Yakuza director announces new studio after leaving Sega

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Toshihiro Nagoshi, former chief creative officer of Sega, where he led the development of the Yakuza series as general manager of Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio, has announced his next move. He started his own studio, simply titled Nagoshi Studio, fully funded by Chinese Internet and games company NetEase.

Nagoshi announced his departure from Sega last October, but today’s news also follows an August Bloomberg report naming NetEase as its potential future partner. Masayoshi Yokoyama, who The Verge interviewed last year about his work on the latest Yakuza game Like a Dragon, is the new head of Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio and is currently working on the next game in the series.

Nagoshi Studio will be based in Tokyo and has hired several longtime former Sega employees and Yakuza associates, including producer Daisuke Sato, artist Kazuki Hosokawa, programmer Koji Tokieda, designer Masao Shirosaki, engineer Mitsunori Fujimoto, the artist Naoki Someya, the director Taichi Ushioda and the artist Toshihiro Ando.

In an interview with Japanese gaming magazine Famitsu, Nagoshi goes into detail on why he chose to leave Sega and join NetEase. He says he wanted to do something different and expresses a desire to create games that appeal to more outside of Japan, while noting that the studio’s focus will still remain on Japan for the time being. Nagoshi says going independent will allow his team to develop games without having to consider Sega’s larger business plan and budget, and believes NetEase is serious about prioritizing the creative freedom of the new studio.

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