Key (company) - History

History

Visual novel release timeline
1999	Kanon
2000	Air
2004	Clannad
2004	Planetarian: Chiisana Hoshi no Yume
2005	Tomoyo After: It's a Wonderful Life
2007	Little Busters!
2008	Little Busters! Ecstasy
2010	Kud Wafter
2011	Rewrite
2012	Rewrite Harvest festa!

See also: List of video games developed by Key

Before forming Key, the founding members worked for another visual novel development company called Nexton under the brand Tactics. At the time of Dōsei's production, Tactics' first game, four of Key's original staff worked on the game: Itaru Hinoue as art director, Shinji Orito as musical composer, and Miracle Mikipon and Shinory contributing to the computer graphics. After Dōsei, the rest of Key's founding staff—Naoki Hisaya, Jun Maeda and OdiakeS—joined Tactics and contributed to two more games: Moon. released on November 21, 1997, and One: Kagayaku Kisetsu e released on May 26, 1998. Due to differing opinions between Nexton and most of the production staff in Tactics on how to produce the brand's next game, most of Tactics' staff left Nexton to pursue work in another publishing company where they could have the freedom to produce their next game.

Itaru Hinoue, who had previously worked at Visual Art's once before, introduced Key's founding members to the president of Visual Art's, Takahiro Baba. Baba gave the developers the freedom they desired, and they officially transferred to Visual Art's where they formed Key on July 21, 1998. With the production of Key's debut title Kanon still in its early stages, a brand name had still not been decided on by the developers. The tentative brand name was Azurite (アズライト, Azuraito?) at first, but Jun Maeda was not pleased with this and wanted a name that would capture the image of the brand. Maeda came upon the name Key when he saw it on a sign for a musical instrument store he would always pass on his way to work and instantly liked the name. The name Key for the studio was ultimately decided by majority rule. Key released Kanon on June 4, 1999 as an adult game, though the scenes containing adult content were kept to a minimum. This gave the player more of a focus on the characters' stories and on the visuals and music, especially for a visual novel at the time of its release. A year later, on September 8, 2000, Key released their second game Air, which was also an adult game and similar in storytelling to Kanon.

The third game named Clannad is a visual novel similar to Key's previous games, but contains no adult content. Clannad was meant to be released in 2002, but was delayed, leading to the game finally being released on April 28, 2004. Seven months after Clannad's release, Key released their shortest game, Planetarian: Chiisana Hoshi no Yume, on November 29, 2004 with a rating for all ages. Planetarian, in contrast to Key's past games, is a linear visual novel that does not require the user to make choices during gameplay; this is what is referred to as a kinetic novel. The brand's fifth game is Tomoyo After: It's a Wonderful Life, an adult game and spin-off to Clannad released on November 25, 2005, which expanded on the scenario of the heroine Tomoyo Sakagami from Clannad. Key released their sixth game, Little Busters!, on July 27, 2007 with no adult content, but released another version of the game entitled Little Busters! Ecstasy on July 25, 2008 with added adult content, story, and visuals.

In commemoration of Key's ten-year anniversary, Key and Visual Art's held a two-day event between February 28 and March 1, 2009 called "Key 10th Memorial Fes, Our Song to Pass the Time That Began From That Day" (～あの日から始まった僕らの時を刻む唄～, ~Ano Hi kara Hajimatta Bokura no Toki o Kizamu Uta~?). Key collaborated with ASCII Media Works' Dengeki G's Magazine to produce a mixed media project named Angel Beats!, which was produced into an anime that aired between April and June 2010. Key's eighth game Kud Wafter was released on June 25, 2010 as an adult spin-off of Little Busters! Ecstasy, which expanded on the scenario of the heroine Kudryavka Noumi from Little Busters! and Ecstasy. Key released their ninth game Rewrite on June 24, 2011 with a rating for all ages. An all ages fan disc to Rewrite titled Rewrite Harvest festa! was released on July 27, 2012.