Today's Weekly Famitsu graced Japan with a continued tribute to the Sony Playstation brand, now celebrating its 20th Anniversary this week (December 3rd). Much like last week's issue, Famitsu has presented us with several pages chronicling the original console's history and its modern day successors. Several more designers and illustrators also made sure to contribute even more of their own autographed and signed sketches of characters from their respective games.

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Adding a bit of a twist from the previous issue, Famitsu included a list of the top 50 games associated with the PlayStation brand. Rather than reflecting the opinions of the magazine's staff, Famitsu chose to run a survey that directly asked gamer's to vote for their favorite games during this years game show. Unsurprisingly, Final Fantasy VII ended up placing 1st with a grand total of 372 votes, while Monster Hunter Portable 2nd G took second with 254 votes, and Final Fantasy X took the bronze with 201. Considering that, with the exception of the Metal Gear Solid series, Resident Evil series, and some niche titles such as Parappa the Rapper, the majority of the games on the top 50 are RPGs, it might be fair to agree that the JRPG genre is still very much relevant to the gamer's of today. Take a look at the full list pictured below.

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To round things off, Famitsu also published a top 30 list of PlayStation characters, also collected from a survey conducted at Tokyo Game Show. First place was taken by Japan's official Sony mascot, Toro (or 井上トロ), with a dramatically dominating 1055 votes. Toro first appeared in the Japan-only PlayStation release Dokodemo Issho (どこでもいっしょ), which became a cult-favorite among the female crowd. The character's popularity would lead to a sequel for the PSP and ongoing cameo appearances in the Monster Hunter series. Coming in second place was none other than PlayStation's original mascot, Crash Bandicoot, trailing far behind with 276 votes.

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In other news, today I also stopped by my local video store (yes, they still exist in Japan!) and picked up the PlayStation 2014 Winter Catalog, which also had it's own insert chronicling the past 20 year's of the brands success. Take it look at it below:

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Stay tuned for more exciting news from Japan.  また今度ね！