Back at the beginning of last year we noticed an explosion of popularity among young girls for a game called Oshare Majo: Love and Berry (オシャレ魔女: ラブ and ベリ), which means “Fashionable Witches: Love and Berry). It seemed to happen overnight. After coming out in late 2004, by summer 2005 Love and Berry was huge, and nearly every young girl we talked to either knew about it or was infatuated with it.
Love and Berry was originally made by Sega as an arcade/card game, placed mostly in game centers or shopping centers frequented by young girls between six and twelve years old. The game is quite easy on its face. Using the cards that they already have, players swipe them in the machine to update fashion, hairstyles, etc for their players. By playing mini-games they can win more cards that they collect and can use in the future. Wearing better clothes and accessories gives the characters more power to win future games, and it goes on like this.
Often in game centers you’ll see whole banks of machines with lots of young girls (often with their parents) holding huge card books and playing the game. The “rhythm and dancing” part of the game involves rhythmic tapping on two big buttons on the machine as the character dances on the screen.
Here’s a video we took yesterday at the game center:
Much like Mushiking, a similar game developed for boys, the game carries over into everyday life as players trade cards with each other and discuss the game. During our many trips to game centers we find the consoles usually packed with players and young mothers watching nearby, often holding the massive card books for their daughters.
Michael is the Editor of JapanTrends.com and Director of the 
