Konami is a popular Tokyo-based maker of video games, toys and trading cards, founded in 1969 as a jukebox rental and repair business in Osaka, Japan. Konami was one of the leading third-party developers during the NES era, with such best-selling games as
Gradius,
Contra and
Metal Gear. It is currently the fourth-largest game company in Japan, behind
Nintendo, Sega Sammy and
Namco Bandai.
Due to Nintendo's restrictions on third-party licensing during that era, Konami could release only five games per year for the NES. Konami found a way around this by creating a quasi-independent subsidiary known as "Ultra Games", which published the first
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles game,
Skate or Die,
Metal Gear (1987), and an expanded version of
Gyruss, among others. (They made a similar move in Europe with Palcom Software Ltd.) After Nintendo relaxed its standards, Konami closed Ultra in 1992 and absorbed its remaining employees into its American branch. Some of the other Konami staff left that same year to create
Treasure Co. Ltd., a company well known for its fast-paced shooters (
Gunstar Heroes,
Radiant Silvergun,
Ikaruga, etc.) Konami also owns a majority stake in
Hudson Soft (recently Hudson became a wholly owned subsidiary), though the latter still operates more or less independently.
In the mid-80s, Konami became famous by one of their
Classic Cheat Codes, dubbed the "
Konami Code". First appearing to US players in the 1986 NES port of
Gradius and made popular in the 1988 NES port of
Contra, it provided the players of the notoriously-diffiicult game with 30 lives, rather than the original 3. Due to the game's popularity, the Konami Code now enjoys a pop-culture status on par with the famous 'XYZZY' keyword from
Colossal Cave Adventure — mention the 'Konami Code', and it's a sure bet than any console gamer worth his eyeteeth will know
exactly which code you mean.
Also got
They Changed It, Now It Sucks in regards to their new logo.
In no way related to the
Konata/Kagami pairing of
Lucky Star, or to
a certain character named Konami, or to any kind of "economy".
Konami is responsible for the following video game franchises:
Licensed Games:
Anime series produced/sponsored by Konami:
Names associated with Konami:
Tropes associated with Konami:
0 reviews