Treasure's founders had come from Konami, where they worked on Nintendo Entertainment System games such as "Castlevania" and "Contra". They found their development environment restrictive and left to try riskier concepts and to singularly focus on making "great games". In the three years between Treasure's founding and "Mischief Makers" development, the company released highly regarded games such as "Gunstar Heroes"known as "one of the definitive 16-bit action games"and "Dynamite Headdy". An average of 12 people worked on "Mischief Makers", with up to 15 at times. Though the team was different in composition from that of previous Treasure titles, it included the lead programmer and character designer from "Gunstar Heroes". Treasure's CEO said that the company liked to expand into new genres, though they primarily work in genres where the staff had the experience. The company sought to depart from the "Gunstar Heroes" shoot 'em up design, and chose to build "Mischief Makers" around an original "catching" gameplay mechanic, which became the hardest aspect to implement. While foreign (non-Japanese) aesthetics were popular with other Japanese developers, Treasure's CEO felt the company's games did not look "particularly foreign" and could appeal to Japanese audiences.