KILLER is DEAD

'No More Heroes' and 'Killer is Dead' Developer Grasshopper Manufacture Acquired By GungHo

In a state­ment released today Gung­Ho Online Enter­tain­ment, a Japan­ese pub­lish­er famous for its long­stand­ing “Rag­narok Online” MMO, announced that it has acquired Grasshop­per Man­u­fac­ture, the Goichi Suda-led stu­dio behind games like “Killer 7,” “No More Heroes,” and the upcom­ing “Killer is Dead.”
As is usual in these types of deals, the press release most­ly fea­tures Suda and GOE boss Kazu­ki Mor­ishi­ta being over­ly com­pli­men­ta­ry toward each other. “[W]ith the addi­tion of Grasshop­per Man­u­fac­ture and Suda51 we are adding some of the most inno­v­a­tive tal­ent in today’s gam­ing world to our stel­lar family,” Mor­ishi­ta effused. “We believe gamers will ben­e­fit from this collaboration.”

Suda fired back with his own salvo: “By join­ing Gung­Ho Online Enter­tain­ment, we are align­ing our­selves with a strong, estab­lished pub­lish­ing force that will sup­port our vision.” 

Pleas­antries aside, Gung­Ho does have a nice crop of stu­dios under its belt, includ­ing Game Arts, who devel­oped the “Lunar” and “Grandia” series of RPGs, and Acquire, best known for the “Tenchu” fran­chise. Even bet­ter, Gung­Ho recent­ly opened a ded­i­cat­ed North Amer­i­can pub­lish­ing arm, giv­ing Grasshop­per fans hope that “Killer is Dead” might see a US release after its Japan­ese debut in June.

Here’s the twist: Xseed recent­ly reg­is­tered a series of domain names that sug­gest a con­nec­tion to “Killer is Dead,” which seems hard to square with the Grasshopper/GungHo deal. Xseed is known for pub­lish­ing, local­iz­ing, and dis­trib­ut­ing niche import titles and has worked with Gung­Ho before. Nev­er­the­less, whether or not “Killer is Dead” will make it to the US of A, and which com­pa­nies will be involved if it does, is still up in the air.