Kaneko (Video Game Company)

**Kaneko** is a video game company that was founded in 1980. The company was named after the company's founder Hiroshi Kaneko. Kaneko is known for developed games such as Air Buster, Nexzr, Blood Warrior, The Berlin Wall, and various other games. However, they gained infamy such as DJ Boy for having negative stereotypes to African Americans, and the Gals Panic series for being pornographic. They gained a cult following from gamers alike. As of 2018, they're now a distribution gaming company. It's unknown whether they'll return to developing games or not.

## Description

Kaneko was founded in June 25th, 1980 by Hiroshi Kaneko. They made games under the name Kaneko Elc. They were an arcade developer and publisher that mostly stays in with arcades. Some time in 1985, they were published under the license in Taito. In 1990, however, Kaneko started to published their own game in their brand.

Kaneko wasn't into home consoles, as they barely released any games for consoles and hand held. Kaneko USA mostly made console games, such as the two Chester Cheetah games. Fido Dido and Socks The Cat games were going to be released, but it was cancelled due to Kaneko shutting down their USA division for unknown reasons.

Then, in 1995, they announced their new arcade system, the Kaneko Super Nova System, which sparked alot of controversy in Hitachi. Kaneko had financial difficulties in 1999, stopping all home consumer development all together.

The Kaneko and Hitachi situation continued to go on in the 21st century. The Hitachi SH-2 had some problems on the Super Nova System, mostly because of the system wasn't finished or licensed enough. Kaneko then sued Hitachi over the Super Nova System, with filing over 1.5 Billion Yen. They declared the company dormant in 2004, yet Hiroshi Kaneko wanted to keep it living. In 2006 a civil lawsuit threatened the company and in 2007, the fate of the company is unknown.

Hiroshi Kaneko passed away in 2014.

Kaneko mysteriously appeared again as a gaming distribution platform mostly during to 2016 and 2018.

## Structure

* Inter State: a division of developing games with Kaneko together.
* ATOP: another division where they made Shogun Warriors and Blood Warrior.

* Kaneko USA: Kaneko's US office where they published some games.
* Kaneko Europe

## History of the company

* June 25th 1980: Kaneko was founded in the name of Kaneko Elc.
* 1981: Kaneko possibly published their first game Red Clash although it was made by Tecmo or Tekhan
* 1982: Developed their first own game, Fly Boy.
* 1983: Mostly developed games for Taito.
* 1990: Started to publish their own games in their brand of Kaneko Co.
* July 1994: Kaneko USA shuts down.
* 1998: Stopped developing for home consoles.
* 2000: Mostly stopped developing video games.
* 2004: Kaneko sues Hitachi over the Kaneko Super Nova System.
* 2006: Kaneko was threatened from a civil lawsuit.
* 2016: Strangely returned for only distributing games. Their website is down however.

## Affliated With

* Acom: Produced games for their hardware.
* Atlus / A.I.: Make games for their hardware.
* Cave: Developed a few (cancelled) games for their Super Nova board.
* Comad: Produced Perestroika Girls for their hardware.
* Creo I: Made Gal Pani spinoff in PC-9801.
* Electro Design: Made many Mahjong games for Kaneko.
* Inter: Licensed some arcade games.
* KID: Developed Chester Cheetah: Wild Wild Quest (Genesis) and Kaneko.
* Kouyousha: Former Data East employees that made Sen-Know and Guts'n.
* Mediaworks: Licensed Vs. Block Breaker from Kaneko.
* Mitchell: Developed Puzz Loop for the Super Nova System.
* Mycom: Published Gals Panic SS and Silhouette Stories.
* Namco: Licensed Air Buster: Trouble Specialty Unit.
* Nippon Columbia: Made MSX ports of Boggy '84 and Jump Coaster.
* Realtime Assocaites: Made the unreleased SNES version of Socks The Cat: Rocks The Hill.
* System Vision: Developed Power Athlete and Chester Cheetah: Too Cool To Fool on SNES/Genesis.
* Taito: Was a publisher to their games.
* Teeny Weeny Games: Developed the unreleased Fido Dido.
* Toaplan: Partnered with the Sharp X68000 ports of Hishouzame and Kyuukukyo Tiger. (Although they were going to release ports of Same Same Same and Tatsujin in 1994.)
* Warashi: Teamed up with Kaneko to make Sengeki Striker.
* Wood Place Inc.:Produced games for their hardware.

## Arcade systems Kaneko made

* Kaneko Fly Boy Based
* Kaneko Samurai Nihon-Ichi Based
* Kaneko Super Qix Based
* Kaneko 16-Bit System
* Kaneko Super Nova System
* Kaneko Nova-F1 (Rumor)

## Notable People

* Hiroshi Kaneko
* Tatsuya Watanabe

## Video Games

* List Of All Kaneko Games
* List Of Undumped Games

## Links

* 1997 Website: https://web.archive.org/web/19970617140345/http://www.alpha-web.or.jp/kaneko/index.htm
* 2002 Website: https://web.archive.org/web/20030622132639/http://www.i-s.ne.jp/kaneko/
* 2016 Website: https://web.archive.org/web/20161220193134/http://kacat.co.jp/
* Kaneko sues Hitachi: https://srad.jp/story/02/05/28/1546205/
* Pixiv: https://dic.pixiv.net/a/%E3%82%AB%E3%83%8D%E3%82%B3
* Wikipedia (JP): https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E3%82%AB%E3%83%8D%E3%82%B3
* WebLio: https://www.weblio.jp/wkpja/content/%E3%82%AB%E3%83%8D%E3%82%B3\_%E3%82%AB%E3%83%8D%E3%82%B3%E3%81%AE%E6%A6%82%E8%A6%81
* AtWiki: https://w.atwiki.jp/gamemusicbest100/pages/2492.html