FRENCH-BREAD
| FRENCH-BREAD | |
|---|---|
| |
| Information | |
| Name | Unknown Co., Ltd (株式会社アンノウン)[Official][1] SOFT CIRCLE FRENCH-BREAD (フランスパン)[In-game][1] Watanabe Production (渡辺製作所)[1995-2003][2] |
| Location | Taito, Tokyo, Japan[3][4][5] |
| Founded | 1995[3] |
| Founder | Nobuya Narita[3] |
| Employees | 14 (July 2021)[4] |
SOFT CIRCLE FRENCH-BREAD (フランスパン) is the main development studio behind the UNDER NIGHT IN-BIRTH series.
History
FRENCH-BREAD was originally created in 1995 under the name Dōjin circle Watanabe Production.[3] When the group had stopped making Dōjin games, they wanted to use a different name from Watanabe Production. The Dōjin circle name "Soft Circle French-Bread" was something a certain member of the team already owned, but wasn't used anywhere. The name came from the fact that they were so young and poor, that all they had to eat was convenience store french breads and tap water.[6]
The term "French bread" is a common noun and thus cannot be used as a company name. Formally, they are officially Unknown Co., Ltd (株式会社アンノウン), but still use French-Bread in their games as that name is more well-known.[1]
On January 22nd, 2026, FRENCH-BREAD had updated their Recruit page and announced they are hiring battle planners.[7]
Core Staff
Nobuya Narita (なりた のぶや)
Nobuya Narita is the producer as well as the main scenario writer for the UNDER NIGHT IN-BIRTH series. He is one of the founders of French-Bread as a dōjin circle.[3] Narita has mentioned in an interview that his favorite character is Hilda.[citation needed]
He often posts to Twitter about his progress in mobile games such as "Fate/Grand Order" and "Ingress".
Narita is a close friend of Takumi Hiiragiboshi, the author of the "Absolute Duo" light novel series. They met over 15 years ago while both were still amateurs making dōjin works. Narita and Seiichi Yoshihara have helped in designing battle suits for the "Absolute Duo" light novels.[8]
Seiichi Yoshihara (吉原 成一)
Seiichi Yoshihara is the character designer and the original planner for the UNI series, and the ideas for characters and the setting have existed since his days in high school. Yoshihara's personal favorite characters are Linne and Seth.[citation needed] In FRENCH-BREAD, he is a sprite artist who has worked with the studio since the days of the Melty Blood series. Back then, he used the name "Honoka Yoshihara" (吉原ほのか).[citation needed]
On April 3rd, 2019, it was announced Yoshihara had illustrated the mascot of the AM Fantasista arcade location, Sistan for a special Exe:Late[st] tournament that would take place during that year's Golden Week.[10] Winners of the tournament would receive a special Shikishi artwork signed by Yoshihara as well.[11]
When illustrating the pre-order bonus artwork featuring Byakuya and Strix for UNDER NIGHT IN-BIRTH II [Sys:Celes], Yoshihara clarified on his Twitter account that while he did draw them in a suggestive pose to emphasize their distorted relationship, they do not actually feel this way towards one another.[12]
Social media-exclusive art by Seiichi Yoshihara
Kamone Serizawa (芹沢 鴨音)
The main battle planner for both Melty Blood and UNDER NIGHT IN-BIRTH, as well as the leader of the programming team. Kamone handles the updates to the official homepage and Twitter. He is also the host of French-Bread's monthly Twitch broadcast, the FRENCH-BREAD Information Station. Kamone is often seen playing the most recently added characters of the game as a way to promote and teach new techniques. He occasionally returns to play using his main character of choice, Hilda. Nowadays, he mostly plays Enkidu.
Hyde (Color 16), Linne (Color 15) and Orie (Color 7) were actually made by him. Seth (Color 5), Gordeau (Color 29) and Hilda (Color 26) were made by the sprite artists based on Kamone's ideas[13].
Kamone has played fighting games since his grade-school days thanks to the influence from his older brother. Kamone spent a lot of his time finding glitches and infinite combos in various fighting games and posting videos to NicoNicoDouga. This eventually led in him being scouted to the FRENCH-BREAD.[14]
Serizawa Kamone isn't his real name[15]. He has used a nickname "Kamone" in the internet since his days in middle school. However, registering to various sites usually requires using a last name and not wanting to use his real lastname, he ended up borrowing a last name from character that appeared in a popular eroge. That character was Chamomille Serizawa from "Gyousatsu♥Shinsengumi".[16]
He plays various fighting game and often streams them on his personal Twitch channel. The archieves are viewable on his Youtube channel. He is well-known as a huge fan of the manga/anime franchise NEW GAME! He is also a fan of smartphone games such as "Kirakira Fantasia" and "Fate/Grand Order".
Art by Kamone Serizawa
Takehiko Wagatsuma (我妻 毅彦 )
Serves as a director for this game. His main job is that of an effect designer, but he is also responsible for the UI design and screen layout.
He has appeared in French-Bread's in-house game tournaments a few times using Vatista.
Art by Takehiko Wagatsuma
Orie's Birthday 2013
Carmine's Birthday 2014
Seth's Birthday 2015
Gordeau's Birthday 2015
Linne's Birthday 2016
Eltnum's Birthday 2016
Byakuya's Birthday 2016
Hyde's Birthday 2017
Phonon's Birthday 2017
Hilda's Birthday 2017
Nanase's Birthday 2018
Yuzuriha's Birthday 2018
Chaos' Birthday 2018
Artists
Takahiro Saitō (斎藤 孝廣)
One of the game's background artists. He also helps in the effect designing.
Art by Takahiro Saitō
Waldstein's Birthday 2013
Hilda's Birthday 2013
Linne's Birthday 2014
Chaos' Birthday 2016
Eltnum's Birthday 2017
White Day 2018
Makoto Satō (佐藤 誠)
CG graphics artist. Has participated in French-Bread's in-house tournaments using Mika and Nanase.
Art by Makoto Satō
Hyde's Birthday 2015
Yuzuriha's Birthday 2015
Nanase's Birthday 2017
Mika's Birthday 2017
Seth's Birthday 2018
Carmine's Birthday 2018
Kara Osawa (大澤 空)
Sprite artist. Plays a lot of Guilty Gear on his days off. Posts on Twitter about "Fate/Grand Order" and "Alice Gear Aegis".
Art by Kara Osawa
Yuzuiha's Birthday 2016
Waldstein's Birthday 2016
Seth's Birthday 2017
Linne's Birthday 2017
Chaos' Birthday 2017
Mika's Birthday 2018
Gordeau's Birthday 2018
Byakuya's Birthday 2018
Daisuke Matsuo (まつお だいすけ)
Sprite artist.
Art by Daisuke Matsuo
Gordeau's Birthday 2016
Hilda's Birthday 2016
Yūsuke Nakahara (中原 悠佑)
Sprite artist. Has participated in French-Bread's in-house tournaments using Gordeau. He was the main artist for Nanase's sprite animations after Yoshihara had designed them.[17]
Art by Yūsuke Nakahara
Yuzuriha's Birthday 2013
Seth's Birthday 2014
Gordeau's Birthday 2014
Byakuya's Birthday 2014
Linne's Birthday 2015
Eltnum's Birthday 2015
Chaos' Birthday 2015
Carmine's Birthday 2016
Orie's Birthday 2016
Valentine's Day 2017
Gordeau's Birthday 2017
Hyde's Birthday 2018
Wagner's Birthday 2018
Phonon's Birthday 2018
Kōtarō Shiratori (白鳥 光太郎)
Sprite artist. Has participated in French-Bread's in-house tournaments using Seth and Byakuya.
Art by Kōtarō Shiratori
Waldstein's Birthday 2015
Hilda's Birthday 2015
Hyde's Birthday 2016
Phonon's Birthday 2016
Christmas 2016
Carmine's Birthday 2017
Yuzuriha's Birthday 2017
Byakuya's Birthday 2017
Linne's Birthday 2018
Eltnum's Birthday 2018
Enkidu's Birthday 2018
Keisuke Koyama (コヤマ ケイスケ)
An outsourced artist who occasionally helps with the sprites.
Art by Keisuke Koyama
Mototsugu Morita (森田 基嗣)
Mototsugu Morita is a sprite artist who started working with FRENCH-BREAD after the release of UNDER NIGHT IN-BIRTH Exe:Late[st], and has since appeared in the credits of subsequent game releases.[18] They are credited as "Moritsugu Morita" in the English version of UNDER NIGHT IN-BIRTH Exe:Late[cl-r],[19] and simply as "Morita" on the official website.[20]
Art by Mototsugu Morita
Hilda's Birthday 2018
Retired Staff
Mubyo (六秒)
Alternatively known as 6sec. He was a sprite artist who, on February 5th 2016, announced that he had resigned from French-Bread.[21]
Art by Mubyo
Gordeau's Birthday 2013
Chaos' Birthday 2013
Yuzuriha's Birthday 2014
Waldstein's Birthday 2014
Orie's Birthday 2014
Hilda's Birthday 2014
Carmine's Birthday 2015
Byakuya's Birthday 2015
Seth's Birthday 2016
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 Kamone's Youtube channel - What is French-Bread?
- ↑ Official Website of Watanabe Seisakujo on the Internet Archive
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 3.4 The Surprising History of the French Bread Studio on Basgrospoing.fr
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 Company info on the Unknown Co, Ltd. Website
- ↑ Recruit Page on inbirth.info
- ↑ Kamone Serizawa's Youtube channel - Why is it called French-Bread?
- ↑ Original post by @inbirthPR
- ↑ FRENCH-BREAD Hatenadiary blog post, published March 25th, 2014
- ↑ Original post by @amfantasista - 17周年のイラストはフランスパンの吉原 成一先生による描き下ろしジスたんです！こちらのイラストを使った色紙に吉原先生の直筆サインを入れていただいたものをジスタ格ゲーフェスト各種目優勝者に進呈！格ゲーフェストにふさわしい1枚になっております、是非参加してゲットしてください！
- ↑ Official post on AM Fantasista's website
- ↑ Inbirth.info post released on April 26th, 2019
- ↑ Original post by @SeichiYoshihara - ビャクヤとツクヨミのイラストは、二人の歪な関係をイメージ化したもので、普段からこういうプレイをしているというわけではないです。This illustration depicts the distorted relationship between Byakuya and Tsukuyomi, but they don't actually act like this.
- ↑ Kamone's Youtube channel - Colors for the next game?
- ↑ 4Gamer Interview
- ↑ Kamone's Youtube channel - Is Serizawa Kamone your real name?
- ↑ Kamone's Youtube channel - You like Serizawa Kamo?
- ↑ FRENCH-BREAD Information Station - Episode 7. Mentioned around 38:05
- ↑ UNDER NIGHT IN-BIRTH II [Sys:Celes] - Credits
- ↑ UNDER NIGHT IN-BIRTH Exe:Late[cl-r] - Credits
- ↑ 森田 tag on Inbirth.info
- ↑ Source @6sec
| Developers | FRENCH-BREAD |
|---|---|
| Assisting Companies | Arc System Works · ECOLE SOFTWARE · SUBTLE STYLE |
| Related Personnel | Musicians (Raito · RyoRca) · Voice Actors |