If there's one role that's the most popular this year, there's no doubt that "The Boxer Cat" is certainly one of the most competitive candidates. Everyone knows that it is an earthbound spirit that cannot become a Buddha and has nowhere to go in "Monster Watch". And that cute image not only makes children like it, but also conquers the hearts of adults.

And the one who created the role of zào was Takuzo Nagano of LEVEL5. As early as the start of the game project, he was already involved in the series production. So how did this super popular work come about? Recently, some Japanese media conducted an exclusive interview with Takuzo Nagano, let us have a look!

■The first step is to start with a proposal written one by one

"I've been involved in Yokai Watch for about four years. Our company's Akihiro Hino (president of LEVEL5 and creative producer of "Yokai Watch") brought the proposal book. The plan book has some character introductions written one by one, and there are also things that include what the yokai watch does, etc., all of which are very simple. ”

In Hino's mind, he already had a clear concept of the game "Yokai Watch". Therefore, Nagano is responsible for how to bring out the worldview of the game in a picture table. The first is the styling of the characters who appear on the stage. Of course, it wasn't possible to be what we see today.

"The theme of this work is 'youkai', so I think it's also a very retro era setting. And all I imagined were the legendary yokai of the past. Therefore, while creating a Showa atmosphere, I was careful not to make the game as scary as Kitaro. However, I was also asked to say that I needed to have the same black humor as Fujiko Fujio-sensei's "Black Salesman". ”

As a result, the first to emerge was a larger, darker cat than the current version.

"The Boxer Cat is a standard Earthbound Spirit. Therefore, I think it is better to reflect a strong resentment from it. Its ears are missing, reflecting that it has been in an accident, and in order to show the obsession of the cat, I also set the tail into two, and the face is still like a flame.

Also, because he had the concept of Showa in his mind, he put a belt on the boxer cat. I really like Ah Yin in "The Story of Injiro", and I also hope that the ground binding cat can have some characteristics in terms of shape. Therefore, in my mind, I created an image of an uncle with his hand in the belt. ”

Shock the facts! If you take a wrong step, maybe the boxer cat we see now is a middle-aged uncle!

■The sash is what Nagano is obsessed with

However, the project could not just follow this uncle's route, but changed to a cute route.

"Originally, the goal of the game was 'boys & girls'. Although "Inazuma Eleven" released by our company is also a children's work, it is based on the theme of football. Anyway, it should be aimed at boys as the main audience. But this time, we had to make both boys and girls like it.

To do this, I had to make adjustments to make the character appear more cute. If it had been that setting, I don't think it would have been so popular (laughs). ”

On the whole, the image of the boxer cat has become more round and more relatable. However, its girdle is still kept as a setting. For Nagano, this is a setting he likes very much.

"Hino didn't call very much about it when he saw the setting of the belt. However, since I wanted to be able to draw a girdle, he said, 'Why don't you set it up to look like a girdle but it's actually a piece of paper?' This proposal was later rejected, but the sash that I loved was retained. ”

I'm afraid that many people have questions about the girdle that does not appear in the game's plot, right? But because of this, we have to say that the setting of the belt is indeed successful. It's not just the boxer cat that's cute, it's the incongruous setting of the girdle that's even more impressive.

■ Vespa determines the worldview

Our impression of a character is often the thickness and number of lines. And the balance of the body and the use of color are worth paying attention to. It can be said that the styling of the characters determines the worldview of the work.

And the biggest headache for Nagano is Vespa, who claims to be the self-proclaimed yokai butler.

"Since Vespa was set to be what it is today, the world view of the yokai watch was determined. I wanted the character to look like a child had drawn it, so I didn't intend to use thin lines. When I was thinking about the role, I was thinking about the role plan while grasping how much of a ratio of 'cute' and 'scary' should have. ”

Although it is said to be a human design, it does not mean that painting what you imagine is working. The character designer must establish a baseline that will influence the impression of the character and create a plan according to this scale.

When you think of Vespa, you often think of its blue lips. So what does it mean to set such a face?

"Vespa has fat lips and is always smiling. The lip setting of Tong Guò also makes this face difficult to see what is going on. We used this as a form of expression for the character to be 'creepy'. ”

As the first youkai to become Keita's friend, Vespa seems friendly on the one hand, and on the other hand, it makes people feel unpleasant in line with the style of the youkai. Indeed, that's what it gives us.

■ Bunka-chan is a very fashionable girl

In addition to yokai, there are other elements that give the game an impact. That's the human character. With Keita as the center, there is a companion who has been playing, and a girl like Madonna...... These characters seem to have been seen somewhere. Yes, anyone who has watched "Monster Watch" should be reminded of a certain national work, right?

"This work is the same as Inazuma Eleven and will be developed as a multimedia work. And we intend to serialize the manga on "コロココミック". Therefore, I also refer to the influence I received from "コロコロコミック". And the representative work of "コロコロコミック" is "Doraemon". ”

But there is no bad character among the characters in "Yokai Watch". Everybody is a good boy. In addition, unlike the eternal shorts boy Nobita, whether it is Keita, Kumashima, or Kanji, they are all very fashionable children. This is also a reflection of an era.

"The monster watch that Jingtai is wearing and the world view of the story are all realistically designed from a certain Cheng dù. And in order to conform to this design, some details have been added to the clothes worn by the characters.

And at that time, my daughter always said that she wanted to wear this and that, and her words also affected me. I grew up as a boy, so I didn't pay much attention to it. But girls have been very concerned about fashion since they were young. Therefore, I deliberately made Wenhua-chan have the setting of 'liking clothes'. ”

Although you may overlook one problem, the game uses a two-protagonist setting. Keita and Wenhua-chan are both protagonists. And Wenhua-chan uses a necklace-type watch, which is very cute!

Nagano has now designed a character that kids will want to emulate. Therefore, I believe that many people want to know how to draw a good-looking boxer cat. So what exactly is the trick ......?

■Even for Nagano, the boxer cat is very difficult

"I also think it's very difficult to draw a boxer cat. I once drew this for a child, and I got a 'It's kind of like the original!' You're doing a good job,' (laughs). I originally wanted to make this character very easy to copy...... However, I think it's difficult to draw the horizontal and vertical proportions and the slightly higher parts of the eyes. However, depending on my mood, I sometimes think, 'Why don't you draw your eyes bigger today?' Even I can't draw a character steadily, so I guess it's hard for everyone. ”

So, when drawing a boxer cat, what exactly is the point?

"You don't need to worry about the details. Simply draw a red and white face. Then there are two tails, and one side of the ear has to be shaved off, and then if you just draw a girdle, then it should have this effect. I wanted the kids to be able to copy the boxer's cat, so I didn't use any details. ”

■ Sketch and be friends!

The character of the boxer cat was designed with children in mind to imitate it. This is also a phrase that Nagano has repeatedly emphasized. And if children have the idea of copying, then they will be able to understand the role and expand their influence, right?

"No, no, it's based on my own experience. When I was a kid, there was a very popular comic called "Muscle Man". This character is very easy to copy, as the "meat" in the name says, and everyone knows this character, and the muscular man has become a very easy to understand mark. So once you copy a character, your friend will say, 'Ah, you're drawing a muscleman.' Then the conversation diverted. Through guò painting, I also realized the communication with my friends. Even now that I'm an adult, I still think it's a great experience from my childhood. And based on my own experience, I think this kind of 'play' can also work, so I wanted to design a character that is easy to be remembered and copied. ”

In order to make copying easy, it is necessary to implement the concept of "thick outline lines". After all, children draw with pencils.

"When I was a kid, even if I wanted to copy something, I couldn't draw it as much as it did in the original comics. The reason for this is that I can only draw thick lines with a pencil with a round tip. As a result, there is no way to draw thin lines like a pen. ”

■After I first joined the company, I quickly made a popular work that sold more than 10 million copies!

Nagano loves to draw very much. And after that, he also aimed to be a manga artist.,Thinking about how to create a plot all day long.。 And before he decided that he was going to become a painter, he lived a very confused life. At this time, a turning point came.

He saw the CM released by Akihiro Hino, the president of LEVEL and the creative producer of "Yokai Watch".

"I watched the CM of the game 'Rogue Galaxy' and immediately had the idea that I wanted to work under this man. So I decided to join LEVEL5. When I saw how confidently he recommended his works to the public, I thought that this company should be able to make people happy to make their works. And when I joined the company, it felt like heaven. It's very happy, to be recognized, and to be able to see the happy appearance of the child. To this day, whenever I go to work, I always have the theme song of "Dragon Quest" in my head, and then I start working with passion. ”

This way of working is also the most ideal and enviable. Surprisingly, though, he's not very close to games. But this is precisely what becomes a plus.

"When I was a child, it was forbidden to play red and white machines in my house. That's why I used to play "The Legend of Zelda" all night at a relative's house. When I was in the upper grades of elementary school, I learned how fun games can be. But until I joined the company, I didn't play games in particular. That's why I was able to produce the "Professor Leighton" series. ”

With cumulative sales of more than 15.5 million units in Japan and abroad, this series of games can be said to be a well-deserved super hit. In fact, Masako Nagano's participation in the game system zuò also started with "Professor Leighton".

"Not long after I joined the company, Hino called me over and said, 'Let's make a game that can sell 1 million units.'" Then I participated in an in-house character contest. It was an opportunity that I got so quickly when I joined the company, so I was motivated to 'do something!' ’

But should I say I'm ignorant? Still don't understand the market? I didn't realize what 1 million units meant. If you want to sell 1 million units, what kind of difficulty will you encounter? But I just feel that if I want to make a game that I have been exposed to before, the requirements are still very strict. ”

In that competition, the character design was certainly one thing, and the contestants were also free to put forward their opinions on the worldview of the work. Here, Nagano proposes a work that he can complete from the perspective of a non-player. And then came a game like reading a book - "Professor Leighton and the Incredible Town".

"I really thought the game was fun and made it. So when it first went on sale, the sales weren't as good as I expected, which made me feel sorry. However, as the series grew, many people became aware of the game through guò publicity, and it slowly became a bestseller. ”

■My attachment is to send messages to myself as a child

Since then, Nagano has worked on works such as the Inazuma Eleven series and Yokai Watch. But even though the work has changed, what Nagano values remains the same.

"I'm making a work that is acceptable to today's children, and to myself as a child. If it was me at the time, what would you think of this work? I don't want to think it's interesting, but at least I want to copy and collect relevant things. I think a lot of people throw away all the (old and outdated) stuff they used to love and forget about it. All they care about is a new evolutionary direction. And once they think of those things that were affected when they were children, they only reveal a kind of indifferent gaze. I think that in creation, our perspective should not be too self-oriented, and maintaining an objective attitude is very beneficial to creation. ”

Many people aim to become a character designer. However, to create a best-selling work, it is necessary to have a broad perspective. That's what Nagano thinks about young people.

"Even if it's a picture, it's going to make people feel excited. I want you to think about it, think about your paintings, is it to please others? Or can you just enjoy it alone? Oops, I said something that seems remarkable! (laughs)"

Nagano cares a lot about how he felt as a child. And I learned a lot from the game.

"A child's world is limited, but I am able to move freely in the game. Through guò games, I feel how vast the world is. In addition, I also learned about the "fun of clearing the level". There is also the fun of fighting and solving difficulties. There are also many difficulties in real life, and if we can't overcome these obstacles, we often can't move forward. In this case, I think it's similar to the mood when playing a certain game. Have fun and face challenges at the same time. So, even though I've become an adult, I still think it's great to be able to make a game. ”

Among the various forms of entertainment, games can develop people's strategic thinking skills. As a different form of entertainment than reading books and watching movies, Nagano's future works deserve our attention.