Video Games
A playing-card company founded in 1889 that ended up defining the medium. Mario and Zelda, the arcade, Street Fighter, Final Fantasy, Pokémon, Kojima, and the hardware, designed with the same care as anything else here.
Part of Japan
69 moments in this segment.
- - Nintendo 1889. Nintendo headquarters Kyoto building. A photograph of Nintendo's first headquarters in Kyoto, Japan in 1889
- - Taito Space Invaders - Original Japanese Commercial. The period Taito television advertisement for Space Invaders, the 1978 arcade release said to have caused a shortage of 100-yen coins in Japan.
- - Shigeru Miyamoto in 1990, with B-Roll from Nintendo Kyoto. An interview with Shigeru Miyamoto filmed in November 1990 with Super Mario Bros. 3 behind him, plus rare B-roll of the Nintendo offices in Kyoto including Pilotwings development.
- - Street Fighter II Fever: Japanese TV Report (1992). A 1992 Japanese television feature on the Street Fighter II arcade phenomenon, filmed in the game centres and sweet shops where crowds gathered around the cabinets.
- - Sony Unveils the First PlayStation (1994). Archive footage from TBS of Sony Computer Entertainment's launch presentation for the original PlayStation, announced 26 October 1994 and released that December.
- - Capcom's Great Restructuring - Japanese TV Report (1997). A 1997 Japanese broadcast on Capcom's crisis after the Street Fighter II boom faded, filming inside the company with Yoshiki Okamoto and Shinji Mikami during the Resident Evil era.
- - Pachinko parlor advertisement girls dsc05739. pachinko parlor Japan. Short-skirted girls advertising (I think?) a Pachinko parlor in Ueno, Tōkyō
- - Pachinko parlor dsc05740. pachinko parlor Japan. The front of a Pachinko parlor near Ueno, Tōkyō, Japan
- - Nintendo office. Nintendo headquarters Kyoto building. Building design by Yoshimura Architects, 2000. 京都市南区 2006年2月18日に投稿者が撮影 Head Quarters of Nintendo, Minami-ku, Kyoto, Japan. The picture was taken by the poster in February, 2006.
- - Tokyo arcade game. game arcade game center Japan. At first glance it looks like they have fashioned an iMac into a gaming cabinet at my local game center but on closer inspection it's a monitor that takes on the appearance of an iMac. For a start the forehead is too big and there's no iChin.
- - Interior of amusement arcade in Japan 02. game arcade game center Japan. Arcade game exhibited in game center.
- - Nintendo Headquarters - panoramio. Nintendo headquarters Kyoto building. Nintendo Headquarters in Kyoto (2010). Building design by Yoshimura Architects in 2000. 京都市南区 2006年2月18日に投稿者が撮影 Head Quarters of Nintendo, Minami-ku, Kyoto, Japan.
- - Sega-Dreamcast-Sports-Black-Console. game console hardware photograph Sega. A Sega Dreamcast. This is a special edition, all-black "Sega Sports" release of the console.
- - Sega-Master-System-Set. game console hardware photograph Sega. The Sega Master System video game console shown with original "joystick" controller. This is the PNG version with transparent background.
- - Sega-Mega-Drive-JP-Mk1-Console-Set. game console hardware photograph Sega. A Japanese Sega Mega Drive (Sega Genesis in America) video game console shown with controller. This is the first model version of the console.
- - NES-101-Console-Set. Nintendo Famicom console photograph. A North American Nintendo Entertainment System, model NES-101, shown with redesigned "bone" controller.
- - Syrmaticus mikado MHNT. game arcade game center Japan. Egg of Mikado Pheasant. Collection of Jacques Perrin de Brichambaut.
- - Nintendo Famicom Tietokonemuseo. Nintendo Famicom console photograph. Nintendo Famicom game console in Helsinki Computer and game console museum.
- - Nintendo Super Famicom Tietokonemuseo. Nintendo Famicom console photograph. Nintendo Super Famicom game console in Helsinki Computer and game console museum.
- - Nostalgic oddities in a shop window on New Briggate, Leeds (12th April 2014). Nintendo Famicom console photograph. Nostalgic oddities in a shop window on New Briggate, Leeds, West Yorkshire. Taken on the afternoon of Saturday the 12th of April 2014.
- - Nintendo Developers Aya Kyogoku and Risa Tabata. Nintendo's Aya Kyogoku, director of Animal Crossing, and producer Risa Tabata discuss their careers as women developing games inside Nintendo.
- - The Making of Breath of the Wild: Open Air. Nintendo's developers explain the 'open air' design philosophy behind Breath of the Wild and how it broke with two decades of Zelda structure.
- - The Making of Breath of the Wild: How Development Began. Nintendo's own documentary series on The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, with the development team explaining how they rebuilt Zelda from first principles.
- - How Mew Was Hidden in Pokémon Red and Green. Game Freak's Shigeki Morimoto, who created Mew, explains how the mythical Pokémon came to be secretly inserted into the 1996 originals and became a schoolyard legend.
- - Junichi Masuda Looks Back on 30 Years of Game Freak. Game Freak's 30th-anniversary series opens with composer and director Junichi Masuda revisiting Quinty, the studio's first game, before Pokémon.
- - Takaryu Tokyo Ramen booth 20190714a. Tokyo Game Show expo. 2019夏日電玩展，鷹流東京拉麵攤位。
- - Taito's Game Director on Space Invaders. TV Tokyo interviews Taito game director Yuichi Toyama about Space Invaders (1978), the arcade game that triggered Japan's first video-game boom.
- - GDC: Unearthing and Preserving Japanese Game History. Brandon Sheffield's 2020 GDC talk on the archaeology of Japanese game preservation and the work of recovering source material for retro compilations.
- - Toshihiro Nagoshi on Sega Leaving the Hardware Business. Sega's Toshihiro Nagoshi, then president of subsidiary Amusement Vision, speaks about the decision to discontinue the Dreamcast and exit console manufacturing.
- - Sashimono Joinery in Tenths of a Millimetre: Teiji Miyamoto. Film on Living National Treasure Teiji Miyamoto, whose plane takes shavings under 0.1mm thick, working zelkova and finishing with wiped urushi lacquer.
- - Ken Kutaragi, Father of the PlayStation, in Conversation. Tekken producer Katsuhiro Harada interviews Ken Kutaragi, the Sony engineer who pushed the PlayStation into existence against internal opposition.
- - How Street Fighter II Was Balanced: The Location Test. Yoshiki Okamoto explains the Japanese location-test process behind Street Fighter II, how arcade earnings per day and player behaviour drove balance changes.
- - Gunpei Yokoi and 'Lateral Thinking With Withered Technology'. A profile of Gunpei Yokoi, the Nintendo R&D head behind the Game & Watch, Game Boy and Virtual Boy, and the design philosophy of using cheap mature components in new ways.
- - Consumer Agency Orders Square Enix Over Gacha Disclosure. Japan's Consumer Affairs Agency issues an administrative order against Square Enix and gumi for misleading representation in the paid gacha of FFBE War of the Visions.
- - ASCII on the Game Boy and Gunpei Yokoi. Former Monthly ASCII editor Satoshi Endo discusses the 1989 Game Boy and Gunpei Yokoi's design thinking while rebuilding the handheld in bricks.
- - Japan's First High School for Aspiring Pro Gamers. Nippon TV reports on the opening of Japan's first specialist high school aimed at students who want to become professional esports players.
- - Elden Ring - Pre-Release Staff Interview. Bandai Namco's interview with the FromSoftware production team before Elden Ring's February 2022 launch, on building an open world from the Souls formula.
- - Hidetaka Miyazaki Accepts Game of the Year for Elden Ring. Miyazaki's full acceptance speech at The Game Awards 2022, where Elden Ring won Game of the Year, the first FromSoftware title to do so.
- - Yoshiki Okamoto on First Meeting Donkey Kong. Capcom producer Yoshiki Okamoto recalls encountering the arcade Donkey Kong (1981) at a Konami showroom and how it set his standard for what a game should be.
- - Eiji Aonuma Plays Tears of the Kingdom. Zelda producer Eiji Aonuma demonstrates Tears of the Kingdom himself ahead of its 2023 release, walking through the systems his team built.
- - Final Fantasy at 35: The Original Developers Reunite. Square Enix gathers Final Fantasy creator Hironobu Sakaguchi, pixel artist Kazuko Shibuya and brand manager Yoshinori Kitase to discuss the series' origins and the JRPG's development.
- - Hidetaka Miyazaki Named to TIME's 100 Most Influential. Japanese games-press report on FromSoftware's Hidetaka Miyazaki, director of Dark Souls and Elden Ring, being named to TIME's list of the 100 most influential people in 2023.
- - Shigeru Miyamoto on How Mario Was Born. Kansai TV's special interview with Shigeru Miyamoto, who explains that Mario was conceived as a 25-to-26-year-old imagined working on New York pipe repair.
- - Yoshiki Okamoto on 1980s Arcade Development at Capcom. Capcom producer Yoshiki Okamoto, who oversaw Street Fighter II, recounts the technical constraints of building arcade games in the company's early years.
- - The Arcade Game Museum Project Loses Its Building. A Japanese game-collecting channel covers the Arcade Game Museum Project's forced withdrawal from its premises, and the practical difficulty of preserving cabinets in Japan.
- - Valorant Masters Tokyo: 37,000 in Makuhari. Nippon TV reports on the first Valorant world championship held in Japan, with over 37,000 spectators at the Makuhari Messe finals.
- - Shinji Mikami on His Capcom Years. Resident Evil creator Shinji Mikami joins fellow Capcom veteran Yoshiki Okamoto for a first on-camera conversation about his time at the company.
- - Why Resident Evil Went Exclusive to the GameCube. Shinji Mikami explains to Yoshiki Okamoto how a PlayStation-born series came to be released exclusively on Nintendo hardware.
- - Nintendo Museum Direct. Nintendo's own presentation introducing the Nintendo Museum in Uji, Kyoto, a permanent exhibition running from the company's 1889 hanafuda cards through its consoles.
- - Japan's High-School Esports Championship. Nagoya broadcaster Mētele follows a high-school Valorant team through STAGE:0, the tournament billed as the Koshien of Japanese esports.
- - The Nintendo Museum Opens to the Press. Kyoto Shimbun films the press preview of the Nintendo Museum in Uji on 25 September 2024, showing the hanafuda, playing cards and consoles gathered in one place.
- - What the Nintendo Museum Means for Uji. MBS covers the October 2024 opening of the Nintendo Museum and interviews a Nomura Research Institute analyst on its expected economic effect on the city of Uji.
- - The Pro Gamer Who Grew Up in a Temple. TBS profiles a Toyama-born professional player who placed third at an esports World Cup in 2024, and the economics of making a living from competitive play in Japan.
- - Nintendo Switch 2 - First Look. Nintendo's Japanese channel publishes the first teaser for the Switch 2 in January 2025, the company's first new home console since 2017.
- - Zelda on Switch 2 - Upgrade Showcase. Nintendo shows the Switch 2 editions of Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom, presented at the April 2025 Switch 2 Direct.
- - Nintendo Direct: Nintendo Switch 2. Nintendo's full April 2025 presentation revealing the Switch 2 hardware, its GameChat features and launch line-up, the successor to the best-selling Switch.
- - The Odyssey Project: Building a Japanese Game Museum. Nippon TV follows French collector Ludovic, owner of thousands of rare items including the first home consoles, as he works toward founding a video-game museum in Japan.
- - Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater - Launch Trailer. Konami's launch trailer for the 2025 remake of Hideo Kojima's Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater, originally released in 2004.
- - Pokémon Presents, July 2025. The Pokémon Company's official July 2025 presentation, announcing Pokémon LEGENDS Z-A and other titles from the franchise Game Freak began in 1996.
- - OD - Kojima Productions Teaser. Kojima Productions' teaser for OD, Hideo Kojima's horror project developed with Xbox Game Studios and Jordan Peele, unveiled in 2025.
- - Tokyo Game Show 2025 Opens at Makuhari. Nippon TV reports from the opening of Tokyo Game Show 2025, where Japanese developers of all sizes courted overseas as well as domestic markets.
- - Gunpei Yokoi in 1980 and the Birth of Game & Watch. How Nintendo, deep in debt in 1980, was saved by Yokoi's handheld Game & Watch, reportedly conceived from watching a commuter play with a calculator on the Shinkansen.
- - Tokyo Game Show and the Return of PC Gaming in Japan. PC Gamer reports from Tokyo Game Show 2025 with ex-Sega developer Jake Kazdal on why PC has re-emerged as a platform in a historically console-dominated market.
- - Arcade Archiver: The Space Invaders Special. Hamster Corporation's official preservation programme devotes a marathon episode to Space Invaders, covering the 1978 original's hardware, variants and its re-release on modern consoles.
- - Donkey Kong on Original 1981 Arcade Hardware. An original Nintendo of America TKG-3 arcade board is powered up and captured directly, showing Shigeru Miyamoto's 1981 Donkey Kong, Mario's first appearance, in its export configuration.
- - PlayStation State of Play, June 2026. Sony's Japanese State of Play broadcast of June 2026, over an hour of announcements and gameplay from studios worldwide including Insomniac's Marvel's Wolverine.
- - Game Freak on Prototyping Poco a Pokémon. Game Freak's Shigeru Ohmori shows part of the original design document and never-before-seen prototype footage for Poco a Pokémon.
- - Four Countries That Regulated Gacha, and What Happened. A comparative analysis of the four national regimes that restricted gacha and paid loot mechanics, and their measurable effect on markets and player behaviour.
- - Game Freak on Developing Pokémon Champions. Game Freak's official channel has its own staff explain the setting and development background of Pokémon Champions, the studio founded by Satoshi Tajiri that created Pokémon in 1996.