Takehiko Hosokawa

This article is written from the Real Life point of view

Takehiko Hosokawa is a Japanese video game designer, working for Production Group No.1 of the Software Planning & Development Department at Nintendo. He has been heavily involved with the development of the most recent core Metroid series titles.

Metroid series

He was the system director and a game designer for Metroid Fusion, a course designer for Metroid: Zero Mission, a director for Metroid: Other M and Metroid: Samus Returns and an assistant director for Metroid Dread. Hosokawa was one of the developers who participated in the Iwata Asks interview about Other M.

During the development of Other M, Hosokawa lived with Yoshio Sakamoto in Tokyo for 3 or 4 months, rather than Kyoto where Nintendo is headquartered. While Fusion and Zero Mission were both 2-D Metroid games, Other M was a game that aimed to blend the feeling of a 2-D game into a 3-D environment, or "make the NES game with the latest technology", referring to the NES Controller-like control scheme of the game. Hosokawa was tasked with pulling Sakamoto's story for the game together, and communicating any changes with Team Ninja.

Hosokawa was concerned about disagreeing with Team Ninja on aspects of Project M. This was because Team Ninja "seemed to be at the opposite extreme" to Nintendo. However, these worries were assuaged through negotiation; Team Ninja responded to Hosokawa's opinions positively and offered their own proposals. Presenting Samus Aran's emotions in the game was very important to the developers, according to him, which necessitated four trips to the United States to ensure that nothing was lost in localization.

Gallery

An art print signed by Hosokawa, in Rafael Machó Alcaraz's collection.

External links

• Iwata Asks