![]() A couple of months later, Sonic X-Treme was canceled entirely. When Naka caught wind of it weeks later, he threatened to quit Sega if anyone else used “his” engine. With the Saturn being notoriously difficult to program for, producer Mike Wallis eventually asked Sega executive vice president Bernie Stolar for the source code to NiGHTS, which was coming along nicely. That game’s development floundered about while the team struggled with mismanagement, high turnover and all manner of development hell. The formidable task of creating Sonic X-Treme, the mascot’s ambitious debut on the brand-new Saturn console – Sega’s PlayStation and Nintendo 64 competitor – went to Sega Technical Institute. ![]() Naka had enough goodwill with Sega by 1994 to pursue his passion project, so Sega put the fate of the blue hedgehog in the hands of other developers while Sonic Team, led by Naka, created NiGHTS into Dreams. His list of game industry sins is a long one. I’m admittedly surprised to see him arrested, but as someone who’s been following the programmer’s career for a long time, I’m unsurprised that karma has finally caught up to him. Naka was a genius programmer in his heyday, creating excellent game engines from scratch using assembly.Īccordingly, many have been shocked to see Naka’s legacy tainted in such a way. Many for decades have called him “the father of Sonic,” despite it being well-documented that the hedgehog had many co-creators. He stood to profit $20,000 from flipping the shares.Īlthough Naka suddenly and dramatically resigned from Sega in 2006, his legacy at the company has persisted. ![]() Naka is accused of insider trading related to non-public information about the 2020 mobile game Dragon Quest Tact, having allegedly bought 10,000 shares of the developer Aiming before information was made public. 17, 57-year-old Yuji Naka, the lead programmer for the original Sonic the Hedgehog, NiGHTS into Dreams, numerous Phantasy Star titles and more, was arrested by the Tokyo District Public Prosecutors Office and charged with violating the Financial Instruments and Exchange Act of 2006.
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