Nintendo Software Technology Corporation,
doing business as
A trade name, trading name, or business name is a pseudonym used by companies that do not operate under their registered company name. The term for this type of alternative name is fictitious business name. Registering the fictitious name with ...
Nintendo Software Technology (NST), is an American
video game developer
A video game developer is a software developer specializing in video game development – the process and related disciplines of creating video games. A game developer can range from one person who undertakes all tasks to a large business with em ...
. NST was created by
Nintendo
is a Japanese Multinational corporation, multinational video game company headquartered in Kyoto. It develops, publishes, and releases both video games and video game consoles.
The history of Nintendo began when craftsman Fusajiro Yamauchi ...
as a
first-party developer to create games for the
North America
North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere, Northern and Western Hemisphere, Western hemispheres. North America is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South Ameri ...
n market, though their games have also been released worldwide. The company was founded by
Minoru Arakawa
is a Japanese businessman best known as the founder and former president of Nintendo of America, and the co-founder of Tetris Online, Inc.
Biography
Minoru Arakawa was born on 3 September 1946 in Kyoto, Japan, the second son of Waichiro Araka ...
,
Claude Comair and Scott Tsumura in 1998 and is located inside of Nintendo of America's headquarters in
Redmond, Washington
Redmond is a city in King County, Washington, United States, located east of Seattle. The population was 73,256 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census.
Redmond is best known as the home of Microsoft and Nintendo of America. The city h ...
.
History
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
The (GBC or CGB) is an 8-bit handheld game console developed by Nintendo. It was released in Japan on October 21, 1998, and to international markets that November. Compared to the original Game Boy, the Game Boy Color features a color TFT scre ...
in 2000 and was a sequel of
Capcom
is a Japanese video game company. It has created a number of critically acclaimed and List of best-selling video game franchises, multi-million-selling game franchises, with its most commercially successful being ''Resident Evil'', ''Monster ...
'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
''Metroid Prime Hunters'' is a 2006 action-adventure game developed by Nintendo Software Technology and published by Nintendo for the Nintendo DS. It was released in North America in March 2006, with other territories later. The story takes place ...
''.
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.
DigiPen's Main Campus was based in the same building as theirs until 2010.
List of software developed
List of applications developed
Cancelled games
References
External links
Official SiteA group interview with NST about ''1080º Avalanche''Two-part interview with Shigeki Yamashiro, producer of ''1080º Avalanche'', and Vivek Melwani, lead game designer and director
{{Authority control
American companies established in 1998
Nintendo divisions and subsidiaries
First-party video game developers
Video game companies based in Washington (state)
Video game development companies
Companies based in Redmond, Washington
Video game companies established in 1998
1998 establishments in Washington (state)
American subsidiaries of foreign companies