Cing, Inc. (Japanese: 株式会社シング, Romaji: Kabushiki-gaisha Shingu) (stylized as CiNG) (pronounced "sing") was an independent Japanese video game developer that used to plan and produce software for home video game consoles and mobile phones, headquartered in the Chuo ward of Fukuoka City, Japan. It was founded in April 22, 1999 by a group of former Riverhill Soft staff.
They were best known for the adventure games they developed, among them being the entries of the Another Code and Kyle Hyde Saga series.
The company filed for bankruptcy on March 1, 2010.
Overview[]
Origin[]
Riverhill Soft, the parent company of Cing, was a manufacturer that developed games for PCs and home consoles. They were best known for creating various mystery franchises among many of their other adventure games. However, management deteriorated due to repeated staff independence, and from 2000, the company changed its policy to content production for mobile phones, and in June 2004, it was declared bankrupt, with the rights of many of Riverhill Soft's IPs transferred to Althi Inc. a company originally established on April 7, 2000 as a subsidiary of bankrupt Riverhill Soft to produce mobile phones titles for games originally made by them. So it can be said that the company was still alive in terms of content production for mobile phones.
As for the home console developers, other companies founded by the Riverhill Soft breakaway group include Level-5, established in October 1998 by Akihiro Hino. Popular for their work on the Professor Layton, Yokai Watch!, and Inazuma Eleven franchises, this is mainly the team that made Overblood and Doctor Hauser. The other company was Cing.
Established in April 22, 1999, almost a year after Level-5, by Takuya Miyagawa who worked on game design at Riverhill, and vice president Rika Suzuki, who was highly acclaimed for planning and writing the scenarios of games such as the J.B. Harold and Tōdō Ryuunosuke series. Mr. Miyagawa started working with senior managing director Rika Suzuki, general affairs manager Maho Jouchi (Suzuki's sister), and programmer Toshihiko Ichimaru, and thus, Cing was created as a means of providing gamers with new and unique video game experiences.
Although, Riverhill Soft disbanded into many companies, it was Cing that inherited the lineage most, often developing games with a similar style to some of Riverhill's titles.
Projects[]
Cing's business can be broadly divided into three categories: game development, production of applications for mobile phones, and website production.
One of Cing's earliest projects was e-JNN in 2001, the website for JNN (Japan News Network) a commercial television network in Japan.
Another work of theirs was the official site for PRIDE (a Japanese mixed martial arts promotion company) on feature phones, which was filled to the brim with contents such as ringtones of PRIDE entrance songs and the players' live voices, e-mail alerts, standby screens, ect., as well as the websites for Kouga and the General Affairs Research Institute.
Following Takuya Miyagawa's work on Contra Advance: The Alien Wars EX for the GBA three years after Cing's foundation, the company's first publicly known video game project was Glass Rose, a Point & Click Adventure title that's very reminiscent of Kohakuiro no Yuigon, written by Rika Suzuki and published by Capcom in 2003 in Japan for the Playstation 2, and despite having Masahiro Matsuoka's likeness (from the popular Japanese pop group Tokio) for its main character, the title failed to prove successful at retail and was never localized in North America, although, it did see a European release.
They later worked on Japan-only feature phone entries of already established franchises between the years 2004 and 2005, most notably Square Enix's Photocard☆Paradise and other games published by Marvelous Liveware Inc. (a subsidiary of Marvelous Entertainment Inc.) like Bokujou Monogatari, Umi no Nushi Tsuri, Moetan Online... The mobile games were mostly handeled by Cing's Tokyo office.
It is with their second console title, Another Code: Two Memories (Trace Memory in the West) in 2005, that the developer became a lot more known. Developed under the aegis of Nintendo, this game was one of the first to appear on the very successful NDS. Its adventure orientation, its gameplay components combining the capabilities of the console, as well as the presence of a rich scenario, make it a renowned title loved by many.
The company then reiterates the experience by developing Hotel Dusk: Room 215, released initially in 2007. The studio, with this title, is betting on a real interactive novel, with a story that completely takes precedence over gameplay mechanics, inviting the player to hold the Nintendo DS aside like a book, it was also praised for it's unique art-style that uses a technique called roto-scoping to draw the characters' movements accurately and make the animations look a lot more realistic, the game had very good reviews, which amassed a number of fans over the years to come.
Cing would also go on to develop Kaite Shabette Hajimeyou!: Monster Farm DS, a Life Simulation video game taking place in the city of Borgan on the Northern Continent. It involves raising, fighting, and breeding monsters. The game was published by Tecmo in Japan on July 12, 2007, but it never received an English localization. Although, it's sequel, Monster Farm DS 2: Yomigaeru! Master Breeder Densetsu, which also got developed by Cing, was released in North America as Monster Rancher DS, on August 3, 2010.
And in 2009, they would work on the second game in the Another Code series, Another Code R - A Journey Into lost Memories for the Wii. A visual novel and adventure game hybrid, and unlike the first title, it left behind the top-down perspective and the world is fully rendered in 3D, the game was only released in Japan and Europe.
Their next Wii title, Little King's Story, a simulation real time strategy role playing game with action-adventure elements, was co-developed by Town Factory and Cing for the Nintendo Wii. The game was published by Marvelous Entertainment in Japan, while their subsidiaries Xseed Games and Rising Star Games published the game in North America and Europe & Australia respectively. The game received a lot of praise in it's release, however, due to factors such as increased development costs due to the prolonged development of LKS and a series of in-house projects brought in from the latter half of 2009 being rejected, sales fell into a slump which affected Cing negatively.
Subsequently, Again on the DS was their next adventure title and the last game published by Tecmo on the system. Released on December 10, 2009. You play by holding the DS vertically just like Hotel Dusk: Room 215. The main character "J" is an FBI investigator who investigates serial murder cases using his paranormal vision ability that allows him to look at the past. The graphics use live-action clippings. And the flow of the game was very similar to that of the J.B. Harold series.
Cing's final project was Last Window: The Secret of Cape West, the sequel to Hotel Dusk: Room 215 and the second game in the Kyle Hyde Saga, and just like its predecessor, the game received very good reviews with most praising the beautiful art-style, and the carefully written narrative.
Bankruptcy & Legacy[]
Shortly after the Last Window's release, on March 1, 2010, Cing began preparing to file for bankruptcy proceedings, due to cash flow problems they ran into, reportedly suffering from liabilities of 256 million yen (USD 2.9m/EUR 2.1m). And with Cing gone, its legacy continues by remnants of the ex-staff.
Among them there's Rika Suzuki who founded her own company in 2009 named Bellwood, where she would write online novels on its offcial site, as well as making Black Rose Suspects, an RPG released in 2017 for mobile phones.
And from the mind of Taisuke Kanasaki under Arc Sytem Works would come Chase: Cold Case Investigations ~Distant Memories~, released on October 13, 2016 which had many of the developers from Cing involved, but not Rika Suzuki, the original writer for all of Cing's adventure titles.
Works[]
Console Games[]
Initial Year of Release | English title | Japanese title (Romaji) | Platform | JP | EU | NA | AU | KR |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
2003 | Glass Rose | Garasu no Bara | PlayStation 2 | |||||
2005 | Another Code: Two Memories (NA: Trace Memory) | Anazā Kōdo Futatsu no Kioku | Nintendo DS | |||||
2007 | Hotel Dusk: Room 215 | Wish Room: Tenshi no Kioku | Nintendo DS | |||||
2007 | Let's Start Writing and Talking!: Monster Farm DS (Fan-Translation) | Kaite Shabette Hajimeyou!: Monster Farm DS | Nintendo DS | |||||
2008 | Monster Rancher DS | Monster Farm DS 2: Yomigaeru! Master Breeder Densetsu | Nintendo DS | |||||
2009 | Another Code: R - A Journey into Lost Memories | Another Code: R - Kioku no Tobira | Wii | |||||
2009 | Little King's Story | Ōsama Monogatari | Wii | |||||
2009 | Again | Again: FBI Chō Shinri Sōsakan | Nintendo DS | |||||
2010 | Last Window: The Secret of Cape West | Last Window: Mayonaka no Yakusoku | Nintendo DS |
Mobile Games[]
Initial Year of Release | Japanese Title | Platforms | Region |
---|---|---|---|
2004 | きせかえごっこ (Romaji: Kisekae Gokko) | i-mode, EZweb, Yahoo! Keitai | JP |
At least before 2005 | もえたん Online (Romaji: Moetan Online) | i-mode, EZweb, Yahoo! Keitai | JP |
At least before 2005 | 川のぬし釣り(Romaji: Kawa no Nushi Tsuri) | i-mode, EZweb, Yahoo! Keitai | JP |
At least before 2005 | フォト☆パラ (Romaji: Foto☆Para) | i-mode, EZweb, Yahoo! Keitai | JP |
2005 | 実録鬼嫁日記 (Romaji: Jitsuroku Oniyome Nikki) | i-mode, EZweb, Yahoo! Keitai | JP |
At least before 2006 | 海のぬし釣り(Umi no Nushi Tsuri) | i-mode, EZweb, Yahoo! Keitai | JP |
At least before 2006 | 牧場物語モバイルライフ (Bokujou Monogatari Mobairu Raifu) | i-mode, EZweb, Yahoo! Keitai | JP |
At least before 2006 | 学校をつくろう!(Romaji: Gakkō o Tsukurou!) | i-mode, EZweb, Yahoo! Keitai | JP |
Web Work[]
Year of Release | Website Names | Type |
---|---|---|
At least before 2002 | e-JNN | Online Website |
At least before 2002 | Kouga | Online Website |
2003 | PRIDE | Feature Phone Web Application |
At least before 2004 | General Affairs Research Institude | Online Website |