Konami
Konami Holdings Corporation referred to as Konami, is a Japanese entertainment and gaming conglomerate. It operates as video game developer and publisher company. Besides those, it has casino around the world and operates health and physical fitness clubs across Japan. Konami is best known for their video games, including Metal Gear, Silent Hill, Contra, Gradius, Yu-Gi-Oh!, Suikoden and Pro Evolution Soccer. Additionally, Konami owns Bemani, known for Dance Dance Revolution and Beatmania, as well as the assets of former game developer Hudson Soft, known for Bomberman, Adventure Island, Bloody Roar and Star Soldier. Konami is the twentieth-largest game company in the world by revenue; the company originated in 1969 as a jukebox rental and repair business in Toyonaka, Japan, by Kagemasa Kōzuki, who remains the company's chairman. The name "Konami" is a portmanteau of the names Kagemasa Kozuki, Yoshinobu Nakama, Tatsuo Miyasako. Konami is headquartered in Tokyo. In the United States, Konami manages its video game business from offices in El Segundo and its casino gaming business from offices in Paradise, Nevada.
Its Australian gaming operations are located in Sydney. As of March 2016, it owns 21 consolidated subsidiaries around the world; the company was founded on March 21, 1969 and was incorporated under the name Konami Industry Co. Ltd. on March 19, 1973. The company's founder and current chairman, Kagemasa Kozuki ran a jukebox rental and repair business in Toyonaka, Osaka before transforming the business into a manufacturer of amusement machines for video arcades, their first coin-operated video game was released in 1978, they began exporting products to the United States the following year. Konami began to achieve success with hit arcade games such as 1981's Frogger and Super Cobra, many of which were licensed to other companies for stateside release, including Stern Electronics and Gremlin Industries, they established their U. S. subsidiary, Konami of America, Inc. in 1982. It was during this period that Konami began expanding their video game business into the home consumer market following a brief stint releasing video games for the Atari 2600 in 1982 for the U.
S. market. The company would release numerous games for the MSX home computer standard in 1983, followed by the Nintendo Entertainment System in 1985. Numerous Konami franchises were established during this period on both platforms, as well as the arcades, such as Gradius, Twin Bee, Ganbare Goemon and Metal Gear. Due to the success of their NES games, Konami's earnings grew from $10 million in 1987 to $300 million in 1991. In June 1991, Konami's legal name was changed to Konami Co. Ltd. and their headquarters would relocated to Minato, Tokyo in April 1993. The company started supporting the 16-bit video game consoles during this period, starting with the Super NES in 1990, followed by the PC Engine in 1991 and the Sega Genesis in 1992. After the launch of the Sega Saturn and PlayStation in 1994, Konami became a business divisional organization with the formation of various Konami Computer Entertainment subsidiaries, starting with KCE Tokyo and KCE Osaka in April 1995, followed by KCE Japan in April 1996.
Each KCE subsidiary would end up creating different intellectual properties such as KCE Tokyo's Silent Hill series and KCE Japan's Metal Gear Solid series. In 1997, Konami started producing rhythm games for arcades under the Bemani brand and branched off into the collectable card game business with the launch of the Yu-Gi-Oh! Trading Card Game. On July 2000, the company's legal English name was changed once again to Konami Corporation, the Japanese legal name remained the same; as the company transitioned into the developing video games for the sixth-generation consoles, they branched out into the health and fitness business with the acquisitions of People Co. Ltd and Daiei Olympic Sports Club, Inc. which became Konami subsidiaries. In August 2001, Konami invested in another video game developer, Hudson Soft, which became a consolidated subsidiary after Konami accepted new third-party shares issued by them. In March 2006, Konami merged all their video game development divisions into a new subsidiary known as Konami Digital Entertainment Co. as the parent company became a pure holding company.
Their headquarters would be relocated once again, this time to headquarters was moved to Minato, Tokyo, in 2007. The absorption of Hudson Soft in 2012 resulted in the addition of several other franchises including: Adventure Island, Bloody Roar, Far East of Eden and Star Soldier. In April 2015, Konami delisted itself from the New York stock exchange following the dissolution of their Kojima Productions subsidiary. In a translated interview with Nikkei Trendy Net published in the following month, the newly appointed CEO of Konami Digital Entertainment, Hideki Hayakawa announced that Konami will shift their focus towards mobile gaming for a while, claiming that, "Mobile is where the future of gaming lies." The trade name of the company was changed from Konami Corporation to Konami Holdings Corporation during the same month. In 2017, Konami is to publicly announce that they would be reviving some of the company's other well-known video game titles following the success of their Nin
Osaka
Osaka is a designated city in the Kansai region of Japan. It is the capital city of Osaka Prefecture and the largest component of the Keihanshin Metropolitan Area, the second largest metropolitan area in Japan and among the largest in the world with over 19 million inhabitants. Osaka will host Expo 2025; the current mayor of Osaka is Ichiro Matsui. Some of the earliest signs of human habitation in the Osaka area at the Morinomiya ruins comprise shell mounds, sea oysters and buried human skeletons from the 6th–5th centuries BC, it is believed that what is today the Uehonmachi area consisted of a peninsular land with an inland sea in the east. During the Yayoi period, permanent habitation on the plains grew. By the Kofun period, Osaka developed into a hub port connecting the region to the western part of Japan; the large numbers of larger tomb mounds found in the plains of Osaka are seen as evidence of political-power concentration, leading to the formation of a state. The Kojiki records that during 390–430 AD there was an imperial palace located at Osumi, in what is present day Higashiyodogawa ward, but it may have been a secondary imperial residence rather than a capital.
In 645, Emperor Kōtoku built his Naniwa Nagara-Toyosaki Palace in what is now Osaka, making it the capital of Japan. The city now known as Osaka was at this time referred to as Naniwa, this name and derivations of it are still in use for districts in central Osaka such as Naniwa and Namba. Although the capital was moved to Asuka in 655, Naniwa remained a vital connection, by land and sea, between Yamato and China. Naniwa was declared the capital again in 744 by order of Emperor Shōmu, remained so until 745, when the Imperial Court moved back to Heijō-kyō. By the end of the Nara period, Naniwa's seaport roles had been taken over by neighboring areas, but it remained a lively center of river and land transportation between Heian-kyō and other destinations. In 1496, Jōdo Shinshū Buddhists established their headquarters in the fortified Ishiyama Hongan-ji, located directly on the site of the old Naniwa Imperial Palace. Oda Nobunaga began a decade-long siege campaign on the temple in 1570 which resulted in the surrender of the monks and subsequent razing of the temple.
Toyotomi Hideyoshi constructed Osaka Castle in its place in 1583. Osaka was long considered Japan's primary economic center, with a large percentage of the population belonging to the merchant class. Over the course of the Edo period, Osaka grew into one of Japan's major cities and returned to its ancient role as a lively and important port, its popular culture was related to ukiyo-e depictions of life in Edo. By 1780, Osaka had cultivated a vibrant arts culture, as typified by its famous Kabuki and Bunraku theaters. In 1837, Ōshio Heihachirō, a low-ranking samurai, led a peasant insurrection in response to the city's unwillingness to support the many poor and suffering families in the area. One-quarter of the city was razed before shogunal officials put down the rebellion, after which Ōshio killed himself. Osaka was opened to foreign trade by the government of the Bakufu at the same time as Hyōgo on 1 January 1868, just before the advent of the Boshin War and the Meiji Restoration. Osaka residents were stereotyped in Edo literature from at least the 18th century.
Jippensha Ikku in 1802 depicted Osakans as stingy beyond belief. In 1809, the derogatory term "Kamigata zeeroku" was used by Edo residents to characterize inhabitants of the Osaka region in terms of calculation, lack of civic spirit, the vulgarity of Osaka dialect. Edo writers aspired to samurai culture, saw themselves as poor but generous and public spirited. Edo writers by contrast saw "zeeroku" as obsequious apprentices, greedy and lewd. To some degree, Osaka residents are still stigmatized by Tokyo observers in the same way today in terms of gluttony, evidenced in the phrase, "Residents of Osaka devour their food until they collapse"; the modern municipality was established in 1889 by government ordinance, with an initial area of 15 square kilometres, overlapping today's Chūō and Nishi wards. The city went through three major expansions to reach its current size of 223 square kilometres. Osaka was the industrial center most defined in the development of capitalism in Japan, it became known as the "Manchester of the Orient."The rapid industrialization attracted many Korean immigrants, who set up a life apart for themselves.
The political system was pluralistic, with a strong emphasis on promoting industrialization and modernization. Literacy was high and the educational system expanded producing a middle class with a taste for literature and a willingness to support the arts. In 1927, General Motors operated a factory called Osaka Assembly until 1941, manufacturing Chevrolet, Pontiac and Buick vehicles and staffed by Japanese workers and managers. In the nearby city of Ikeda in Osaka Prefecture is the headquarters office of Daihatsu, one of Japan's oldest automobile manufacturers. Like its European and American counterparts, Osaka displayed slums and poverty. In Japan it was here that municipal government first introduced a comprehensive system of poverty relief, copied in part from British models. Osaka policymakers stressed the importance of family formation and mutual assistance as the best way to combat poverty; this minimized
Arcade cabinet
An arcade cabinet known as an arcade/coin-op machine, is the housing within which an arcade game's electronic hardware resides. Most cabinets designed since the mid-1980s conform to the Japanese Amusement Machine Manufacturers Association wiring standard; some include. Because arcade cabinets vary according to the games they were built for or contain, they may well not possess all of the parts listed below: An output, on which the game is displayed, they may display either vector graphics, raster being most common. Standard resolution is between 315 vertical lines, depending on the refresh rate. Slower refresh rates allow for better vertical resolution. Monitors may be oriented horizontally or vertically, depending on the game; some games use more than one monitor. Some newer cabinets have monitors. Printed circuit boards or arcade system boards, the actual hardware upon which the game runs. Hidden within the cabinet; some systems, such as the SNK Neo-Geo MVS, use a main board with game carts. Some main boards may hold multiple game carts as well.
A power supply to provide DC power to the arcade system boards and low voltage lighting for the coin slots and lighted buttons. A marquee, a sign above the monitor displaying the game's title, they are brightly colored and backlit. A bezel, the border around the monitor, it may contain instructions or artwork. A control panel, a level surface near the monitor, upon which the game's controls are arranged. Control panels sometimes have playing instructions. Players pile their coins or tokens on the control panels of upright and cocktail cabinets. Coin slots, coin returns and the coin box, which allow for the exchange of money or tokens, they are below the control panel. Translucent red plastic buttons are placed in between the coin return and the coin slot; when they are pressed, a coin or token that has become jammed in the coin mechanism is returned to the player. See coin acceptor. Early coin slots could be defeated using a piezo-electric gas fire or gas oven igniter held against the steel bodywork of the cabinet, thus enabling free credits to be obtained.
In some arcades, the coin slot is replaced with a card reader that reads data from a game card bought from the arcade operator. The sides of the arcade cabinet are decorated with brightly coloured stickers or paint, representing the gameplay of their particular game. There are many types of some in fact being custom-made for a particular game. Upright cabinets are by far the most common in North America, they are made of wood and metal, about six feet or two meters tall, with the control panel set perpendicular to the monitor at above waist level. The monitor is housed inside the cabinet, at eye level; the marquee is above it, overhangs it. Controls are most a joystick for as many players as the game allows, plus action buttons and "player" buttons which serve the same purpose as the start button on console gamepads. Trackballs are sometimes used instead of joysticks in games from the early 1980s. Spinners are used to control game elements that move horizontally or vertically, such as the paddles in Arkanoid and Pong.
Games such as Robotron: 2084, Smash TV and Battlezone use double joysticks instead of action buttons. Some versions of the original Street Fighter had pressure-sensitive rubber pads instead of buttons. If an upright is housing a driving game, it may have a steering wheel and throttle pedal instead of a joystick and buttons. If the upright is housing a shooting game, it may have light guns attached to the front of the machine, via durable cables; some arcade machines had the monitor placed at the bottom of the cabinet with a mirror mounted at around 45 degrees above the screen facing the player. This was done to save space, a large CRT monitor would otherwise poke out the back of the cabinet, to avoid eye strain from looking directly up-close at the monitor. To correct for the mirrored image, some games had an option to flip the video output using a dip switch setting. Other genres of game such as Guitar Freaks feature controllers resembling musical instruments. Upright cabinet shape designs varies from the simplest symmetric perpendicular boxes as with Star Trek to complicated asymmetric forms.
Games are for one or two players. Cocktail cabinets are shaped like low, rectangular tables, with the controls set at either of the broad ends, or, though not as common, at the narrow ends, the monitor inside the table, the screen facing upward. Two-player games housed in cocktails were alternant, each player taking turns; the monitor reverses its orientation for each player, so that everything seems right-side-up from each perspective. This requires special programming of the cocktail versions of the game; the monitor's orientation is in player two's favour only in two-player games when it's player two's turn, in player one's favour all other times. Simultaneous, 4 player games that are built as a cocktail include Warlords, others. Cocktail cabinet versions were released alongside the upright version of the same game, they were common in the 1980s during the Golden Age of Arcade Games, but have since lost popularity. Their main advantage over upright cabinets was their smaller size, making them seem less obtrusive, although requiring
Shinjuku
Shinjuku is a special ward in Tokyo, Japan. It is a major commercial and administrative centre, housing the northern half of the busiest railway station in the world and the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building, the administration centre for the government of Tokyo; as of 2015, the ward has an estimated population of 337,556, a population density of 18,517 people per km². The total area is 18.23 km². Since the end of the Second World War, Shinjuku has been a major secondary center of Tokyo, rivaling to the original city center in Marunouchi and Ginza. Shinjuku is commonly used to refer to the entire area surrounding Shinjuku Station; the southern half of this area and of the station are in fact part of the Yoyogi and Sendagaya districts of the neighboring Shibuya ward. Shinjuku is surrounded by Chiyoda to the east; the current city of Shinjuku grew out of several separate towns and villages, which have retained some distinctions despite growing together as part of the Tokyo metropolis. East Shinjuku: The area east of Shinjuku Station and surrounding Shinjuku-sanchome Station known as Naito-Shinjuku, houses the city hall and the flagship Isetan department store, as well as several smaller areas of interest: Kabukichō: Tokyo's best-known red-light district, renowned for its variety of bars and sex-related establishments.
Golden Gai: An area of tiny shanty-style bars and clubs. Musicians, journalists and directors gather here, the ramshackle walls of the bars are plastered with film posters. Shinjuku Gyoen: A large park, 58.3 hectares, 3.5 km in circumference, blending Japanese traditional, English Landscape and French Formal style gardens. Shinjuku Ni-chōme: Tokyo's best-known gay district. Nishi-Shinjuku: The area west of Shinjuku Station known as Yodobashi, is home to Tokyo's largest concentration of skyscrapers. Several of the tallest buildings in Tokyo are located in this area, including the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building, KDDI Building and Park Tower. Ochiai: The northwestern corner of Shinjuku, extending to the area around Ochiai-minami-nagasaki Station and the south side of Mejiro Station, is residential with a small business district around Nakai Station. Ōkubo: The area surrounding Okubo Station, Shin-Okubo Station and Higashi-Shinjuku Station is best known as Tokyo's historic ethnic Korean neighborhood after World War Ⅱ.
Totsuka: The northern portion of Shinjuku surrounding Takadanobaba Station and Waseda University, today referred to as Nishi-Waseda. The Takadanobaba area is a major residential and nightlife area for students, as well as a commuter hub. Toyama: A residential and school area, in the east of Ōkubo and south of Waseda University, extending to the area around Nishi-Waseda Station, Gakushuin Women's College and Toyama Park. Ushigome: A residential area in the eastern portion of the city. Ichigaya: A commercial area in eastern Shinjuku, site of the Ministry of Defense. Kagurazaka: A hill descending to the Iidabashi Station area, once one of Tokyo's last remaining hanamachi or geisha districts, known for hosting a sizable French community. Yotsuya: An upscale residential and commercial district in the southeast corner of Shinjuku; the Arakichō area is well known for its many small restaurants and izakaya."Shinjuku" is popularly understood to mean the entire area surrounding Shinjuku Station, but the Shinjuku Southern Terrace complex and the areas to the west of the station and south of Kōshū Kaidō are part of the Yoyogi and Sendagaya districts of the special ward of Shibuya.
Most of Shinjuku is occupied by the Yodobashi Plateau, the most elevated portion of which extends through most of the Shinjuku Station area. The Kanda River runs through the Ochiai and Totsuka areas near sea level, but the Toshima Plateau builds elevation in the northern extremities of Totsuka and Ochiai; the highest point in Shinjuku is Hakone-san in 44.6 m above sea level. In 1634, during the Edo period, as the outer moat of the Edo Castle was built, a number of temples and shrines moved to the Yotsuya area on the western edge of Shinjuku. In 1698, Naitō-Shinjuku had developed as a new station on the Kōshū Kaidō, one of the major highways of that era. Naitō was the family name of a daimyō. In 1920, the town of Naitō-Shinjuku, which comprised large parts of present-day Shinjuku, parts of Nishi-Shinjuku and Kabukichō was integrated into Tokyo City. Shinjuku began to develop into its current form after the Great Kantō earthquake in 1923, since the seismically stable area escaped the devastation.
West Shinjuku is one of the few areas in Tokyo with many skyscrapers. The Tokyo air raids from May to August 1945 destroyed 90% of the buildings in the area in and around Shinjuku Station; the pre-war form of Shinjuku, the rest of Tokyo, for that matter, was retained after the war because the roads and rails, damaged as they were and these formed the heart of the Shinjuku in the post-war construction. Only in Kabuki-cho was a grand reconstruction plan put into action; the present ward was established on March 15, 1947 with the merger of the former wards of Yotsuya and Yodobashi. It served as part of the athletics 50 km marathon course during the 1964 Summer Olympics. In 1991, the Tokyo Metropolitan Government moved from the Marunouchi district of Chiyoda to the current building in Shinjuku. (The Tokyo International F
Law enforcement in the United States
Law enforcement in the United States is one of three major components of the criminal justice system of the United States, along with courts and corrections. Although each component operates semi-independently, the three collectively form a chain leading from an investigation of suspected criminal activity to the administration of criminal punishment. Law enforcement operates through governmental police agencies. There are 17,985 U. S. police agencies in the United States which include college campus police, sheriff departments, local police, federal agencies. The law-enforcement purposes of these agencies are the investigation of suspected criminal activity, referral of the results of investigations to the courts, the temporary detention of suspected criminals pending judicial action. Law enforcement agencies, to varying degrees at different levels of government and in different agencies, are commonly charged with the responsibilities of deterring criminal activity and preventing the successful commission of crimes in progress.
Other duties may include the service and enforcement of warrants and other orders of the courts. Law enforcement agencies are involved in providing first response to emergencies and other threats to public safety. Policing in the United States is conducted by "close to 18,000 federal, state and city departments, all with their own rules"; every state has its own nomenclature for agencies, their powers and funding vary from state to state. At the federal level, there exists both federal police, who possess full federal authority as given to them under United States Code, federal law enforcement agencies, who are authorized to enforce various laws at the federal level. Both police and law enforcement agencies operate at the highest level and are endowed with police roles; the agencies have nationwide jurisdiction for enforcement of federal law. Most federal agencies are limited by the U. S. Code to investigating only matters that are explicitly within the power of the federal government. However, federal investigative powers have become broad in practice since the passage of the USA PATRIOT Act.
There are federal law enforcement agencies, such as the United States Park Police, that are granted state arrest authority off primary federal jurisdiction. The Department of Justice is responsible for most law enforcement duties at the federal level, it includes the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Drug Enforcement Administration, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Explosives, the United States Marshals Service, the Federal Bureau of Prisons and others. The Department of Homeland Security is another branch with numerous federal law enforcement agencies reporting to it. U. S. Customs and Border Protection, U. S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, United States Secret Service, United States Coast Guard, the Transportation Security Administration are some of the agencies that report to DHS, it should be noted that the United States Coast Guard is assigned to the United States Department of Defense in the event of war. At a crime or disaster scene affecting large numbers of people, multiple jurisdictions, or broad geographic areas, many police agencies may be involved by mutual aid agreements.
For example, the United States Federal Protective Service responded to the Hurricane Katrina natural disaster. The command in such situations remains a flexible issue. In accordance with the federal structure of the United States government, the national government is not authorized to execute general police powers by the Constitution of the United States of America; the power to have a police force is given to each of the United States' 50 federated states. The US Constitution gives the federal government the power to deal with foreign affairs and interstate affairs. For police, this means that if a non-federal crime is committed in a US state and the fugitive does not flee the state, the federal government has no jurisdiction. However, once the fugitive crosses a state line he violates the federal law of interstate flight and is subject to federal jurisdiction, at which time federal law enforcement agencies may become involved. Most states operate statewide government agencies that provide law enforcement duties, including investigations and state patrols.
They may be called state police or highway patrol, are part of the state Department of Public Safety. In addition, the Attorney General's office of each state has its own state bureau of investigation such as in California with the California Department of Justice. In Texas, the Texas Ranger Division fulfill this role though they have their history in the period before Texas became a state. Various departments of state governments may have their own enforcement divisions, such as capitol police, campus police, state hospitals, Departments of Correction, water police, environmental game wardens or conservation officers. In Colorado, for instance, the Department of Revenue has its own investigative branch, as do many of the state-funded universities. Known as parishes and boroughs, county law enforcement is provided by sheriffs' departments or offices and county police. County police tend to have countywide jurisdiction. For places that have both county police and county sheriff
Japan
Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies off the eastern coast of the Asian continent and stretches from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and the Philippine Sea in the south; the kanji that make up Japan's name mean "sun origin", it is called the "Land of the Rising Sun". Japan is a stratovolcanic archipelago consisting of about 6,852 islands; the four largest are Honshu, Hokkaido and Shikoku, which make up about ninety-seven percent of Japan's land area and are referred to as home islands. The country is divided into 47 prefectures in eight regions, with Hokkaido being the northernmost prefecture and Okinawa being the southernmost one; the population of 127 million is the world's tenth largest. 90.7 % of people live in cities. About 13.8 million people live in the capital of Japan. The Greater Tokyo Area is the most populous metropolitan area in the world with over 38 million people. Archaeological research indicates; the first written mention of Japan is in Chinese history texts from the 1st century AD.
Influence from other regions China, followed by periods of isolation from Western Europe, has characterized Japan's history. From the 12th century until 1868, Japan was ruled by successive feudal military shōguns who ruled in the name of the Emperor. Japan entered into a long period of isolation in the early 17th century, ended in 1853 when a United States fleet pressured Japan to open to the West. After nearly two decades of internal conflict and insurrection, the Imperial Court regained its political power in 1868 through the help of several clans from Chōshū and Satsuma – and the Empire of Japan was established. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, victories in the First Sino-Japanese War, the Russo-Japanese War and World War I allowed Japan to expand its empire during a period of increasing militarism; the Second Sino-Japanese War of 1937 expanded into part of World War II in 1941, which came to an end in 1945 following the Japanese surrender. Since adopting its revised constitution on May 3, 1947, during the occupation led by SCAP, the sovereign state of Japan has maintained a unitary parliamentary constitutional monarchy with an Emperor and an elected legislature called the National Diet.
Japan is a member of the ASEAN Plus mechanism, UN, the OECD, the G7, the G8, the G20, is considered a great power. Its economy is the world's third-largest by nominal GDP and the fourth-largest by purchasing power parity, it is the world's fourth-largest exporter and fourth-largest importer. Japan benefits from a skilled and educated workforce. Although it has renounced its right to declare war, Japan maintains a modern military with the world's eighth-largest military budget, used for self-defense and peacekeeping roles. Japan is a developed country with a high standard of living and Human Development Index, its population enjoys the highest life expectancy and third lowest infant mortality rate in the world, but is experiencing issues due to an aging population and low birthrate. Japan is renowned for its historical and extensive cinema, influential music industry, video gaming, rich cuisine and its major contributions to science and modern technology; the Japanese word for Japan is 日本, pronounced Nihon or Nippon and means "the origin of the sun".
The character nichi means "sun" or "day". The compound therefore means "origin of the sun" and is the source of the popular Western epithet "Land of the Rising Sun"; the earliest record of the name Nihon appears in the Chinese historical records of the Tang dynasty, the Old Book of Tang. At the end of the seventh century, a delegation from Japan requested that Nihon be used as the name of their country; this name may have its origin in a letter sent in 607 and recorded in the official history of the Sui dynasty. Prince Shōtoku, the Regent of Japan, sent a mission to China with a letter in which he called himself "the Emperor of the Land where the Sun rises"; the message said: "Here, I, the emperor of the country where the sun rises, send a letter to the emperor of the country where the sun sets. How are you". Prior to the adoption of Nihon, other terms such as Yamato and Wakoku were used; the term Wa is a homophone of Wo 倭, used by the Chinese as a designation for the Japanese as early as the third century Three Kingdoms period.
Another form of Wa, Wei in Chinese) was used for an early state in Japan called Nakoku during the Han dynasty. However, the Japanese disliked some connotation of Wa 倭, it was therefore replaced with the substitute character Wa, meaning "togetherness, harmony"; the English word Japan derives from the historical Chinese pronunciation of 日本. The Old Mandarin or early Wu Chinese pronunciation of Japan was recorded by Marco Polo as Cipangu. In modern Shanghainese, a Wu dialect, the pronunciation of characters 日本; the old Malay word for Japan, Japun or Japang, was borrowed from a southern coastal Chinese dialect Fukienese or Ningpo – and this Malay word was encountered by Portuguese traders in Southeast Asia in the 16th century. These Early Portuguese traders brought the word
PlayStation 2
The PlayStation 2 is a home video game console, developed by Sony Computer Entertainment. It is the successor to the original PlayStation console and is the second iteration in the PlayStation lineup of consoles, it was released in 2000 and competed with Sega's Dreamcast, Nintendo's GameCube and Microsoft's Xbox in the sixth generation of video game consoles. Announced in 1999, the PlayStation 2 offered backwards compatibility for its predecessor's DualShock controller, as well as for its games; the PlayStation 2 is the best-selling video game console of all time, selling over 155 million units, with 150 million confirmed by Sony in 2011. More than 3,874 game titles have been released for the PS2 since launch, more than 1.5 billion copies have been sold. Sony manufactured several smaller, lighter revisions of the console known as Slimline models in 2004. In 2006, Sony announced and launched its successor, the PlayStation 3. With the release of its successor, the PlayStation 2 remained popular well into the seventh generation and continued to be produced until January 4, 2013, when Sony announced that the PlayStation 2 had been discontinued after 12 years of production – one of the longest runs for a video game console.
Despite the announcement, new games for the console continued to be produced until the end of 2013, including Final Fantasy XI: Seekers of Adoulin for Japan, FIFA 13 for North America, Pro Evolution Soccer 2014 for Europe. Repair services for the system in Japan ended on September 7, 2018. Though Sony has kept details of the PlayStation 2's development secret, work on the console began around the time that the original PlayStation was released. Insiders stated that it was developed in the U. S. West Coast by former members of Argonaut Software. By 1997 word had leaked to the press that the console would have backwards compatibility with the original PlayStation, a built-in DVD player, Internet connectivity. Sony announced the PlayStation 2 on March 1, 1999; the video game console was positioned as a competitor to Sega's Dreamcast, the first sixth-generation console to be released, although the main rivals of the PS2 were Nintendo's GameCube and Microsoft's Xbox. The Dreamcast itself launched successfully in North America that year, selling over 500,000 units within two weeks.
Soon after the Dreamcast's North American launch, Sony unveiled the PlayStation 2 at the Tokyo Game Show on September 20, 1999. Sony showed playable demos of upcoming PlayStation 2 games including Gran Turismo 2000 and Tekken Tag Tournament – which showed the console's graphic abilities and power; the PS2 was launched in March 2000 in Japan, October in North America, November in Europe. Sales of the console and accessories pulled in $250 million on the first day, beating the $97 million made on the first day of the Dreamcast. Directly after its release, it was difficult to find PS2 units on retailer shelves due to manufacturing delays. Another option was purchasing the console online through auction websites such as eBay, where people paid over a thousand dollars for the console; the PS2 sold well on the basis of the strength of the PlayStation brand and the console's backward compatibility, selling over 980,000 units in Japan by March 5, 2000, one day after launch. This allowed the PS2 to tap the large install base established by the PlayStation – another major selling point over the competition.
Sony added new development kits for game developers and more PS2 units for consumers. The PS2's built-in functionality expanded its audience beyond the gamer, as its debut pricing was the same or less than a standalone DVD player; this made the console a low cost entry into the home theater market. The success of the PS2 at the end of 2000 caused Sega problems both financially and competitively, Sega announced the discontinuation of the Dreamcast in March 2001, just 18 months after its successful launch; the PS2 remained as the only active sixth generation console for over 6 months, before it would face competition from newer rivals. Many analysts predicted a close three-way matchup among the three consoles. While the PlayStation 2 theoretically had the weakest specification of the three, it had a head start due to its installed base plus strong developer commitment, as well as a built-in DVD player. While the PlayStation 2's initial games lineup was considered mediocre, this changed during the 2001 holiday season with the release of several blockbuster games that maintained the PS2's sales momentum and held off its newer rivals.
Sony countered the Xbox by temporarily securing PlayStation 2 exclusives for anticipated games such as the Grand Theft Auto series and Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty. Sony cut the price of the console in May 2002 from US$299 to $199 in North America, making it the same price as the GameCube and $100 less than the Xbox, it planned to cut the price in Japan around that time. It cut the price twice in Japan in 2003. In 2006, Sony cut the cost of the console in anticipation of the release of the PlayStation 3. Sony, unlike Sega with its Dreamcast placed little emphasis on online gaming during its first few years, although that changed upon the launch of the online-capable Xbox. Coinciding with the release of Xbox Live, Sony released the PlayStation Network Adapter in late 2002, with several online first–party titles released alongside it, such as SOCOM: U. S. Navy SEALs to demon
