Tomonobu Itagaki

Tomonobu Itagaki was born in Tokyo on April 1, 1967. Itagaki later graduated from Waseda University Senior High School in March 1985. He enrolled in Waseda University and graduated from its School of Law in 1992.

Tecmo (1992–2008)

Itagaki joined Tecmo in 1992 as a graphics programmer, and initially worked on the Super Famicom Soccer video game, Captain Tsubasa 4, released in Japan, followed by the Super Famicom version of the American football video game, Tecmo Super Bowl, released worldwide. Between the choices of Tecmo and Sega, Itagaki chose to work for Tecmo as he lived closer to the company. He was mentored by Yoshiaki Inose (of Solomon's Key, Bomb Jack, Rygar and original Ninja Gaiden fame) and Akihiko Shimoji (Tecmo Bowl) in his early years at Tecmo, and learned from them to include fun as a necessary component in his projects. His career breakthrough came in 1996 with his first Dead or Alive game, a game based on Sega Model 2 hardware (Virtua Fighter) created in response to a request from the Tecmo management when the company was in financial trouble.

The release of Dead or Alive 2 greatly increased the series popularity, as well as Itagaki's. He had sought to create fighting games with details he felt were lacking in other games. However, at D.I.C.E. 2012, Itagaki said one of his managers at Tecmo tricked him into releasing the game on PlayStation 2 in Japan during March 2000 before he felt it was fully completed. The move greatly upset Itagaki, but despite the incident and the PS2's architecture being difficult to work with, he continued to further enhance Dead or Alive 2 on the system. Starting with Dead or Alive 3, Itagaki would release a series of successful games exclusively for Xbox. The move to Xbox was driven by how more powerful, developer friendly and easier the Xbox's architecture was to work with compared to other consoles, Itagaki became good friends with Microsoft's Seamus Blackley whose engineer team treated Itagaki as a guest of honor compared to Sony's engineers, and how Tecmo games generally underperformed on the PS2. Dead or Alive 3 became one of the Xbox's killer apps as it was a critical and commercial success. Itagaki's rise through Tecmo had been steady since then. He was appointed the head of Tecmo's third creative department in April 2001. and assumed the leadership of Team Ninja in July of the same year.

In the Dead or Alive Xtreme Beach Volleyball, Itagaki brought together the girls of Dead or Alive onto an island. The player is to foster good relationship between the girls to create a harmonious winning beach volleyball duo. In the second iteration of the series, the focus is shifted by expanding the number of activities the player can have the girls take part in. He explained the core of the game as a paradise where the player can watch the girls they 'love' enjoy simple activities. For Dead or Alive 4, he pushed back the release of the game in order to polish the game based on feedback of top Japanese Dead or Alive players recruited to playtest the game. He decided to exclude guns from the moveset of the Spartan named Nicole in Dead or Alive 4.

The Butt Battle, and Tug-of-War of Dead or Alive Xtreme 2 were heavily panned on the basis of minigame design. Itagaki defended those games as nostalgia comedic pieces, meant to make the player remember the celebrity games played on Japanese television. With Dead or Alive Xtreme 2, he chose to patch an easy-cash exploit rather than leaving it alone and ruminating over the consequences.

Ninja Gaiden (2004) was Itagaki's effort to develop a game centered on violent gameplay with super ninja Ryu Hayabusa as the protagonist. Capitalizing on the brand name of the earlier NES series, Itagaki developed a critically acclaimed action-adventure game for the Xbox. While working on Ninja Gaiden, he wanted to produce the "best and the ultimate action game" on the Xbox before moving on to the Xbox 360, which led to the production of the additional downloadable content Ninja Gaiden Black. He continued work on it to release an enhanced version, Ninja Gaiden Black. Tecmo appointed him as an executive officer in June 2004 and later assumed the position of general manager of the high-end production department in February 2006. In March 2008, he released Ninja Gaiden: Dragon Sword for the Nintendo DS. The move to a portable console was partly due to a promise made to his daughter.

Itagaki claimed to be one of the very few in the Japanese video game industry to establish communications with the Western world. He suggested other Japanese developers should do like-wise and be aware of the gaming tastes outside Japan, so as to be able to reverse the Japanese gaming industry slump of the mid-2000s.

He objected to the suggestion of Kasumi in the Ninja Gaiden universe, saying her "soft" nature conflicts with the "hard-edged" nature of the game, whereas Ayane perfectly fits in.

Itagaki was married and had a daughter, whom he has mentioned as one of the primary influences on his projects and a constant gaming partner in games like the Halo series. Itagaki had in his office a set of katana his father made for him, which he tended to take out to show to his visitors. As he wished to stop people from reading his expressions during gambling-type games, he was always seen wearing sunglasses, a habit that became his trademark in the video game community.

On October 16, 2025, Itagaki's family posted news of his death through a pre-written message on his Facebook account. He was 58 and, according to his close friend James Mielke, had been suffering from a serious illness in his final days. Team Ninja acknowledged his death and offered condolences on social media, together with industry veterans such as Tekken producer Katsuhiro Harada. Others, such as Super Smash Bros. director Masahiro Sakurai wrote separate tributes. Harada and general manager of Koei Tecmo's entertainment division, Yosuke Hayashi, were amongst the attendees who were Itagaki's memorial service held on November 27, 2025, and delivered eulogies.

Lawsuit

In 2006, a female former Tecmo employee filed a sexual harassment suit against Itagaki. She claimed that Itagaki had made several unwanted sexual advances on her since 2003. While Itagaki admitted to kissing her, he claimed that whatever had gone between them had been consensual. Tecmo's ensuing investigation reached the conclusion that "the allegations in question were a result of the former employee's desire to vent frustration over her own personal affair, and not indicative of sexual harassment." Tecmo also demoted Itagaki and the accuser for their mingling of "personal affairs with their corporate responsibilities". In June 2007, a Tokyo district court found Itagaki innocent of the charges.