive Of Our Own, which is either same gender shipping or tournaments with lots of other characters. People don't write about what could be the story, characters and monsters of a future game or mod. The only good thing about this is that since these communities barely exist, there will never be toxic stuff going on there, like what TheMayz and AmorAltra did on the Friday Night Funkin' community.

[Lens]

I totally feel you on this one because truly, the Koei Tecmo games are seriously underrated, and it's a big shame because they put so much effort into their games. 

 

[killamch89]

I've always been a huge admirer of the Ninja Gaiden, Dynasty and Samurai Warrior series. I've been playing them since the early 2000s. There's also Dead or Alive and World Cup games that I've been playing since the mid 90s not to mention more recent games like Nioh. Tecmo games is really underrated - they've been serving us bangers since the 90s and they really haven't been appreciated as much as other companies such as Konami.