Tadashi Sugiyama
Tadashi Sugiyama (杉山 直, Sugiyama Tadashi) joined Nintendo in 1983, and served as one of the original young design staff for Nintendo's creative department. Sugiyama contributed graphic design to several games and worked with several talented Nintendo staff like Shigeru Miyamoto, Kenji Miki, Yoichi Yamada, and Satoru Iwata. Sugiyama originally worked as a graphic designer and character artist on several early Famicom titles. One of his early famous creations were the character designs of Popo and Nana from Ice Climber. Sugiyama went on to co-direct (with Yoichi Yamada) the blockbuster sequel, Zelda II: The Adventure of Link. Sugiyama was one of the central designers working on Shigeru Miyamoto's GBA-GCN Connectivity experiments, most of which never saw release.Sugiyama currently serves as a senior producer of his own EAD Software Development Group in the central Kyoto headquarters.