Koji Igarashi

For the Ritual of the Night boss, see IGA.

Koji Igarashi (五十嵐孝司 Igarashi Kōji^?), also simply known as IGA, is a Japanese game designer, director, and former producer of the Castlevania series by Konami. Born on March 17, 1968 in Fukishima prefecture, he joined Konami in 1990 in full-time full-time capacity, after having worked there part-time for a year while he attended school. He left the company in March 2014. On May 11, 2015 Igarashi launched a Kickstarter campaign for his new project Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night, a spiritual successor to his Castlevania games. He currently lives in Tokyo.

He voiced his personified enemy character, IGA, in Ritual of the Night.

Profile[]

Igarashi started his career at Konami just when they established a new wing to the company that focused on creating educational software. Igarashi and a number of other graduate employees were instructed to build a business training simulation, in which the player would learn how to run a successful business. Despite the team's efforts to get the masquerading game built, the project was canceled after 12 months of development, towards the end of 1990.

Igarashi was moved to a new team and tasked to develop programming tools for the PC Engine game console, where he worked on Twin Bee and Gradius 2. Afterwards, he was moved onto the development team for a new kind of game, the dating simulation game Tokimeki Memorial. Even though he was employed as a programmer, Igarashi was instructed to write the storyline for Tokimeki Memorial.

Despite Igarashi's misgivings, Tokimeki Memorial was a hit. Because of the game's success, his boss requested him to write a sequel, but Igarashi protested. His superiors relented and produced a list of all the game projects currently in development at the company. Because of Tokimeki Memorial's success Igarashi was told he was allowed to pick the game he wanted to work on next. The game that he ended up choosing was Castlevania.

The Castlevania title Igarashi was assigned to ended up canceled and the team was disbanded. However, several members including Igarashi ended up working on Symphony of the Night, a side-project to the Castlevania series, which later became an important milestone and influenced many later Castlevania titles.

After Symphony of the Night was finished, Igarashi and the rest of the team decided to take a break from developing any sequels as they felt they needed to recover their creative energy. Afterwards, the Castlevania brand was handed to the Nagoya and Kobe branches of Konami. When KCEK's Circle of the Moon was planned for an American release, Igarashi requested to Konami's American president to become the game's producer in America, handling the PR. In return, the president requested Igarashi to produce a Castlevania game every year.^[1]

Eventually, Igarashi resigned as Castlevania producer because the series made less of a profit than it used to, making it less of a priority to Konami.^[1] One of the reasons he cited were the lowering of game's prices while the base development costs of the games stated the same, while at the same time the fanbase didn't increase enough to compensate for this.^[1] Another reason was that around 2008 Igarashi was developing a Castlevania game for PS3 and Xbox 360, but the development was troubled. Igarashi mentioned it was a combination of these factors that resulted in Konami asking him to step down as producer.^[1]

Igarashi left Konami in March 2014. Following this departure he stated: "I've decided to break out on my own to have the freedom to make the kind of games I really want to make — the same kind I think fans of my past games want as well." On May 11, 2015 Igarashi launched a Kickstarter campaign for his new project Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night, a spiritual successor to his Metroidvania style of Castlevania.

Credits[]

Below is a list of works associated with Koji Igarashi.

Game Name	First released	System	Role(s)
Detana!! TwinBee	1992	PC Engine	Programmer
Gradius II	1992	PC Engine Super CD-ROM	Programmer
Tokimeki Memorial	1992	PC Engine Super CD-ROM	Scenario Writer
Castlevania: Rondo of Blood	1993	PC Engine	Special Thanks
Akumajō Dracula (canceled)^[2]	N/A	Sega 32X	Programmer
Tokimeki Memorial: forever with you	1995	PlayStation, Sega Saturn	Scenario Writer
Castlevania: Symphony of the Night	1997	PlayStation	Assistant Director, Programmer, Scenario Writer
Elder Gate	2000	PlayStation	Director, System Programmer
Castlevania: Circle of the Moon	2001	Game Boy Advance	PR (America only)^[1]^[3]
Castlevania Chronicles	2001	PlayStation	Producer
Castlevania: Harmony of Dissonance	2002	Game Boy Advance	Producer, Scenario Writer
Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow	2003	Game Boy Advance	Producer, Scenario Writer
Castlevania: Lament of Innocence	2003	PlayStation 2	Producer, Scenario Writer
Nano Breaker	2004	PlayStation 2	Producer
Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow	2005	Nintendo DS	Producer, Scenario Writer
Castlevania: Curse of Darkness	2005	PlayStation 2	Producer, Scenario Writer
Castlevania: Portrait of Ruin	2006	Nintendo DS	Producer, Scenario Writer
Castlevania: Order of Shadows	2007	mobile phone	Special Thanks
Castlevania: The Dracula X Chronicles	2007	PlayStation Portable	Producer, Scenario Writer
Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia	2008	Nintendo DS	Producer
Castlevania Judgment	2008	Wii	Producer
Akumajō Dracula (canceled)	N/A	PlayStation 3	Producer
Akumajō Dracula: The Arcade	2009	Arcade	Special Thanks
Castlevania: The Adventure ReBirth	2009	Wii	Producer
Castlevania: Harmony of Despair	2010	Xbox Live Arcade, PlayStation Network	Producer
Otomedius X: Excellent!	2013	Xbox 360	Producer
Leedmees	2013	Xbox 360, Kinect	Producer
Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night	Summer 2019	PC, PlayStation 4, Nintendo Switch, Xbox One	Producer