Creator of Double Dragon and ‘grandfather of the beat ’em up’ dies at age 64

Former Technōs developer Yoshihisa Kishimoto has died, leaving behind a legacy of influential beat ‘em-ups including the Renegade and River City franchises.

One of gaming’s unsung heroes has sadly passed away, with news that Yoshihisa Kishimoto died on Thursday, April 2. He was only 64 years old but was responsible for a number of iconic video games, which earned him the epithet of the ‘grandfather of the beat ‘em up’.

Kishimoto entered game development in the early 1980s, starting at Data East where he worked on laserdisc games Cobra Command and Road Blaster. His most famous games were produced at the now defunct Technōs, where he worked on Nekketsu Kōha Kunio-kun (aka Renegade) and Double Dragon.

Renegade was the first entry in the long-running Kunio-kun (aka River City) franchise and in 1986 established all the basic concepts of the scrolling beat ‘em-up, including vertical and horizontal movement and combating multiple enemies at once using a limited range of martial arts moves.

According to Kishimoto, Renegade was semi-autobiographical and inspired by his days as a teenage student, when he would regularly get into fights – in part due to a break-up with a girlfriend who left him.

Although it was not technically the first ever beat ’em up – which is generally regarded to be 1984’s Kung-Fu Master – Renegade became the template which all subsequent games followed.

Kishimoto was a big fan of Bruce Lee, especially in the film Enter the Dragon, which also influenced the game. However, many of his titles were not released outside of Japan or were heavily altered for Western markets, with Renegade being revised to draw inspiration from the movie The Warriors.

Double Dragon was released a year later, in 1987, and expanded on the ideas from Renegade to establish a genre that would go on to include the likes of Capcom’s Final Fight and Sega’s Streets Of Rage.

Although Kishimoto directed the arcade and home console versions of both original games, he had nothing to do with Target: Renegade and Renegade 3: The Final Chapter, which were made in the UK by Ocean Software.

Kishimoto did work on other Kunio-kun games, though, such as Super Dodge Ball and Shodai Nekketsu Kōha Kunio-kun, and unrelated titles such as WWF Superstars and The Combatribes.

Technōs went bust in 1996 (its assets are now owned by Guilty Gear developer Arc System Works) at which time Kishimoto began to work as a freelancer designer and producer, although on lower budget titles that were not released outside of Japan.

Although he never worked on a big budget title again, he was at least consulted, or given a credit, on most subsequent Double Dragon and River City games, such as Double Dragon Neon and River City Girls.

Kishimoto’s passing was announced by his son on Sunday, but his cause of death is unknown at this time.

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