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| Company type | Private |
|---|---|
| Founded | April 21, 1997; 27 years ago (1997-04-21) |
| Headquarters | Kichijoji Hommachi 1-31-11 KS building 7F,, |
Key people | Masanobu Suzui (鈴井匡伸) |
| Products | Video games |
| Brands | monsteroctopus |
Number of employees | 52 (April 2024) |
| Website | indieszero.co.jp |
indieszero Corporation, Ltd. (Japanese:有限会社インディーズゼロ) is a Japanesevideo game developer headquartered inMusashino, Tokyo,Japan. Founded on April 21, 1997, it is a frequent collaborator withNintendo, developing some of their smaller scale and more experimental titles.
The name is aportmanteau, indicatingindependent video games with a low budget and minimal connections to other developers, which is described as "almost zero".[1]
The philosophy of the company is to make games that are easy to understand and user-friendly.[2][3] The company initially specialized in games forhandheld game consoles, but eventually expanded tosmartphones.[1][4] It makes licensed trading-card games for popular franchises such asLegend of Mana andFinal Fantasy.[5]
The founder Masanobu Suzui commented that the company plans to "make new products that has never been created before". He regards the company as a game developer that "cherishes a creative viewpoint rather than state-of-the-art technology capabilities" and makes games that can be immersed by a long-time video game player but also aimed at what everyone can easily play.[6]
In 1997, at age 24, Masunobu Suzui founded the company along with two members from the fresh graduate discovery projectNintendo &Dentsu Game Seminar (predecessor of the current Nintendo Game Seminar). They were initially tasked with developing for Nintendo'sSatellaview peripheral for theSuper Famicom. This includesSutto Hankoku andCooking Pong!.[7]
The company developed many games for theNintendo DS such asElectroplankton.Shaberu! DS Oryōri Navi released by Nintendo in July 2006 won the 10th Media Arts Festival Entertainment Division Excellence Award.Oshare Majo: Love and Berry was released from Sega in November, with one million copies sold and a special prize in the annual work section of the Japan Game Award 2007.[8][9]
In June 2011, the company releasedDualPenSports as its first Nintendo 3DS game.[10] It then collaborated withSquare Enix onTheatrhythm Final Fantasy, in which Masunobu Suzui reunited with former Bandai producer Ikuro Kuroku. The game was ported to iOS and arcade, and had two independent sequels titledTheatrhythm Final Fantasy: Curtain Call andTheatrhythm Dragon Quest.[10]
The company collaborated withNintendo EAD for the development ofNES Remix for both theNintendo 3DS and theWii U. During the planning phase,Koichi Hayashida, the Director of Nintendo Tokyo Production Department, who had participated in the Nintendo & Dentsu Game Seminar as a student together with Masunobu Suzui, called Suzui to partner on the game development. Suzui brought a prototype, which Hayashida immediately approved. Development of the Nintendo 3DS Guide Louvre Museum was recently completed, so the company was able to commit to the project. The game was well-reviewed and two sequels in the form ofNES Remix 2 andUltimate NES Remix were developed.[4][11]
The company first mobile game isGrand Marche no Meikyuu, released in September 2016. The game was developed in collaboration with Square Enix, after development ofTheatrhythm Dragon Quest.[12] Square Enix announced the game server's closure in November 2017.[13]
During Nintendo'sE3 Presentation in 2017, the company was revealed to be co-developingSushi Striker: The Way of Sushido, a strategic action-RPG-puzzle game for the Nintendo 3DS with Nintendo.[14][15] It was ported as the company's firstNintendo Switch game, to be released on the same day as the 3DS version, and revealed in aNintendo Direct in March 2018.[16][17]