Toshihiro Nagoshi

Toshihiro Nagoshi
Place of birth: Shimonoseki, Yamaguchi, Japan
Date of birth: 1965-06-17 (age 54)
Company(ies): Sega of Japan
Role(s): Designer, Director, Producer, Executive
Education: Tokyo University of Art and Design

Toshihiro Nagoshi (名越 稔洋) is the current Chief Creative Officer of Sega and head of Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio.

He graduated from the Tokyo University of Art and Design in 1989 and joined the company shortly thereafter, working for AM2 under Yu Suzuki as a CG designer. He quickly ascended the ranks, and in 1998 became the manager of Sega AM11. He was also very integral into making Shenmue come to life. Although the credits only tell us he was a supervisor; he has revealed the development story. He was called by the CEO at the time to get the game finished, and as a result, he had to serve as producer and director on the final months of development. He recognized that as one of the turning points in his career.

When Sega AM11 became Amusement Vision, Nagoshi took the helm as president. He designed and created AM2's arguably most famous racing game Daytona USA, as well as the popular titles Super Monkey Ball and Yakuza.

After the collaboration with Nintendo on F-Zero GX, he would receive a call from Nintendo, requesting the source code of the game and wanting him to explain how they made such game. Nagoshi, who already was the president of Amusement Vision, achieved something that not even Nintendo could figure out. He stated, "After it released, I got a call from Nintendo. They said they wanted to see all the source code for the game, and wanted me to explain how we'd made that game, in that timeframe and with that budget, in detail. They were wondering how we'd done it - they couldn't figure it out. We were able to achieve something a lot higher than what Nintendo had expected."

He started getting executive credits unrelated to his current division from October of 2003 onwards. This stopped in April 2005, when he only managed the New Entertainment R&D Dept.. He returned to managing Sega's entire output when New Entertainment turned into CS1 in the middle of 2008.

On April 1, 2012, following a 2012 reshuffling, Nagoshi became the CCO of Sega. In October 2013, once Sega Sammy purchased the bankrupt Index Corporation under the shell corporation, Sega Dream Corporation, Nagoshi was appointed as a member of the board of directors for the reformed Atlus.

For game development, he frequently collaborates or has collaborated with Tetsuya Kaku, Daisuke Sato, Jun Tokuhara, Masayoshi Yokoyama and Masayoshi Kikuchi. In the executive enviorment, he has worked with Naoya Tsurumi and is currently working with Osamu Ohashi and Haruki Satomi.

Production history

• Virtua Racing (Model 1;
  1992) — Chief Designer
• Daytona USA (Model 2;
  1994) — Chief Designer
• Daytona USA (Model 2;
  1994) — Producer and Director
• Thunder Force VI (PlayStation 2;
  2008) — チーフプロデューサー (as 名越 稔洋)
• 7th Dragon (Nintendo DS;
  2009) — Chief Producer (as 名越 稔洋)
• K-On! Houkago Live!! (PlayStation Portable;
  2010) — チーフプロデューサー (as 名越 稔洋)
• Super Monkey Ball 3D (Nintendo 3DS;
  2011) — Chief Producers
• 7th Dragon 2020-II (PlayStation Portable;
  2013) — Executive Producers (as 名越 稔洋)
• Dengeki Bunko Fighting Climax (PlayStation 3;
  2014) — エグゼクティブプロデューサー (as 名越 稔洋)
• 3D Fantasy Zone: Opa-Opa Bros. (Nintendo 3DS;
  2014) — Executive Producers
• 3D OutRun (Nintendo 3DS;
  2014) — Executive Producers
• 3D Fantasy Zone II W (Nintendo 3DS;
  2014) — Executive Producers
• 3D Streets of Rage 2 (Nintendo 3DS;
  2015) — Executive Producers
• 3D Gunstar Heroes (Nintendo 3DS;
  2015) — Executive Producers
• Sega Ages Virtua Racing (Nintendo Switch;
  2019) — Executive Producers
• Sega Ages Wonder Boy: Monster Land (Nintendo Switch;
  2019) — Executive Producers

• Digital Dance Mix Vol.1 Namie Amuro (1997) — Special Thanks
• Sonic Battle (2003) — Executive Management
• Sonic Heroes (2003) — Development Division
• Sonic Advance 3 (2004) — Development Division
• Shining Force: Resurrection of the Dark Dragon (2004) — Executive Producer
• Ollie King (2004) — Special Thanks
• Sonic Riders (2006) — Development Support
• Yakuza 2 (2006) — General Director
• Ryu ga Gotoku Kenzan! (2008) — Planning/Original Concept
• Sonic Unleashed (2008) — Chief Producer
• Yakuza 3 (2009) — Planning/Original Concept, General Director
• Bayonetta (2009) — Chief Producer
• Sonic and the Black Knight (2009) — Chief Producer
• Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Winter Games (2009) — Chief Producer
• Sonic & Sega All-Stars Racing (2010) — Creative Officer
• Yakuza 4 (2010) — General Director
• Sonic Free Riders (2010) — Chief Producer
• Sonic Colors (2010) — Chief Producer
• Sonic Generations (2011) — Chief Producers
• Yakuza: Dead Souls (2012) — General Director
• Binary Domain (2012) — General Director
• Super Monkey Ball: Banana Splitz (2012) — Chief Producer
• Super Monkey Ball 2: Sakura Edition (2012) — Creative Officer
• Phantasy Star Online 2 (2012) — Executive Supervisors
• Yakuza 5 (2012) — General Director
• Ryu ga Gotoku 1&2 HD Edition (2013) — General Director
• Sonic Lost World (2013) — Chief Producer
• Hero Bank (2014) — Overall Production
• Ryu ga Gotoku: Ishin! (2014) — General Director
• Yakuza 0 (2015) — Executive Director
• Mario & Sonic at the Rio 2016 Olympic Games (2016) — Executive Supervisor (Sega Games)
• Yakuza Kiwami (2016) — General Director
• Yakuza 6: The Song of Life (2016) — Executive Director
• Puyo Puyo Chronicle (2016) — Chief Producers
• Sonic Mania (2017) — Executive Producer
• Sonic Forces (2017) — Executive Producer
• Yakuza Kiwami 2 (2017) — Executive Director
• Fist of the North Star: Lost Paradise (2018) — Executive Director
• Valkyria Chronicles 4 (2018) — Executive Producer
• Judgment (2018) — Based on a story by, Executive Director

Magazine articles

Main article: Toshihiro Nagoshi/Magazine articles.

Interviews

Some or all of the following content should be mirrored on Sega Retro (or Retro CDN).

• Toshihiro Nagoshi interview by Sega (August 14, 2003)

External links

• Blog (Japanese)
• Toshihiro Nagoshi on Wikipedia