Katsuhiro Harada is leaving Bandai Namco After 31 Years - News
by William D'Angelo , posted on 08 December 2025 / 1,672 Views
Katsuhiro Harada, the producer on the Tekken series, announced he is leaving Bandai Namco at the end of the year after over 31 years at the company.
Harada has worked on the Tekken franchise since the beginning. He started by balancing and tweaking the timing of the first entry. In Tekken 3 he was a designer and director on the series.
Read the full message from Katsuhiro Harada below:
I’d like to share that I’ll be leaving Bandai Namco at the end of 2025.
With the Tekken series reaching its 30th anniversary—an important milestone for a project I’ve devoted much of my life to—I felt this was the most fitting moment to bring one chapter to a close.
My roots lie in the days when I supported small local tournaments in Japanese arcades and in small halls and community centers overseas.
I still remember carrying arcade cabinets by myself, encouraging people to a “Please try Tekken,” and directly facing the players right in front of me.
The conversations and atmosphere we shared in those places became the core of who I am as a developer and game creator.
Even as the times changed, those experiences have remained at the center of my identity.
And even after the tournament scene grew much larger, many of you continued to treat me like an old friend—challenging me at venues, inviting me out for drinks at bars.
Those memories are also deeply precious to me.
In recent years, I experienced the loss of several close friends in my personal life, and in my professional life I witnessed the retirement or passing of many senior colleagues whom I deeply respect.
Those accumulated events made me reflect on the “time I have left as a creator.”
During that period, I sought advice from Ken Kutaragi—whom I respect as though he were another father—and received invaluable encouragement and guidance.
His words quietly supported me in making this decision.
Over the past four to five years, I’ve gradually handed over all of my responsibilities, as well as the stories and worldbuilding I oversaw, to the team, bringing me to the present day.
Looking back, I was fortunate to work on an extraordinary variety of projects—VR titles (such as Summer Lesson), Pokken Tournament, the Soulcalibur series, and many others, both inside and outside the company.
Each project was full of new discoveries and learning, and every one of them became an irreplaceable experience for me.
To everyone who has supported me, to communities around the world, and to all the colleagues who have walked alongside me for so many years, I offer my deepest gratitude.
I’ll share more about my next steps at a later date.
Thank you very much for everything.
Postscript
Although I will be leaving the company at the end of 2025, Bandai Namco has asked me to appear at the [Tekken] World Tournament Finals at the end of January 2026, so I expect to attend as a guest.
For 30 years I kept saying, “I’ll do it someday,” and never once performed as a DJ at a tournament event.
So instead, I will be releasing—for the first and last time—a 60-minute Tekken DJ-style nonstop mix (DJ mix), personally edited by myself, together with this announcement.
Listening to it brings back many memories.
Thank you again, sincerely, for all these years.
Read a message from Bandai Namco below:
Regarding the Departure of Katsuhiro Harada
Katsuhiro Harada, who has long led numerous projects including the Tekken series, will be leaving Bandai Namco. This comes as the Tekken series finishes celebrating its 30th anniversary, a milestone he deeply contributed to as executive director and executive producer on the franchise. Harada-san is making an appearance and meeting with the Tekken community at the “Tekken World Tour 2025 Global Finals” Last Chance Qualifier (LCQ) and Top 20 Finals, held in Malmo, Sweden, on January 31 and February 1, 2026.
Regarding the Future of the Tekken Series
To our fans, rest assured that we are fully committed to future development and content plans for Tekken 8. We will continue to take community feedback on the game and its content to heart to ensure that we uphold the vision and spirit built by Harada-san, dedicating our utmost efforts to ensure the legacy of the Tekken series continues as a fighting game franchise beloved worldwide.
We express our deepest gratitude to Harada-san for providing us with vision and continued success over the years.
A life-long and avid gamer, William D'Angelo was first introduced to VGChartz in 2007. After years of supporting the site, he was brought on in 2010 as a junior analyst, working his way up to lead analyst in 2012 and taking over the hardware estimates in 2017. He has expanded his involvement in the gaming community by producing content on his own YouTube channel and Twitch channel. You can follow the author on Bluesky.
More Articles
I wish Itagaki was alive to react to this
I kind of wonder if this decision was informed in any part by his grief over Itagaki's death. I mean, yeah, he's put in a 31-year career, but maybe the untimely death of his old rival and friend made him decide that 30 years was enough.
Will he be retiring or moving on to create something new!?
70% chance he’s taking the Chinese money I’d estimate
I wonder what that means for Tekken x Streets Fighter
He saw the new Virtua Fighter and got scared
I can only hope VF6 will finally give Tekken the competition it has needed for a long time. VF deserves great success.
