It was revealed that NES and SNES chief architect Masayuki Uemura passed away on December 6 at the age of 78. The Famicom, the system that would become the NES in the West, was the fruit of an idea by Uemura, who joined nintendo As a Sharp engineer in 1972, at a time when he was exploring the possibilities of electronic entertainment.

After graduating from Chiba Institute of Technology, Masayuki Uemura joined Nintendo in the early 1970s. Work began at Famicom in 1981, at the request of Nintendo President Hiroshi Yamauchi to create a device capable of playing arcade games on TV. He has risen to the position of Director of Nintendo R&D2, which will not only produce Famicom but also its beloved successor, SNES/Super Famicom. During his time with the company, Uemura was also the producer of several titles, including ice climber And Chloe Chloe Land A trio of sports titles: football And baseball NS golf.

Uemura retired from Nintendo in 2004 and became a professor at Ritsumeikan University in Kyoto, the organization Today gave the sad news of his disappearance .

In an interview with Nintendo LiveDuring a rare visit to the UK, Masayuki Uemura discussed one of the highlights of his career:

The best time I remember was when we completed the development [del] Famicom. At the time, we didn’t know if it would be popular or not, but the fact that we were able to complete the product was very satisfying. That was the first task. To make sure I finished developing the device and did so I was happy.

It’s no exaggeration to say that Nintendo and the wider video game world will be so very Different today if we don’t take advantage of Uemura’s tremendous contributions.

Masayuki Uemura, the former chief engineer of the NES and SNES, has passed away. He was one of the genius minds behind some of our best memories of the game. pic.twitter.com/KO43DIGuTt

– Archipelago | Archipelago (SailToArchipel) December 9, 2021