Japan

The 日章旗? or Nisshōki (which translates to the "sun-mark flag", which has been used as the Japanese flag since August 13, 1999.

Japan (Japanese: 日本) is an island country in East Asia with maritime borders to China, Russia, North Korea and South Korea. Japan was politically unified under the leadership of the Emperor through the Meiji restoration, a series of events that culminated in 1868. The current constitution came into effect on May 3, 1947. Japan's head of state is the Emperor Akihito. The capital of Japan is Tokyo, which including the Greater Tokyo Area, is the second largest single metropolitan area in the world, only behind New York City, and is the worlds most populous single metropolitan area.

Japan's media rating system is called Computer Entertainment Rating Organization (CERO), which has rated all Grand Theft Auto games as Z, which is for people eighteen years of age and older. Older GTA games were released later in the Japan than in the English speaking world due to being localised for the Japanese audience through Rockstar Japan. Capcom publishes many of the GTA games when they are released in Japan while CyberFront have also released some recent GTA games.

• Grand Theft Auto III (September 25, 2003)
• Grand Theft Auto: Vice City (May 20, 2004)
• Grand Theft Auto Double Pack (July 29, 2004 Xbox version, February 27, 2007 PS2 version)
• Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas (January 25, 2007)
• Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories (July 26, 2007 PSP version, September 6, 2007 PS2 version)
• Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Stories (December 6, 2007)
• Grand Theft Auto IV (October 10, 2008)
• Grand Theft Auto V (October 10, 2013)

CyberFront released games:

• Grand Theft Auto IV (March 20, 2009)
• Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars (September 24, 2009)

Japanese characters

2D Universe

• Hana Funabashi
• Hiroshi
• Refried Noodle
• Gama Rei
• Yonsi Zoo San (born in Tokyo)
• Tetsuo (born in Hiroshima)
• Danny Zoo (born in Okinawa)
• Johnny Zoo (born in Tokyo)

3D Universe

• Kanbu
• Asuka Kasen
• Kazuki Kasen
• Kenji Kasen
• Toshiko Kasen
• Yamazaki
• Yuka

Japanese gangs

2D Universe

• Yakuza

3D Universe

• Yakuza

Japanese businesses

• Maibatsu Corporation

Game world

Grand Theft Auto IV

• The film Full Robo Hickey Hurry Mech Battlesuit is set in Japan.
• The anime series Princess Robot Bubblegum is made in Japan.

The Lost and Damned

• A contact of Jim Fitzgerald and Angus Martin buys stolen Angel bikes off of them, and then ships them to Japan.

Grand Theft Auto V

• The golf club owned by Mark Fostenburg and stolen by Trevor Philips was imported from Japan.
• A number of actors playing Vietnamese families in the 1977 film Bury Me were from Japan.
• The Japanese yen, Japan's currency, is one of the possibilites your $10,000 'investment' to iwillsurviveitall.com can be shown in
• The flag of Japan can be seen in the first trailer for Grand Theft Auto V (0:16).

Real world references

• The mission Dragon Haul Z in Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars is a reference to the Dragon Ball Z anime series.