Memoir

For a few years, I worked as a subcontracted engineer stationed at bank-affiliated system development sites in Japan, through a so-called SES (System Engineering Service) company. I honestly didn’t know how many companies sat between me and the final client. Margins got skimmed at every tier, and by the time the work reached the floor, the original request had been diluted many times over. This piece isn’t about any specific company or person — it’s about the structure itself. ...

I’ve been following two things for about thirty years now: fighting games and Monster Hunter. I bought most of the hardware, and I’ve touched almost every entry in both series. But looking back, what stays with me isn’t which title was the most fun — it’s who I played with, and how. The Arcade Golden Age As a teenager I read Gamest every month. The publisher went under and the magazine folded; it became Arcadia, and I read a bit of that too. In Street Fighter I went through every version — II, II’, II’ TURBO, Super II, Super II X — and then on to ZERO, ZERO2, ZERO3, III, 2nd Impact, 3rd Strike. ...