IWATANI Toru

Born in 1955 in Tokyo, IWATANI joined Namco Ltd. (now Namco Bandai Games) in 1977. In 1980 he created the video game Pac-Man. Based on the theme of eat ing, the game received high praise worldwide; in 2005 it was recognized by Guinness World Records as the world's most successful arcade machine. He has produced over 50 games, including Pac-Land, Ridge Racer, Alpine Racer, and Time Crisis. He became a professor in the Faculty of Arts Department of Game at Tokyo Polytechnic University in 2007. He is also director of the Digital Games Research Association Japan, a fellow of Namco Bandai Games, and the author of Pac-Man no Game-gaku Nyumon (An Introduction to Pac-Man Gaming; Enterbrain, 2005).