Takanari Ishiyama

Overview

Takanari Ishiyama (石山貴也) began his career in the Japanese game industry as a sound designer at Konami in the late 1990s, working on titles like Metal Gear Solid and the Tokimeki Memorial Drama Series. After leaving Konami, Ishiyama joined Genki in 2000 where he worked on games as a planner with a majority of his titles being developed for mobile phones. Some of his earliest mobile titles include Eternal Labyrinth, Fugre Battler, Gurita no Otsukai Puzzle, and writing scenarios for six entries in Genki's Movie Adventure series.

His most famous creation during this period was the Detective Ryosuke Kibukawa series, adventure games that were modeled after old-school titles from the Famicom era. The games were planned, composed, and written by Ishiyama and were quite popular for their time. Ishiyama would end up producing 10 episodes in the franchise, including an installment on the Nintendo DS, before eventually leaving Genki in 2005 to join Square Enix. Since then, he has helped direct and write titles such as Final Fantasy XII: Revenant Wing, Blood of Bahamut, Schoolgirl Strikers, and in 2023 Ishiyama returned to the adventure genre with Paranormasight.

References

1. Japanese Wikipedia Page
2. Introduction Interview with Takanari Ishiyama (Genki, 2004).
3. Interview with Takanari Ishiyama (Gamer, 2022).
4. Blood of Bahamut Interview, Part 1, Part 2, Part 3 (Official Blood of Bahamut Blog, 2009).
5. Paranormasight Developer Interview (Dengeki Online, 2023).
6. Schoolgirl Strikers Interview (Gamebiz, 2014).
7. The Centennial Case and Paranormasight Interview (Famitsu, 2023).