Game Freak was the Japanese game studio that developed Pokémon Red and Green.
The company began as a video game fanzine created by Satoshi Tajiri, who later joined forces with illustrator Ken Sugimori. Game Freak became an official development company in 1989, and its early work included games published by Namco.
Tajiri conceived Pokémon around the idea of collecting creatures and exchanging them with another player through the Game Boy Link Cable. Game Freak turned that concept into a role-playing game, with Sugimori handling much of the artwork and Junichi Masuda contributing music and programming.
Nintendo published the Pokémon games, but Game Freak was their principal developer. Creatures also became involved in the project and later helped manage and develop parts of the wider Pokémon property. This three-company structure is a distinctive feature of the franchise.
Game Freak has continued developing the main Pokémon role-playing games across later generations. Its name is therefore associated not only with the original 1996 release, but also with the core series that followed it.