Rieko Kodama

Infobox Artist
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name = Rieko Kodama


imagesize = 160 x 200
caption = "First Lady of RPGs"
birthname = Rieko Kodama
birthdate = May 23, 1963
location = Kanagawa, Japan
deathdate =
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nationality = Japanese
field = Video Game Designer
training =
movement =
works = Phantasy Star series, Skies Of Arcadia, Altered Beast
patrons =
influenced by =
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Rieko Kodama (Also credited as Phoenix Rie, Phenix Rie or Phoenix) [ [http://www.the-nextlevel.com/feature/interview-rieko-kodama/ Interview: Rieko Kodama] from The Next Level] is a video game designer who is commonly referred to as "the First Lady of RPGs." [http://sega-16.com/Sega%20Stars-%20Rieko%20Kodama.php Sega Stars: Rieko Kodama] from Sega-16.com] She has been involved with some of Sega's High Profile projects such as "Alex Kidd", the "Phantasy Star series", "Sonic The Hedgehog", "Shinobi", "Deep Fear", and several other A-list games.

Biography

Education

Born in Kanagawa, Japan, she began her education undecided between art and archaeology. She opted for art and enrolled in a trade school for advertising design. In 1984, a fellow student brought her to work at Sega.

Influence of archeaeology can be seen in several games that she has worked on such as Phantasy Star, Skies Of Arcadia etc where the player often has to travel and discover past civilizations.

Early career

Kodama started in character design, for arcade titles such as "Champion Boxing" (1984) and "Ninja Princess" (1984), as well as some Master System games like "Alex Kidd in Miracle World" (1986) and "Quartet" (1987).

As one of the few designers at the company, she found herself working on multiple titles at once, being credited on as many as five or six games a year. Kodama built up a reputation as an artist and was soon given a chance to work on larger projects, such as "Phantasy Star", which was released to counter rival game "Dragon Quest". As the main designer, Kodama was responsible for creating all the character designs, the 2D maps, battle-scene backgrounds, and townspeople, among other things.

New Strategy

In 2005, Kodama had the opportunity to helm the highly anticipated remake of Altered Beast. Despite Overworks experience with reviving old Sega franchises (Shinobi), Kodama was not able to produce a game up to the standards of Sega Of America [http://www.gamespot.com/ps2/action/alteredbeast/news.html?sid=6111962] . Altered Beast was rated 10th on ScrewAttack's Worst 2-D to 3-D games list.

In 2006, Kodama helmed Mind Quiz, which was designed for multiple platforms (Nintendo DS & Sony PlayStation Portable) and a critical failure [http://www.gamefaqs.com/portable/ds/review/938101.html] .

Simon Jeffery Sega’s Vice President was interviewed by Gamespot prior to E3 2007, during the course of the interview he commented on the Japanese game studios.

"The Japanese internal studios are taking a little bit of a breather. They're looking around at the market seeing how they can help their products become more successful in the Western markets, shifting some multiplatform strategy, which is very difficult for Japanese companies to do. Japanese companies, as you know, tend to just build a game on one specific format. So they're working very closely with Sega to make Japanese games move bigger numbers in the West overall, as well as looking to build up more of an external development portfolio in Japan as well" [http://videogames.yahoo.com/news-522460] .

Although this is not a direct comment towards Kodama, her studio has not released a multi platform game, Mind Quiz being the only exception.

Gameography

In the 80s and 90s video game designers were not credited under their actual name.

References

External links

*moby developer|id=62615|name=Rieko Kodama
* [http://www.g-wie-gorilla.de/content/view/161/18/ Interview with Rieko Kodama]
* [http://www.smspower.org/translations/phantasystar-en/videofenky_interview_translation/ Interview on Phantasy Star 1]