Motoi Sakuraba is a Japanese composer and keyboardist. He is known for his numerous contributions in video games, including the Tales, Star Ocean, Mario Golf, Mario Tennis, Golden Sun, and Dark Souls series, as well as several other anime series, television dramas, and progressive rock albums.
Intelligent Systems Co., Ltd. is a Japanese video game developer best known for developing games published by Nintendo with the Fire Emblem, Paper Mario, WarioWare, and Wars video game series. Originally, the company was headquartered at the Nintendo Kyoto Research Center in Higashiyama-ku, Kyoto, but later moved to a building near Nintendo's main headquarters in October 2013. They were also responsible for the creation of various development hardware both first and 3rd party developers would use to make games for Nintendo systems, such as the IS Nitro Emulator, the official development kit for the Nintendo DS.
Atlus Co., Ltd. is a Japanese video game developer, publisher, arcade manufacturer and distribution company based in Tokyo. A subsidiary of Sega, the company is known for video game series such as Megami Tensei, Persona, Etrian Odyssey, and Trauma Center, as well as Print Club (Purikura) arcade machines. Its corporate mascot is Jack Frost, a snowman-like character from their Shin Megami Tensei series. Outside of video games, the company is known for their Purikura arcade machines, which are selfie photo sticker booths popular in East Asia.
Monolith Software Inc., trading as Monolith Soft, is a Japanese video game development studio originally owned by Namco until being bought out by Nintendo in 2007, best known for the Xenoblade Chronicles series of games. The company was founded in 1999 by Tetsuya Takahashi with the support and cooperation of Masaya Nakamura, the founder of Namco. Their first project was the Xenosaga series, a spiritual successor to the Square-developed Xenogears. Multiple Square staff would join Takahashi at Monolith Soft including Hirohide Sugiura and Yasuyuki Honne.
tri-Ace, Inc. is a Japanese video game developer founded in 1995. They are known for their role-playing games, most notably the Star Ocean and Valkyrie Profile series.
Baten Kaitos: Eternal Wings and the Lost Ocean is a role-playing video game developed by Monolith Soft and tri-Crescendo and published by Namco for the GameCube. In it, the player assume the role of a "guardian spirit" – an unseen player avatar – who guides protagonist Kalas and his party of companions in an adventure across an aerial floating island-based kingdom in the clouds. The game is focused around the concept of "Magnus" – magical cards that capture the "essence" of items found in the in-game world. The concept is used as a plot device, for in-game item management, and as a basis for the card-themed battle system. The game was noted for its unique battle system, which included aspects of turn-based and action-based battle systems, collectible card games, and poker.
Xenosaga I & II is a 2006 role-playing video game co-developed by Monolith Soft and Tom Create, and published by Namco for the Nintendo DS. A spin-off of the Xenosaga trilogy and forming part of the Xeno metaseries, Xenosaga I & II retells the events of Xenosaga Episode I and Xenosaga Episode II while expanding on its characters and narrative. Displayed from an angled two-dimensional perspective, Xenosaga I & II makes use of a turn-based battle system with elements carried over from the main Xenosaga games.
Namco × Capcom is a tactical role-playing (RPG) crossover video game developed by Monolith Soft for the PlayStation 2 and published by Namco in 2005. The gameplay combines tactical RPG and action sequences during battles, featuring characters from video game series owned by Namco and Capcom. The narrative sees original characters Reiji Arisu and Xiaomu, operatives for paranormal investigative group Shinra, confront distortions bringing characters from other realities into their own.
AlphaDream Corporation, Ltd. was a Japanese video game development company founded in 2000 by Tetsuo Mizuno and Chihiro Fujioka in Tokyo, Japan. In partnership with Nintendo, it produced software for the Game Boy Color, Game Boy Advance, Nintendo DS, Nintendo 3DS, and Nintendo Switch, including the Mario & Luigi series. The company's staff included former developers from Square, such as Yoshihiko Maekawa. On October 1, 2019, AlphaDream was shut down after filing for bankruptcy, and on February 28, 2020, AlphaDream ceased to exist as a company.
Baten Kaitos Origins, released in Japan as Baten Kaitos II, is a 2006 role-playing video game developed by Monolith Soft and Tri-Crescendo for the GameCube. It is a prequel to Baten Kaitos: Eternal Wings and the Lost Ocean (2003). Similar to the first entry, the player assume the role of a "guardian spirit" – an unseen player avatar – who guides protagonist Sagi and his party of companions in an adventure across an aerial floating island-based kingdom in the clouds. The game retains the original's focus around the concept of "Magnus" – magical cards that capture the "essence" of items found in the in-game world, where the concept is still used as a plot device, for in-game item management, and as a basis for the card-themed battle system, albeit with minor tweaks.
Hiroya Hatsushiba is the founder of video game developer tri-Crescendo, and a long time sound programmer for composer Motoi Sakuraba, whom he also gives English titles of the tracks Sakuraba creates.
Disaster: Day of Crisis is a 2008 action-adventure light gun shooter developed by Monolith Soft and published by Nintendo for the Wii. In it, the player must survive various natural disasters while battling terrorists and rescuing civilians. According to Nintendo, the game features "cutting-edge physics and gripping visuals" to recreate the sheer terror of major catastrophes.
T&E Soft Incorporated was a Japanese-based video game developer founded in 1982. Although they have made games with a wide variety of genres, they are primarily known for their action role-playing, golf and puzzle video games.
Yasuyuki Honne is a video game artist, director and producer. He was employed by Square from 1993 to 1999 and is now working at Monolith Soft. He is known for his work on the Chrono series, Xeno games and Baten Kaitos series.
Visual Arts, formerly Visual Artist Office and previously spelled in English as VisualArt's, is a Japanese publishing company which specializes in publishing and distributing visual novels for a large list of game developers. Visual Arts has developed game engines their brands currently use, including the current engine, called Siglus, and older engines RealLive and AVG32. Visual Arts also handles the distribution of these games. The games published are mostly for a male audience, though they also publish games targeted towards women as well. They are well known for publishing games developed by Key, such as Kanon, Air, and Clannad.
Fragile Dreams: Farewell Ruins of the Moon is an action role-playing game for the Wii developed by Namco Bandai Games in co-operation with Tri-Crescendo. The game was released by Namco Bandai Games in Japan on January 22, 2009. It was later published by Xseed Games in North America on March 16, 2010, and in Europe by Rising Star Games on March 19, 2010, followed by its release in Australia on October 7, 2010.
Nazca Corporation was a Japanese company that developed video games for the Neo Geo games console. The company was formed in 1994 by a group of employees from Irem who were tired of the company's inactivity. In 1996, the company was acquired by SNK.
Kaito is a Voice Synth developed by Yamaha Corporation for the VOCALOID1 engine, and distributed by Crypton Future Media. He has performed at live concerts onstage as an animated projection along with Crypton's other Voice Synth characters. His original codename was "TARO" back during "Project Daisy", the predecessor of VOCALOID, and was one of the original four known vocals for the project. His voice provider is Japanese singer Naoto Fūga. He was the fifth and final vocal released for the original VOCALOID software, and the second vocal released in Japanese.
8-4, Ltd. is a Japanese video game localization company based in Shibuya, Tokyo. The company was founded in 2005 by Hiroko Minamoto and former Electronic Gaming Monthly (EGM) editor John Ricciardi. They were joined by Ricciardi's EGM colleague Mark MacDonald in 2008, who departed in 2016 to work as VP, Production of Business and Development at Enhance Games. It performs Japanese-to-English and English-to-Japanese translation and localization on a contract basis with credits including Monster Hunter, Nier, Dragon Quest, Fire Emblem, Tales, Undertale and more. The company is named after the final level of Super Mario Bros.
