Keita Tanpan

Keita Tanpan is a game developer born on March 5, 1987. Since his first game released on Pokegames, The Last Chimchar, he has been a successful indie developer. He began working with Megasoft in 2009 for the production of Pokefight Returns, and has since then been a famous game developer, known best for the Pokefight series.

Personality
Keita is known to be a unique character. Many game developers of large, simple series are expectably upbeat and two-dimensional as their games. However, Keita is very cynical and aloof. He can go into random, serious episodes of depression, hinting that he may have bipolar disorder. His most famous one was in 2012 in the early production of Pokefight 6. He became so depressed, he quit the team, resulting in Pokefight 6 being a sloppy game compared to the rest. Keita is also fairly shy. He refuses to attend many conventions and events when he is asked to speak there. When he does speak, he often seems uncomfortable and has long pauses while talking.

Personal Life
Keita was born in March of 1987 in Castelia City. According to him, he spent the first five years of his life weaving crowds until his family moved to Nacrene. He lived there for the remainder of his childhood, and he believes, "the artistic and historical aspects of the city shaped me a lot." During this time, he got into video games. However, when he was just starting middle school, his dad left the family. Him and his mom moved to Cartoon Island, where she could find a job to feed the two.

"I don't know how I got through high school. I barely managed Bs and I didn't have a lot of friends. But I kept playing video games and they were always there for me. And then I started making video games, too." After high school, Keita had no way to get into college and instead started working like his mom. He eventually grew angry at his mom, saying she was, "too depressing and expectant of me." He moved into an apartment closer to his workplace and continued to work there. He continued working on video games after he got a nice laptop, which he admitted costed him more than he had.

Career
When he was eighteen, he posted a game of his for the first time: The Last Chimchar. The game was liked, so he made a second one called Pokefight. It wasn't very popular, but those who played it loved it. He also made Pokequest, but while he was making this game, Pokefight became extremely popular. It got on the top games of Pokegames. Keita considered this a huge accomplishment, and his mood was boosted so much he decided to seek a project he'd always dreamed of: an MMO.

In late May, Franklin Hagure, an indie game developer Keita had met on Pokegames, got a call. "He was so excited it scared me," Franklin later explained. "He spoke all frantically and it took a minute before he actually got to the point." Keita asked his friend to help him turn Pokefight into an oline fighting game. Franklin agreed, not realizing how big the project was. The two soon began working on the game.

"It took a whole year to make the game. I was pretty motivated the whole time. In March we finished but we still had to make a server." Keita purchased the use of a server from SuperServers. He says he and Franklin split the initial cost, and he did all the monthly payments. In April they publicly released Pokefight Online. Thanks to a couple of sponsers, the game was a huge success. It gained a fan-base and, soon, attention from some bigger companies.

In July of 2007, Keita got a call from Megasoft asking if he was willing to work with them to make a second Pokefight for the XBall 180. Keita accepted, a bit surprised that such a big company liked his game. However, a few weeks before production, Keita got a stomach flu.

After the release of Pokefight X, Keita and Franklin worked on Pokefight Returns. They planned to release it for PC and XBall. It was released on New Year's Eve. After a rocky start due to poor advertising, the game took off. Keita was excited to release the next Pokefight, and by next year Pokefight: Four-Mon was released, followed the next year by Pokefight 5. He even co-directed Pokemon Henkan. During this time, Keita moved to a nice home in Lays Neighborhood.

However, this perfect stream of games was not to last. "Pokefight 6 was going to be another great game, but Keita fell into a very sudden  depression," according to Franklin. "This wasn't new of him, but this time he was so down he didn't even make an effort to come to work. He told me he didn't want to work on 'yet another Pokefight.'" Keita quit the team soon into production.

After Pokefight 6, Franklin was requested by Megasoft for a seventh installment of the series to be one of the first games out for the soon-to-come XBall Zero. Franklin felt this was an opportunity he absolutely could not let down, but he also couldn't do it alone, and managed to get Keita to work with him The two worked quickly, finishing just in time for the release of the new console in November. Apparantly, though, this is when Megasoft began to detatch the two from the games, limiting their creative choices and power over the production. Pokefight 7 was a huge success however and was rated the top game of the XBall.

Keita decided that the next installment would be the last for him. Megasoft continued to treat him and Franklin unfairly, but Pokefight Unlimited ended up being an amazing game. Keita quit Pokefight afterwards, spending his time relatively alone in his home.

Eventually, Keita noticed a surge of people wanting Pokefight Returns back. Him and Franklin reopened the game to much applause from nostalgic fans.