Shinya Nishigaki
From Sega Retro
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| Shinya Nishigaki |
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| Place of birth: Osaka, Osaka, Japan |
| Date of birth: 1962[1] |
| Date of death: 2004-02-14[1] (age 41-42) |
| Company(ies): Climax Entertainment[1], Climax Graphics[1] |
| Role(s): Story Designer, Producer |
| Education: Aoyama Gakuin University (198x-1984; Bs Economics)[1] |
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Shinya Nishigaki (西垣 伸哉) was a Japanese video game developer and former Climax and Crazy Games game designer, producer, and story designer, most known for his work on the cult-classic survival horror games Blue Stinger and Illbleed.[1]
Contents
Career
Shinya Nishigaki got his start in the Japanese video game industry by working as a promotion consultant for what was then known as the Daiko Advertising Agency, now called Asatsu-DK. He joined the agency at age 22 after graduating with a degree in economics from Aoyama Gakuin University. While working with different video game clients, Nishigaki began to acquaint himself with an industry that was exploding. At age 26 he quit advertising and joined Enix to work in their business development department. There, Nishigaki worked on the English localization of Dragon Quest 2 and its sequel.[1]
Nishigaki then moved to Climax Entertainment where he gained experience on three action RPG titles. In 1992, Nishigaki was a scenario writer on Landstalker, which was released internationally and eventually sold 400,000 copies. He then helped on the production of Lady Stalker three years later, which went on to sell 150,000 copies. In August of 1996, Nishigaki would produce Dark Savior for the Sega Saturn.[1]
Talk of Sega's 128-bit next-gen console was surfacing and Nishigaki had a desire to create games with more cinematic qualities. This desire was warranted by his love and avid interest of cinema. Born in 1962 to mother Keiko and father Masao, Nishigaki grew up in Osaka. Masao was an advertising executive at Toho Studios and would allow his son to accompany him to movie premieres and showings. It was here that Nishigaki immersed himself in European and American films, all of which he could watch for free.[1]
At that time, Climax Entertainment's CEO Ken Naito only wanted to concentrate on racing titles and RPGs. Nishigaki took his cinematic video game ambitions and left Climax Entertainment to form a sister company in the Shinjuku district of Tokyo, fifteen minutes away from the offices of his former employer. Nishigaki's new company, Climax Graphics, would open in December of 1996. Both Climax Graphics and Climax Entertainment would keep in close connection with one another by sharing technical, design and programming know-how, alongside directly co-developing video games together. It was here that two Sega Dreamcast games, Blue Stinger and Illbleed would be created.[1]
Production history
Games
- Shining Force (Mega Drive; 1992) — Promotion Directed by[2]
- Landstalker: The Treasures of King Nole (Mega Drive; 1992) — Scenario[3]
- Dark Savior (Saturn; 1996) — 3D Map Planner[4]
- Blue Stinger (Dreamcast; 1999) — Original Story
- Blue Stinger (Dreamcast; 1999) — Producer
- Blue Stinger (Dreamcast; 1999) — Story
- Time Stalkers (Dreamcast; 1999) — 制作支援 (as 西垣 伸哉)
- Time Stalkers (Dreamcast; 1999) — Coopration
- Illbleed (Dreamcast; 2001) — Story
- Illbleed (Dreamcast; 2001) — Creature Design
- Illbleed (Dreamcast; 2001) — Background Design
- Illbleed (Dreamcast; 2001) — Game Scenario And Dialog
- Illbleed (Dreamcast; 2001) — Producer
- The Maze of the Kings (NAOMI GD-ROM; 2002) — Producer
Music
- Landstalker: Koutei no Zaihou (CD; 1992) — Special thanks
Photographs
- Main article: Photos of Shinya Nishigaki
External links
- Remembering Shinya Nishigaki and his "Crazy Games" Blue Stinger and Illbleed article by John Andersen at Gamasutra