Masaki Matsuno
From Sega Retro
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| Masaki Matsuno |
|---|
| Company(ies): Sega of Japan |
| Role(s): Engineer, General Manager |
Masaki Matsuno (松野 雅樹) is a Japanese engineer and designer. He joined Sega in April 1985, and under the arcade machine-focused AM4, AM5 and AM6 departments engineered and designed cabinets for many of the company's most successful titles during the late 1980s and 1990s. Matsuno left Sega at an unspecified time some point after the mid 90s, and continued to work in game development.
Career
Alongside fellow recruits such as Satoshi Mifune, Masaki Matsuno joined Sega in April 1985.[1] Training work for new employees saw him organise warehouse storage; despite the company's buy-out by CSK a year before his arrival, Matsuno has recalled sorting vinyl jukebox records and English documents, both vestiges of Sega's previous foreign ownership, alongside meeting David Rosen.[1] After contributing to Sega's first taikan game, Hang-On, in its later stages of development, his debut project was Studio 128 follow-up Space Harrier, in which he played a lead role in chassis design.[2] The success of these then led to head design positions on the similarly-popular OutRun and After Burner cabinets.[1] With his role in the company established after a mere two years through his frequent voluntary overtime work, Matsuno was promoted to be a section chief of arcade cabinet production with the approval of Hayao Nakayama.[1]
His most complex project began in 1989, when he and overseas Sega personnel were ordered by Hisashi Suzuki to inspect an unlicensed rotational After Burner cabinet discovered on location test in Perth, Australia.[1] On the belief that he and Sega could do much better than it, Matsuno began work on what would later become the R360, leading a newly-assembled team of fresh developers including Masao Yoshimoto.[1] After the R360 was completed in 1990, Matsuno then headed cabinet development for Rad Mobile and Virtua Racing. By this time, Sega's cabinet production personnel had been collectively grouped as AM4, of which he was a manager.[2] He also collaborated with the attraction-focused AM5 to create Virtua Formula and VR-1.[2] The mid 1990s saw Matsuno carry out head planning and design on the smaller Astro City, Blast City, and Super Megalo multi-purpose cabinets.[1]
After a special thanks in Star Wars Arcade and latterly production on Aqua Stage with AM6, further credits for Matsuno do not appear to exist. It is understood that he left Sega at some point after these titles, though has still been involved in game development at other companies.[1]
Production history
- Hang-On (1985)
- Space Harrier (1985)
- OutRun (1986)
- After Burner (1987)
- R360 (1990)
- Hang-On (Hang-On hardware; 1985) — Mechanical Engineer
- Space Harrier (Hang-On hardware; 1985) — Mechanical Engineer
- OutRun (OutRun hardware; 1986) — Mechanical Engineer
- After Burner (X Board; 1987) — Mechanical Engineer
- Galaxy Force (Y Board; 1988) — Mechanical Engineers
- Super Monaco GP (X Board; 1989) — Mechanical Engineers
- Rad Mobile (System 32; 1991) — Cabinet Product by
- Megalo 50 (??; 1992)
- Virtua Racing (Model 1; 1992) — Mechanical Effect Technician
- Super Megalo (??; 1993) — Planning & Development
- Virtua Formula (Model 1; 1993) — Production Leader
- Astro City (??; 1993) — Planning & Development
- Star Wars Arcade (Model 1; 1993) — Special Thanks
- Aqua Stage (H1 Board; 1995) — Producer
- Blast City (??; 1996) — Planning & Development
- Ring Out 4x4 (NAOMI; 1999) — Producers
Hardware
- R360 (Mid-size attraction; 1990) — Mechanical Engineers
- Virtua Formula (1993)
- Astro City (1993)
- Super Megalo (1993)
- Blast City (1996)
Photographs
- Main article: Photos of Masaki Matsuno
External links
- Video Game Storytellers Part 19: Sega's genes, passed down to the next generation by the development team of the ultimate sensory game cabinet, R360. interview with Fumio Kurokawa at 4Gamer.net (Japanese)