Michael Kogan, a Russian-Ukrainian businessman who founded the Japanese video game company Taito, was among those inducted into the Amusement Industry Hall of Fame this March.
Kogan, born in Odesa on January 1, 1920, emigrated to Japan just after the conclusion of the Second World War. During his life there, he established one of the largest networks of Japanese game arcades under the name Taito Corp. and eventually entered video game design and production.
His classic video called Space Invaders, brought out in 1978, is often considered the gateway game into the coin-op amusement machine industry’s video game boom period, which lasted well into the 1980s.
President Ronald Reagan once lauded Space Invaders as a good tool for youngsters to learn the skills of a combat pilot.