Tsunekazu Ishihara (Japanese:石原 恒和,Hepburn:Ishihara Tsunekazu; born November 27, 1957) is a Japanesevideo game designer,director,producer andbusinessman who is thepresident andChief executive officer ofThe Pokémon Company.

Prior to working with thePokémon franchise, Ishihara was part ofApe Inc. and worked on titles such asEarthBound, and then years later he foundedCreatures Inc.

Ishihara's work withPokémon, in which he was involved since early development stages during the 1990s, had him as a producer from Creatures while he also heavily focused on licensed and spin-off products such as thePokémon Trading Card Game, with him founding The Pokémon Company to handle such business activities. He was also crucial in the development ofPokémon Go, having supported the concept of a location-based Pokémon game.

Ishihara was born on November 27, 1957, in the city ofToba. In 1983, he completed a Masters in Art and Design at theUniversity of Tsukuba.^[1][2] After his graduation, he joined Ape Inc. in 1991, where he worked in the development of various video games,^[3] among othersMario & Wario (1993), andEarthBound (1994).^[4][5] In 1995, after leaving Ape Inc., Ishihara founded the development companyCreatures Inc.,^[6] with assistance fromSatoru Iwata.^[7]

When the planning and development for thePokémon series began in 1990, Ishihara worked withGame Freak as a producer at Creatures to develop theRed andGreen titles, at one point with Creatures providing a cash infusion during the company's financial difficulty to help them in the development of the game.^[4][7] Following the title's release, Ishihara founded the Pokémon Center Company—todayThe Pokémon Company—and became its Representative Director.^[3]

Prior toRed andGreen's release, Ishihara initiated the development of thePokémon Trading Card Game.^[8] In an interview,Satoru Iwata noted that people involved with Creatures Inc. would refer to Ishihara as "The King Of Portable Toys" due to Ishihara's extensive involvement on licensedPokémon products—including the trading cards,anime, andmovie; according to Ishihara, his involvement and focus on the licensed products was to ensure that thenext titles in the series—which he was again involved in—were successful.^[9]

Ishihara stated that he had initially expectedGold andSilver to be his finalPokémon games intending to leave the series after the two games were finalised; however, following their success, increased requests for licensed Pokémon products prompted a joint venture between Nintendo, Game Freak and Creatures Inc. to establishThe Pokémon Company in 2000, which was meant to take licensing and brand management tasks away fromGame Freak, which was to focus on working on the next titles. Ishihara was then placed as president and CEO of the new company.^[10][11] During the development ofFireRed andLeafGreen, Ishihara and Iwata convinced Game Freak to use theWireless Adapter for trading in the games, instead of trading Pokémon through cables like in previous titles.^[12][13] Ishihara was also involved with the tie-in "Pokéwalker" inHeartGold andSoulSilver.^[14]

In 2014, following anApril Fools prank onGoogle Maps involving users "catching" Pokémon on the app, Ishihara began to negotiate licensing of Pokémon characters for anaugmented reality game withNiantic Labs. Ishihara had been an avid player of Niantic'sIngress title, and he endorsed the planned game—which secured support from Iwata.^[15][16] Upon its release in 2016, the titlePokémon Go was considered a massive success, with Ishihara referring to its cultural impact as a "Pokédemic", comparing it to the peak popularity of Pokémon in the late 1990s.^[17]

During an interview withBloomberg, Ishihara noted that he was initially skeptical on theNintendo Switch's success, doubting the prospects of a video game console with the abundance of smartphones.^[18] Despite this, they naturally started development on several Nintendo Switch games as a Nintendo affiliate. Later, in 2019, Ishihara announced the titlePokémon Sleep slated for a 2020 release, which he stated was to make "players to look forward to waking up every morning".^[19]

In April 2023, Ishihara stepped down as CEO of Creatures Inc., a position he held for decades while still working at The Pokémon Company as its president and CEO. Ishihara continues to serve as President of The Pokémon Company.^[20]

• CEDEC Awards 2011 – Special Award.^[2]
• Minister of Economy, Trade and Industry Award 2011.^[3]
• Japan Innovators Award 2016 – Soft Power Award (along withJohn Hanke).^[21]

• 1957 births
• Living people
• Nintendo people
• Japanese video game producers
• Pokémon people
• People from Mie Prefecture
• University of Tsukuba alumni
• Japanese businesspeople in the video game industry
• 20th-century Japanese businesspeople
• 21st-century Japanese businesspeople
• Businesspeople from Mie Prefecture

• CS1 Japanese-language sources (ja)
• Articles with short description
• Short description is different from Wikidata
• Pages using infobox person with multiple employers
• Articles with hCards
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