Native name フランスパン Predecessor Watanabe Seisakusho | Romanized name Furansu Pan Headquarters Japan | |
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Industry Computer and video games Key people Narita Shinya (Producer)
Raito (Producer, Composer) Video games Under Night In‑Birth, Ragnarok Battle Offline, Glove on Fight, Dengeki Bunko: Fighting | ||
French Bread (known as Watanabe Seisakusho prior to 2003) is a Japanese video game developer best known for their work in fighting games, particularly the Melty Blood series. The studio started off as a dōjin circle and has largely focused on fighting games, with a few older exceptions such as Bike Banditz. Their newest release, Under Night In-Birth, was released in September 2012. An updated version of the game titled Under Night In-Birth Exe:Late was released in Summer 2013. French Bread collaborated with Sega and Ecole Software to develop a fighting game titled Dengeki Bunko: Fighting Climax.
Foundation
The circle was named Watanabe Manufacturing (渡辺製作所, Watanabe Seisakusho) came from Narita's friend who Narita often played with video games after the high school. They initially developed desk accessories for Windows. Narita, a leader of the circle, found dojin Windows action games and fighting games such as the Tokimeki Taisen (ときめき大戦) and the Moon Lights 2, ported from X68000, then he decided to develop an Windows game. It was initially developed as an original work, but it took much time for developing character graphics. When he asked for his friend, he knew a visual novel To Heart. He was absorbed, and decided to develop it as a derivative work. Characters came from To Heart and the game system was based on Asuka 120% which Narita and his members were absorbed. They released the Queen of Heart '98 on December 30, 1998, it was successful among dojin gamers.
The Melty Blood series co-worked with Type-Moon in 2002 was the most notable work. As in 2015, they continue developing fighting games with Sega.