Naoto Ōshima

Naoto Ōshima
Born	January 26, 1964 (1964-01-26) Unknown
Occupation	Game designer

Naoto Ōshima (大島 直人, Ōshima Naoto) (January 26, 1964) is a Japanese national and former Sega employee who designed and created the characters of Sonic the Hedgehog and Dr. Eggman. However, Yuji Naka and Hirokazu Yasuhara often get the credit for his work on the Sonic series, because of their close association with the Sonic name. Ōshima gained renown at Sega's Sonic Team for creating characters and playing integral roles in the development of games like Phantasy Star, Sonic CD, Nights into Dreams..., and Sonic Adventure.

After leaving Sonic Team, he formed an independent game company called Artoon. Since then he has stepped down from the position of president in the company and was replaced by Yutaka Sugano. There he went on to work on such games as Pinobee and Blinx: The Time Sweeper, and in 2004, the sequel to Blinx, Blinx 2: Masters of Time & Space. In 2010, Artoon was absorbed into AQ Interactive.

He is occasionally credited under the nickname "Big Island" (or "Bigisland"), which is a literal translation of his family name.

In 2010, he and other key members of Artoon left to form Arzest.

Sonic is surrounded by series creators Yuji Naka (left), Naoto Ōshima (center), and Hirokazu Yasuhara (Right) at Sonic's 20th Anniversary party

Production history

• Kujakuo (1988) — Designer
• Phantasy Star (1988) — Designer
• Phantasy Star II (1989) — Designer
• Sonic the Hedgehog (1991) — Character Design, Project
• Fatal Labyrinth (1991) — Designer
• Sonic Eraser (1991) — Special Thanks
• Sonic CD (1993) — Director
• SegaSonic the Hedgehog (1993) — Special Thanks
• Knuckles' Chaotix (1995) — Original Character Concept
• Sonic 3D Blast (1996) — Advisor
• Nights into Dreams (1996) — Director, Nights Designer
• Christmas Nights (1996) — Director, Visual Designer
• Sonic R (1997) — Graphic Advisor
• Sonic Jam (1997) — Supervisor
• Burning Rangers (1998) — Director, Character Designer, Graphic Artist
• Sonic Adventure (1998) — Story Event Motion Designer, Story Event Coordinator, CG Movie Producer, Opening Movie Editor
• Silent Hill (1999) — Graphic System Programmer
• Pinobee: Wings of Adventure (2001) — Director
• Blinx: The Time Sweeper (2002) — Director
• Silent Hill 3 (2003) — Effect Programmer
• Blinx 2: Masters of Time and Space (2004) — Director
• Yoshi's Universal Gravitation (2004) — Producer
• Yoshi's Island DS (2006) — Producer
• Blue Dragon (2006) — Executive Producer
• Lost Odyssey (2007) — Special Thanks
• Away Shuffle Dungeon (2008) — Character Designer
• Flingsmash (2010)
• Wii Play: Motion (2011)
• Sonic Generations (2011) - Special Thanks