CAVE Interactive CO., acronym for “Computer Art Visual Entertainment”, is a japanese video game company founded in 1994 by former employees of Toaplan following its bankruptcy. They are known primarily for their “bullet hell” shoot ‘em ups; from 1995 up to 2010, CAVE was one of the most prolific shoot ‘em up developers in the Japanese market. Alongside this, CAVE has produced a variety of other types games for arcades, home consoles, PCs, and smartphones, also dating back to 1995.
Key staff members include Tsuneki Ikeda (director and COO) and Makoto Asada (game development department head) who left the company in 2013. On January 24, 2014, community manager “Masa-King” announced that the Cave-World Twitter and blog were shutting down on February 28, 2014, terminating all existing English social media presence in the west.
CAVE’s arcade titles have used various arcade boards over the years. Earlier titles used a CAVE-designed board based on a Motorola 68000 CPU, with later releases moving over to the PGM (Poly Game Master) hardware, and then, starting with Mushihimesama, onto boards based on the Hitachi SH-3 CPU. CAVE dabbled in PC-based hardware for Deathsmiles II, but switched back to SH-3 for later titles.
Since 2006, CAVE has hosted CAVE Matsuri, a yearly festival in which several announcements regarding company affairs are made. Also, some titles are offered exclusively at this event such as Mushihimesama Cave Matsuri ver 1.5.
Within the Guinness World Records, Cave holds the record for the “most prolific developer of danmaku shooters”, having released 48 games in the genre since 1995 as of October 2010.