Shigenori Soejima

Shigenori Soejima (副島 成記, Soejima Shigenori, born February 24, 1974) is a Japanese video game artist working for Atlus. Inspired in his work as an artist from an early age, he initially worked in minor roles on several games after joining Atlus. His first major work as an artist was on the strategy role-playing game Stella Deus: The Gate of Eternity. He has most notably worked on the Persona series, taking over as main character designer from his mentor Kazuma Kaneko for Persona 3 onwards.

Biography and career

Soejima was born in Kanagawa Prefecture, though his family moved quite often during his childhood due to his father's office work: a month after his birth, his family moved to Machida, Tokyo, and in future moves relocated Fukuoka Prefecture, then back to Machida and then to Suginami. During his time in Fukuoka, Soejima attended kindergarten school. While there, he developed a taste for drawing and practiced his skills by copying the characters from Doraemon, a manga series of which he was fond. As his family went through further moves while he was attending first-grade elementary school, he found the frequent changes in his environment unsettling, and became slightly introverted due to not being able to make friends. His drawing became a conciliatory activity during this period. For these early drawings, Soejima used a notepad and ballpoint pens. Eventually, he made some friends in elementary school, who shared his enthusiasm for Doraemonand encouraged him in his pursuit of a career as a cartoonist.