Japanese culture, though very "western", is not very American. Many essential American cultural elements such as religion, guns, cars, libertarians, feminism, and no sex on TV are missing, and it is certainly not as individualist.
It's not a great place to be a programmer, though - people I know working at pixiv (a modern foreigner-friendly web startup) aren't paid even entry-level US salaries.
But with pixiv you can see one of the good sides of Japan. It's basically DeviantArt, but amateur artists on pixiv have often practiced for years and their art is technically good, whereas DeviantArt posters are all more than satisfied with their weird fetish art they drew in MS Paint.
You could try Korea, which is a lot more like America. Specifically, Texas.