The Japanese fanbase chose names according to their culture and language, and miles away the North American/European fanbases did the same. It wasn't until New Leaf that there was more intermingling between us and we quickly came to use "uchi" (a term used by the Japanese) to describe one of the new personality type. Thinking about it the reason why is very obvious to me:
Gaming culture as a whole has become a lot more mainstream in recent years. You got people who have become rich off playing video games for an audience on places like Youtube and Twitch. So with a big title game like New Leaf coming out, there was a lot of hype surrounding it before it even came out in NA. A lot of people saw this as an opportunity for views. The game hadn't come out in the rest of the world, but it was already out in Japan so you had a lot of old and new Youtubers doing Lets Plays of the Japanese game, and of course using Japanese guides as there were no English sources at this point. And with prices of imports being so cheap these days (compared to how they were back in say.... 2005) you had even more people buying the Japanese games and guides for personal use as well. Then you had about a million blogs dedicated to the game, scourging the internet and translating both official and fan-made Japanese guides --a feat that has once again become easier in recent years.
Not to say that back in 2005 you didn't have people reading Japanese guides and playing Japanese releases of Wild World. It probably just wasn't as easy as it is now to share the knowledge they had gathered.
p.s: Im sorry for any typos/things that don't make sense. Currently recovering from eye surgery so my vision isnt the greatest.
Gaming culture as a whole has become a lot more mainstream in recent years. You got people who have become rich off playing video games for an audience on places like Youtube and Twitch. So with a big title game like New Leaf coming out, there was a lot of hype surrounding it before it even came out in NA. A lot of people saw this as an opportunity for views. The game hadn't come out in the rest of the world, but it was already out in Japan so you had a lot of old and new Youtubers doing Lets Plays of the Japanese game, and of course using Japanese guides as there were no English sources at this point. And with prices of imports being so cheap these days (compared to how they were back in say.... 2005) you had even more people buying the Japanese games and guides for personal use as well. Then you had about a million blogs dedicated to the game, scourging the internet and translating both official and fan-made Japanese guides --a feat that has once again become easier in recent years.
Not to say that back in 2005 you didn't have people reading Japanese guides and playing Japanese releases of Wild World. It probably just wasn't as easy as it is now to share the knowledge they had gathered.
p.s: Im sorry for any typos/things that don't make sense. Currently recovering from eye surgery so my vision isnt the greatest.
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