Namco Founder Masaya Nakamura Passes Away at 91 Years

Gaming lost one of its greats this year, with Namco founder and “father of Pac-Man” Masaya Nakamura having passed away at January 22nd, 2017. He was 91 years old.

Namco had a humble beginning as a manufacturing company in 1955, but then Nakamura decided he’d re-focus his budding company to focus on Arcade machines. He started working with Atari after purchasing their Japanese subsidiary, and changed their name to Nakamura Amusement Machine Manufacturing Company… or NAMCO, for short, in 1970.

Their first game, Gee Bee, was launched in 1978, with their second, Galaxian, coming the next year, which revolutionized the industry by having multicolor sprites. However, it wasn’t until 1980 and 1981 that NAMCO would cement its place in gaming history when it released Pac-Man and Galaga, respectively, which were two of the most successful arcade machines ever.

They were one of the few companies to walk away from the 1985 video game crash, purchasing Atari Game’s north American branch for 10 million bucks, which helped catapult them to even further success… at least, until the release of the NES, at which point they slowly transitioned into console games, and eventually even amusement parks.

In 2005, Namco merged with Bandai to become Namco Bandai, who have created and published some of the most beloved games of the last and current generation, including Dark Souls, Super Smash Brothers, and Tekken.

As one of the founders of the video games, he’ll be dearly missed by the industry he helped revolutionize, and the people who were inspired by his and his company’s work. We wish his family and friends the best in this troubling time.