UPL Co., Ltd
Moby ID: 5541
- Universal Play Land (from 1982 to 1984)
Overview edit · view history
UPL, short for Universal Play Land, was established in the early eighties (not even the old employees know the exact year) as Universal's (now Aruze) sales branch in the Kantō region. Its head office was in the Tochigi prefecture, while most of the games development was conducted in its Tokyo office.
Although UPL did arcade games in a variety of genres, it is mostly remembered for its vertically scrolling shooters with a high level of tactical thinking. Though UPL did quite well in the arcades, it almost missed the bus when consoles arrived on the scene, and was a late comer on the NES, releasing its first home game in 1988. While this may be seen as one reason for UPL's 1992 bankruptcy, the main factor seems to have been the company's unsuccessful pachinko machine business.
Credited on 24 Games from 1982 to 1992
Displaying most recent · View all
| Mahjong Haōden: Kaiser's Quest (1992 on TurboGrafx-16) |
| Kōtetsu Yōsai Strahl (1992 on Arcade, PlayStation 4, Nintendo Switch) |
| Acrobat Mission (1991 on SNES, Arcade) |
| Black Heart (1991 on Arcade, Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4) |
| Ninja Taro (1991 on Game Boy) |
| Gomola Speed (1990 on TurboGrafx-16) |
| USAAF Mustang (1990 on Genesis, Arcade, PlayStation 4...) |
| Bio-Ship Paladin (1990 on Genesis, Arcade, Nintendo Switch...) |
| Vandyke (1990 on Arcade, PlayStation 4, Nintendo Switch) |
| Omega Fighter (1989 on Arcade, Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4) |
| Task Force Harrier (1989 on Arcade, Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4) |
| Atomic Robo-Kid (1988 on Genesis, Amiga, Atari ST...) |
| Mutant Night (1987 on PlayStation 4, Nintendo Switch, Arcade) |
| Rad Action (1987 on NES, MSX, Wii...) |
| Ark Area (1987 on Arcade, PlayStation 4) |
| XX Mission (1986 on Arcade, PlayStation 4, Nintendo Switch) |
| Return of the Invaders (1985 on Arcade) |
| Penguin-Kun Wars (1985 on Game Boy, NES, MSX...) |
| PiPi (1985 on MSX) |
| Raiders5 (1985 on PlayStation 4, Nintendo Switch, Arcade) |
[ view all ]
History +
- 1992
-
UPL closes its doors forever.
- 1984
-
Company changes its name from Universal Playland to UPL.
Trivia +
UPL means Universal Play Land, which gives a hint that it was related to the Universal company.
At the time of its bankruptcy, UPL had two arcade titles in development:
- Break Show, a Final Fight-style beat'em up.
- Kaisoku! Sparrows!!, a vertically scrolling shoot'em up.
Furthermore, Acrobat Mission was already laid out for porting to SNES, Megadrive and PC Engine.
Related Web Sites +
-
UPL Gravedigger
Site run by old UPL staff, featuring a timeline of what happened after 1992, technical data and old documents used during development of many games. Japanese language.
Frequent Collaborators
Companies- 13 games with HAMSTER Corporation
- 5 games with NMK Co. Ltd.
- 4 games with Taito Corporation
- 2 games with Mecano Associates
- 2 games with Nippon Dexter Co., Ltd.
- 2 games with Jaleco Ltd.
- 2 games with Sammy USA Corporation
- 2 games with Khaos
- 1 game with Tose Co., Ltd.
- 1 game with Software Studios
- 11 games with Tsutomu Fuzisawa
- 7 games with Nobuyuki Narita
- 6 games with Akemi Tsunoda
- 6 games with Toshio Arai
- 6 games with Yoshio Nagashima
- 5 games with Minoru Tomizawa
- 5 games with Mutsuo Kaneko
- 4 games with Noriko Fuzisawa
- 4 games with Kinya Aoyama
- 3 games with Kaoru Kamigiku
Contribute
Add your expertise to help preserve video game history! You can submit a correction or add the following: