People draw inspiration from all sorts of different places, but Takashi Nishiyama, the director of the first Street Fighter game released in 1987, had a very specific thing he was trying to re-create in a video game back in the 1980s.
“Back in the day, there was an electro-mechanical arcade machine where you did karate chops to break bricks,” said Takashi Nishiyama, via a Gamest interview that was released the same year as the original Street Fighter game, which was translated by Shmuplations.
While it’s not confirmed that this electro-mechanical arcade unit was The Karate by ESCO Trading Co. Inc., that was released in 1980, it sure seems like what Nishiyama was referring to. Check out The Karate and the original Street Fighter arcade machine side-by-side, pictured below.
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“I was wondering if you could make that into a video game. That was the genesis of the idea for Street Fighter,” Nishiyama said.
It’s funny to think that such an invention could birth one of the most popular video game series of all time, but inspiration can come from unusual places. Note that the pads and general aesthetics for both machines have some overlap.
It’s well documented that the original Street Fighter’s pressure-sensitive pads were a headache for both Capcom and people who wished to play the game, as they would regularly break, and people were sustaining injuries to their hands while trying to play the game.
At one point during development, the pressure-sensitive pads didn’t have rubber covers, so they made Hiroshi Matsumoto’s hands swell up. Matsumoto served as the designer of the original Street Fighter.
These things resulted in Capcom replacing the pressure-sensitive pads with the famous 6-button layout.
It’s not all sunshine and rainbows when developing a video game, and Street Fighter 1 was no exception, as it took a physical and mental toll on its development staff.
“When you’re the planner for a game, you can’t get angry. You’ve got to always stay level-headed. It’s fine to rage at the program and the hardware. When you get stuck on a development, of course it’s not just anger you feel, but fatigue, too,” said Nishiyama.
“Basically everyone starts to go a little koo-koo. The planner’s job in that situation is to sort of cushion the blow by listening to everyone’s concerns,” he noted.
At that point, Nishiyama is asked if that makes him more stressed out.
“It can get frustrating, yeah. And that’s partly why we made this game, so you could take out your anger on it,” he said.
“We sometimes jokingly refer to it as ‘Stress Fighter’ *laughs*. It’s one of those games for sure. Please play this game to relieve your stress,” concluded Nishiyama.
There’s quite a bit more on the creation of the game you can check out at Shmuplations, found via Time Extension.
Source: Event Hubs