Nintendo Software Technology

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Nintendo Software Technology Corporation
Nintendo Software Technology
Company typeSubsidiary
IndustryVideo games
Founded1998; 26 years ago (1998)
FoundersMinoru Arakawa
Claude Comair
Scott Tsumura
Headquarters,
Key people
Tim Bechtel[1] (president)
ProductsList of software developed
OwnerNintendo
Number of employees
~50 (2019)[2]
ParentNintendo

Nintendo Software Technology Corporation, doing business as Nintendo Software Technology (NST), is an American video game developer. NST was created by Nintendo as a first-party developer to create games for the North American market, though their games have also been released worldwide. The company was founded by Minoru Arakawa, Claude Comair and Scott Tsumura in 1998 and is located inside of Nintendo of America's headquarters in Redmond, Washington.

History[edit]

The establishment took place in 1998 through a collaboration with the private university DigiPen Institute of Technology, also located in Redmond. The offices opened with several doctorate level instructors and some recent graduates of the university working with several Nintendo of America designers and producers. Their first game, Bionic Commando: Elite Forces, was released for the Game Boy Color in 1999 and was a sequel of Capcom's Bionic Commando.

Over the years, NST has developed many games for Nintendo consoles such as the Mario vs. Donkey Kong series, Wave Race: Blue Storm, and Metroid Prime Hunters.

NST started developing Project H.A.M.M.E.R. For the Nintendo Wii but several problems landed the project in 'development hell'. A large amount of funding was spent on cut-scenes early in development, and so when the project started to fall behind, senior staff didn't want to end it because of the capital already spent. The American developers suggested that the problem was the gameplay, however, the Japanese managers believed the problem was the environments. This dispute, among others, made the project drag on for a number of years, before it was completely abandoned in 2009 and a large number of staff were made redundant.[3]

DigiPen's Main Campus was based in the same building as theirs until 2010.

List of software developed[edit]

Year Title Platform(s) Director Producer
1999 Bionic Commando: Elite Forces Game Boy Color Josh Atkins Andrew Hieke
Minoru Arakawa
2000 Ridge Racer 64 Nintendo 64 Akila Redmer Andrew Hieke
Minoru Arakawa
Crystalis Game Boy Color Josh Atkins Andrew Hieke
Pokémon Puzzle League Nintendo 64 Yukimi Shimura Takehiro Izushi
Genyo Takeda
2001 Wave Race: Blue Storm GameCube Shigeki Yamashiro Shigeru Miyamoto
Minoru Arakawa
2003 Nintendo Puzzle Collection (Panel de Pon) Hitoshi Yamagami
Yukimi Shimura
Andrew Hieke
Takehiro Izushi
The Legend of Zelda: Collector's Edition Shigeru Miyamoto
1080° Avalanche Vivek Melwani Shigeki Yamashiro
Shigeru Miyamoto
2004 Mario vs. Donkey Kong Game Boy Advance Yukimi Shimura
Ridge Racer DS Nintendo DS Vivek Melwani Shigeki Yamashiro
2006 Metroid Prime Hunters Masamichi Abe Shigeki Yamashiro
Kensuke Tanabe
Mario vs. Donkey Kong 2: March of the Minis Yukimi Shimura
2007 Sin and Punishment (English translation) Nintendo 64
(on Wii Virtual Console)
Hideyuki Suganami Masato Maegawa
Takehiro Izushi
2008 Super Smash Bros. Brawl (Masterpiece Mode)[citation needed] Wii Masahiro Sakurai Kensuke Tanabe
Crosswords DS (Co-developed w/ Nuevo Retro Games) Nintendo DS Yukimi Shimura Shigeki Yamashiro
Masao Yamamoto
2009 Mario vs. Donkey Kong: Minis March Again DSiWare Yukimi Shimura Shigeki Yamashiro
Kensuke Tanabe
2010 Aura-Aura Climber Masamichi Abe Yukimi Shimura
Mario vs. Donkey Kong: Mini-Land Mayhem! Nintendo DS Yukimi Shimura Shigeki Yamashiro
Kensuke Tanabe
2012 Crosswords Plus Nintendo 3DS Stephen Mortimer Yukimi Shimura
2013 Mario and Donkey Kong: Minis on the Move Yukimi Shimura
Kensuke Tanabe
2015 Mario vs. Donkey Kong: Tipping Stars Wii U / Nintendo 3DS Akiya Sakamoto
2016 Mini Mario & Friends: Amiibo Challenge[4] Wii U / Nintendo 3DS[4] Akiya Sakamoto
Kensuke Tanabe
Super Mario Maker for Nintendo 3DS (port work/new content) Nintendo 3DS Yosuke Oshino Takashi Tezuka
Shigeki Yamashiro
Hiroyuki Kimura
2017 Snipperclips - Cut it out, together! (development support) Nintendo Switch Adam Vian Takao Nakano
Toyokazu Nonaka
2018 Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker (port work/new content) Nintendo 3DS / Nintendo Switch Kenta Motokura
Shinya Hiratake
Koichi Hayashida
2019 The Stretchers (development support) Nintendo Switch Viktor Lindäng
Masamichi Abe
Paul Allen
Takao Nakano
Toyokazu Nonaka
Keisuke Terasaki
Yoshiaki Koizumi
Katsuya Eguchi
2020 Good Job! (development support) Masataka Takemoto
Coen Neessen
Katsuya Eguchi
Toyokazu Nonaka
Fernando Rojas Braga
2021 Super Mario 3D World + Bowser's Fury (co-development)[5] Kenta Motokura
Koichi Hayashida
Yoshiaki Koizumi
Kaori Ando
2023 F-Zero 99 Chris Polney Takao Nakano
Shinya Saito
2024 Mario vs. Donkey Kong (remake) Vivek Melwani Shinya Saito
Takao Nakano

List of applications developed[edit]

Year Title Platform(s) Director Producer
2006 Nintendo 64 Emulator Wii
2009 BBC iPlayer Channel Wii
Mario Calculator and Clock DSiWare Shigeki Yamashiro
Animal Crossing Calculator and Clock DSiWare Shigeki Yamashiro
2011 Kirby TV Channel Wii
2012 Wii U Chat (Co-developed w/ NERD and Vidyo)[6] Wii U Fumihiko Tamiya
2013 Wii Street U[7] Wii U Toshiaki Suzuki Keiichi Kawai

Cancelled games[edit]

Title Platform(s)
Project H.A.M.M.E.R. Wii

References[edit]

  1. ^ https://www.linkedin.com/in/tim-bechtel-0185b15/[self-published source]
  2. ^ "Largest Employers | Redmond, WA".
  3. ^ "Project H.A.M.M.E.R. [Wii – Cancelled] – Unseen64". unseen64.net. 4 April 2008.
  4. ^ a b Allen, Eric Van (13 January 2016). "Mini Mario & Friends: Amiibo Challenge Announced as Pack-In with New Amiibo in Japan". ign.com.
  5. ^ Super Mario 3D World + Bowser's Fury - Credits And Secret Ending, retrieved 2024-02-27
  6. ^ "Iwata Asks". nintendo.com.
  7. ^ "Iwata Asks". nintendo.com.

External links[edit]