, sometimes credited as Kihaji Okamoto, is a Japanese video game designer. He is credited with producing popular titles for Konami, including Gyruss and Time Pilot, and for Capcom, including 1942, Gun.Smoke, Final Fight and Street Fighter II. He later founded the companies Flagship and Game Republic, and then created the hit mobile games Dragon Hunter and Monster Strike for Mixi. He also played a role in the creation of Rockstar's Red Dead franchise. Several franchises he helped create are among the highest-grossing video game franchises of all time, including Street Fighter, Monster Strike and Red Dead.
History
Early career at Konami
His early games Time Pilot (1982) and Gyruss (1983) innovated in the shoot 'em up genre during the golden age of arcade games. The Killer List of Videogames included both Gyruss and Time Pilot in its list of top 100 arcade games of all time. Although these games turned out to be successful titles for Konami, Okamoto's employer was not happy as apparently Okamoto had been told to create a driving game instead. Internal disagreements, financial and credible, caused his termination from Konami.
Career at Capcom
Joining Capcom in 1983, Okamoto directed several arcade games such as 1942 (1984), SonSon (1984), and Side Arms (1986). His 1985 shoot 'em up Gun.Smoke later inspired a spiritual successor, Red Dead Revolver, the first installment of the Red Dead series.
The last game he directed was the 1989 CP System game Willow (1989). He would oversee the development of Capcoms subsequent arcade games as a producer and was responsible for recruiting character designer Akira Yasuda for Capcom. Okamoto and Yasuda developed some of Capcom's biggest hits, most notably the beat 'em up game Final Fight (1989) and fighting game Street Fighter II (1991). Street Fighter II is estimated to have grossed as of 2017, making it the third highest-grossing video game of all time, after Space Invaders and Pac-Man.
In 1996, Okamoto became Capcom's head of development and oversaw all their games. In 1997, he established Flagship, a subsidiary company of Capcom that specialized in creating stories for their games.
Okamoto approached Angel Studios with the idea for an original intellectual property entitled S.W.A.T. It later adopted a Western theme at Okamoto's recommendation, redefining the acronym as "Spaghetti Western Action Team". It was intended to be a spiritual successor to Gun.Smoke. Okamoto then left Capcom, Rockstar Games acquired the rights to Red Dead Revolver in December 2003 and resumed development, releasing it for the PlayStation 2 and Xbox in May 2004.
In 2011, Game Republic also shut down due to debt, and a year later, Okamoto announced that he had retired from making console games and started working on mobile games.
Mixi
In recent years, he created the mobile games Dragon Hunter and Monster Strike (2013) for Mixi. Dragon Hunter was a moderate success, before Monster Strike became a major hit, competing with Puzzle & Dragons for the top spot on mobile charts. By 2018, Monster Strike had grossed over $7.2 billion, surpassing Puzzle & Dragons to become the highest-grossing mobile app of all time.
Later years
Okamoto became the chairman of the Japan Game Culture Foundation in November 2017, an organization which seeks to support young game creators. In 2018 he made the Malaysian game development company Okakichi. In November 2022 he was appointed as "game advisor" for the Whole Earth Foundation, a Japanese organization seeking to raise infrastructure maintenance awareness through a cryptocurrency smartphone game.
Since 2020 he has also made three YouTube channels which he uses to discuss various topics. His "YoshikiOkamotoGameCh" channel in particular looks back at his life as a video game designer for over 40 years, discussing experiences with past games he was involved in, his opinion on other games, and interviews with individuals related to game development. He also used this channel to announce his planned retirement in June 2027.
Influences and style
Okamoto has said that he gets ideas from scenery from movies, citing particularly the works of Akira Kurosawa and Chinese ghost stories. He commented that "We don't make games for ourselves - I don't actually play games very much."
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|Street Fighter II Turbo
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|rowspan="3" |1993
|Cadillacs and Dinosaurs
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|The Punisher
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|Super Street Fighter II
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|rowspan="5" |1994
|Super Street Fighter II Turbo
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|Eco Fighters
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|Darkstalkers: The Night Warriors
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|Armored Warriors
|Director
|-
|X-Men: Children of the Atom
|Producer
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|rowspan="3" |1995
|Street Fighter: The Movie
|Executive producer
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|Night Warriors: Darkstalkers' Revenge
|rowspan="2" |Producer
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|Marvel Super Heroes
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|rowspan="2" |1996
|Star Gladiator
|General producer
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|Mega Man 8
|Executive producer
|-
|rowspan="8" |1997
|Street Fighter III: New Generation
|rowspan="2" |General producer
|-
|Battle Circuit
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|Mega Man: Battle & Chase
|Executive producer
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|Vampire Savior
|General producer
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|Mega Man X4
|rowspan="3" |Executive producer
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|Super Gem Fighter Mini Mix
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|Breath of Fire III
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|Street Fighter III: 2nd Impact
|General producer
|-
|rowspan="4" |1998
|Resident Evil 2
|Supervisor
|-
|Marvel vs. Capcom: Clash of Super Heroes
|rowspan="5" |Executive producer
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|Plasma Sword: Nightmare of Bilstein
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|Mega Man & Bass
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|rowspan="6" |1999
|Trick'N Snowboarder
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|Power Stone
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|Dino Crisis
|Supervisor
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|The Misadventures of Tron Bonne
|Executive producer
|-
|Resident Evil 3: Nemesis
|Supervisor
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|Strider 2
|General producer
|-
|rowspan="5" |2000
|Resident Evil - Code: Veronica
|Supervisor
|-
|Marvel vs. Capcom 2: New Age of Heroes
|rowspan="4" |Executive producer
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|Breath of Fire IV
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|Capcom vs. SNK: Millennium Fight 2000
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|Mega Man X5
|-
|rowspan="6" |2001
|The Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Seasons
|rowspan="2" |General producer
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|The Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Ages
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|One Piece Mansion
|rowspan="3" |Executive producer
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|Capcom vs. SNK 2
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|Mega Man X6
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|Maximo: Ghosts to Glory
|Advisor
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|rowspan="2" |2002
|Auto Modellista
|Executive producer
|-
|Breath of Fire: Dragon Quarter
|Supervisor
|-
|rowspan="3" |2003
|Devil May Cry 2
|rowspan="3" |Executive producer
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|Chaos Legion
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|Group S Challenge
|-
|2005
|Genji: Dawn of the Samurai
|Executive director
|-
|rowspan="3" |2006
|Monster Kingdom: Jewel Summoner
|Producer
|-
|Brave Story: New Traveler
|rowspan="3" |Executive director
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|Genji: Days of the Blade
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|2007
|Folklore
|-
|2008
|Dragon Ball: Origins
|rowspan="2" |Executive producer
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|rowspan="3" |2010
|Dragon Ball: Origins 2
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|Clash of the Titans
|rowspan="3" |Executive director
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|Majin and the Forsaken Kingdom
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|2011
|Knights Contract
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|2013
|Monster Strike
|Game designer
|-
|}
References
External links
- Yoshiki Okamoto personal website
- Yoshiki Okamoto at MobyGames
- Game Republic homepage (Japanese)
- E3 2001: The Yoshiki Okamoto Interview, IGN
- Yoshiki Okamoto: The Clown Prince of Gaming , Gamers Today
- FAQ: Yoshiki Okamoto, EDGE