Mayumi Moro

From Sega Retro

MayumiMoro 2022.jpg
Mayumi Moro
Place of birth: Arakawa, Tokyo, Japan[1]
Date of birth: 19??-02-04[2] (age Expression error: Unrecognized punctuation character "?".)
Employment history:
Sega Enterprises (1994-04-01[3] – )
Divisions:
Divisions:
Divisions:
Sega Sammy Holdings (2019-09-27[8] – )
Role(s): Director, Designer, Artist
Education: Kuwasawa Design School[3]

Mayumi Moro (茂呂 真由美), known as Mayumi Moro Watanabe after marriage[9], is a Japanese businesswoman and artist and former Sega of Japan Art Director, designer, and artist, currently employed at Sega Sammy Holdings. She is best known for her work on Panzer Dragoon Saga, the Space Channel 5 series and the Sonic Channel website. Moro has also directed several Android games and designed T-shirts for promotional events. She has been a prominent public speaker since 2018, giving presentations about issues on the mind's of working parents and their bosses/managers. Moro has 2 daughters[10].

Moro created the Morolians from Space Channel 5,[11] and they are named after her surname.[12]

Education

Mayumi Moro was mostly educated at woman-only schools, as early as Joshi Seigakuin Junior & Senior High School[8]. She also took a design class at Ochabi Institute under Kashiwa Sato and Masafumi Ishiwata[8]. Before joining Sega, Moro graduated from Kuwasawa Design School[3][8] alongside Mayumi Horisawa and Ringo Manabe[3]. She also studied design at the Suido Bata Academy of Fine Arts under Hide Nakaya[8].

Career

Game development

Moro as a new Sega employee in 1994.

Mayumi Moro joined the Consumer R&D Department[4] of Sega Enterprises in 1994. Moro was 151 centimeters tall at the time, but hoped she wouldn't be teased for being so short her new workmates[3]. Some fellow new artists in 1994 who she would work with soon after include Hiroki Okabata, Makiko Banju and Yumiko Miyabe.

Moro first worked on games for the Sega Saturn, her first 2 projects both being the first in a series of football/soccer games: Victory Goal[13][4], where she imported photos of players into the game's yearbook and created the Aurora Vision video[4]; and J.League Pro Soccer Club o Tsukurou!, designing the player's uniforms and creating textures, among other things[14]. Despite only having about a year or two of experience by this point, Mayumi Moro then became the sole designer for the Western version of Baku Baku Animal on Saturn[15][16].

Moro created graphics for the first Sakura Taisen in 1996, specifically making pixel art, which she had never done before[17]. She and several other Sakura Taisen developers would then be part of Sega CS1[5], creating what is often listed as Moro's first major accomplishment: Panzer Dragoon Saga[18], for which she created field art for 2 areas[19][13][20]. Around 1997, before Panzer Dragoon Saga was released, she was one of the department's many Panzer Dragoon developers who began developing Space Channel 5, with Moro needing to be transferred to Sega Digital Media to work on the game, at the request of Yumiko Miyabe[5]. Various developers split off of Digital Media to form Sega Software R&D Dept. 9 in 1999 before the game's release[5]. For SC5, Moro worked on characters and backgrounds, most notably creating the Morolians[11], who are named after her surname[12]. As a modeling artist, she also created the in-game model of Michael Jackson[21].

The Michael Jackson model in Space Channel 5, created by Mayumi Moro, does a pose from different angles.

Software R&D Dept. 9, like the other software development departments, were spun off into their own subsidiary company in 2000: United Game Artists. Here, Moro continued her work on the Space Channel 5 series as art director for Space Channel 5: Part 2, taking over the role from Yumiko Miyabe who was promoted to the game's overall director. Moro also worked on facial animation for Astro Boy, which began its development at UGA.

Moro in United Game Artists HQ, holding a toy of one of her characters.

Web and mobile development

After United Game Artists was merged with Sonic Team in 2003, Mayumi Moro instead became a web designer for the Puyo Puyo and Sonic the Hedgehog franchises among others. She was the director of Sonic Channel from 2005 to 2009[19][6], and directed the mobile game Sonic the Sketchhog for the series' 20th anniversary[22], plus created the original sketches[19]. She also worked on the similar mobile games Sonic & Tails Kuuchuu Sanpo and Sonic: Jump[23] (not to be confused with the 2 more well-known mobile games named Sonic Jump, from 2005 and 2012).

Beginning with Sega Superstars Tennis in 2008, she was also regularly consulted on the representation of the Space Channel 5 franchise in crossover games, also for Sonic & Sega All-Stars Racing and the Project X Zone duology.

Around 2012, she was moved from CS2 to Mobile R&D, creating games for Android like a redesigned version of Baku Baku Animal[24][15] and the new spin-off game Baku Baku Camera[25]. These two were exclusive to au Smart Pass, while the 2 AR Touch games she created thereafter were exclusive to Telebeena[6].

In 2015, Mayumi Moro branched out into apparel, designing Space Channel 5-inspired shirts and bags that were made available at Tokyo Game Show 2015[26][27]. The most notable apparel she designed was released 2 years later, the Sega GameJam T-Shirt[6]. Possibly related, by 2018 she was stationed at the Planning, Development & Managing Dept. under the Development Supervision Dept, itself under the IP & Game Div.[7].

Her final role at Sega Games (now not tied to any specific department[28]) was managing the social media accounts for D×2: Shin Megami Tensei Liberation[29].

Human resources and presentations

Kozue Suzuki and Mayumi Moro present for CEDEC 2019

In 2019, Mayumi Moro transferred to Sega Sammy Holdings and was stationed at the General Affairs and Human Resources HQ: Facility Service Dept.: Communication Promotion Div. (総務人事本部 ファシリティサービス部 コミュニケーション推進課)[8]. Per the name, she was responsible for promoting better communication between employees.

Beginning slightly earlier, in 2018, Mayumi Moro, often with Kozue Suzuki, became regular speakers for Unity Women in Gaming: Tokyo[30], Sanuki X Game[31] and GameCreatorsGuild (GCG)[32].

Moro also gave at least one presentation almost annually at CEDEC. In 2018, she and Suzuki talked about a healthy work/life balance for working mothers[33]; they held another panel in 2019 on this same topic[28]; In 2021, she moderated a panel on paternity leave, half of the men present made up of Sega employees[34]; later the same day she was part of a 3-part presentation, with Kiminori Takeuchi and Historia CEO Shun Sasaki, about working from home and working parents' concerns about it[35]; 2 days later Moro and Jun Matsunaga were two of the judges for PERACON2021 who ensured the diversity of submitted PERACON products, with this being Moro's fifth time reviewing for PERACON[36]; in 2022 she and ILINX CEO Hiroyuki Tanaka discussed the COVID-19 pandemic and how it had affected the way parents work, as well as a boss/manager's perspective[37]; in 2023, the same pair discussed the "era of VUCA and the thoughts about it from working parents and executives[38]; 2 days later she discussed Femtech in relation to the video game industry and providing people, especially men, with a better understanding of it[39].

Production history

Games

Music

Magazine articles

Main article: Mayumi Moro/Magazine articles.

Photographs

Main article: Photos of Mayumi Moro

External links

References

  1. ↑ https://www.facebook.com/mayumi.moro/about_places
  2. ↑ https://www.facebook.com/mayumi.moro/about_contact_and_basic_info
  3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 3.4 Harmony, "1994 4" (JP; 1994-04-01), page 22
  4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 4.3 @MORO_M on Twitter (Wayback Machine: 2019-11-22 12:50)
  5. ↑ 5.0 5.1 5.2 5.3 https://www.4gamer.net/games/409/G040915/20221019050/ (Wayback Machine: 2022-11-11 03:01)
  6. ↑ 6.0 6.1 6.2 6.3 https://cedil.cesa.or.jp/cedil_sessions/view/1992 (Wayback Machine: 2021-05-06 10:16)
  7. ↑ 7.0 7.1 https://cedil.cesa.or.jp/cedil_sessions/view/1872 (Wayback Machine: 2023-11-23 16:57)
  8. ↑ 8.0 8.1 8.2 8.3 8.4 8.5 https://www.facebook.com/mayumi.moro/about_work_and_education
  9. ↑ https://www.facebook.com/mayumi.moro.watanabe
  10. ↑ https://game.creators-guild.com/g4c/19267/ (Wayback Machine: 2022-08-18 07:39)
  11. ↑ 11.0 11.1 http://www.u-ga.com/jp/company/list_staff.php?HID_EMP_NO=J00105 (Wayback Machine: 2003-04-03 21:50)
  12. ↑ 12.0 12.1 Dreamcast Magazine, "2000-06 (2000-02-25)" (JP; 2000-02-11), page 56
  13. ↑ 13.0 13.1 https://www.4gamer.net/games/409/G040915/20221019050/
  14. ↑ @MORO_M on Twitter (Wayback Machine: 2019-11-22 12:58)
  15. ↑ 15.0 15.1 @MORO_M on Twitter (Wayback Machine: 2019-11-22 13:02)
  16. ↑ @MORO_M on Twitter (archive.today)
  17. ↑ @MORO_M on Twitter (Wayback Machine: 2019-11-22 13:33)
  18. ↑ https://cedec.cesa.or.jp/2022/session/detail/172.html
  19. ↑ 19.0 19.1 19.2 @MORO_M on Twitter
  20. ↑ @MORO_M on Twitter (Wayback Machine: 2019-11-22 13:36)
  21. ↑ @MORO_M on Twitter (archive.today)
  22. ↑ @MORO_M on Twitter (archive.today)
  23. ↑ https://techblog.sega.jp/entry/2017/09/25/100000
  24. ↑ https://www.facebook.com/mayumi.moro/posts/357089517721283
  25. ↑ @MORO_M on Twitter (archive.today)
  26. ↑ @Space_Channel5 on Twitter (archive.today)
  27. ↑ @MORO_M on Twitter (archive.today)
  28. ↑ 28.0 28.1 https://cedec.cesa.or.jp/2019/session/detail/s5c865fd25a6fb.html (Wayback Machine: 2021-06-30 23:31)
  29. ↑ https://cedil.cesa.or.jp/cedil_sessions/view/1992
  30. ↑ https://meetup.unity3d.jp/jp/events/683
  31. ↑ https://sxgkagawa3.peatix.com/view (Wayback Machine: 2023-11-23 17:18)
  32. ↑ https://game.creators-guild.com/g4c/19267/?utm_campaign=0902 (Wayback Machine: 2022-11-03 10:22)
  33. ↑ https://cedec.cesa.or.jp/2018/session/detail/s5a828d946c78d.html (Wayback Machine: 2023-11-23 17:08)
  34. ↑ https://cedec.cesa.or.jp/2021/session/detail/s6064daaf0e1a7.html (Wayback Machine: 2022-06-28 13:08)
  35. ↑ https://cedec.cesa.or.jp/2021/session/detail/s6064ddcfc2bc6.html (Wayback Machine: 2022-08-14 05:28)
  36. ↑ https://cedec.cesa.or.jp/2021/session/detail/s60b05a88063ab.html (Wayback Machine: 2023-11-23 17:42)
  37. ↑ https://cedec.cesa.or.jp/2022/session/detail/172 (Wayback Machine: 2022-12-05 01:57)
  38. ↑ https://cedec.cesa.or.jp/2023/session/detail/s642949e47ed5f (Wayback Machine: 2023-11-23 06:57)
  39. ↑ https://cedec.cesa.or.jp/2023/session/detail/s6440f7ad3d2df (Wayback Machine: 2023-11-23 18:08)
  40. ↑ File:Victory Goal Saturn credits.pdf
  41. ↑ File:Kisuishou Densetsu Astal Saturn credits.pdf
  42. ↑ File:Baku Baku Animal Saturn credits.pdf
  43. ↑ File:J.League Pro Soccer Club o Tsukurou! Saturn credits.pdf
  44. ↑ File:Sakura Taisen Saturn credits.pdf
  45. ↑ File:Azel Panzer Dragoon RPG Saturn credits.pdf
  46. ↑ File:SevenRingsInHand CD JP booklet.pdf, page 11
  47. ↑ File:SRAOST CD JP booklet.pdf, page 3
  48. ↑ File:FacetoFaith CD JP booklet.pdf, page 11
  49. ↑ File:TalesofKnighthood CD JP booklet.pdf, page 10
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