Toshihiro Nagoshi

Toshihiro Nagoshi’s New Studio To Be Named ‘Nagoshi Studio’ Leaks European IP Office

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Toshihiro Nagoshi has been a big figure at SEGA ever since he worked on the massively popular Daytona USA with SEGA-AM2. Ever since then he has had his own studio, first with Amusement Vision with creating hit games like Super Monkey Ball and later to creating the massively popular Yakuza series and the Ryu Go Gotaku Studios! Nagoshi would announce him leaving SEGA this past October to work with Chinese developer NetEase.

The story has always been that Nagoshi would set to create his own new team over at NetEase and create new games for the company. Sadly the Nagoshi Studios trademark has now been removed from the EU IP Office entry, but the representative company ‘Ingenias’ has also filed a ton of IP trademarks including “Abyss Rush”.

Looking at the trademarked logo, it seems like most likely, the new studio will be barring Toshihiro Nagoshi’s family name. Nagoshi Studio makes sense and the logo having a film strip as part of its design makes sense considering RGG Studios’ games have always been highly cinematic.

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SEGA News Bits LIVE: Shenmue the Animation Update

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New information about Shenmue the Animation has dropped via an online panel, and on this SEGA News Bits we take a look at what was revealed. Also, two SEGA legends are departing the company. Who are they and where are they going? Click play and let’s find out!

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Yakuza Creator Doesn’t Want Kazuma Kiryu in Fighting Games Because He Doesn’t Want Him ‘Beating Up Women’

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While Kazuma Kiryu is a big, strong Japanese man that has slapped children and even killed a few people. It seems that series Creator and Producer Toshihiro Nagoshi doesn’t want his leading hero in fighting games because, he doesn’t want  him hitting women. According to a recent Red Bull France interview:

“We do get this request a lot. Of course there are exceptions, but fighting games generally have female characters, and personally I don’t really want to see Kiryu beating up women.”

Its understandable to feel this way since Kazuma Kiryu is a old school type and wouldn’t make sense for a character like him to assault women. I don’t disagree with him, but fighting games aren’t considered canon or real. Its like, are we really gonna say Mario is out there hitting women and knocking them into a internal abyss when he ring outs them? I think you guys all agree that Kazuma Kiryu joining a game like Tekken 7 or even a new Virtua Fighter won’t ruin his character?

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Yakuza: Like A Dragon’s story mode alone will be more than twice as long as previous games

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The latest issue of the Weekly Famitsu magazine in Japan had a huge feature on the upcoming Yakuza: Like a Dragon (aka Yakuza 7: Wherebouts of Light and Darkness). There are a ton of great tidbits of new information regarding the upcoming game but one that stood out was the team saying that Yakuza: Like a Dragon‘s story mode will be ‘more than twice as long’. That really makes you question if its because of the new combat system, which is taking a turn based RPG approach or if its just because this game will have more content. I mean, Yakuza 5’s story was ridiculously long and if this is going to be more than double the length…. I’m in!

Check out the tidbits over at Gematsu!

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SEGA celebrates 30 years of Toshihiro Nagoshi with a look back at his career

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SEGA has released a sit down interview video with Toshihiro Nagoshi, chief creative officer at SEGA. SEGA fans know Nagoshi best for Daytona USA, the Super Monkey Ball games and Yakuza. The interview contains some interesting information, including Nagoshi saying that the games where he listened to other people didn’t work too well (Binary Domain, perhaps?). In regards to the Yakuza franchise, Nagoshi notes that the original Yakuza did not sell enough to cover development costs which led to the team having to more effectively use their resources for the sequel. Only a year passed between the first two Yakuza games, and this was an effort to keep the series alive in people’s minds, which meant a very busy and short development cycle. This hard work paid off, however, as Yakuza 2 sold twice as many copies as the first game.

Check out the video for yourself above, and here’s hoping we see more content like this from SEGA’s YouTube channel!

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Project JUDGE gets almost an hour long English-dubbed presentation

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If you are excited for the next Ryu Ga Gotoku Studios (Yakuza Studio) next game, right now using the working title Project JUDGE (JUDGE EYES in Japan) then you are in luck since there is a long form presentation which features Takuya Kimura, Shosuke Tanihara, Kenichi Takito, Akira Nakao, Alexandros (Japanese rock band), and SEGA’s Toshihiro Nagoshi!  This presentation is dubbed, with a translator for fans to from America to enjoy.

This is possibly one of the more in-depth reveals to a game in a very long time, especially for SEGA. Not only did we get a world wide announcement, but Japan also got a demo on the same day it was revealed and its coming out by the end of 2019 in Asian countries. Yakuza Studio is on fire!

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Next Yakuza Project to remain ‘hardcore’ but ‘interesting’ according to SEGA’s Toshihiro Nagoshi

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The latest retail issue of Edge magazine features a interview with SEGA Chief Creative Officer Toshihiro Nagoshi where he talks about the development stories behind F-Zero GX and Yakuza; but also teases the Yakuza Studios next project:

“It will still be quite hardcore at the beginning, but I want the player to think “Oh this game seems really interesting” – that’s what I’m aiming for this time. That goes for the technology too, though I don’t want to say more as it will spoil the fun. By introducing a new and more current systems, I’d like to increase the number of players. And if I do that, I can re-introducing Kiryu-san to some new fans. That would be ideal.” – Toshihiro Nagoshi
The most interesting part is where he says he wants to re-introduce Kiryu-san to new fans, which is odd because the next Yakuza project, being titled Shin Yakuza, is suppose to have a brand new lead character and Yakuza 6 was meant to be Kiryu’s last game. Some people are assuming there is some translation errors, but could it be that Shin Yakuza will have Kazuma Kiryu as a NPC supporting character in the story? I guess we will find out sooner than later, with Tokyo Game Show 2018 around the corner… What do you think?
[Via: ResetEra]

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SEGA teases possible New Sakura Wars game presentation during Tokyo Game Show 2018 talk

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If you guys didn’t already know, SEGA will be reviving the Sakura Wars franchise with a brand new game which was announced at SEGA Fes 2018 this past April. As far as that announcement, SEGA and the team have been pretty hushed on details until it was brought up on SEGA’s latest Sega-Nama broadcast, a official Japanese SEGA news variety program hosted by Toshihiro Nagoshi.

Hit the jump to check out Nagoshi and co-host Anyana Tsubaki discuss the possibility of a Sakura Taisen presentation set for ‘summer’:

Continue Reading ➜

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Nagoshi says Yakuza 3, 4 and 5 remasters are for new overseas fans, confirms no cut content

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In a recent streaming broadcast discussing the upcoming Yakuza 3, Yakuza 4 and Yakuza 5 remasters for PlayStation 4, SEGA’s chief creative officer Toshihiro Nagoshi revealed new information about the genesis of the remasters. According to Nagoshi, the remasters are intended for new overseas fans. Following the release of Yakuza 0, the franchise has seen a renaissance outside Japan with latest title Yakuza 6: The Song of Life being the biggest US launch in the series’ history. So it only made sense to fill the gap between Yakuza Kiwami 2 and Yakuza 6.

Also revealed in the video, Nagoshi states that there will not be cut content in the remasters, which is great news for those who played the PS3 originals outside Japan. Check out the full video here, and in the comments below share your thoughts on the news!

[Source: Resetera]

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SEGA’s Toshihiro Nagoshi teases unannounced projects for 2018

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The Japanese website 4Gamer has put up an article talking to Japanese video game developers from a wide range of companies on what to expect from them in 2018. It is basically a yearly tradition at this point. Sadly we only got one person interviewed from SEGA and that was Toshihiro Nagoshi, who has many hats at SEGA including Chief Creative Officer. This is what Toshihiro Nagoshi had to say about 2018:

“We still have some unannounced things. We have more surprises, so please look forward to it!”- Toshihiro Nagoshi

Sucks that he didn’t tease what these announcements could be or from what studio within SEGA they are coming from. Toshihiro Nagoshi’s own studio, Yakuza Studios, seems to have laid out its future recently at this year’s TGS with titles like Yakuza Kiwami 2 (Just released earlier this month in Japan), Hokuto ga Gotoku (comes out March 2018), Yakuza Online mobile game, and the barely teased Shin Yakuza title. I doubt these announcements are from the Yakuza Studio, but you never know. There was that financial report that stated SEGA wanted to revive major IPs on their road to 2020. Could we be seeing some of the first hints of this next year? What do you want to see SEGA announce for next year? Let us know in the comments below!

[Via: Siliconera]

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Yakuza Kiwami 2 happened due to how well Yakuza 0 and Yakuza Kiwami did outside Japan

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Yesterday we discussed how Yakuza Studio head Toshihiro Nagoshi had a live stream to explain details on their earlier announcements. One of those was to confirm that the Fist of the North Star game was running on the studio’s older Yakuza 0 engine and the other fun tidbit was that Yakuza Kiwami 2 is only happening due to how well Yakuza 0 and Yakuza Kiwami performed with pre-orders and overall sales.

According to NeoGAF poster Gacha-pin, he specifically mentioned ‘Yakuza‘ and not ‘Ryū Ga Gotoku‘ (Like a Dragon) as the franchise is known as in Japan and Asian countries. This means that maybe SEGA is finally impressed with how the game has performed in Europe and in the Americas? We are getting a impressive Yakuza 6 premium edition and it seemed that when Yakuza 0 came out it kept selling out on Amazon. Its good to see a game that I have been following for more than a decade finally get the recognition it deserves outside of Japan. Seeing as SEGA America is already asking fans if they are hyped for the upcoming Yakuza games, I would wager that we will be getting more Yakuza titles in the future. Good times.

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SEGA’s Fist of the North Star confirmed to run on Yakuza 0’s engine, not Yakuza 6

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thumb-chara01-modalSEGA held another live stream the other day to confirm some misconceptions revolving around their recent Yakuza Studio announcements which included a new Fist of the North Star game. At the time it was highly believed to be running on the ‘Dragon Engine’ which is the latest in-house engine created by the studio, this was mostly due to Yakuza Kiwami 2 using the engine.

So why will Fist of the North Star use the older, Yakuza 0/Kiwami engine? According to studio head Toshihiro Nagoshi its because the team has more experience with the ‘Kiwami engine’ and its better for celshaded graphics. Also note that the Dragon Engine is still under development, while the older engine already achieves 60fps at 1080p on the PlayStation 4 while Yakuza 6 ran at 30 fps.

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SEGA announces Fist of the North Star game by Yakuza studio

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It seems that Yakuza Studios is hard at work over there, because they announced not one, not two, not three, but four new projects. As you seen from our last posts, this amounts to a remake of Yakuza 2, a new Yakuza side game with new protagonist and even a Yakuza Online mobile game. But sometimes the studio wants to take a break from the world of Yakuza, hint them making a Fist of the North Star game with the Yakuza 6 graphical engine. UPDATE: Its actually running on the Yakuza 0 engine!

The game is going by the name of ‘Yakuza of the North Star‘, but will probably get a real title down the road. It seems like a working title. It has been confirmed that the voice actor for Kazuma Kiryu (Takaya Kurdoa) will also be voicing Kenshiro! Seems that the game is in early stages and we will be hearing more about it come 2018 or even in the Tokyo Game Show next month!

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SEGA officially announces Yakuza Kiwami 2, Goro Majima will be playable

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We all knew it was coming thanks to Sony’s mistake on early Friday morning but SEGA has now officially announced Yakuza Kiwami 2. Following from the success of Yakuza Kiwami, SEGA began developing a remake of the second Yakuza game. It’s obvious to see the mass improvements the dragon engine is already providing as they bring this classic back for the modern generation. Personally speaking Yakuza 2 has my favorite story and cast of characters in the series but the game obviously has been held back by the technology of the time so to see it updated brought a smile to my face.

Yakuza Kiwami 2 promises to feature seamless maps of Osaka and Tokyo. The theme song for Yakuza Kiwami  2 is being performed by SiM, a Reggae Pop band. Yakuza Kiwami 2 hits the PlayStation 4 in Japan on December 7th of this year. No word about a Western release, but I wouldn’t expect it until months after Yakuza 6 ships.

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