Creator Thumbprint in Video Games.
- Totaka's Song
, a short, 19 note tune hidden in almost every game Kazumi Totaka has worked on as a composer, and first discovered in the tank game X. These three videos document but a fraction of the time and effort gamers have invested in finding the melody. - Shinji Mikami from Resident Evil fame has a thing for masked wrestlers and Sentai as demonstrated in games where he can actually get away with it. (Killer7 had MASK de Smith and the Punishing Rangers AKA The Handsome Men, God Hand had Mr. Gorilla Mask and the Mad Midget Five.)
- Goichi Suda AKA Suda51 likes Mind Screw A LOT. He also seems to have a thing for gratuitous gore, semi-futuristic decadent places with slashes of Magical Realism, and rave music. He also seems to love lucha libre, as seen in No More Heroes, where the player character collects luchadore masks (who all have names like "La Guerra, Jr.") and learns new wrestling moves from finding masks with notes in them. Suda51 even wears a luchador outfit in some press releases. And as mentioned above, there is MASK de Smith, who is a luchador.
- Final Fantasy:
- Hironobu Sakaguchi likes to "make players cry" and wrote most of the emotional scenes in the games he wrote scenario material for. His games use Standard Fantasy Setting, mythology about crystals, and a lot of Follow the Leader of whatever Dragon Quest was doing at the time.
- Takashi Tokita has an internal reputation for always including time travel elements in his games and jokes about this, though this is not actually true (only two of his games included it).
- Yoshinori Kitase is known for having strong overarching visions of what he wants to achieve and tries to enforce cohesion. He is the reason for the push towards 'cinematic' content in FF, as he felt it was important that even non-video game fans can look at the screen and know what's going on. (The push towards cartoony graphics over sprites in the mobile phone FF ports was his, as he felt sprites don't make sense to people who aren't familiar with game tropes.) His villains are usually Laughably Evil, Sissy Villain types, and draw a lot of influence from '70s and '80s Tokusatsu (a lot of his villains are connected to space or outright aliens). By Sakaguchi's admission, Kitase is better at 'big setpieces'
- Kazushige Nojima: Unconventional Urban Fantasy settings and more psychologically realistic writing, often incorporating adolescent elements like Wake Up, Go to School & Save the World. Heroes who use performative personas in order to suppress elements of themselves that they dislike, and villains who are even more desperate to be something they aren't. He tends to focus on themes of memory and likes to deconstruct RPG stereotypes with Dysfunction Junction setups and, in his later work, World Limited to the Plot Absurdism where RPG gameplay tropes are Serious Business. His stereotypical main character would be an arrogant (but secretly insecure) Deadpan Snarker Defrosting Ice King with a real dark side, who acts detached from other people and has Laser-Guided Amnesia; even his innocent and cheerful Woobie heroes tend to have a few of these twists to them. He is also significantly more likely than the other major FF scenario writers to give All There in the Manual explanations for some of his more baffling plotlines.
- Yasumi Matsuno also writes emotionally realistic material, but with a significantly less 'adolescent' tone than Nojima's, and favours Dark Fantasy settings with lots of Gothic Horror elements, extremely complex worldbuilding, and references to real-world Medieval history. He tends to deal with themes of class struggle, with nobles and peasants at odds and usually a finale which involves killing God.
- Square-Enix designer Tetsuya Nomura is heavily inspired by Japanese street fashions and style trends, leading occasionally to Fashion Dissonance in his older work, as well as to Zipperiffic. He also likes to give his protagonists, and often as many of his characters as possible, a stud in their left ear, imitating Nomura's own piercing. Note that in Final Fantasy VII Remake, for which the characters were redesigned by a new artist, Cloud is missing his Nomura ear piercing (which he has in all other appearances). When in charge of scenario, he tends to write straightforward storylines along Whole-Plot Reference lines (e.g. Musashi vs Kojiro, Hamlet, etc.), and takes influence from pop culture ephemera such as fashion labels, music videos, and advertising. Over time he's become prone to Internal Homage, particularly focusing on storylines that contact the series' past legacy.
- Tetsuya Takahashi, founder of Monolith Soft and Square Enix alumnus, has several. His games will usually feature at least one Humongous Mecha, if not more. The entire premise of Xenoblade, in fact, is about two races living on two continent-sized titans. They will also feature at least one Robotic Action Girl as a playable party member, and there will be lots of religious symbolism integrated into the plot and the lore of his games.
- Castlevania Czar Koji "IGA" Igarashi seems to have a weird fixation with furniture, namely chairs.
- Dracula always waits for the Belmont sitting in his throne before the final fight. His son Alucard and Soma who's his reincarnation can also catch some rest sitting down in the many chairs they encounter.
- Castlevania: Curse of Darkness. Former henchman Hector can collect more than 10 different types of chairs scattered all around the stages and store them in the aptly named "Weary Chair Room".
- Castlevania: Harmony of Dissonance. Most Castlevania heroes can collect weapons, magical items, and such. Juste Belmont collects random items of furniture and decorates an empty room of the castle with them. You know, the castle he intends to destroy.
- IGA appears to have acquired a taste for the Final Boss of the Arrange Mode to be the now-Rogue Protagonist of the normal mode. It started with the Julius Mode of Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow and extended to Nightmare Mode in Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon and Zangetsu Mode in Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night.
- Shigeru Miyamoto:
- He has implemented personal interests into many of his games, including Pikmin (gardening), Nintendogs, Wii Fit, and Wii Music. Nintendo later banned him from talking about his current hobbies. His earlier works were definitely based on his childhood experiences, too. In fact, the premise of The Legend of Zelda was based on his exploration of caves as a child. In an interview for a game-developer site, he flat-out tells other designers to base their games on things they like.
- Miyamoto has admitted to being a Western fan, which is particularly apparent in the 3D Zelda games. For example, The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask and The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess all have Epona, Ocarina of Time has Lon Lon Ranch, Majora's Mask has Romani Ranch, and Twilight Princess has the redesigned Kakariko Village, the Hidden Village, Ordon Ranch and the plot similarities with The Searchers.
- Miyamoto is an avid fan of classic arts like painting. He cited the work of Paul Cézanne as the main inspiration for the impressionism-based visuals of The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword, while The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild owes its visuals to gouache paintings and en plein air watercolors.
- Miyamoto also designs things so that their function is apparent when looking at them, i.e. The Goomba was designed so you'd jump on them, and any enemy, or obstacle, with spikes is something you should avoid. He has said to his production staff "when in doubt, use spikes". This comes from his background in Industrial Design in high school.
- Yuji Horii of Dragon Quest fame is a compulsive gambler which is why many of the games in the series have some sort of gambling mini-game in it. (Though it's been said that the fact that you can only save in the town's churches is a way to try to make going out in the field/dungeons feel a bit more of a gamble as well.)
- Guilty Gear character designer Daisuke Ishiwatari seems to use belts as a unifying motif minus a few rare cases (Anji Mito has only a sash). Sol Badguy tops the list with 24 belts in his costume design. Funnily enough, the costumes still manage to look pretty cool. He also loves rock music; almost every character in the series is a reference to either a famous rock musician or a band. Queen seems to be his favorite, with nearly every aspect of Sol referring to something about either the band itself or Freddie Mercury.
- There are so many Flash and Interactive Fiction games about escaping from a locked room remarkably like, say, a programmer's bedroom (usually complete with bed, closet and computer) that it has become its own genre. This might have to do with a throwback to early adventure games, which seized on the genre because of technical limitations; it's a lot easier to write and code a game about a single room than it is about, say even a small apartment.
- Hideo Kojima:
- He tells people that instead of being 70% water like normal people, he's 70% movies. As a child, he would often come home to an empty house and sometimes claims that he was raised by movies. As a result, not only do his games homage all his favourite movies to the point where they're almost Massively Multiplayer Crossover Fan Fiction, but many of his characters are also movie fans (although the only one explicitly 'raised' on movies is Raiden and he's anything but an upstanding member of society).
- Kojima is also obsessed with butts, and tends to incorporate butt shots and prominent butts on character designs whenever possible, not even as Fanservice a lot of the time (the first visual in the E3 2018 Death Stranding trailer is a shot of a baby's butt...)
- He also likes to include plot twists involving the betrayal or deception of an authority figure, and a player character who discovers they're not who they think they are. Most famously, in Metal Gear Solid Solid Snake discovers he's a clone of Big Boss, his former commander turned traitor who he had to kill. Oh, and he was sent to Shadow Moses as a delivery system for a bioweapon.
- Matt Roszak of Epic Battle Fantasy fame loves Final Fantasy, Pokémon, anime, and cats. Every single one of his works contains homages to the first three, often in the form of blatant Shout Outs, as well as copious amounts of cats, and is drawn in a very Animesque fashion.
- Games with Viktor Antonov on art direction tend to feature some very signature elements—clashing classical and futuristic architecture, angular blue-grey metal structures, and tall, spindly robotic creatures. Half-Life 2 and Dishonored practically look like they're set in the same universe.
- Rare
- Keys, enormous keys, bigger and heavier than the characters, the most famous being the infamous ice key from Banjo-Kazooie/ Banjo Tooie. Both Diddy Kong Racing and Donkey Kong 64 feature gigantic gold keys as plot coupons; finding or using a key is always a momentous occasion.
- Really small main characters, compared to everything else around them, almost causing a perpetual Macro Zone. Even if the character in question is an animal that is very large in real life (like bears or gorillas).
- Eyeballs on as many things as possible, even if the object in question is normally non-sentient (vegetables, books, etc.).
- Masahiro Sakurai is quite infamous for this, with his games including SOME idea taken from previous works. Most of the time, said elements are from Kirby, but he also seems to have loved implementing elements from Kid Icarus: Uprising for Super Smash Bros. for Wii U & 3DS. Most commonly:
- Hyperactive Metabolism using live-action food.
- The use of a checklist that gradually fills up as the player completes various challenges in-game. Often the primary method of unlocking things.
- An in-game encyclopedia containing every item found in-game (and in related games, in the case of Super Smash Bros.). It can be filled out either by collecting items in-game, through a gachapon-style lottery or by playing a mini-game.
- Paying an amount of in-game currency to increase the difficulty level. Continuing after a Game Over lowers the difficulty by a set amount.
- His games often have highly stylized menus, which are usually designed by his wife Michiko Sakurai. The Super Smash Bros. series and Kid Icarus: Uprising exemplify these.
- Hidetaka Miyazaki of FromSoftware:
- He loves incorporating Dark Fantasy into his works, particularly in the Dark Souls series. He also really, REALLY loves Berserk, with there usually being a reference to it at least once in every game he has directed or has been involved in.
- Also, expect brutally hard swamp levels where you are both slowed and poisoned by the swamp water.
- The characters in his games are also frequently wear face-obscuring headwear. Whether helmets, veils, masks, or cloaks, very few characters go barefaced. Expect most of them to do an Evil Laugh at least once during their dialogue as well.
- Every game he's directed contains a Player Headquarters with a loyal female NPC who provides upgrades to you.
- Expect the Final Boss to be a Duel Boss of some sort, usually a tragic one.
- Bungie loves them the number 7 and its multiples. Expect it to show up as dates, names, and other things in their games. Also expect some form of artificial intelligence to go off the deep end at some point, most notably Durandal, 05-032 Mendicant Bias, and Rasputin.
- Blizzard Entertainment absolutely loves both the Fallen Hero and Grey-and-Gray Morality tropes. There are very few out and out Card Carrying Villains and most of the antagonists have a very good reason for what they are doing.
- Bethesda Softworks frequently references sweet rolls in their games. The most notable example is in The Elder Scrolls. At the start of most of the games in that series, you are described a scene where you decide what to do when someone accosts you for your sweet roll (a scene that is actually incorporated into the actual gameplay of Bethesda's later RPG, Fallout 3).
- There is at least one Indy Escape segment in each Naughty Dog game. Be it a boulder, a polar bear, a collapsing bridge or exploding mummies, it'll be there.
- Sam Barlow, the creator of Telling Lies, Her Story and Aisle (and the designer of Silent Hill: Shattered Memories and Silent Hill: Origins) is fond of incorporating fairy tales into the plot, the theme of dual identities, and profession-based surnames for protagonists (Smith, Mason, Miller).
- Quantic Dream:
- There isn't one game that doesn't involve or center around detectives or police officers in a police department setting. Also, expect there to be intense or sometimes goofy chase scenes, and two cops with very different personalities forced to work together as partners to solve their missions.
- Story-telling is a major driving influence for their games more than anything else.
- David Cage seems to have a thing for women with short hair. His female protagonists, such as Madison Page from Heavy Rain has short hair, as does Jodie Holmes from Beyond: Two Souls. In Detroit: Become Human, Kara starts the game with fairly long hair that's mostly kept in a ponytail but eventually has to cut it short because the plot requires you to do so later on.
- David Cage is also infamously known for having a knack of adding/shoehorning in some kind of plot twist or supernatural/fantasy elements, which are almost near constant in each of his games. Fahrenheit goes from a story about one of the protagonists covering up a murder to the protagonist finding out he's actually a superhuman with incredible powers; Beyond: Two Souls has the main protagonist have a supernatural spirit connected to her by a tight invisible tether and can communicate to him; even games like Heavy Rain or Detroit: Become Human have some kind of supernatural element in them.
- An Optional Sexual Encounter, often in awkward situations. Detroit: Become Human surprisingly doesn't have one despite making very clear a lot of the robots in-game are capable and have been used for sex.
- Novotrade International under the design leadership of Ed Anunziata made both the 16-bit Ecco the Dolphin games and Kolibri, which share similar aesthetics, similar "environmentalism but with a coat of sci-fi surrealism" themes, and a similar "hunt for the key to pass a physical barrier" puzzle structure.
- SNK:
- The company has a habit for introducing initial villains who are portrayed as utterly despicable beings, before following up with a Contrasting Sequel Antagonist who is far more of an Affably Evil Anti-Villain than their predecessor. This has happened no less than five times: first with both Wolfgang Krauser and Kain R. Heinlein after Geese Howard, then Original Zero after his clone, then Adelheid Bernstein after his father Rugal, and finally Nameless after K9999.
- SNK also is prone to introducing the protagonist's designated rival in the second game of a series or Story Arc — Genjuro Kibagami, Iori Yagami, Kula Diamond, Elisabeth Blanctorche and Isla were all introduced this way.
- A trend in some of Yoko Taro's games is for the final ending to delete your save file, as shown by NieR, NieR: Automata, and the Taiwanese and Global servers of SINoALICE.
