Yoshihisa Kishimoto, the creator of the Double Dragon and River Metropolis (Kuno-kun) franchises, has died on the age of 64.
This was confirmed by his son, Ryūbō Kishimoto, on a number of social media channels.
“That is the son of Yoshihisa Kishimoto,” he wrote on Fb. “I’m sorry to tell you that my father has handed to relaxation on 04/02/2026… I hope you’ll proceed to take pleasure in my father’s works, together with Kuno-kun. Thanks.”
In a follow-up put up on Twitter/X, he continued, “I am sorry for not with the ability to reply, however thanks very a lot for the numerous heartfelt reminiscence messages. I am actually delighted to study that there are individuals all over the world who’ve performed the Kunio-kun sequence extensively and perceive my father much more deeply than I do. Please proceed to take pleasure in my father’s works with a smile sooner or later.”
Kishimoto is an business luminary, starting his profession at Knowledge East engaged on laserdisc video games, and finally becoming a member of a number of colleagues at Technōs. There, he grew to become identified for his work on quite a few beat-em-ups over time, particularly Double Dragon and the Kunio-kun sequence, which was identified within the West as River Metropolis. His early work was primarily based partly on a breakup he went by means of throughout his faculty years, in addition to Bruce Lee’s martial arts movies equivalent to Enter the Dragon. It was from this that in 1986 he created Nekketsu Kōha Kunio-kun, or Renegade because it was titled internationally, the primary sport within the River Metropolis franchise. Along with his workforce at Technōs Japan, he went on to create quite a few sequels for arcades and, finally, video games for the NES, SNES, and PlayStation.
Kishimoto finally left Technōs, citing a need to work on one thing apart from the identical franchises time and again, in addition to frustration that the studio was spending much less and fewer cash on sport improvement. Within the years since, he labored independently underneath the identify “Plophet”, making his personal unique work in addition to consulting on different video games. His most up-to-date work was as director on Double Dragon IV in 2017, which was printed by Arc System Works after it acquired the license from Technōs, although he additionally collaborated and consulted on newer River Metropolis video games.
Ryūbō Kishimoto acknowledged {that a} non-public funeral for his father would happen tomorrow.
Rebekah Valentine is a senior reporter for IGN. Received a narrative tip? Ship it to rvalentine@ign.com.
