Comments 6

Re: "He Was Literally Frothing At The Mouth" - Yuji Naka Really Didn't Want Sega To Make Mature Games

MR883

@vfXander For many in the west, it might seem right to say Shenmue and Yakuza are of the same level in maturity. Meanwhile in Japan standard & tropes that the Japanese are accustomed to, clearly tell us that Yakuza is the mature game, while Shenmue is a kids kung fu movie in comparison. Yakuza is inspired by all the Yakuza movies, directed by Takashi Mike etc.

Same with the House of the Dead, the reaction in Japan was different where Mortal Kombat was a non starter. It was seen as a mature game.

Just shedding some light why Sega of Japan felt like they were making family friendly wholesome games the whole time, while the West which were used to Genesis marketing felt different.

Re: Celebrating Makoto Uchida, Golden Axe Creator And One Of Sega's Longest-Serving Staffers

MR883

Adding:

He actually went to America in 1995 to develop the Dynamite Deka series and Alien Front Online. He then went to China with some other fellow/AM1 devs to basically make the new Altered Beast - and in that established Sega Studios Shanghai, which he is heading. He still directed all the way until the PS2 remake of Dynamite Deka (2006)...Altered Beast PS2 (2005) was still a project he was heavily involved with.

Sega Studios Shangahi in itself has a turbulent history...they are a support studio and a game developer at the same time.
It's in the games that they make themselfes which can be more attributed to have more of a profile. They made ports like NiGHTS, Dynamite Deka, SA1&2 HD, HotD 3&4 on PS3 up until 2012.
Then they became a studio developing arcade games like HotD EX, Transformers, Golden Gun, Mission Impossible Arcade and Daytona Champioship USA.

Its actually not well known where the whereabout of Makoto Uchida are now, as the last few Sega games did not have Sega Shanghai credited, which they usually have. I bet he us supervising the new Golden Axe.