Ask HN: Expat software engineers in Japan, how are you making it happen?

There seems to be a lot of desire for software engineers to live and work in Japan, at least some fairly passionate minority of people. I also see people on HN pop up from time to time and describe the fact that they live and work in Japan; I suspect most are expats, tho I may be totally wrong here. :)

I'm wondering: How are you all pulling it off? Where are you working?

From what I've seen, salaries and working conditions at Japanese software firms seem generally on the weaker side.

Obvious options seem to be:

1. Work for Google Japan, or some other major Western company with a Japanese engineering presence 2. Work for a Japanese game company 3. Become an entrepreneur 4. Work at a Japanese company (Rakuten, etc)

What are most of you doing and do you have any advice here? I'm wondering how the crowd here distributes between these four options (or possibly others).

I'd love to return to Japan, and if possible I'd love to work outside of the Tokyo region (so, likely remote if necessary).

<Edit>

I can speak Japanese and would prefer a Japanese language working environment, but am flexible on that if need be.

Thanks!