Nichibutsu

From vgmrips
(Redirected from Nihon Bussan)
Nichibutsu
Founded 1970-10
Defunct 2003-01
Major Products My Vision, Moon Cresta, Crazy Climber, various Mahjong games
Key People Kenji Yoshida (music / SFX of most Nichibutsu games)
Company page in vgmrips Nichibutsu
Company website Nichibutsu


Nichibutsu Co. Ltd (often called as Nihon Bussan, ja:日本物産 / ニチブツ) was a video game company, founded in 1970 in Osaka, Japan.

History

In 1978, Nichibutsu started to make Arcade games. Like many small game companies at time, Nichibutsu created Moon Base, a Space Invaders clone. In the following year, they opened their American division.

In 1980, Nichibutsu remade Namco's Galaxian into Moon Alien, and sold it with . In the same year, Nichibutsu developed Moon Cresta, a shooting game that runs in the Namco Galaxian hardware. Moon Cresta was so popular, making Nichibutsu to develop sequels in future. Another game developed in that year, was Crazy Climber, a Nichibutsu classic. Their innovative gameplay makes Crazy Climber a major hit around the world.

In 1986, Nichibutsu started to port their Arcade games for the Family Computer. Games such as Terra Cresta, Magmax and Seicross was released in the same year.

In 1988, Nichibutsu started to make PC games, mainly for MSX2 and NEC PC-9801. On the same year, Nichibutsu developed Crazy Climber 2, the sequel to the original Crazy Climber, as well their last non-Mahjong game in the Arcades.

In 1990, Nichibutsu started to make games for the PC Engine and for the Game Boy. In the following year, Nichibutsu started to make games for the Mega Drive.

In 1996, Nichibutsu started to make games for the Sega Saturn, through their main focus at time are the PlayStation.

In 2001, Nichibutsu released their last home console game for the PlayStation, a boat racing game. After that, all things released in Nichibutsu proprietes for home consoles was released by HAMSTER Corporation (a company created by the former gaming division of Toshiba EMI).

In 2005, Nichibutsu released their last Arcade game. From ownard, Nichibutsu reimaned inactive for a long period.

In 2014, HAMSTER owned all Nichibutsu proprietes, including both Arcade, console and PC games. In the same year, HAMSTER released Moon Cresta and Crazy Climber into the PlayStation 4's ArcadeArchives.