Draft:Influence of gyaru in media

Gyaru have a significant amount of influence in media during the Heisei era. This infulence can range from different media or from of entertainment such as movies, manga or anime, video-games, music, television programs and even a presence on the web.

Music

Many genres of music are popular for gyaru and are sung or made by or for gyaru. From eurobeat, to EDM, Trance and other genres of music or eurobeat remixes, they are casually listened to by gyaru. Eurobeat remixes are regularly danced to as well with parapara written in Japanese as パラパラ (parapara).

Singers such as Koda Kumi, Namie Amuro and Ayumi Hamasaki are internationally famous, and regarded as inspiration for many gyarus. Other J-pop artists who were considered to be essential to listen to were LOVE to LOVE, GAL DOLL, KAHORI and Juliet. Other favorites include singer known by her stage name Sifow also known as Shiho Fujita who at the time, was not only a model but also a singer for J-Pop as she had been a solo artist when starting her music career as Sifow.

Video games

Cosplay of Junko Enoshima from Danganronpa at Katsucon in 2014

Many characters from various Japanese media have a gyaru connection. For example, in the Yakuza series, especially in its third iteration, Yakuza 3. It debuted a side-mission which would then be included with its gameplay and features in later sequels. Where in fictional Kabukichō or as the game refers to it as Kamurocho, the player would need to recruit women to join a hostess club. These women were actual gyaru from the magazine Koakuma Ageha. These models are used as actual character models in the game; their whole appearance was replicated to the smallest detail to have them created and placed as 3D characters. These models from Koakuma Ageha are Sayaka Araki, Nemu, Rina Sakurai, Eri Momoka, Riho Nishiyama, Rina Aikawa and Shizuka Muto. They have even been compared to their replicated three-dimensional counterparts. These characters would become hostess of these fictional hostess clubs; if the player chooses to do this side-mission and complete it. But the hostess club section of the game first appeared in Yakuza 2 in the sense of visiting the clubs themselves and not in the similar way as in the third game where the player recruited actual members for the clubs. They even have their own magazine in the games called Kamutai Magazine which is also replica of the actual magazine Koakuma Ageha. This content was omitted in the Western releases of Yakuza 3.

In Danganronpa, the character of Junko Enoshima is inspired by gyaru subculture; she is called a super high school level gyaru (in the English dub, this is changed to “Ultimate Fashionista”). The Persona series also has a gyaru. In Revelations: Persona, there is a kogyaru named Yuka Ayase. No More Heroes 2: Desperate Struggle has a kogyaru enemy as a character. The player must defeat her to proceed in-game; she is known as Shinobu Jacobs who is encountered later in the game. The visual novel escape room series Zero Escape has the character Clover Field or 四葉フィールド Yotsuba fi-rudo that is portrayed as a gyaru. 

The Wagamama Fashion: Girls Mode series, known as Style Savvy and Style Boutique in North America and the PAL region respectively, is based on multiple Japanese street fashion subcultures and has a main focus on brands and selling apparel. The video game has a variety of brands and styles but also some of these that can be interpreted as mimicking or representing some gyaru fashion brands. For example, the in-game apparel brand AZ*USA (AZ-USA in the West) has a striking resemblance to the gyaru brand D.I.A.; another would be the brand CherryBerry (April bonbon in the West) also having its own representation of the amekaji style. Most probable inspiration would be the gyaru brand COCO*LULU.

The video-game franchise Animal Crossing by Nintendo also had a gyaru, but she only appeared in a spin-off game of this series. Specifically the Animal Crossing: Happy Home Designer on the Nintendo 3DS, the character named Lottie appears in that video game for the first time, she is a character represented as an otter. After multiple encounters with her, there will be an in-game event on the third day of gameplay, where her uncle Lyle will state himself that she wears too much makeup in a game dialogue and in a later in-game event she can even be found without her makeup. She will state to the player character, that it was due to the fact she woke up too late for work but would often wear her makeup to impress a male colleague; the colleague's name in game is Digby. She also appears in Animal Crossing: amiibo festival on the Wii U. Here are her looks on in-game. This character has recently been added to the Nintendo Switch version of Animal Crossing, Animal Crossing: New Horizons, through the paid downloadable content of Animal Crossing: Happy Home Paradise. Though that isn't supposedly the only gyaru influenced character in Animal Crossing; but instead of an non-playable character it is actually a villager within the series. The gorilla villager Jane or フィーバー (Fever) has been remarked having a ganguro like appearance in どうぶつの森 on the Nintendo 64 and GameCube Japanese versions of said game.

Another video game franchise with a gyaru character is the Dragon Quest series. On the Nintendo DS game Dragon Quest IX there is a gyaru as the fairy character, Sandy. The video-game company, Nintendo did not only cater to gyaru by the use of video-game promotions with gyaru or video games related to the gyaru subculture. They have a series of applications that can be used for both the Nintendo DSi and Nintendo 3DS. They are on the Nintendo DSiWare and the Nintendo eShop. It is a purikura application for both video-game consoles developed by the company Atlus. In Japan this series of applications are known as いつでもプリクラ キラデコプレミアム (itsudemo purikura kiradekopuremiamu) and abroad as the 'Sparkle Snapshots' series. Nintendo has made an homage to gyaru by having weapons in Wii U game Splatoon being inspired by decoden culture as the .52 deco gal and .96 deco gal; they have also used amiibo as a costume for the same game, a kogyaru outfit for female inkling characters. Besides that Splatoon 2 octoling idol Marina voice actress is a gyaru known as Alice Peralta and also has her own group with the voice actress of Pearl as the LAIDBACKS.

The Super Gals! anime series had its own video game, it is a series of threequels published in 2001 and 2002; produced by Konami for the Game Boy color and the PlayStation. The anime series Hime Gal Paradise also had its own video game on the Nintendo 3DS published by Nippon Columbia-games.

The avatar fashion web browser game and virtual community which later became a sequel series on the Nintendo DS, Poupéegirl, was popular amongst gyaru.