Kotaro Uchikoshi Opens Up on CRASH KEYS and the Project That Fell Through
The interview lays out the practical reason the studio went public ahead of schedule: with the cancelled project's funding gone, Uchikoshi is now openly soliciting work and investment for CRASH KEYS.
Reporting from 1 source: Game Spark.
Kotaro Uchikoshi, the writer behind the ZERO ESCAPE and AI: The Somnium Files series, established CRASH KEYS in March 2025 while still at Kazutaka Kodaka's Too Kyo Games, intending to reveal the company alongside a new title in 2027. That project was cancelled, the expected money fell to zero, and he announced the studio early on October 15, 2026. He says he spent three days and nights in bed after the cancellation.
The company was already registered when the project collapsed. Uchikoshi says the announcement was pulled forward because the money expected a few months later dropped to zero, and he needed a public way to seek work and funding.
He remains at Too Kyo Games, the studio headed by Kazutaka Kodaka, and describes the motivation for a separate company plainly: outside clients who want to work with him tended to approach through Too Kyo's name, which is associated with Kodaka. CRASH KEYS is named after an organization in the ZERO ESCAPE series, and its tagline about a door that only a broken key opens is meant to signal work outside conventional methods.
Written with AI by Yomimono from the 1 cited source below, including Japanese-language reporting where cited. See our editorial policy.
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