Donkey Kong was not programmed by Nintendo

[Erik_Twice]

Neither was Zaxxon. They were programmed by a company called Ikegami Tsushinki. Wikipedia page:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ikegami_Tsushinki

The code also has the Ikegami logo and an easter egg witht he company name:
http://gdri.smspower.org/wiki/index.php ... _Tsushinki

CONGRATULATION !IF YOU ANALYSE DIFFICULT THIS PROGRAM,WE WOULD TEACH YOU.*****TEL.TOKYO-JAPAN
044(244)2151 EXTENTION 304 SYSTEM DESIGN IKEGAMI CO. LIM.

Interesting stuff!

[Curlypaul]

Well there you go, something else that I never knew

[Flake]

Was the arcade game that Donkey Kong was originally patched onto programmed by them, too?

[Valkyrie-Favor]

Miyamoto designed the Donkey Kong game, but the programming was done by a rather mysterious group of programmers. Maybe this is the "Four Man Team?"

[Xeogred]

Miyamoto designed the Donkey Kong game, but the programming was done by a rather mysterious group of programmers. Maybe this is the "Four Man Team?"

Haha, perhaps.

[k.vlaros]

Hadn't read this before, thanks for the head's up. In both the case of Radar Scope and Donkey Kong, the second link indicates that Ikegami and Nintendo had a business arrangement that Ikegami would program Nintendo's design document. That doesn't do too much to pop my fanboy bubble. Every bit I've read about Miyamoto and DK has phrased it as though he came up with the concept of the DK (Popeye) game around the limitations of the Radar Scope hardware. I've never seen it suggested he did the programming and if the programming was done by a contractor of Nintendo's rather than in house, so be it (look at what became of Intelligent Systems, after all!). It is shady that Nintendo would keep the reductions running for longer than agreed to and I wonder exactly how much their penance came out to in the 1990 settlement. The hidden message (does the translation suggest it's a talent recruitment?) is very cute.

Oh, and I bought Zaxxon on Virtual Console. Based on the punishment of that game, I don't have much sympathy for Ikegami! (tongue in cheek...)

EDIT:

Also, I wonder if this in any way explains the skull-crushingly conspicuous absence of Donkey Kong (arcade) or any other early Nintendo arcade game from the Wii's Virtual Console Arcade section? Maybe Nintendo would have to pay license fees to Ikegami for any future releases?

[Erik_Twice]

I still don't know why Zaxxon is so divisive