[Gamasutra rounds up recent reports on the Japanese games industry from local news site Andriasang.com, a leading destination for English-language news on Japan's game industry.]
In our latest round-up of Japanese game industry news not previously reported on Gamasutra, we look at Nintendo's first paid 3DS downloadable content, a paid girlfriend email service, and One Piece Musou.
Nintendo released the first paid downloadable content for the 3DS this week, offering ¥100 ($1.29) decoration sets for Tobidasu Print Club Kiradeco Revolution, a photo editing app sold through the system's eShop download store. The decoration sets include themed frames, backgrounds, and stamps.
Square Enix will also put out the first 3DS retail game offering paid DLC this week with Theatrhythm Final Fantasy. Consumers will be able to purchase extra songs for the rhythm game by spending ¥150 ($1.93) on each track. Nintendo's upcoming Fire Emblem: Awakening will have paid DLC, too.
Namco Bandai Games has already received 500,000 orders from retailers for One Piece Pirate Musou, its upcoming crossover game that pairs popular anime/manga franchise One Piece with Tecmo Koei's long-running action game series Dynasty Warriors. The game is set to release exclusively or PlayStation 3 on March 1.
One Piece Pirate Musou will ship alongside a special Gold Edition PS3 bundle (pictured), which features an image of the franchise's hero Luffy and will sell for ¥38,170 ($492).
Konami will include a "New Love Plus Girlfriend Mail" service with the release of New Love Plus, the latest entry for the popular dating sim coming to 3DS this week. Users who sign up for the ¥315 ($4) monthly service will receive messages from their virtual girlfriends discussing their daily activities and other topics.
The service was previously available though Konami's DX mobile portal for feature phones. With the 3DS version, players upload their save data to Konami's service, and receive emails that use their in-game nickname on their feature phones, smartphones, or PCs. The feature will be free before switching to subscriptions in mid-March.
