EMPLOYEE INTERVIEWS

Game Designer

A Game Designer bringing exciting action to players worldwide

Joined in 2018

Game Designer R.M.

＼ Career Path ／

Played hundreds of games, new and old, in his student days.
From a young age, was active in aikido and went on trips abroad.
Joined SEGA and was tasked with creating battles for the Like a Dragon & Yakuza Series; also implemented new game elements and wrote substories.
Designed and supervised the entire battle system for the next game.
The system received positive feedback from users, providing a boost of confidence.
Currently section leader overseeing the overall design for battles.
Manages everything from the initial concept to final refinements.
01STEP 1
02STEP 2
03STEP 3
04STEP 4

Q1
What I Studied

I majored in economics, so I didn't study anything directly game related. I'd always loved games, though, and I'd played hundreds of classic and modern games. Any retro game that caught my eye got added to my collection. On longer breaks, we'd fly to Europe and tour around different art museums, and I'd been into aikido since I was a kid. My experience with aikido has come in handy. I still suggest moves during motion capture, and sometimes I even perform them.

Q2
Why I Joined SEGA

I hadn't really planned to join a game company when I started my job search. But when I thought about careers, being on the production side for the sequels to my favorite games appealed to me. That's what I wanted to bring into the world. So I started looking into game companies. My impression of SEGA was that they didn't really specialize in a particular genre or style, but rather tried their hand at multiple different types of games. The fact that I'd be able to play a role in such a wide variety of games is a big part of why I joined.

Q3
My First Assignments at SEGA

After joining the company, I first worked on the battle design for Yakuza: Like a Dragon. I handled everything for the weapon crafting feature: how to incorporate it into the game's lore, the specifications, putting out the order for it, and implementing it. I also got experience with a lot of other tasks—designing and integrating long battles, improving existing minigames like golf and darts, and planning and writing substories. I learned the whole process from planning through completion with the support of my boss and senior employees, and that experience has become the bedrock of my career.

Q4
Biggest Surprise After Joining SEGA

I was expecting that a major game company like SEGA wouldn't let junior employees handle more than tiny parts of game development. In reality, there are a lot more opportunities than just planning and specifications, including putting in requests to the dev team, implementation, and final refinements. I was surprised by how much they let me do. Another surprise was how many new challenges they take on for each new game in a series. Yakuza: Like a Dragon was the first time they'd changed over to an RPG-style game, and that was a big swing. To me, this is the kind of place where you can always try and find new ways to make games fun, even in long-running series.

I'm essentially mentoring junior colleagues on ways to improve games.

Q5
Current Duties

Recently, working as a game designer and section leader, I oversaw the entire battle design for Yakuza Kiwami 3. That meant creating a concept for what kind of battle style and gameplay we should incorporate, giving feedback on the specifications and implementations of each game designer, consulting with programmers and artists, and final balance adjustments. From the planning stage until the game was done, it was my job to put the team's ideas together and make the game as fun as possible.

Q6
Motivation and Successes

I supervised all things combat in Infinite Wealth, from the system design that served as the foundation to the battle design for each piece of content to the overall balance adjustments. The idea was to take the big changes we'd made in the previous game, Yakuza: Like a Dragon, and expand on those to make fighting even easier to play while adding depth. And we got just the reaction we were hoping for after the game launched, with news outlets, users, and streamers all saying it had surpassed the last game. That was really fulfilling. It felt like players had picked up what we'd put down.

Q7
Future Goals

In the future, I want to create a new, company-defining IP for SEGA. Instead of following in the footsteps of the genres we already have, I want to make a game that gives birth to its own genre and serves as a reference point for a lot of other games. The Like a Dragon & Yakuza Series has tackled a lot of different playstyles—it's been an RPG, had online battles, ship battles, lots of things. I want to use the experience we've gained to create a whole new way to have fun that nobody has thought of yet.

Q8
SEGA's Appeal

SEGA brings people together under one roof who are passionate about lots of things. Games, of course, but also books, movies, even stuff like martial arts. We also have people who don't usually play games, and their opinions are incredibly useful when we want to see how someone would react after playing for the first time. Our stories, animations, motion captures, UI, and all the rest are a product of this diversity of knowledge and sensibilities. There's also a mindset that pervades the company where everyone, regardless of their job title, is thinking about how to make our games better. We don't simply follow the plan that's been laid out. Everyone from programmers to artists is proactive in proposing ideas to try to make a better end product. And I love that.

Q9
Message to Applicants

I want to work with people who have a strong passion for making fun games that surprise players. And it's not all about playing tons of games. The key is to love what you've really dug down into, whether that's books, or movies, or sports, or whatever. Those are the things that really help you as a creator. When making a game, the way to get the ideas beyond what you could have imagined is to bring together people with diverse knowledge and sensibilities and have them exchange views. If you want to leverage your areas of expertise as you work with your friends to bring new games to the world, then SEGA is the place for you.

Q10
A Recent Highlight

I was on a project where I'd served as the game designer section lead, and my team members showed their appreciation for me at the end of it. The ending happened to overlap with my birthday, and when I went into the meeting room there was a cake that said, "We love R.M," haha. Between the joy of finishing the game and the feeling that I'd developed bonds of trust with my team member, I was really moved as a leader.

A Typical Day

10：00 AM　
Arrive at the office
10：30 AM　
Morning meeting with game designers
Report the day's tasks, share communication items
11：00 AM　
Assess current play environment, confirm progress, consider next steps
12：30 PM　
Lunch break
1：30 PM　
Troubleshooting, confirm next steps with project members
3：00 PM　
Detailed discussions with programmers, artists, sound team
7：00 PM　
Leave the office
[an error occurred while processing this directive]