Jerry Momoda

Gerald (Jerry) Momoda’s video game career began in 1982 as one of the first ten employees of Nintendo of America Inc.. Initially hired for his prowess in the arcade game Donkey Kong, Jerry became NOA’s first market research analyst and game master. Soon after joining the company, he was called to NYC by Howard Lincoln to play Donkey Kong in the courtroom during the historic legal case, Universal vs. Nintendo. After the surprising success of Donkey Kong, Jerry helped Shigeru Miyamoto and Genyo Takeda to better understand the American market and player. He assisted in the development of multiple games that were eventually released on the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES), and others. At Nintendo, Jerry fell in love with the video game industry where he combined a business degree with his love for art and video games.

In 1985, Jerry became a product manager with Sega to pursue his passion for cutting edge technology video games. While at Sega, he assisted with a large array of games; his personal favorite projects during this time are Out Run and Choplifter.

In 1987 Jerry fulfilled a dream to work for another pillar in the history of video games, Atari Games. As part of the Atari marketing team led by Mary Fujihara, Jerry localized Namco; titles and was the product manager on original games with in-house dev teams.

Jerry’s most productive years were spent as a product manager at Namco. A fan of both Namco games and their progress in 3D technology, Jerry joined the company in 1993. Jerry’s presentation to Namco management in Tokyo resulted in the creation of Tekken. Tekken is the largest selling fighting game in history. In an effort to bring more players out to the arcade, Jerry worked on several games featuring complicated controls and unique cabinet designs.

Jerry credits his childhood love for art and board games, combined with a vivid imagination as a foundation to his successful career in video games. Jerry is now retired, living in the San Francisco Bay area. He still loves games and writes a video game blog, jerrymomoda.com.