Should executives be game producers? Koei Tecmo’s founder Kou Shibusawa says yes 

Koei Tecmo founder and CEO Yoichi Erikawa, also known by his game creator pseudonym Kou Shibusawa, recently held a lecture at G-Star 2024, Korea’s largest video game convention. As reported by 4Gamer, Erikawa shared insights into his philosophy of game development and corporate management, including the reason why he and each of the company’s executives double as game producers. 

Erikawa founded Koei with his wife in 1978, after the family textile business he was supposed to inherit went bankrupt. Doing a complete one-eighty to programming, he created Koei’s early breakthrough hits, including Nobunaga’s Ambition and Romance of the Three Kingdoms. 

In his recent lecture, Erikawa says that his varied experience as a businessman – from managing finances, payrolls and inventory to looking for new staff, became his foundation for designing innovative gameplay. For example, going from battle-only gameplay to introducing new simulator-like mechanics in Romance of the Three Kingdoms. For Erikawa, good games are born from personal experience, both private and professional. 

“Executives should be producers,” Erikawa says during his presentation. Drawing parallels to the film industry, he notes that producers must be able to look at a script and gauge its budget, audience and long-term profitability. Producers and company executives alike, he says, have to be attuned to three core pillars of production – meeting deadlines, sticking to budgets and maintaining quality. “For this reason, all of Koei Tecmo Games’ executives are producers.” 

At the same time, it feels important to note here that Erikawa himself, although a seasoned businessman, is hardly what many of us imagine when we hear the word “corporate executive.” Not only does he have 44 years of hands-on experience making games, but he is a through and through gamer. He plays video games basically every other waking moment, getting up at 5AM every day to play mobile titles like Fate Grand Order and NIKKE, then playing in-development games at the office, and finally coming back home to hit console titles like Metaphor: ReFantazio and Final Fantasy VII Rebirth. He calls this “doing what you love with all your might,” so it’s safe to say his ideal of an executive-game producer comes with the prerequisite of being crazy about video games. 

In addition, Erikawa emphasizes the human side of things, describing a producer as someone who can empathize with their development team’s highs as well as their lows.