Takayoshi Sato

Takayoshi Sato (佐藤 隆善 Satō Takayoshi) was a member of Team Silent: he was the character designer as well as the CGI director for Silent Hill and Silent Hill 2.

Biography
Takayoshi Sato studied fine arts at Tokyo’s Tama Art University in Japan, receiving a BFA in oil painting. He was hired by Konami in 1996, after taking three art tests and five interviews. His earliest work with Konami in 1996 was working on numerous animations for Sexy Parodius for the Sony PlayStation and Sega Saturn. He then began work on the first Silent Hill game for the PlayStation. He worked on characters, environments and the mood of the games as well as helping with the creation of the story. “I tried to depict a town that is desolated, filled with sorrow yet you cannot stop loving it.” It took him 2 and a half years to single-handedly create all of the CGI scenes in the game. Sato created the higher-res characters himself, the environments, all aspects of modeling and texturing, as well as lighting in the CGI movie sequences.

"Silent Hill 1 became very successful and I got three awards for it. That allowed me to pursue my own creative vision. "

For Silent Hill 2, he worked on the story line, the game system, and led all the pre-production activities. After working on Silent Hill 2, because of divergences with Konami Japan, he decided to relocate to the US to work on the development of other games. He worked for a few years for Konami of America, working with the staff there to help them to focus on important gameplay features in their games.

"I still think that Silent Hill 1 and 2 represent the best of my work. They have my largest influence. I can do much better now, though. "

Since 2006, Sato has been working with Virtual Heroes Serious Game division in North Carolina as a research associate and art director. He has helped to schedule, plan, and finish more than 20 games in the space of 3 years. Sato has also designed the characters for Tale of Tales’ independent game, Fatale, for which he created the characters of John the Baptist and Salome.