Top Japanese fighting game players seem to get more general public recognition compared to North America, which can lead to stuff like this that we don’t get in the States.
REJECT recently released a commercial for Sony’s Xperia cellphones in Japan starring some fighting game legends including CR|Haitani, Kokujin and one more you should definitely recognize.
Haitani is dressed up as a soldier skulking through a building, but complains to his captain that it’s too dark to really see anything inside.
The captain chimes in back through the radio basically saying, “It’s okay, backup is coming.”
Said backup turns out to be Kokujin dressed as an angel and pulls out a golden letter that reads along the lines of “Kokugami, game god incarnate.”
This seems to be a pun on Kokujin’s name because “jin” can be read as person while “gami” would make him a god instead.
He comes advertising a special function of the Xperia phone that I think translates to “Low Gamma Raiser” or something very close to that, which seems to improve the brightness settings / light levels for gaming.
【こく神からお知らせ】
かゆいところに手が届く逸品、あります。#ハイタニ危機一髪#隊長は誰 pic.twitter.com/IVOnunVJl4
— REJECT (@RC_REJECT) March 23, 2024
With the mode on, Haitani is able to see and take out a zombie, who we thought might be Rohto|Tokido at first.
It turns out, however, that Tokido was actually the captain’s voice on the radio.
Before this released, REJECT also put out a behind the scenes video for the commercial shoot where you can also see some other familiar Japanese FGC faces too.