Masanobu Endō | |
---|---|
Born |
Shibuya-ku, Tokyo, Japan |
February 23, 1959
Occupation | Video game designer |
Years active | 1984-present |
Masanobu Endō (遠藤 雅伸 Endō Masanobu?, born February 23, 1959 in Shibuya, Tokyo, Japan) is a game designer, president of Game Studio and Mobile & Game Studio, and the director of Digital Games Research Association Japan. He formerly worked for Namco, where he created arcade games and is best known for Xevious and The Tower of Druaga, which were important titles in the scrolling shooter and action role-playing game genres, respectively.
He graduated from the Yokohama Suiran High School and from the Department of Information & Image Science at the Chiba University.
In 1981, Endō joined Namco. During his time with the company, in 1982 he created the wildly popular shoot 'em up game Xevious, single-handedly designing, programming and drawing the graphics for the game. Later he produced games such as The Tower of Druaga and Grobda, both released in 1984. Xevious set the template for vertical scrolling shooters, while The Tower of Druaga laid the foundations for action role-playing games.