Instantly recognizable to any gamer worth their salt, Konami's bygone logo and its accompanying chime introduced more classic titles than we can count. When the familiar waves, slanted hourglasses, were retired in 2003, we felt their passing like the death of an old friend. We poured out liquor, fired 21 shots into the air from our Zappers, and bumped Master P's "I Miss My Homies" for days.
Though the logo is now gone, it will certainly never be forgotten ...
The good die young.
While Konami's history traces back to CEO Kagemasa Kozuki's founding of a jukebox rental and repair business in 1969, the company name wasn't established until 1973. Partners and founders -- Kagemasa Kozuki, Yoshinobu Nakama, Hiro Matsuda, and Shokichi Ishihara -- all lent letters from their surnames to form Konami Industry Co., Ltd. Translated from Japanese to English, Konami can mean "small waves."
Konami's first logo was finalized in 1981, just after the company started to release arcade games and right before it began putting out PC titles. There's not much remarkable about the blue, thick letters, but the curl at the end of the K always annoyed us with its somewhat resemblance to LJN's jumbo J. It's an association that no respectable video game company should ever suffer.
As you can expect, the logo change received much criticism from fans of Konami's older titles. Some felt the new designs were remarkably less aesthetically pleasing, while others complained that they bore no resemblance to the markings from their youth. Our favorite grievance, the one that makes us look away to hide our watery eyes, comes from Select Button forumer Slonie: "The new Konami logo cannot jauntily walk onto the screen while a happy tune plays, like the old one can."
Konami Logo
1986 - 2003
"So we beat on, boats, against the current,
borne back ceaselessly into the past."
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_thumbnail.jpg "Mega Man Star Force 2")
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
8-12-2007 @ 8:56PM
Tim said...
I never knew companies were so anal as to think that italics signified they weren't a "stable entity"
It's italics for crying out freaking loud...
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8-12-2007 @ 9:20PM
Backslash said...
Please tell me you didn't use a Gatsby quote. ;_;
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8-12-2007 @ 9:44PM
Trogdor said...
Ummm, just one question... Why do people care so much about A LOGO??? I mean, come on! I didn't grow up back in the day, but even now, I wouldn't care much if companies like Bethesda, Square Enix or Capcom changed their logos. The logo doesn't matter... The games do.
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8-13-2007 @ 12:22AM
BPM said...
@Trogdor:
Sometimes a change in logo reflects a change in business policies, and overall quality of the company's products.
Take for exmaple, Konami's TMNT games based on the original cartoon (old Konami logo) to the ones based on the new cartoon (new Konami logo).
For whatever reason, Konami just can't make stunning TMNT games like they used to.
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8-13-2007 @ 1:35AM
TooManyGames said...
Hey! Those tats belong to retro music mixer Shawn Phase! www.tempsoundsolutions.com/ Shawn Phase played at East Coast Gaming Expo 3, was a great show! Check out some of his work on his website!
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8-13-2007 @ 4:58AM
JC Fletcher said...
Trogdor: Sometimes people like the way a thing looks, or associate a certain image with a happy emotion or memory.
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8-13-2007 @ 7:03AM
geeky said...
Logos are very important to a companys identity. As important and symbolic as the emblem on the hood of your car, the stitching on the side of your shoe, or the flag of your country. It may seem superficial, but really, its not.
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8-13-2007 @ 9:52AM
Carmencita said...
I'm all out of love,
I'm so lost without you...
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8-13-2007 @ 5:40PM
BPM said...
Oh, here's some Konami trivia:
Konami is sometimes represented as 573.
5 = Go, changed to voiceless "ko"
7 = Nana, shortened to "na"
3 = Mittsu, shortened to "mi"
This is sometimes referenced to in games.
Namco does this as well. Their number is 765.
7 = Nana, shortened to "na"
6 = Muttsu, shortened to "m"
5 Go, changed to voiceless "co"
Namco also referneces to this in their games, too.
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