Overview
Choice Provisions (formerly known as Gaijin Games) is an independent game studio founded in 2007 by Alex Neuse. They are located in Santa Cruz, California.
Their first game, Bit.Trip Beat, was released on Nintendo's WiiWare service on March 16, 2009, and was published by Aksys Games in the United States and Europe, and by Arc System Works in Japan. Described as an "action/rhythm" game, its game play consists of a Pong-like block that the player would move up and down to bounce back incoming blocks in various patterns. Correctly reflecting the blocks increases the resolution of the presentation, all while playing electronic 8-bit music.
Their second game, Bit.Trip Core was released on WiiWare on July 6, 2009. It is similar in theme to Bit.Trip Beat, but this time uses only a d-pad and a button to shoot out yellow beams that intercept incoming blocks to again play electronic 8-bit music. The remaining four entries in the series used similarly diverse gameplay mechanics.
Alex Neuse reports that the Bit.Trip series tells the story of Commander Video, but what exactly that story means is up for interpretation.
The full Bit.Trip series was later ported to the 3DS as Bit.Trip Saga. The game is also the studio's first to see a physical release, and was published on 3DS game cards. A spin-off of the Bit.Trip series, Runner 2: Future Legend of Rhythm Alien, was later developed as a full-fledged sequel to Bit.Trip Runner and was released on multiple platforms.
Name Change
On June 5, 2014, Gaijin Games announced that the company's name was formally changed to Choice Provisions. Though a reason for the name change was not made explicit publicly, the word "Gaijin," the Japanese word for "foreigner," also carries certain negative connotations.
Choice Publishing
In trying to take advantage of their experience in the business, Choice Provisions started a publishing initiative called Choice Publishing under which they would start helping other developers publish their titles across a multitude of platforms. Among the first titles are Shutshimi, Dragon FantasyDragon Fantasy: The Volumes of Westeria. and Dragon Fantasy The Black Tome of Ice for Steam and various consoles.
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