Late August, 1983.
Setagaya Ward, Tetsu Kobayashi's garage.
An SG1200 was casually thrown on the floor, with two self-made cartridges inserted.
Tetsu Kobayashi and Yuji Naka each held a joystick, ready to playtest.
Smoke Mountain Tank Battle had been completed, though it still lacked final graphical assets and some corresponding sound effects.
As the music started, two tanks appeared on the screen—just blocks with a line, crude representations of tanks.
With limited time, the two had not yet created more detailed graphics.
At this moment, they were playing a "casual difficulty" session.
Tetsu Kobayashi took the lead, maneuvering through the alleys to chase enemies, while Yuji Naka quietly stayed near their base to defend.
The screen flickered briefly, and several enemy tanks appeared, drawn just as simply, aimlessly wandering and firing.
Just as Tetsu Kobayashi destroyed the third tank, a different tank appeared in a corner of the screen, colored red instead of gray like the others.
This was an elite tank—faster and stronger than ordinary tanks, with stats roughly 1.5 times higher.
1.5 times was a significant boost! All attributes multiplied by 1.5, resulting in a total increase of over 2.
The elite enemy was essentially a mini-boss.
Tetsu Kobayashi remained calm, pulling back his joystick and hiding in a side alley.
The red tank fired furiously, blasting the brick wall in front of him to pieces.
Tetsu Kobayashi's eyes flicked to the upper-right corner, where a five-star item had spawned.
If collected, the tank could upgrade, firing faster, dealing more damage, and at higher levels even shooting through steel.
He pushed the joystick to the right, aiming to grab the star.
But just then, the previously aimless gray tank suddenly moved toward the star.
It grabbed the five-pointed star just before Tetsu Kobayashi could reach it.
"Damn it!"
He shouted, furiously smashing the neighboring wall with the joystick, ducking behind it before the upgraded gray tank could fire.
The gray tank shot twice, narrowly missing him.
The shells flew and eventually hit a target below.
"Baka!" Yuji Naka cursed loudly.
Even lying down, he got hit!
Where Yuji Naka disappeared, a boot icon appeared on the field.
Tetsu Kobayashi drove toward Yuji Naka's remains and finally, without interference, collected the boot.
Instantly, the previously slow tank surged like it had been filled with diesel.
Yuji Naka clenched his fists, silently cheering.
Can't lose!
Tetsu Kobayashi remained calm, not overly excited.
He maneuvered the high-speed tank, firing and dodging, and after three hits, finally destroyed the red elite tank. In its place appeared an item.
A pistol icon!
Immediately, the previously aimless gray tank charged like a dog seeing its prey.
Tetsu Kobayashi pushed the joystick; the tank sped forward at triple speed, grabbing the pistol before the gray tank could reach it.
Visibly, Tetsu Kobayashi's tank had changed.
Just a few more lines drawn, but the difference was clear.
The pistol item could immediately upgrade the controlled tank to max level! It could break steel walls, survive an extra shot, move faster, fire faster, and duel elite tanks without disadvantage.
Tetsu Kobayashi turned and easily destroyed the previously annoying gray tank.
Game over.
No next level existed—only one level had been created, and the number of enemies wasn't maxed.
Tetsu Kobayashi put down the joystick and exhaled.
He looked at Yuji Naka.
"How was it?"
"I think it's great—exciting! But the graphics are too crude. We still need to improve them," Yuji Naka said.
Tetsu Kobayashi nodded slightly, though he felt a bit helpless.
This was troublesome! He wasn't very good at art design.
In fact, they had already made some graphic assets, but hadn't used them for this playtest because the results weren't satisfactory.
On Tetsu Kobayashi's computer screen were several images, contributed by both him and Yuji Naka.
But it still wasn't the look of the tank battle he had in mind.
The tanks looked more like flat images than actual tanks.
They lacked a sense of depth.
Namco had an excellent team of 2D designers—something a small indie team couldn't match.
Tetsu Kobayashi pondered. His FC art was okay, but it could never compare to professional designers.
"What can we do? Dig for new talent at Sega? That's not easy. Was there any famous art director in the 1980s?"
He thought of one.
Hideaki Anno.
But he shook his head.
Impossible to hire him. At that time, Anno was already working in Tokyo with Hayao Miyazaki as an art director—not someone Tetsu could casually call.
"Guess we'll have to find someone who'll be great in the future but is still unknown now. But who even pays attention to the art director when playing games?"
Tetsu Kobayashi muttered to himself.
The few he knew were now unknown; the famous ones were unreachable.
In short: a tough situation.
He made a mental note.
In the 1980s, when games were small in scale, a few people could handle development—but the team still needed to be efficient.
Art, music, programming—these three were most important. Text content was less critical.
"Yuji Naka knows electronic synthesis music, but he's only an enthusiast, not a professional composer. Besides him, I should find professionals to handle art and music," he thought.
One professional artist, one professional musician.
Tetsu Kobayashi tried a few more playtests with Yuji Naka. The results were unsatisfactory.
Eventually, they outsourced the work to Sega, asking internal staff to handle the graphics. Compared to the two of them, the quality improved significantly, reaching the tank level Tetsu envisioned.
However, the cost was high—200,000 yen for a set of assets.
This strengthened Tetsu Kobayashi's resolve.
He needed to find a qualified artist as soon as possible.
Yuji Naka could handle music part-time, and Tetsu could recall some himself.
But art was different. If you couldn't draw, you couldn't draw. Someone who could only draw old men couldn't be a proper 2D designer.
Anyway.
By September, Smoke Mountain Tank Battle was considered finished.
Sega's art was excellent; the tanks' 3D effect was fully hand-drawn.
Japan's 1980s–1990s art quality was world-class, rare in an 8-bit color palette but able to achieve effects comparable to 32-bit graphics.
Overall, Tetsu Kobayashi was satisfied with this work.
That Friday afternoon, he brought the game cartridge to Minoru Tanaka's office as scheduled. According to the contract, he needed Tanaka to inspect the game.
Before knocking or announcing himself, Tanaka suddenly pushed the door open.
"Tetsu? Perfect timing," he said, grabbing Tetsu Kobayashi's wrist. "I'm about to go to a meeting. Come along."
Tetsu Kobayashi was startled.
"Is it appropriate for me to attend?!"
"Of course. This is the inspection meeting itself. We're going to inspect Hunter!" Tanaka replied.
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