4 years 2 months ago
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Kazuhisa Hashimoto, the man behind the legendary Konami Code, has died, aged 61.
Hashimoto joined Konami, then a primarily coin-op focussed company, in 1983, soon entering its console division, where he would work on the likes of Track & Field, Goonies, and the Mystical Ninja series. It was here that Hashimoto implemented his famed Konami Code, while creating the 1986 NES port of classic side-scrolling shooter Gradius.
By his own admission, Hashimoto found the arcade original "really tough", and so created the code - up, up, down, down, left, right, left, right, B, A, Start - in order to grant himself a full selection of power-ups and more easily test the home console version.