16-bit Rhythm Land - LORE SHOCK

16 bit Rhythm Land is a new Mega Drive game hailing directly from Japan! It just released on the 21st of February, 2019, courtesy of Columbus Circle.
There's a little brother version too, on the famicom: 8-bit Rhythm Land.


COLUMBUS SHOCK

16 and 8-bit Rhythm Land are the last two games by Columbus Circle, a company based in Tokyo which mainly sells compatible consoles and various peripherals; they have been putting out some interesting releases, starting with the Famicom game Kira Kira Star Night DX, on the 24th of May, 2016.

Next there would be two famicom music cartridge releases, 8-bit Music Power and 8-bit Music Power Final, on the 6th of April, 2017.
These would feature various old-school composers well-known in both the arcade and the home scene of videogames in the 80s and 90s, much like the game we're about to play.

So, after an original game and two music cartridges for Nintendo's 8-bit system, Columbus Circle moved up the ranks and released, for the first time in physical format, Kaizou Choujin Shubibinman Zero by NCS/Masaya.
Originally released exclusively for the Super Famicom's Satellaview modem peripheral, Shubibinman Zero has a copyright date of 1994, then came out for the Satellaview in 1997, meaning its cartridge release probably got scrapped initially, then sold digitally in 1997, then, on the 30th of June, 2017, Columbus Circle gave it a full-fledged release.

Now they've done it: they made their own game released a half-unreleased one and even threw in a couple music cartridges. You'd think they'd lay down on the variety, now, but no: Neo Heiankyo Alien is immediately announced-- a remake of an old game that has a very interesting backstory we are not going to discuss; dot artist Hiroshi Ono (Pac-Man, Dig Dug, Galaga, Xevious) worked on this one, among the usual all-star cast Columbus Circle employs.
Interesting to note, here, is that Nakagata, the producer and also composer, had worked on a game (Zombie Nation) for the company that put out the GameBoy Heiankyou Alien.
Yuuichirou Shinozaki was also employed for the box art; we'll look into this person later.

Proving their strength in the Famicom field, their next release is a overhaul of Battle Kid: Fortress of Peril, which itself was already a recent game, released in 2010. Columbus Circle's version, marketing it as a cool game from overseas brought into Japan, came on the 18th of October, 2018, redubbed Battle Kid: Kikenna Wana ("Dangerous Trap").


Finally, releasing simultaneously on the 21st of February, 2019, we have 8-bit Rhythm Land and 16-bit Rhythm Land.
We shall now focus on the latter, of course, which contains 20 songs made by composers from the old scene who are so good, that, honestly, I'd be happy with the purchase even if it were just a music cartridge.
There was a little launch event in the Surugaya Shinjuku Marui Annex Store, featuring some of the staff members, including the multitalented producer Norio Nakagata and, peculiarly, Memi Aizawa, a  popular MegaDrive cosplayer who has a prolific twitter and has been a guest in other MegaDrive-related events as well, working not only as a cosplayer but also as a promoter and semi-official MegaDrive girl.
You can find her blog here: http://memiest0325.hatenablog.com/
-- and her twitter here: https://twitter.com/memiest

The event mainly consisted in a talk show and a signing session.

Columbus Circle also collaborated with other companies, such as Piko Interactive or SoftGarage, to handle the sale of some rereleases in Japan; specifically the Super Famicom games Majuuou, Iron Commando and Gourmet Sentai: Bara Yarou.
Credits

PRODUCE/MUSIC 中潟 憲雄（NORIO NAKAGATA）
・PROGRAM/MUSIC 杉山 和彦(KAZUHIKO SUGIYAMA）
・PROGRAM 木藤裕之(HIROYUKI KITO)、YOMOGIDA
・GRAPHIC 松枝 希世志(KIYOSHI MATSUEDA), 吉村清人(KIYOTO YOSHIMURA)
・PACKAGE ILLUSTRATION 篠﨑雄一郎（YUICHIRO SHINOZAKI)

Being this a game that just released, the lore I can provide revolves around each and every one of the game developers.
I bet you are familiar with some of the games these guys have worked on before...
..And looking into them, not only it's surprising to see how experienced the team is in the actual old scene of good games, but it is also very encouraging, for the ever so flourishing MegaDrive scene nowadays, to look up each one of these people and realize that a Japanese team with experience on old games now adds up to the gigantic list of new MegaDrive releases.

DEVELOPER SHOCK
The main producer, Norio Nakagata, is a composer from the oldschool scene, having worked on around 11 Namco arcade and Famicom games from 1985 to 1988, most notably the 1986 arcade game Genpei Toumaden.
After that, his career continued on home systems as he kept composing on several games, mainly for Nintendo platforms but it would later transition to mainly PlayStation and PlayStation 2 stuff, more prominently  with the extremely prolific Kamen Rider series of videogames by Bandai.
He started off with Namco, then moved on to KID, Kindle Imagine Develop, where he worked as their first sound designer; he then worked for Meldac, then Kaze, both being companies involved in the making of Zombie Nation, where he not only composed but also directed, much like he would in Rhythm Land 28 years later.

An interesting oddball game he has worked on would be the X68000 shmup Scorpius, maybe his only computer FM Sound soundtrack, much like Rhythm Land might be his only one for consoles.

Nakagata has his own company website, where he lists even more titles than the 36 present on the Japanese Wikipedia article. http://digifloyd.com/works.html



Kazuhiko Sugiyama, credited as programmer and composer, worked on a number of Taito games starting from Rastan Saga II, in 1988.

Hiroyuki Kito, credited as programmer, doesn't seem to have been a high profile developer, although he might have been using aliases.
Anyway the only credits I could find are those for Mario Party DS and Namco Musem Essentials.

Kiyoshi Matsueda and Kiyoto Yoshimura are credited for the graphics.

Matsueda has worked, for Saurus, on the Super Famicom World Heroes 2 and a couple of Neo Geo CD games: Ironclad and Pleasure Goal: 5 on 5 Mini soccer; he has also worked on Neo Heiankyo Alien, 2017 Famicom release by Columbus Circle.

Yoshimura, on the other hand, is perhaps the most interesting developer here to look into: he's the only one that has worked on a MegaDrive game before 16-bit Rhythm Land. That game would be Master of Monsters, the somewhat improved home port of the PC88 game; there, he's credited for "Graphic".
Not only Master of Monsters, though, as he was also part of the graphics team in the all-Japanese version of Eye of the Beholder, for the Mega CD, where Yuzo Koshiro also worked.

Last but not least (and that's before venturing into the composer list..!), we have the person responsible for the Package Illustration, which I find to be extremely pleasing.
It's Yuuichirou Shinozaki, also involved with Namco:
The Tower of Druaga, The Return of Ishtar, The Quest of Ki, Dangerous Seed, Rompers, Family Circuit '91.. These are all Namco games he has worked Graphic or Character Design on, starting with Druaga in 1984.
He also did some assistance work in Konami's PlayStation version of Policenauts and in regards to the Movie CG.

Let's move on to the sound team, perhaps the most important part of 16-bit Rhythm Land, given the premise of, you know, a rhythm game.



SOUND SHOCK


・MUSIC:
●WING☆GHOST
●大野木 宣幸（NOBUYUKI OHNOGI）
●COSIO
●古代 祐三（YUZO KOSHIRO）
●杉山 和彦（KAZUHIKO SUGIYAMA）
●TAMAYO
●TECHNOuchi
●中潟 憲雄（NORIO NAKAGATA）
●並木 学（MANABU NAMIKI）
●ヨナオケイシ（KEISHI YONAO)

WING☆GHOST

He has worked on PC-88 Etrian Odyssey sound together with Yuzo Koshiro.

Nobuyuki Ounogi

An missed veteran in the videogame music scene, Ounogi was born in 1956 and started out when he joined Namco 1980 initially as a programmer.
A song he made on a synthesizer would become the high score tune for Larry X (1980) which would lead him to work sound for games such as Galaga, Bosconian, Mappy and Metrocross.
He would leave Namco in 1985 and would afterwards almost exclusively work on Famicom games, like the first three Wizardry games; he would leave the game industry itself during the first half of the 90s to succeed the family miso shop, which makes his participation in this new game very interesting.

COSIO

COSIO is an alias for Hirokazu Koshio, former Taito composer and Zuntata member. The name is also a parody of the CASIO brand, as COSIO was in charge of keyboards.
EGG and Jupiter-B are his other aliases.

Yuzo Koshiro

Overly influential composer in the FM Sound and Yamaha-soundchip related scene, particularly with his PC-88 sound programming and compositions; formerly a Falcom employee, he later set up his own family company, Ancient, with the help of his mother and joined by Ayano Koshiro, his sister who works as game design and, particularly, its artistic areas.
He is still very active to this day and gladly likes to get involved not only in live concerts but in mixed projects, such as Monster Boy and the Cursed Kingdom.

Kazuhiko Sugiyama

Also a former Taito employee, he started out in 1988 with the development of Rastan Saga II.
Interestingly enough he was a programmer, rather than a composer; he still appears twice in the credits. Perhaps his role in 16-bit Rhythm Land is more close to that of a sound engineer.. I hope the game lists who made each song!

TAMAYO

Tamayo Kawamoto, seemingly the only female in the group, is another former Taito employee and also a Zuntata member; she started with Capcom in 1984, though, as one of their first inhouse composers, working on SonSon as her first game, then collecting a multitude of credits including the likes of Legendary Wings, Avengers, Tiger Road, Black Tiger, 1943 Kai: Midway Kaisen, Forgotten Worlds and Ghouls 'n' Ghosts.
Interestingly enough, she also worked on Gamera 2000, the 1997 PlayStation game.

TECHNOUCHI

Alias for Yuuji Takenouchi, this former Konami composer started in 1989 with X68000 and MSX games, Ajax and Space Manbow being his first ones; Quarth, Metal Gear 2 and SD Snatcher would follow, all in 1990 and all for the MSX. After that, he started working on arcade titles such as Hexion, X-Men, Gaiapolis and Mystic Warriors.
In more modern times he's been active and prominent in a way not akin to most of the other composers here, as he has been a lead sound designer for the exceedingly popular Demon's Souls, on the PlayStation 3, and its sequels.

Norio Nakagata

Already covered on top~

Manabu Namiki

Yet another composer who worked on many great titles of the old guard; yet another composer involved with great companies and people from the old scene, Manabu Namiki has worked for Allumer, NMK, 8ing & Raizing and, for a whopping 8 years he has been part of Basiscape, Hitoshi Sakimoto's sound company.
Namiki, who started in 1900 and was born in 1971, being as he's one of the youngest ones presented here, is still active under Emutsu not just as a composer but also as a planner and director.
Most notable titles include but are definitely not limited to: Bomb Jack Twin, Thunder Dragon 2, Zed Blade, Battle Garegga, Armed Police BatRider, Dimahoo, DoDonPachi Daioujou, Mushihimesama and Castlevania: The Adventure ReBirth.

And finally, the icing on the luxurious cake that is this soundteam...
Keishi Yonao
Born in 1969, Yonao is the composer associated mainly with the Asuka 120% and Dies irae series.
Other notable works include YU-NO, together with Ryu Takami, and generally a bunch of computer games, such as Mad Stalker and Star Trader on the X68000, or even Mahjong Fantasia; more recently, the shooter Strania: The Stella Machina..

I am very happy that he somehow ended up working on a MegaDrive title as well, given how his works are mainly limited to the home computers.