Japanese RPG's

    

One thing I want to get in Japan is a tabletop RPG. Not a videogame/computer RPG but a real Tabletop RPG with paper and dice :) 

Wikipedia has a nice write up of the game scene, although it is a short article, they also have a nice list of tabletop RPGs by genre.

I wonder if Gear Antique Renaissance is still available?

Sword World 2.0 was published in 2008 and is still popular. Heh, they only use six siders, poplyhedrals are not common. Class/Skill systems are old hat in the American tabletop scene but it has its advantages.

Sword world RPG's classes are called ginou (技能 lit. skill^?). Each ginou has packaged a number of skills. It is considered as a hybrid system between class system and skill system, so it is often called class-skill system.

There are 8 classes (Bard, Fighter, Priest, Ranger, Sage, Shaman, Sorcerer and Thief) for Player Characters and 2 classes (Dark Priest and Dragon Priest) for only NPCs. 5 major races (Human, Dwarf, Elf, Half-elf and GrassRunner) can become PCs.

The game uses only two 6-sided dice, as other polyhedral dice aren't common in Japan. 2d6 dice roll is translated into a more wide range of random numbers by using a Rating table. The Rating table is used for damage roll, damage reduction roll and such. 

The official Japanese web site of Sword World is here. 

One more thing to get while in Japan.  ^-^