The video gaming community is mourning the loss of one of its early pioneers, Masayuki Uemura. Uemura, whose death on Monday at the age of 78 was just announced, was the lead architect behind the Nintendo Entertainment System [NES] and its successor the Super Nintendo Entertainment System [SNES]. Uemura was born in Tokyo in 1943 and became an electrical engineer. In 1972, he joined Nintendo and was soon working on the predecessor to early hit game "Duck Hunt". In the early '80s, he was tasked with creating a home console to rival Atari, and Nintendo's president asked Uemura come up with a game using cartridges.

Masayuki Uemurao helped revolutionize the home video game industry with the Nintendo NES, and will forever be remembered for games like Duck Hunt. The Japanese engineer died Monday at the age of 78.

Kyoto – Masayuki Uemura, the lead architect for the breakthrough Nintendo Entertainment System and the Super NES, and a visiting professor at Ritsumeikan University, has died, the university said Thursday. After joining Nintendo Co. in 1971, Uemura was in charge of developing the NES and its successor the SNES. The consoles, known in Japan as Famicom -- an abbreviation of family computer -- and Super Famicom, became huge hits with combined sales of 100 million units worldwide. The mega hits propelled Nintendo to become one of the world's leading video game companies. The cause of Uemura's death on Monday was not released.