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Upon beating the Namco arcade game Splatterhouse, released in November 1988, the following is shown in the credits along with the expected programmers and artists:

Special Makeup credit

 SPECIAL MAKEUP DESIGNED
          AND
       CREATED BY
       DAIHADAN13

My mind immediately went to literal makeup on a human actor, but to my knowledge everything in the game and promotional material is too cartoony and exaggerated to have warranted a madeup actor for reference.

I'm curious if "Special Makeup" is a specific programming or game design term in older arcade games.

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    This is borderline Arqade material, I think.
    – user3840170
    Jan 1, 2022 at 19:13
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    @user3840170 Nah, pretty sure they'd pull the "developer intent" card on me. Besides, they're pretty terrible with historical questions. Of course if this isn't a good fit for Retrocomputing, please feel free to close the question
    – GGMG-he-him
    Jan 1, 2022 at 20:15
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    Basically, the reason I'm putting this question on this site is because I was hoping to approach this problem like a programmer in the 80's would have, rather than as a game player. For example, would makeup have been considered shorthand for character model production? Or would it have been industry jargon for customer-facing cabinet design?
    – GGMG-he-him
    Jan 1, 2022 at 21:11
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    I'm posting this as an answer since I can't prove it, though I'd like to. My -guess- would be that daihadan13 designed some monsters or characters and they were credited in this way as an homage to horror movies. It is -possible- that if the cabinet had a live action photo of a made up character, it could be that too. I believe the chances of it being specific industry jargon for something other than these two are low.
    – knol
    Jan 2, 2022 at 12:47
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    If I were to hazard a guess, I'd say the credit is for contribution to the specific aspects of character design. That said, as much as I am curious to find out the actual answer to this question myself, I'm afraid I don't think it quite fits into the retrocomputing category - this question could just as well be applied to a recently released game.
    – moonwalker
    Jan 2, 2022 at 18:58

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