Yoshiki Okamoto leaves Capcom
Imad Hussain
"Legendary Capcom producer Yoshiki Okamoto (Street Fighter, for one)
has left his company, blaming poor decisions by Capcom execs, and his
disapproval with the direction the company was going. So he has left
to forge his own company; Game Republic."
My thoughts:
Yoshiki Okamoto was the visionary behind Final Fight and Street
Fighter II. He was in a large part responsible for the Resident Evil
series (particularly RE2) in his role as Capcom's general manager of
production design. He began his video game design career at Konami by
creating the classics Time Pilot and Gyruss virtually single-handedly
before moving to Capcom with 1942. He was also heavily involved with
the creation and operation of Flagship, the Capcom affiliate that
wrote the storylines and scenarios for the GameBoy Color Legend of
Zelda games as well as the Resident Evil games (RE 2 onwards) and even
developed Onimusha.
His loss comes as a major blow to Capcom -- Okamoto was one of the
video gaming world's most important figures; perhaps not up there with
Shigeru Miyamoto, but at least on par with Gumpei Yokoi, Hironobu
Sakaguchi and Yuji Naka.
On the other hand, Okamoto has always been a rebel and independent.
After all, he created Time Pilots against the explicit instructions of
his boss (who wanted him to create a simulator for driver's ed) and
was actually fired from Konami, despite the immense popularity of his
games. Perhaps he'll be better off with his own, entirely independent
company (Flagship wasn't very independent, was it?).
--
Best,
Imad Hussain
mag...@purdue.edu
Tempora
news:Pine.SOL.4.51.03...@herald.cc.purdue.edu...
> From Insert Credit (and Gamefront.de):
> "Legendary Capcom producer Yoshiki Okamoto (Street Fighter, for one)
> has left his company, blaming poor decisions by Capcom execs, and his
> disapproval with the direction the company was going. So he has left
> to forge his own company; Game Republic."
>
>
I'm hoping Microsoft decides to pick up this new development team on the
cheap,
when this Game Republic can't get the level of funding usually provided by
Capcom, to round out their international stable
of USA Bungie and UK Rare since it doesn't seem MS will be picking up Sega.
Rob McGregor
> Yoshiki Okamoto was the visionary behind Final Fight and Street
> Fighter II. He was in a large part responsible for the Resident Evil
> series (particularly RE2) in his role as Capcom's general manager of
> production design. He began his video game design career at Konami by
> creating the classics Time Pilot and Gyruss virtually single-handedly
> before moving to Capcom with 1942. He was also heavily involved with
> the creation and operation of Flagship, the Capcom affiliate that
> wrote the storylines and scenarios for the GameBoy Color Legend of
> Zelda games as well as the Resident Evil games (RE 2 onwards) and even
> developed Onimusha.
>
> His loss comes as a major blow to Capcom -- Okamoto was one of the
> video gaming world's most important figures; perhaps not up there with
> Shigeru Miyamoto, but at least on par with Gumpei Yokoi, Hironobu
> Sakaguchi and Yuji Naka.
>
> On the other hand, Okamoto has always been a rebel and independent.
> After all, he created Time Pilots against the explicit instructions of
> his boss (who wanted him to create a simulator for driver's ed) and
> was actually fired from Konami, despite the immense popularity of his
> games. Perhaps he'll be better off with his own, entirely independent
> company (Flagship wasn't very independent, was it?).
Rebel is damn straight. I can't think of any better way to say it.
But this said, Okamoto has "left" Capcom three times now after this latest
event right? (I'm sure I remember he left once after being unhappy about
how Street Fighter was being handled, then once again when he went to form
Flagship in 1997 - which after RE2 couldn't get much other work so he
ended up bring it to Capcom). Capcom also gave him a lot more say in some
of these projects than they should have - for example he was nearly the
cause of there never being a Biohazard as much as he was in getting
Mikami's work off the ground. I think he was also the one to cause some
headaches with Onimusha, clashing with Inafune on somethings. Maybe I
misread that.
I wonder who's going to take up his role as one of the producers on the
Resident Evil movie sequel. He clearly can't be involved anymore like he
was on the first film.
Clydefrog
wrote:
>From Insert Credit (and Gamefront.de):
>"Legendary Capcom producer Yoshiki Okamoto (Street Fighter, for one)
>has left his company, blaming poor decisions by Capcom execs, and his
>disapproval with the direction the company was going. So he has left
>to forge his own company; Game Republic."
>
He disagrees with Capcom starting to become a revolutionary company
again, like in the 1991-1995 era, as opposed to the
milk-everything-for-every-last-scent-and-run-everything-into-the-ground
company policy they had?
What an asshat.
section8pidgeon
> creating the classics Time Pilot and Gyruss virtually single-handedly
Wow, Time Pilot and Gyruss are 2 of my favorite old-school arcade
games. I had no idea that they were created by the same guy.
Clydefrog
(section8pidgeon) wrote:
Yes. Too bad he's an egotistical asshole who deserved to be shut out
from every gaming company he has ever been employed by.
Danielle Bradley
Rob McGregor wrote:
"Executive Producer" to be exact :D :p
And yeah, I was thinking the same thing. Okamoto served as an
advisor/helper for the first Resident Evil movie. I remember hearing
Paul Anderson saying that Okamoto was there for them answering
questions and such, relating to Resident Evil.
BLITZ
"Danielle Bradley" <djbr...@shaw.ca> wrote in message
news:3EFEFD18...@shaw.ca...
Mentski
"Clydefrog" <voramyr_s...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:un5tfv408rih7qbpn...@4ax.com...
Oh yes, that wonderful 91-95 era, where we saw:
Street Fighter II
Street Fighter II' Champion Edition
Street Fighter II Turbo Hyper Fighting
Super Street Fighter II
Super Street Fighter II Turbo
(Not that I'm complaining much about that, this is the SF2 group, after all
(or at least thats where I'm reading this, hello a.g.r-e!). But they've been
franchise milkers since SF2 came out, If you'd said 86 to about 93, I might
have agreed with you.)
</delurk>
'Ski
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