One of the biggest benefits of being a gamer in Japan, is the ready access to high quality art books. Unlike in America, where one has to hope that the preorder bonus for an anticipated game has an artbook included, Japanese book stores sell video game artbooks in the same section as video game strategy guides, and for a pretty reasonable price.For those who wanted better quality photos of the Okami art book I posted some time ago, I have included extra photos.
Here are a few sample photos of the ones I’ve picked up recently:
Sengoku Basara 2
Baten Kaitos
Biohazard Ad Arts Collection
Capcom Design Works
Okami
Kazuma Kaneko Collection: Shin Megami Tensei 2
For those curious, the entire collection of photos was taken with my Casio W41CA cell phone, at 1600×1200, and then resized to fit the blog.
Not pictured are a few artbooks I left in the US, including: Xenosaga Episode 1, Biohazard Archives, and Soul Calibur 2. I intend to pick up the Tales of the Abyss artbook some time this weekend, but whether or not that actually happens remains to be seen.
Hi Nayan,
Artbooks are always nice, but this humble country is a wasteland in this concern. Keep up the good work!
be assured of my eternal envy concerning that fine collection.
Greetings from Bonn,
Christian
Hi Nayan,
Those artbooks are seemed to be so artistic and graphical, aren’t they? Actually they’re great, but I wanna apologize to you for my lack of understanding. I can only classify each of paintings into two types “Dragonquest-like” or “Final Fantasy-like” (￣ε￣;).
naoi
This sounds like an odd request, but could you post the picture of Tobi? Y’know, the little demonic slip from Oni Island? I’ve been hunting for it (and the artbook) but have so far been unsuccesful.
Refering to Okami by the way.
I’m rather jealous. I wish I could find BKI, BKII and the BOFV artbook, but that’s nigh impossible…
“This sounds like an odd request, but could you post the picture of Tobi? Y’know, the little demonic slip from Oni Island?”
Uh hmm…I forget who Tobi is. It’s been about 5 months since I played through Okami. Can you give me a description?
Yes, Tobi (Or since you played Japanese, Hayatobimaru) is the demon slip from Oni Island, where you fight Nine-tails. He’s the dude you have to race.
Ah okay. I will flip through the book tonight after the podcast and see if I can find a good photo of him to post.
Hey if you want the artbook of okami then you can d/l it at boxtorrents? ;p I just did and it’s very well done and all the scans are perfect!it’s 297 pages long and about 1.49gb….so you can tell it’s quality! ;p
That’s definitely one option for those in the states. I just wish these were on sale for you guys to buy.
rargh. i want the Okami book.. why isn’t it on eBay?! scans neither? *pouts* T_T
Have you checked torrent sites? Scans of the okami artbook should still be available.
These japanese artbooks are great to celebrate games.
Here’s some links if you wanna buy them, torrents are cool but there’s nothing like the real deal.
http://www.otaku.com
http://en.bemmu.com/
http://www.animecastle.com/
http://previews.diamondcomics.com/public/
Diamonds’s Previews catalogue always have jap game art books to order. You can get Previews from any comics store to buy and browse through every month. Much better than their website. Check intenational section of website.
Also try http://www.amazon.com as they also sometimes stock them.
I own Capcom Design Works, Resident Evil Archives, The Art of Metal Gear Solid, all great books I got from otaku.com.
Happy hunting people.