Japanese music is starting to get more popular among gamers, thanks to titles like The World Ends with You, Persona 3: FES and Persona 4. In order to recreate the Japanese environment and experience, the soundtracks for all three of these games was filled with Japanese hip hop, rap, pop and rock.

And while these three games seem to be getting the majority of the credit for bringing Japanese music to the attention of a wider audience, there are quite a few other games which include Japanese rock to round out the experience. The majority of games with Japanese songs included are JRPGs, but this isn’t a hard and fast rule.

Important Importables today is looking at a handful of video games which feature Japanese rock, or JRock songs by well known artists. The context in which the song appeared in the game will be discussed, as well as a little information on the artist and some songs of his, hers or theirs that may be similar to the track in question. Who knows, you may end up finding some new songs for your iPod or mp3 player…

As any Japanese video game fan knows, video games and popular music have very close ties in Japan. Singers will have their songs featured in the games. They will be used in advertising campaigns. They may even be called upon for character modeling.

Two weeks ago Important Importables talked about Hikaru Utada, one of the most popular female singers in Japan and her video game connections. This week Important Importables looks at yet another Japanese superstar, Gackt Camui. Gackt is well known for his music, his acting and his contributions to the gaming worldwide. (He’s also incredibly pretty, multilingual and one of my favorite singers.)