{"id":129232,"date":"2022-10-27T02:35:00","date_gmt":"2022-10-27T02:35:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.nintendolife.com\/#article-139970"},"modified":"2022-10-27T02:35:00","modified_gmt":"2022-10-27T02:35:00","slug":"sega-veteran-and-industry-legend-rieko-kodama-has-passed-away-aged-59","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/2022\/10\/27\/sega-veteran-and-industry-legend-rieko-kodama-has-passed-away-aged-59\/","title":{"rendered":"Sega Veteran And Industry Legend Rieko Kodama Has Passed Away, Aged 59"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"media_block\"><a href=\"https:\/\/images.nintendolife.com\/5df28026ec7e7\/large.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/images.nintendolife.com\/5df28026ec7e7\/small.jpg\" class=\"media_thumbnail\"><\/a><\/div>\n<figure class=\"picture\"><a class=\"scanlines\" title=\"Skies of Arcadia\" href=\"https:\/\/images.nintendolife.com\/332beb5ff4ef5\/skies-of-arcadia.large.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"lazy\" src=\"image\/svg+xml;base64,PHN2ZyB4bWxucz0iaHR0cDovL3d3dy53My5vcmcvMjAwMC9zdmciIHZpZXdCb3g9IjAgMCA5MDAgNTA2Ij48L3N2Zz4=\" width=\"900\" height=\"506\" data-original=\"https:\/\/images.nintendolife.com\/332beb5ff4ef5\/skies-of-arcadia.900x.jpg\" alt=\"Skies of Arcadia\"><\/a><figcaption class=\"caption\"><em class=\"credit\">Image: SEGA<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>There&#8217;s some incredibly sad news coming out of Japan today &#8211; with Sega confirming the legendary game developer Rieko Kodama has passed away at 59 years of age. SEGA producer Yosuke Oskunari revealed Kodama had passed away after a memorial message for Kodama was discovered in the credits of the Mega Drive Mini 2:<\/p>\n<aside class=\"object object-tweet\">\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\"><p><span lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">As you understand it. We respected her.<\/span>\u2014 Yosuke Okunari \/\u5965\u6210\u6d0b\u8f14 (@okunari) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/okunari\/status\/1585436886415593472?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">October 27, 2022<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/aside>\n<p>Kodama was one of the first females in video game development to make a name for herself and was often associated with Sega&#8217;s role-playing games. She&#8217;s also been formally recognised as a <a class=\"external\" href=\"https:\/\/gdconf.com\/news\/trailblazing-sega-dev-rieko-kodama-be-honored-pioneer-award-gdc-2019\">pioneer of the industry<\/a> &#8211; with her career in game development spanning more than three decades.<\/p>\n<p>Rieko Kodama started out at Sega in 1984 as a graphic designer working on games like <strong>Champion Boxing<\/strong>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nintendolife.com\/games\/mastersystem\/alex_kidd_in_miracle_world\">Alex Kidd<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nintendolife.com\/games\/megadrive\/altered_beast\">Altered Beast<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nintendolife.com\/games\/mastersystem\/sonic_the_hedgehog\">Sonic the Hedgehog<\/a> and went on to become a director and producer for series like <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nintendolife.com\/games\/mastersystem\/phantasy_star\">Phantasy Star<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nintendolife.com\/games\/gamecube\/skies_of_arcadia_legends\">Skies of Arcadia<\/a>. In more recent years, she worked on the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nintendolife.com\/games\/switch-eshop\/sega_ages_sonic_the_hedgehog_2\">Sega Ages<\/a> line as the lead producer.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"object object-tweet\">\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\"><p><span lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">You can read more about Rieko Kodama&#8217;s legacy here, where she was awarded the Pioneer Award at GDC 2019: <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/5OfArGZcTI\">https:\/\/t.co\/5OfArGZcTI<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/Q60s6RBHZt\">pic.twitter.com\/Q60s6RBHZt<\/a><\/span>\u2014 RPG Site (@RPGSite) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/RPGSite\/status\/1585449812253892609?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">October 27, 2022<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/aside>\n<p><em>On behalf of the entire community here at Nintendo Life, our thoughts go out to Kodama&#8217;s family, friends, and colleagues during this difficult time.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Image: SEGA There&#8217;s some incredibly sad news coming out of Japan today &#8211; with Sega confirming the legendary game developer Rieko Kodama has passed away at 59 years of age. SEGA producer Yosuke Oskunari revealed Kodama had passed away after a memorial message for Kodama was discovered in the credits of the Mega Drive Mini [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-129232","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-nintendo-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/129232","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=129232"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/129232\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=129232"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=129232"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=129232"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}