The sudden death of Dragon Ball creator Akira Toriyama has shocked millions of fans across the world, including the developers at CyberConnect2, with CEO Hiroshi Matsuyama confirming the company will close down temporarily to mourn the late mangaka.
Matsuyama took to Twitter to express his sadness over Toriyama's passing, adding that despite aiming to be someone who always tries to spread positivity, he broke down in tears during a meeting with CyberConnect2 employees working on an unnamed project.
Matsuyama apologised to CC2 employees and announced that the company is closing its doors on March 8 to allow employees to properly mourn Toriyama.
CyberConnect2 was the developer behind the Dragon Ball RPG DBZ: Kakarot, released in 2020 for PS4, Xbox One, and PC. The game would be ported to Nintendo Switch in 2021 and receive enhanced versions for the PS5 and Xbox Series S and X just this past year.
Toriyama was directly involved with the project, creating an original character for the game - Bonyū. In fact, that would be only the third Dragon Ball character the mangaka would create for a videogame adaptation of his seminal work, the others being Android 21 for Arc System Works' Dragon Ball FighterZ and Shallot for Dragon Ball Legends.
Of course, Toriyama's influence in the gaming industry is just as memorable as his work as a manga creator. He helped bring the Dragon Quest world to life, creating original characters for the entire mainline series right from the first one in 1986.
He is also responsible for character designs in the Blue Dragon series and in Chrono Trigger, revered as one of the greatest videogames of all time, partially due to the timeless character designs, which look as cool now as they did back in back in 1995.
Toriyama's work will continue to excite fans of his work as an RPG based on his Sand Land manga will be released this April. For Dragon Ball fans, a Budokai Tenkaichi spiritual succesor, DBZ Sparking! ZERO is also being developed.
Finally, it's unclear how much work he managed to complete in the upcoming Dragon Quest 12: The Flames of Fate, although the game has been in development since 2019 before it was officially revealed back in 2021.
DQ12 will definitely be a bittersweet entry for fans of the series as it not only will likely mark Akira Toriyama's final game in the franchise but also long-time composer Koichi Sugiyama, who passed away in 2021.
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