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Kenichi Iwao (岩尾賢一 iwao ken'ichi?) is a writer known for his work on the script to the original Resident Evil[1] as well as Parasite Eve.

Contributions to Resident Evil[]

Iwao joined the Resident Evil team half-way into its development, and served the project as a "planner",[2] a senior role in Capcom projects at the time which gave team members creative influence over the project akin to the director. Iwao was particularly focused on scenario planning, and worked with director Shinji Mikami in developing a story and script for the game. With Capcom anticipating the next generation of video games to be primarily story-driven, they would request repeated updates as to the nature of the story.[3] The two men disagreed on both story and work philosophy for the project: Iwao wanted a complex sci-fi horror narrative with the backstory uncovered in documents scattered in the game, while Mikami believed a story would detract from the game aspect and wanted it kept limited with a Megaman-style story.[3][4] Ultimately Iwao's proposals earned the interest of the higher-ups and he devised a branching scenario for Chris Redfield - later expanded for a Jill Valentine story - as well as conceiving of the science-fiction story elements for the game including Clay Virus.[5]

Following completion of Resident Evil, Iwao conceived of a basic story outline for Resident Evil 2, but left Capcom before it could be written, with it falling into the hands of Hideki Kamiya. When moving to Square Enix, Iwao used this rough outline when directing Parasite Eve II. His own work on Resident Evil was soon followed-up by Noboru Sugimura.

Sources[]

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