Data East Corporation (株式会社データイースト Dēta Īsuto Kabushikigaisha) also abbreviated as DECO, was a legendary Japanese video game developer and publisher company active from 1976 to 2003, when it declared bankruptcy.
Their main headquarters were located in Suginami, Tokyo. The American subsidiary, Data East USA, had been headquartered in San Jose, California.
Data East proved to be one of the more successful and long-lasting companies in the business, surviving the video game crash of 1983 in reasonably good shape and going on to release dozens of games for both arcade and home console systems over the next two decades. Some of their most famous coin-op arcade games from their 80s heyday included Metal Clash, Karate Champ, Heavy Barrel, BurgerTime, Dragonninja, Sly Spy, RoboCop, Bump 'n' Jump, Trio The Punch – Never Forget Me..., Karnov and Atomic Runner Chelnov. Karate Champ was the first successful fighting game, due to being one of the most influential to modern fighting game standards. During the late 80s and the 90s they also produced games like Midnight Resistance, Crude Buster, the Vapor Trail trilogy and the Joe & Mac: Tatakae Genshijin and Fighter's History series.
Data East also purchased licenses to manufacture and sell arcade games created by other companies. Their most successful licensed games included Kid Niki: Radical Ninja, Kung Fu Master and Vigilante, all licensed from Irem, and Senjou no Ookami (Commando), licensed from Capcom. They had a brief stint as a Neo Geo arcade licensee in the mid-1990s, starting with Spinmaster.
