By bbayle – Posted on 23 Sep 2022 at 09:00
Ken Kutaragi. We do not really know his name, but he is responsible for the creation of one of the most popular consoles in history: the Playstation.
If his name is not the most famous among players, it would nevertheless be inappropriate to underestimate the influence of Ken Kutaragi in the world of video games. It’s not called the “father of the Playstation” for nothing. But back to the beginnings of his career: Ken Kutaragi began his career at Sony in 1975, at age 25, as an engineer. Towards the end of the 80s, he watches his daughter play the Nintendo Famicom (the NES here), and he realizes the full potential of video games.. It must be said that at the time, the senior executives of the Japanese firm had no real interest in the medium, which was then not very profitable. Kutaragi’s career takes a turn when Nintendo announces that it needs a new sound manager for its new console, the Super Famicom.
The Playstation was born thanks to a secret
Ken Kutaragi, despite still working at Sony, took the challenge seriously, and designed the SPC700, a technological gem that allowed the Super NES to become particularly impressive in sound and surpass the Mega Drive in the domain. However, Kutaragi performed this work secretly, working for a direct competitor in the technology field. When the executives of his box learned of his actions, they almost fired him, but it was the president of Sony at the time, Norio Ohga, who managed to keep him in the company to allow him to finish his project.
Moreover, the story between Kutaragi and Nintendo does not stop there: Nintendo indeed wanted to add CD support to its Super Famicom, and then turned to Sony (the inventor of the support with Phillips). Kutaragi managed to persuade Sony to participate in this project, and worked for a time on the Super Famicom (even if she ended up keeping the game cartridges), which allowed her to learn a lot about video games. He then decides to make a 32-bit console with the CD-ROM as support. This is how the Playstation was born, and how Sony established itself in the video game market in a sustainable way.. From April 15, 1997, Kutaragi became the president of Sony Computer Entertainment, and remained so for 10 years. It was under his leadership that the PS2, PSP and PS3 were launched. Eventually, he left office in 2007. Kutaragi is unquestionably an important figure in the medium, and the main responsible for one of the most popular console series in history.
Source
