Yukuridanshi
lurking, ,
- Joined
- Feb 18, 2001
- Posts
- 66
Hello everyone. I've been around a while, so many of you know me. For those who don't, my name is Rob Scharr. I'm a first-year graduate student in the Technical Japanese Program at the University of Washington in Seattle.
This is about a book that was published back in December 2001 in Japan by Aspect (Sega's publishing arm). The title of the book is "Game Works" (no relation to Sega's arcade chain), and it is by Yu Suzuki, the man behind all of Sega's major arcade simulators of the 1980's, along with the Virtua Fighter/Shenmue series.
What was this book about? Sit back, relax, and I'll tell you.
The book detailed not only the making of all of Suzuki's major works, but quite a bit of Suzuki's personal life as well. His job is to "inspire people," and he talks about the ways to do that during the better part of the book. Packaged with the book was a Dreamcast GD-ROM containing a compilation of arcade-perfect translation of his first five major games- Hang-On, Space Harrier, After Burner II, OutRun, and Power Drift. (There is a chapter dedicated to each game in the text).
Around when this book was published, I was living in Japan at that time doing my undergraduate work as an exchange student. I was so moved by the book that I decided that I would translate it, both for my personal Japanese study and in hopes of having the book read by a larger audience at some time in the future.
I finished the project in April of this year, and had been in contact with a couple of folks at Sega of Japan regarding a possible publication of GW in North America. Upon hearing the news and seeing the manuscript, they were very impressed, but told me that a third-party would need to pick up the book, since Sega's publishing arm is not operational outside of Japan. The search for a publisher, however, has been fruitless- perhaps I just haven't looked in the right places.
One candidate for publishing the book is the Smithsonian Press, whom I have recently contacted. One distinction between them and all of the publishing agents I've contacted (none of whom know the first thing about, nor want anything at all to do with anything game-related) is that the Smithsonian Institution itself conferred one of its highest awards on Yu Suzuki- he was awarded the Computer World Smithsonian Award in 1998 for his pioneering work in 3D simulation. Therefore, since the book reflects the collections of the SI, they are willing to at least give the manuscript a look. Even so, nothing is guaranteed as of yet.
Where does everyone here come into this? I know that this is a very dedicated community with a lot of Sega fans present. What I ask of you is that if you even have the slightest respect for what Suzuki has done for the industry, contact Sega of America (or Japan), or your preferred publisher, and tell them that you support this endeavor to bring this book to the states. Those who are in charge of brokering this deal on Sega's behalf include Fumio Goto (Sega of Japan) and Masuhiro Tsukada (Aspect), so they're the key names to remember. And although I'm not at liberty to give out any email messages in this post, do mention these individuals in your correspondance. Another way you can support me is by posting this elsewhere on any other game-related message boards you may frequent. I have urged Sega to aggressively persue a publisher in the States for this book based on support from gamers, and I urgently need your help in conveying that support.
Again, this book is like no other, for it holds gamers in an esteem that no other gaming publication does- Suzuki goes out of his way to make the personal connection with the reader, and realizes that gamers are multi-faceted, multi-talented human beings. This book must be published in the United States.
Thank you for your support.
Robert W. Scharr
Technical Communication, University of Washington
This is about a book that was published back in December 2001 in Japan by Aspect (Sega's publishing arm). The title of the book is "Game Works" (no relation to Sega's arcade chain), and it is by Yu Suzuki, the man behind all of Sega's major arcade simulators of the 1980's, along with the Virtua Fighter/Shenmue series.
What was this book about? Sit back, relax, and I'll tell you.
The book detailed not only the making of all of Suzuki's major works, but quite a bit of Suzuki's personal life as well. His job is to "inspire people," and he talks about the ways to do that during the better part of the book. Packaged with the book was a Dreamcast GD-ROM containing a compilation of arcade-perfect translation of his first five major games- Hang-On, Space Harrier, After Burner II, OutRun, and Power Drift. (There is a chapter dedicated to each game in the text).
Around when this book was published, I was living in Japan at that time doing my undergraduate work as an exchange student. I was so moved by the book that I decided that I would translate it, both for my personal Japanese study and in hopes of having the book read by a larger audience at some time in the future.
I finished the project in April of this year, and had been in contact with a couple of folks at Sega of Japan regarding a possible publication of GW in North America. Upon hearing the news and seeing the manuscript, they were very impressed, but told me that a third-party would need to pick up the book, since Sega's publishing arm is not operational outside of Japan. The search for a publisher, however, has been fruitless- perhaps I just haven't looked in the right places.
One candidate for publishing the book is the Smithsonian Press, whom I have recently contacted. One distinction between them and all of the publishing agents I've contacted (none of whom know the first thing about, nor want anything at all to do with anything game-related) is that the Smithsonian Institution itself conferred one of its highest awards on Yu Suzuki- he was awarded the Computer World Smithsonian Award in 1998 for his pioneering work in 3D simulation. Therefore, since the book reflects the collections of the SI, they are willing to at least give the manuscript a look. Even so, nothing is guaranteed as of yet.
Where does everyone here come into this? I know that this is a very dedicated community with a lot of Sega fans present. What I ask of you is that if you even have the slightest respect for what Suzuki has done for the industry, contact Sega of America (or Japan), or your preferred publisher, and tell them that you support this endeavor to bring this book to the states. Those who are in charge of brokering this deal on Sega's behalf include Fumio Goto (Sega of Japan) and Masuhiro Tsukada (Aspect), so they're the key names to remember. And although I'm not at liberty to give out any email messages in this post, do mention these individuals in your correspondance. Another way you can support me is by posting this elsewhere on any other game-related message boards you may frequent. I have urged Sega to aggressively persue a publisher in the States for this book based on support from gamers, and I urgently need your help in conveying that support.
Again, this book is like no other, for it holds gamers in an esteem that no other gaming publication does- Suzuki goes out of his way to make the personal connection with the reader, and realizes that gamers are multi-faceted, multi-talented human beings. This book must be published in the United States.
Thank you for your support.
Robert W. Scharr
Technical Communication, University of Washington
