Star Fox Artist Shares Thoughts on Switch 2 Redesign: “I Favor the Movie Version”

Artist Takaya Imamura, the creative mind behind Fox McCloud’s original design in Star Fox, has shared his thoughts on the character’s new look, recently unveiled in the remake of Star Fox 64 for Switch 2.

“I wake up in the morning,” Imamura posted on X, as translated by the platform’s tools. “A ton of messages have come in. Oh! Star Fox is finally making a comeback… I’ve gotta post about this… wait, this isn’t a dream, right?”

Having retired from Nintendo in 2021 after more than three decades, Imamura was a key developer on the first Star Fox game for SNES back in 1993. Shigeru Miyamoto envisioned a cast of animal characters, with the lead being a fox. Imamura took on the task of designing them, even drawing inspiration for Fox McCloud’s “essence” from Miyamoto himself, the game’s producer.

“Fox is based on Miyamoto-san, and the rabbit, Peppy, is based on the game’s director [Katsuya] Eguchi-san,” he explained in an interview last year. “If you look closely, you can see the similarities.”

He went on to detail the inspirations behind other characters: “Falco was based on [Tsuyoshi] Watanabe-san from the graphics team. When I looked at his face, his nose was quite prominent, like a Roman nose. And Slippy was inspired by the assistant director, [Yoichi] Yamada-san – he just kind of gave me that impression, and he liked frogs as well.”

The new Switch 2 designs have faced criticism for appearing overly realistic, with some fans feeling that Fox McCloud lacks his signature aura.

“I guess this is how it turns out if I’m not supervising… or something like that,” Imamura remarked on X. “I think the concept is good,” he added when discussing the new character designs. “Personally, I prefer the movie version,” he noted in a follow-up post, “but I thought this one was good in its own way, with a clear direction!”

However, not everyone shares his positive view on the redesigns.