The company was founded on March 30, 1998 in
Suginami, Japan. Its founder,
Goichi Suda, gave two reasons why he chose the name "
Grasshopper:" The first being a reference to the
song of the same name by UK band
Ride, which he was listening to on repeat when forming the company. The second reason is that, originally, he wanted to use the Japanese word
"battamon" as the company’s name.
"Batta" means
"grasshopper" and
"mon" is
"a thing", and when the words are put together, it means
"copy" or
"fake". However, he later changed his mind and stuck to Grasshopper instead. The word
"Manufacture" was added in because his game company was about "building things." Headed by Suda, GhM were responsible for several original titles, ones that are also fraught with financial risk, but ultimately gained international mainstream attention in 2005 for the
GameCube and
PlayStation 2 game
Killer7. Following releases included
Michigan: Report from Hell (released in Japan, Europe), the
Nintendo DS game
Contact, the
Wii game
No More Heroes and its sequel
No More Heroes 2: Desperate Struggle, and
Shadows of the Damned. Potential losses were often made up by the development of games based on popular anime franchises, such as
Samurai Champloo: Sidetracked,
Blood+: One Night Kiss, and
Rebuild of Evangelion: Sound Impact. In May 2007, Suda announced during a speech at the 2007 Game Developers Conference that Grasshopper was at the time working on three titles for the Wii, two of which were released:
No More Heroes and
Fatal Frame IV. There is no available information on the status of the third Wii game in development then. Grasshopper was said to be working on an
Xbox 360 title, and presented a concept for a
PlayStation 3 game called
Kurayami, a non-linear action-adventure inspired by the worrying and confused universe of the Czech writer
Franz Kafka, whom Suda admires. This was later cancelled and reincorporated ideas were put into the game
Shadows of the Damned. During development of
Shadows of the Damned, the employee count of Grasshopper would double to 140. On 30 January 2013, Grasshopper Manufacture was acquired by
GungHo Online Entertainment. Their first title released under GungHo was
Let It Die. In 2018, the company would post a notice of an absorption-type split over issues in management, confirming that new Grasshopper Manufacture, Inc. would now operate independently of GungHo and work on their own intellectual property such as
No More Heroes under Goichi Suda's management. The old Grasshopper Manufacture, Inc. (currently
Supertrick Games) would retain a majority of Grasshopper staff at the time, which would be assigned to work on GungHo-owned IP such as
Let It Die. Grasshopper Manufacture would subsequently downsize to a more
indie scaled studio, hosting 20 employees as of 2019. The company's first title developed after the split was
Travis Strikes Again: No More Heroes, a spinoff entry in the
No More Heroes series, marketed as a return for the franchise, a tribute to indie games and a commemorative title for Grasshopper Manufacture's history. The game was followed up with
No More Heroes III, the first proper mainline installment for the franchise since 2010. The game retains the core development team from the previous title and was developed in collaboration with outsourced staff, being self-published by Grasshopper Manufacture, with physical distribution assistance from
Nintendo. As a pair, the games mark Goichi Suda's return to a directorial role, having not directed a game since the original
No More Heroes in 2007. Grasshopper was acquired from GungHo by
NetEase Games by October 2021. In announcing the acquisition, Grasshopper stated that they had plans for at least three major games in the next ten years. In May 2022, it was revealed that Grasshopper opened a new studio named Yabukiri Studio, while they teased the announcement of a new game. == Games developed ==