Susumu Takajima/Blogs/December 1, 2007

Hi, this is Driller or Susumu Takajima from Drillimation.

Oh boy, I can't believe it's December already, and it's Christmastime once again. It's almost the birthdays of our son Minoru (December 9) and my queen Kagami (December 21). Today, I'm actually going to be interviewing her just for you!

Driller: Today, I'm going to be giving the inner viewings of you to our son. The goal of this interview is discussing both our gaming and voice acting history and our stances on them.

Kagami: Thank you Susumu, and since you mentioned "son", I can't believe you are making me have another baby! So today, I want to start off with your first gaming memories. So, what was the first video game you played?

Driller: Good question Kagami! Basically, the Famicom was the first video game console I ever played, but you might not even know this about me, I wasn't actually born in Japan. I was actually born in America during one of my father's business trips. So basically, I hold citizenship in both Japan and the United States! Pretty dang crazy! Obviously, I spent most my youth in Japan and went to America during my summer breaks when you and I were in elementary, junior high, and even senior high. I studied English with an American tutor, who was working at the American Drillimation facility. She wanted me to provide the translations for the Drillimation games. Moving on, my father actually owned a Commodore 64, PC-88 and PC-98 machines, and even the IBM PC.

Driller: Steering away from the above, the first video game I ever played was Namco's Pac-Man, which I did not know that it was more popular in America than our home country of Japan. Also, before the first Mr. Driller game was made, the Famicom also came out, so my family got one right away. Whenever I would get a new game, I would tell it to everyone at school and encourage them to get that particular game. Some of the biggest games that influenced me were Super Mario Bros., Pac-Man, and Xevious.

Kagami: Yeah, my story also began with the Famicom as well. That was a gift I got for Christmas in 1986 before I even met you, and I got two games with it: Super Mario Bros. and of course, the NES port of Mr. Driller. My mother had been watching an awful lot of Lucky Star during my early years, and The Drillimation Series was the first anime I ever watched as a youngster. And so, the reason I came to Drillimation was there was an ad campaign looking for a young girl to voice Remilia Scarlet in Touhou 6: The Embodiment of Scarlet Devil. I had a bit of anxiety about voicing a vampire, but I did it anyway.