On June 20th, the following DQ9 ad with musical act SMAP will be shown nationwide in Japan. Well on into their thirties, SMAP is the country’s biggest boy band group.

Back in April, SMAP singer Tsuyoshi Kusanagi was arrested for indecent exposure. When police officers approached him, Kusanagi replied, “What wrong with being naked?” After taking time off and staging a “come back”, Kusanagi also appears in this commercial — fully clothed, we might add.

Earlier this week, Famitsu polled folks with a “Dragon Quest 9 Pre-Launch Awareness Survey”. It was mostly multiple choice with a few free response questions. Oddly, for the multiple choice question “Do you plan on buying Dragon Quest 9?”, there isn’t a “I’m not going to buy it” reply. Instead, the choice is the more gentle “I don’t know whether I will buy it or not.” Semantics!

Feel free to take the survey yourself.

Do you have a Nintendo DS?

Did you know that Dragon Quest 9 is going on sale on July 11?

Do you plan on buying Dragon Quest 9?

For those planning on buying hardware on launch date. What kind of DS do you plan on purchasing?

What would make you think about buying Dragon Quest 9?

Whom do you think you’d play multi-player?

On launch day, how long would you play Dragon Quest 9?

Do you usually play video games for long stretches?

How many people you know are aware of the Dragon Quest series?

Which previous Dragon Quest titles have you previously played?

Please tell us a memory that’s connected with Dragon Quest!

The survey also asks about the game’s customisation feature and ends with a request to draw Dragon Quest character Slime from memory. Can you do that? Can you?

ファミ通　「ドラクエ９発売前意識調査」　買わない選択肢は無い [Akiba Blog]