33 Facts About Toshihiro Nagoshi

Toshihiro Nagoshi is a Japanese video game producer, director and designer.

Toshihiro Nagoshi was the chief creative officer for Sega until 2021 when he became creative director.

Toshihiro Nagoshi went on to be the general director of Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio, and later became a member of the board of directors for Atlus.

Toshihiro Nagoshi graduated from Tokyo Zokei University with a degree in movie production and joined Sega shortly thereafter, working for the second arcade department under Yu Suzuki as a CG designer.

When Toshihiro Nagoshi paid them a visit, he happened to see a NASCAR race, which inspired Daytona USA initially.

In Japan, only F1 racing games were popular, though Toshihiro Nagoshi decided to not develop one.

Toshihiro Nagoshi says that he stayed persistent in creating a more difficult kind of game.

The CEO knew that Toshihiro Nagoshi was the only person that Suzuki trusted.

Toshihiro Nagoshi has said that there is no developer that he learnt more from than Suzuki.

Toshihiro Nagoshi became president of the studio Amusement Vision, and he was not sure on how to approach his new role at first.

Toshihiro Nagoshi thought that consistently making profit would be for the best.

Toshihiro Nagoshi's approach worked, as he was promoted to officer alongside Yuji Naka and Hisao Oguchi, who ran profitable studios in the form of Naka's Sonic Team and Oguchi's Hitmaker.

Toshihiro Nagoshi became interested in console development as a result of Sega leaving the hardware business.

The CEO of Sega at the time complained that games became too expensive to make, and Toshihiro Nagoshi told him that they couldn't do it any cheaper.

The CEO was impressed, assuming that Toshihiro Nagoshi had the western market in mind, which Toshihiro Nagoshi didn't at all.

Toshihiro Nagoshi says that if he started working at Nintendo instead of Sega, he would have already quit the videogame industry.

Toshihiro Nagoshi decided not to compete with big western companies such EA, Activision and Rockstar and decided to double down on the Japanese market instead.

Amusement Vision and Smilebit had different cultures and strengths, so Toshihiro Nagoshi thought it'd be best for the staff morale to start from scratch and to develop a new IP in the form of Yakuza.

When developing the Yakuza franchise, Toshihiro Nagoshi learned the difference between nurturing one IP and making many types of genres during his time at Sega AM2 and Amusement Vision.

Toshihiro Nagoshi thought it was very valuable to see both sides.

In February 2012 it was announced that Toshihiro Nagoshi would be promoted to the role of chief creative officer at Sega of Japan, as well as being appointed to the company's board of directors.

Toshihiro Nagoshi took up these positions on April 1,2012.

In October 2013, once Sega Sammy purchased the bankrupt Index Corporation under the shell corporation, Sega Dream Corporation, Toshihiro Nagoshi was appointed as a member of the board of directors for the reformed Atlus.

In 2014, Toshihiro Nagoshi was involved in the multimedia kids franchise, Hero Bank, a superhero game that has money as a very important theme despite being aimed at kids.

Toshihiro Nagoshi wants to continue to explore different types of drama and expand the overall playerbase further.

In October 2021, it was announced that Toshihiro Nagoshi would be leaving both Sega and Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio along with series director Daisuke Sato.

The series producer and writer Masayoshi Yokoyama would become the new studio head in place of Toshihiro Nagoshi who was in the position since the beginning.

Toshihiro Nagoshi grew up in Shimonoseki, Yamaguchi in a small port town.

Toshihiro Nagoshi had a close relationship with his grandmother more than anyone else.

Toshihiro Nagoshi's father was known to be in perpetual debt, something for which Nagoshi was frequently ostracized by other children.

Toshihiro Nagoshi has said that his interest in video games and game development was sparked when his girlfriend at the time gave him a Famicom with a copy of Super Mario Bros.

Toshihiro Nagoshi's parents were physically unscathed, though his mother was left mentally scarred to such an extreme extent that she allegedly could not even recognize her own family.

Toshihiro Nagoshi has said that these events served as the primary source of inspiration for Yakuza's narrative.