Famitsu | One Million Power

With the Creators’ Cats: A Cat Games Feature

(The following is a translation from the 03/08/2018 issue of Famitsu magazine. Original page scans can be found at the end of the article.)

A Nyan-Nyan Special Feature: Was That Game Made With the Support of This Cat!?

With the Creators' Cats: A Cat Games Feature

In our February 1st issue there was a feature in which we introduced game creators' dogs. But we suspect there are a lot of creators that are cat people as well! So in honor of February 22nd being Cat Day, cats are going to be running rampant throughout this feature. So take a look at all of these creators' cute partners that support their hard work in game creation from behind the scenes! These pages are also packed full of all sorts of fluffy information on games in which cats appear or are befriended in! Continue Reading

Famitsu Special Report – The Mystery of TOSE

(The following is a translation from the 04/13/2017 issue of Famitsu magazine) This is the real story behind TOSE: The game development company that's been making games for nearly 38 years (since 1979), but hardly any gamers know.

The Story of the Biggest and Most Beloved Japanese Contract Development Company That's Worked on 2257 Different Games

Back in February, Editor in Chief and author Hayashi went to an office in a business district in the Karasuma area of Kyoto. His destination was the biggest Japanese game development company, TOSE: An independent contract development company. Particularly amazing was the materials room hidden within, shown to us by CEO Shigeru Saitou: The over 1000 games that TOSE developed (excluding digital games) were all lined up in that narrow space. Saitou remarked "It's unfortunate that we can't show everyone all of the software that we've developed". As previously mentioned, TOSE develops games under contract from publishers, so they're rarely able to publicize the games that they develop due to contracts with their clients. Even editors in video games media don't know very much about them. Our Editor in Chief even remarked "Huh? TOSE made that game too?!" several times. What lied there was truly a new history of video games from the Famicom era to the present, unknown to anyone. Continue Reading