The company is in "final negotiations" with creator Toshihiro Nagoshi.

The Chinese developer and publisher, NetEase, is reportedly in "final negotiations" with Yakuza creator Toshihiro Nagoshi to steal him away from Sega, the company he has been with sine 1989. Bloomberg reports that at NetEase, Nagoshi would build up a new team and develop new games for the company.

As of right now, a final contract and full extent of his duties have not yet been finalized.

NetEase has a lot of fingers in a lot of pies right now. They have developed and published games like Identity V, Fantasy Westward Journey, and more, but they're mainly known for their partnerships with western developer Activision Blizzard. They are a major reason why games like World of Warcraft and Overwatch can be played in China. Though with new regulations in place, those games might not have much of a community left in that region starting next month.

Toshihiro Nagoshi started his career at Sega working on early arcade titles from the studio. His first credit came with being a designer on Virtua Racing. He also served as the producer and director for the Monkey Ball series. He then went on to lead Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio, which is responsible for bringing the world the latest Yakuza titles for the past nine years. They also created Binary Domain and the Judgment franchise.