The other face of the Demon Artist, Kaneko Kazuma (Digital Devil Apocalypse)

Remember the announcement from a couple of months ago about the Digital Devil Apocalypse interview? The Kaneko one. Well, I don’t celebrate Halloween, but here’s a treat for you (no tricks!).

(relevant banner thanks to @eirikrjs)

For Digital Devil Apocalypse scans check the scans tag, they’ll be easy to find.

The man called ‘the Demon Artist’. The man who reinterprets ancient myths and legends into modern allegory. The vision of the world that travels from his brain to his fingertips can be without doubt associated with the words ‘the Demon Artist’. However, it seems that those words weave a rather insular association. The Demon Artist – Kaneko Kazuma. In truth, there are many things to say about the demon motifs in his art, and becoming more aware of them in order to understand his illustrations is certainly no mistake. And yet, we have dared to leave that way of thinking aside.

This interview does not intend to introduce the demons themselves, but to approach the secrets of the designs born at the interstice of intention and chance, and to hear Kaneko’s interpretations of his own motifs. Each illustration has been categorised according to the particularities of its shape, an approach that characterises the entire framework.

First of all, I would like to know why you are called the ‘Demon Artist’.

I called this in the strategy guide for the NES version of Megami Tensei II, my first job at Atlus. I personally have doubts about it though. It stuck simply because my work was drawing demons. You see, I don’t draw as a hobby; I don’t want to do anything unless it’s got a purpose. I usually like tarrying and procrastinating, but since this is work, I will take my idiosyncrasies into account, but still won’t turn it into a hobby. I will never get into the mood to do it otherwise. Maybe one day I’ll do something about it, but I want to take my time for now. I hate overworking or stressing myself out.

What can you say about your demon motifs?

I love using natural phenomena as inspiration, so I reinterpret them in my own way to have them fit in with the game. Terminology expands as well, so lately I’ve had all kinds of things to think about – focusing on particular mythologies, for example.

Do you mean that in the beginning you weren’t really taking the original mythology into account that much?

Yes. We now have books about imaginary worlds or about fantasy, but if these kind of ideas were used in games, they’d end up overtaking them. When I started this line of work, Norse mythology wasn’t that popular, although people did know about Ultraman’s Alien Baltan.

So, back then, I had to take inspiration from lesser known mythologies and beliefs, because I was eager to give them a shape somehow. There was this train of thought that Indians should be the ones to illustrate Hindu mythology. Indian goddesses, for example, would all look like they’re floating and so on. But you see, thanks to RPGs and fantasy games, people became more aware and started doing research. That is why I figured I should tackle those differences that were now obvious.

At first the motifs for mythologies and beliefs were limited and you had to draw them in a way that was easy to understand, while nowadays you are using an intrinsic approach that aims for awe and fear, showing your own interpretation of the subject, right?

Exactly. Even normal life has its own quirks, you know? Like the times I get a bad feeling or when I get annoyed. These daily life experiences and feelings are a considerable influence on the way I shape characters, giving them a really common feel. I want to express this common feeling that cannot apply to people who have isolated themselves from society.

What does ‘common’ mean to you?

The people who live normally are ‘common’. If you can’t walk around a city normally, then you aren’t ‘common’. Well, depending on those people’s hobbies or likes and dislikes, walking around town can mean all kinds of things. But what I want to have in my art is this realistic feeling of daily motion.

How about you?

I rarely go out for no reason; I usually try to find one, even if it’s just ‘Man, I kind of want to buy a bag’. Speaking of which, I’m a complete shopaholic. I start thinking that I’m utterly hopeless unless I buy something. I do get bored really fast though. For clothes I prefer Jeans Corona, so I always look for them everywhere and if I can’t find my size, I’ll have them order a pair for me; if they don’t fit, I sell them. Even if I throw them away, my garbage bags are transparent so it’s obvious a mountain of flashy clothes goes inside and it ends up looking like the garbage of an actor or something. I like Nicholas Cage, you know. Fashion like you see in Wild At Heart is really cool. For going out, I mean, since I usually work at the company during the day.

What about nightlife?

It exists. I’m not against adult entertainment and I go to clubs by myself as well, but I have to be careful if I go in a group, so it’s rather difficult. I want things to be really fun, so I take the role of making evenings entertaining for everyone. But, truth be told, I don’t really like that either. Even if I go to the club by myself, I just laze around and since I go by myself very rarely, I don’t really talk about these nights and keep them a secret. They’re still pretty fun.

Is it fun, going to those places?

It is. There are quite a lot of things happening around there. I get hit on by girls, for example. It’s different from simply walking around with a camera. I’m using CG now, so I don’t take photos of backgrounds anymore and use a digital camera instead, and at times like these I attract quite a lot of attention. I wonder if they’re interested in dating.

What do they talk about?

Well, we end up exchanging phone numbers sometimes, but I’m not interested in dating, so I simply forget about them. I really got into adult entertainment once I started going there for research, although I’m not really interested in people at the moment. That’s why no matter what someone gives me, I can’t give back. I only do inexcusable things. This is a sin, right…and it ends up reflected in my works. Like in Persona 2: Innocent Sin.

I see, so that’s how it was supposed to be…

That’s what sin is like, you know. This is a strange thing to say, but I have a rather long face, so when I was a kid, or later in school, people would always point that out; it became an emotional period for me and I’d get really mad. But you see, I didn’t mind the way they said it and that was a sin. Even I felt like I had to do something, so instead of bearing ill will, I would rather hurt others.

Do you place ‘everyday feelings’ and ‘sin’ at the root of demon design?

I do. Demons are portrayed differently in manga, novels or movies, but, in the end, they are nothing more than something born out of human imagination. Their shape particularly so. They bother us, so we’ll give them bat wings and things like that. Acting like this or revering them gives people peace. I feel that the most important aspect when drawing demons is to study their creators.

What are your fears?

I guess I’m afraid of what the future holds. And a strange one: getting killed by a mass murderer. Socially wise, it would restructuring. I definitely fear what tomorrow might bring.

What do you think about giving human shape to the origin of fear?

Take night, for example. It’s bright at night now, but it used to be completely dark before, so people got scared just from hearing a strange voice or a sound. They gave it a form and blamed Azukiarai [mysterious noise that sounds like azuki beans being washed or ground is heard]. Many of the demons I draw are based on the human form. If I go too wild though, they won’t look scary anymore and if I mix them up too much, they might end up looking interesting, but not frightening. If beings of the underworld actually existed, they’d probably resemble the Angels of Evangelion, and perhaps laughing at them would be only natural do, but they still wouldn’t be scary. I think you can only use humans as a motif if you want to transmit fear or awe. Putting a human’s likeness in a costume is the same as in reality: doing things according to one’s own likes and dislikes, trying out all sorts of looks, changing one’s hairstyle. Here’s an old and embarrassing story, but I think Jeanne D’Arc’s design is a good example. Her category: Hero. I put her in a certain costume, so she gained a certain identity and became a certain type of person. It’s an old and common motif among French revolutionary heroes, so it was easy to use.

I noticed that you gave the main gods of each mythology human forms.

Amon Ra, Takemikazuchi, Vishnu…might be a coincidence, but the greatest gods are still difficult to interpret. They are the bodily manifestations of natural disasters, so they’re illustrated similarly to the god Raijin, no matter the belief. They are accompanied by thunder clouds and flashes of lighting. I do have these images in mind, but giving them shape is difficult. I once drew a strange ball with lighting around it and put a face in its middle [Zeus in Kyuuyaku Megami Tensei], then added all kinds of details, but in the end it made me realise the human form is still the best.

The more they’re related to phenomena, the more human they look…

Yeah, it tends to end up like this. Their identity as actual existences is clearly of a low level and beings related to phenomena need a philosophical explanation. The lighting that comes rolling down has got to be praised and it’s only natural if you think about its effects on agricultural life; still, there are cases nowadays when you wonder why exactly it is revered. If we have to give shape to things we don’t understand, then making them look human is the easy way to go.

Do you use familiar things as motifs?

My own self who is afraid of the future. Parents, among others. I am an only child, but once your parents will became unable to do anything, you’ll have to live together, wouldn’t you hate something like that? Sending them to the nursing home is fine and all, but I’d still be the one to pay for everything and I’d hate that. The funeral too, I don’t even know how I’d handle it. I hate things like that. On the other hand, I don’t like children either. I have a lot of friends with kids and everyone’s having fun but I’d personally think it’s just too noisy. I guess there’s no love in me for that, but I can’t even tell whether this is true or not though. These kind of things are scary. Honestly. I want to give these things a bit more thought. Take your ancestors, for example. People might not believe in ghosts, but they do believe in the spirits of their ancestors. They even go to visit their graves and perform funeral rites too. I think that’s strange though. You don’t need to do all those things if you don’t believe in them. It probably sounds a bit cold, but I think that creating spirits and strange happenings strengthens family bonds and preserves bloodlines. So if we revere human forms, resentment might also arise, but if they are gods and spirits, we might not understand them, so the only option left would be to praise them. This is what I base these demi-humans on.

Very interesting. If we revere real humans, it might also give rise to opposition. However, giving human shape to those phenomena means…

Yeah, very unpleasant. Perhaps we find it difficult to empathise unless the human form is involved. Praying at shrines is also an odd thing. There’s no cash dispenser, so when the gods hear all that they must think ‘I have to grant their wishes’. Kind of interesting.

Do you pray at shrines?

No. I went to visit Taira no Masakado’s head mound while we were working on the Megaten series, but that is because I personally respect him. A different matter. There are a lot of facets to this. If we were to follow the theory that the Imperial Family is part of the Hebrew lineage, then he would also become someone who opposed the Jews. The imperfect hero, so to speak. It would be cool if that kind of man existed. It would kind of feel similar to young people visiting Kimura Takuya’s future grave.

Then what about humans themselves?

Pretty indifferent to them. My parents owned a sushi store, so I was able to see a lot of customers coming and going – monks, yakuza, teachers. When I was in primary school, I saw my teacher doing lewd things to a young girl. I saw the strength of the yakuza. I guess I grew pretty indifferent after seeing all that. There’s also the service industry. Here’s a strange story: if I take my subordinates out for fun, I have this habit of making great efforts to make them feel good. It’s like all my efforts come to naught and, in the end, I return to my old self; wishing deep inside for sincerity makes me feel lonely. Perhaps having no expectations is what makes me so cold towards people.

What are the differences between real humans and demons who have a human form?

When I think up characters, I think up a lie in a way. In the case of hot-headed characters, I try to find an objective explanation for their behaviour. There are also aspects that need more than a simple drawing, so it all becomes a group effort, together with the game’s script and timing. I draw demons intuitively, but thinking that I draw about 300 demons in four months is pretty terrible. There’s also no personal compensation. Both gods and demons were created by man’s unfairness: giving form to things that worried him and then laying the blame on them. What I really love, looks wise, is Takakura Ken in yakuza movies; you don’t really see this in real life though and I don’t want that kind of transitory lifestyle to be confined to just a moment, I want to be like that all the time. But it’s difficult, you see. We humans blame our weaknesses on other things that won’t allow us to act in a certain way. The ones who take the bad guy role in such moments are the demons.

That is why many people needed them for a long time.

Yes. Their numbers are decreasing now. Nowadays, murderers or thieves are much more frightening than shapeless things. Physical, rather than psychological fear. Perhaps such aspects reflect the atmosphere of the times the best.

What about the beast motifs?

It’s hard for me to draw beasts. Four-legged animals are difficult and I feel like I can’t even get the musculature of serpents right. So I still can’t settle on a pose for them. Roaring beasts look really cool, but I can’t keep using that forever. It’s a difficult composition and I get sad when all my efforts go unnoticed.

 

Do you keep the traditional descriptions of beasts or do you add your own interpretations?

I mostly keep them as they are. There are quite a lot of composite demons, like Chimera, that I feel like might actually be based on dinosaurs. There are theories saying that fossil dating is not that precise, meaning they might have lived much closer to our ages. Reconstructing dinosaurs from their skeletons doesn’t get everything right either. Their colours for one. It seems they actually had fur and the like, and it made me think they might have been similar to composite beasts. However, beasts like Kerberos or Yamata-no-orochi are already said to symbolise certain things: Orochi, for example, symbolises the river or an antagonistic group of eight men. There seems to be this theory floating around that it is actually the Ark of the Covenant. The Ark is a rectangular box with eight angles and three borders extending from each angle, basically resembling a forked branch and having a sword get out of that box is only natural [upon defeating Yamata-no-orochi, Susanoo found the sword Kusanagi in its body]. I thought it was pretty interesting. Also, perhaps the three heads of Kerberos symbolise Law, Chaos and Neutral. There are basically a lot of symbolic animals as there are human-shaped gods.

A lot of the Fallen are also animals. We have a horse and a dragon, among others.

The Key of Solomon features a lot of animals. It made me think that the Hebrews made their own gods the best and turned other people’s gods into demons, with the artists back then adding their own interpretations.

Are traditional depictions the result of the combined power of people’s imagination just as living beings result from the combination of genetic elements?

A tornado, for example, resembles a dragon, right? You obviously can’t imagine things you’ve never seen before, so this comparison fits. The evolution of organisms is a strange thing. I still can’t understand why giraffes have such a long necks, even though Darwin wrote his whole book on evolution. Beings suddenly born with a strange defect or mutation adapted by coincidence. I can’t help but think there really was a god who one day simply decided to create them. But then, if you think about it, just why did he make them? I love animals and every time I watch ‘Amazing Animals’ or the Discovery Channel, I notice there are so many strange creatures. Look at the spider, whose body is so small, yet legs are so randomly long. They’re really cool, but how do they live? It is a mystery. I’m actually quite interested in that.

 

Speaking of evolution, there are so many theories you can’t just settle on one; I think this is pretty fun.

It is. We don’t really know what is right and what is wrong, so using our imagination is really fun indeed. Drawing beasts is particularly interesting, since they have a wide variety of motifs.

Do you love animals?

I love them, but my house is too small, so I can’t keep any. I’d do it if I had a big enough house  though. I’d get a huge dog to look cool (laughs). When I was a kid, there was this yakuza in my neighbourhood who walked around with his two or three Shepherds. They also had some great names, like Shachi [killer whale], not plain ones like Koro. I used to think they were so cool! I was born in the shitamachi [lower Tokyo] though, so I couldn’t even imagine keeping one in our house. Maybe a dirty Shiba or something.

 

You talked in the beginning about paying attention to the people around you, but that seems more like something spiritual, and when they have a pet some tend to exaggerate…

Yeah. I mean, there are people calling them ‘my little So-and-so’. Well, I’ve never kept pets, so I wouldn’t know, but I wonder if I’d become like that too. I probably would and it sounds scary. It really scares me that I don’t know how it would all end up. Don’t you think people are extremely carefree right now? There’s no need to force them to change. However, once a pet or a child enters your life, everything will be much different and you won’t be able to get back to your old habits.

Speaking of which, do you prefer cat-like or dog-like women?

Visually, cats. But personality wise…I wonder. I’m a fickle person, so I don’t want people to meddle in my affairs more than necessary. But don’t you think there are a lot of people who like being bound to something or someone? It feels like people want to be together, not romantically, but as simple humans. I dislike this kind of thing. I guess women might prefer practical matters though. Well, it also has to do with my Mara’s response (laughs).

I see. Perhaps that is why felines are anthropomorphised so often.

Ah yes, I see, I see. Feline characteristics and women are linked directly, as expected. Women make feline moves on purpose and that remains imprinted in your mind.

Sometimes even snake-like.

Snake-like! (laughs). There are quite a lot of snake women, you know: the ones whose upper half is human and lower half is serpent, you see them a lot in creation myths. Or take Tiamat or Nyoka for example. Perhaps snakes fit into a different category.

 

What other creatures represent animal nature besides dogs, cats and snakes?

There’s a lot of cattle too, bulls in particular. Think ox-headed Vajra, Kudan, Minotaur and so on. You can find a lot of examples in the Middle East. One man named Velikovsky advanced this theory that Venus was formed from Jupiter, and due to solar winds and other influences, it acquired the tail of a comet, similar to two horns. That image was compared to a cow and that is why Lucifer, traditionally associated with Venus, had to have the horns too.

 

So you had to draw it your own way as soon as you read about it.

I simply thought it was interesting and adopted it as it was; when I agree with something I find intriguing, I embrace its original form.

Let us depart for a bit from the theme of beasts and turn towards life as a whole; let’s talk about plant demons.

Flowers and trees are difficult to draw. Europeans believed in forests. I believe that in places like India, China or the Middle East, soma and plums become fruits that grant power and that’s how they are classified. Vegetation doesn’t actually have will, so it’s necessary to give it some spirit, anthropomorphising or combining it. We count gods in a similar way*, so I wouldn’t say they’re unrelated. The spirits of the forest in Europe act similarly to humans, but they are originally trees, so it led me to wonder whether certain spirits come from trees or not.

*Kaneko refers here to the counter for gods/nobles/etc 柱 [hashira] created through the combination of the kanji 木 [ki, tree] and 主 [nushi, master, owner, guardian spirit].

Trees have the longest lifespan of all natural organisms. That makes them sound almost divine in a way.

Places where vegetation grows, like forests or mountains, were spirit realms after all. They were places for those who had left society behind, places that had been left behind themselves. You could even say they looked scary to normal people. Perhaps these people mistook the ones who took refuge into the mountains for vegetation spirits. You could say the latter became assimilated to plants.

You said earlier that vegetation doesn’t have will, but lately there have been many studies regarding communication with plants.

Yes, indeed, but I can’t help but think that even those results were simple reflexes. It’s said that humans have a spirit and soul, but aren’t those just brain activities? The human spirit is just the crystalised form of a person’s memories. If we think neither soul nor spirit exist, we can conclude it’s the same for plants. If you do something to them, they’ll react and that will make them look alive to you. They’re basically like those new toys, Furby. There were experiments where plants grew after listening to music, right? I think that’s also a reaction to wavelengths.

It’s the same for people’s prayers. Words of prayer conducted by wavelengths and rhythm.

Exactly. There’s something close to us at festivals, strange clubs or when tension rises: the result of people getting together.

You have designed all kinds of spiritual entities, invisible or amorphous beings, but I’m curious what you really think about them.

You mean if I believe in an afterlife? I don’t know, to be honest. It would be way too convenient to say ‘There really is life after death!’ like the actor Tamba Tetsurou. Isn’t that a rip-off of Swedenborg’s ‘Spiritual Diary’? It also resembles Dante’s Divine Comedy. It’s like creating your own world together with people who share your sensibilities. Anyway, Tamba said that in order for everyone to be happy, a world where you go at it all the time, since there’s too much lust left at the moment of death, will appear. What is he even talking about, doing it until you die or what…aren’t you dead already? (laughs). Well, if you think about it, the only thing you can do is think that such a thing can’t exist. Memories pile up, creating the soul known as the self and I personally believe it’s like someone inserting a soul inside you. But who knows what it’s really like.

I also see ‘memories’ as an important theme. For example, I think it’s like being told while alive ‘if you kill people, you’ll go to Hell’ and the same thing is repeated even after your death. Common memories are symbolically moved into the spirit world, don’t you think?

You’re right. Actually, I have a feeling these aren’t actually memories. I think it would be interesting if a spirit world actually existed, but thinking about my own death is rather frightening. Thinking that everything would disappear all of a sudden, it’s all so unclear. I think it might be better to say it exists, though, because there are so many strange tales related to it, like stories about reincarnation. Say, there were Japanese people who woke up one day speaking German and having memories of a past life. Makes me wonder whether it’s something like genetic imprinting. Perhaps they’re all made up, but as long as they have that certain something, they’re interesting and manage to feel real. Not to mention that the charm of a lot of those stories depends on the existence of a spirit world. Oh well, I’m not Freud, but there are things such as different parts of the spirit and so on. I wonder what it’s really like. Can’t be this simple.

When you draw something spiritual, do you think there might actually be a spirit or do you just see something in your head?

I think the imaginary is closer to my thought process. I’ve never seen a spirit anyway. Speaking of which, sometimes I think I catch glimpses of transparent things of indeterminate shape in room corners, but they all turn out to be just stains on the wall. Ghost photography is pretty much the same. Hitokotonushi, for example, is nothing but a bunch of tree leaves which resemble a human at first glance.

Rather conceptual.

Yes, exactly. I think about it first, then draw it. Speaking of Hitokotonushi, his story says that members of the Imperial Family prostrated themselves before him, so he probably used to be a blood relation. He did have to go in the mountains though, so I designed him according to Shinto tradition: you might not be able to see him, but he is the leaves of the trees. I thought it would be interesting to use typical Shinto elements like shimenawa [rope] or shide [paper]. Shimenawa represents clouds, while shide represents lighting, like symbols of Yahweh; also, the clanging you can hear at shrines resembles the sound of thunder, while the cash box could be the Ark. Interesting, isn’t it? I enjoy these kind of things, since the moment someone says it’s all really foolish, I feel like all power of imagination disappears.

 

It’s interesting to see all these different explanations.

I know, right? There are some that are simply horrible though, like people of the future driving flying saucers. I just can’t agree with that. You can’t help but ask why they’d just come to Earth from the other side of the Universe. From the future even! It’s just laughable to think about these kind of third-rate SF ideas.

It’s got to make sense.

Right, right. It’s interesting when they make reasonable sense. I like explaining these kinds of things to myself. My dream is to do all this research this by myself, travel like Mizuki Shigeru, maybe to Cambodia, maybe somewhere else. I don’t have time for a guide or anything like that though. There are so many things to do now: Maken X, PS2 games.

There are many ghosts featured in the games, but I also noticed many humorous demons, like Kashiyama, Yulia, Speedy or Quicksilver…

There are a quite lot of mischievous ghosts, don’t you think? They manage to get really annoying. Take Poltergeist for example: there always has to be something flying around, moving. Nothing can stay still. That’s why they’re called ‘spirits’. I don’t think they’re scary, so I thought I should make them humorous. Do you know about ley lines?

The route known as Ryuumyaku in Feng Shui?

Yes. It seems a lot of phenomena happen at the crossroads of that ley line. There also appear to be a lot of cases of spontaneous human combustion. One of my subordinates once told me, I don’t know if it’s true or not, that every time he thought of how much he disliked work, his hands would start burning. He’d freak out and stop the fire, but there would be no trace left, not a burn. This kind of thing takes place due to the intersection points of electromagnetic energy and apparently it happens many times when people’s mentality gets really negative. Makes me think that Poltergeist might also be related to puberty. The way it relates to human mentality is just so interesting, I can’t help but make it look humorous. Apparently, many years ago people who could have out-of-body experiences gathered and tried to move things around in that state. Only four could move things just a little bit though; it seems you have no power when your spirit is out of your body. The physical body is stronger. That’s why there’s nothing to fear about ghosts (laughs). Well, vengeful spirits are the scariest. If we think of them as living humans’ feelings, things get a bit different. Take curses and similar things for example; I think prejudice can become a method of killing someone, and we can also call this prejudice ‘feelings’.

I see. Fortune telling is similar. It’s like an obvious suggestion.

Yes, exactly! This way, I think a lot about things and then make them myself. That’s why I rather enjoy drawing.

Those designs turned out humorous because they were related to human mentality. Seeing people through your eyes is interesting.

Well now. Drawing humorous illustrations is fun. I could have made them scary too, but I simply chose the humorous option. It would be nice to get human misery right, but I won’t get that far. Well, I’m also influenced by the way words sound. Quicksilver, for example, is cool and you may even encounter it in tailor shops (laughs). Your environment is like something born out of emotional attachment. If you go to a cold region, for example, you end up staying at home a lot, leading to the appearance of an abnormally high number of spirits related to the house. Or take sounds, for example. You can hear the sounds of fridges or air conditioners in cities given shape by emotional attachment. It gets interesting, however, once you realise that this energy is released by people. I kept this in mind even in Maken X. As if the power to create Images existed as atoms; like the power to create Images of time and space.

Speaking of the inorganic, you also have mechanical designs.

Ah yes, mecha. I love robots but I’m not very good at drawing them. There are quite a few patterns I like, like humans fused with machines or the ones who completely resemble machines.

Are these completely different things conceptually?

Yes. For example, angels are said to have four faces, they are said to be wheels, sounds or fire, and many people even thought they might be flying saucers. I found those ideas interesting, so I turned them into mecha. According to folk belief, Wicker Man is actually a tool for human sacrifice, built with a full body where people are put in and burnt. Wicker Man and the like resemble dummies, so putting negative thoughts into things turns them into something close to mononoke [spirits]. Then there were beings like Tlazolteotl, a goddess of the bathroom, needed some artificial component to make their function obvious.

I think that creating artificial beings resembles an alchemist creating a homunculus and might be similar to robotic engineering nowadays. Did you do this on purpose?

Perhaps saying ‘no’ would be a lie. To be honest, I like Pinocchio style tales better than simple machines. The ones that feel like artifact spirits and so. We also have dolls made from chrysanthemum flowers, right? The ones with long, long hair.

Objects have a heart.

Don’t feel that your belongings, whether they are a car or a Mac, start working badly when your mood is bad? Maybe it’s just my imagination, but thinking they’ve got a heart is romantic, so I draw them like that.

Do you also personify things? Like naming dolls.

No. I have a lot of transformable cyborgs and Spawn figures at home, but I’d really dislike it if they started dancing around after I go to sleep. If I start talking to them, my words may end up as kotodama and gain powers. That’s scary. I live by myself, and sometimes when I get back home, I tend to say ‘I’m back’, you know? I really wouldn’t like to be told ‘Welcome back’, I’d get the creeps. I wouldn’t even dare get inside anymore. That’s why I avoid this as much as possible. I’m a quite the scaredy-cat. Ghosts and the like have this ability to attack exactly when you least expect it. If one of them came and said ‘Good evening, I am a spirit and I hate you’, you’d feel like replying ‘What the hell, you wanna fight, punk?’, but when you’re vulnerable, they come all of a sudden and you can’t help but get scared. That kind of skill can only belong to something created by humans after all.

So, mechanical gear is the future. Are you afraid of it because it’s inanimate?

Hmm. When it will appear, it will have some sort of predetermined purpose, so I think it resemble something precisely built for that. This makes things simple and their purpose solid. Things only built for a simplified purpose.

There are also Zouma, the same type of artificial creations; are they a different concept?

Those are things Victor intends to create and they’re more like created beings than Frankenstein’s monsters. Besides, they are given names and are made to evolve. I love robots, so I watch both anime and tokusatsu, but, you see, there’s no way robots can move that accurately and it’s difficult to make them move in the first place. So, here’s an extreme argument, they’d need something similar to brains and they also need something like muscle tissue in order to move their joints freely. The Zouma basically end up like the Replicants from Blade Runner. It is also necessary for them to have skin, or, if it’s not possible, to be covered in vinyl or clothes. That’s how I thought up the concept of the Zouma. Perhaps that’s why they tend to be fused into the Hero race.

Giving real life robots humanoid shapes, so they can do their job unnoticed among people, is considered the ideal solution. Do Zouma have a human form for the same reason?

Real life human shaped robots, like P3, are pretty active indeed. However, I think that Zouma were created to attain the most beautiful form possible from Victor’s point of view, rather than to be useful in daily life.

What about your personal point of view?

I personally think that spherical robots that fly around are the ultimate form. They’re extremely simple and can change their form at will. But, you see, Victor is rather special. He even created a maid for himself. She turned out nice though, kind of feels like Ayanami [Rei] (laughs). I imagined her as more of a comic relief at first, but the young staff’s feverish romantic feelings crept in, so she ended the way she is now. I imagined her with random metal pieces only around her mouth too. This is a strange topic, but someone like me, who does character designs, probably feels similarly to Victor when I see a cosplayer; seeing the things I created move and dance really makes me feel like him. Isn’t there something like a cosplay sex industry nowadays? I kind of want to try it and ask for Sonomura Maki (laughs). They’d probably tell me ‘Oh! I see, hmm’ and then look for her on the Internet. That would be really unpleasant.

You said you love robot anime and tokusatsu; is it because of the stories or because of the visuals?

Both. The stories themselves have more twists than any soap opera. It doesn’t matter there are always the same kinds of enemies, fighting styles or all kinds of other situations will always be different and varied. I’m inspired by everything that has to do with its visuals, but the mecha design in particular has a great flow I find very interesting. Super robots or things that actually show joints, things that were instinctively tried for the first time.

Are you also interested in the movement mechanics of robots?

I like to think about it, but you’ll encounter obstacles as soon as you think about doing it yourself. Maneuverability is better if you want to ride a giant robot and yell ‘Move!’, ‘Ugh..’.

So your designs, besides having that mechanism in mind…

No, no, I haven’t thought about it so far (laughs). But I’d like to think about it and try it out. Robots depend on the world setting first of all. When a robot’s importance is firmly established, it becomes cool for the first time.

What tokusatsu shows do you watch?

I watch Kyuukyuu Sentai GoGoFive every Sunday. I’ve found Pink really cute lately, especially when she was played by Satou Tamao. It also seems that enemy female general roles go to adult movie actresses now. Looks like the producers like big breasts. On the one hand, they’re playing in a kid’s show, saying ‘So you’ve come, something-something Five’, on the other, you can’t help but remember certain activities of theirs. I really enjoy this gap. I also watch Robokon, but that Robina seems to release a lot of dangerous fluids from her brain (laughs). That’s why Sunday mornings are really awesome. Being up all night will make dangerous fluids come out.

Now, let us start a conceptual discussion about mysterious beauty; first, beauty from your point of view. Can you please tell me where you think beauty resides?

It’s hard to tell what beauty is. It’s different for everyone. If something is too beautiful, it wouldn’t really have an effect anymore.

You are right. Beauty and the sexual aspect do not necessarily coincide.

Right. Seeing a beautiful photo won’t make you feel anything, but seeing someone pooping naked by the river in the middle of the forest will shock you. Especially if the poop is getting washed away (laughs). Wow, that’s one strong mental image. People in the same field of work as me have certain fixed ideas about women, or, how should I put it, there are a lot of people who draw them as beautiful. Some think aggressive women are cute, while others are too fond of doll-like girls. That’s why I draw whatever figures I find sexy based on my own experiences.

In other words, beauty resides in the female body?

Well, yes, you can find it in the female body, but even one look at it will move you deeply. More than that, it’s better if you only have a glimpse at the back. In that moment, you get the feeling everything has gone blank. Just a glimpse and then bam! You feel like extending your hand.

Nekomata used to be naked in the past, but she started wearing clothes halfway through. Is it because of the latest trend to only show brief glimpses?

That’s right. I’ve grown up.

The editors seems to have loved the Devil Summoner version of Angel though.

Her lower part was naked, so it was really well hidden back then. But I wonder. What if it’s hiding a dick? I keep that in mind and give my best whenever I draw Mara and others (laughs). Also, Arioch has fangs.

In a way, we could add Mara and Arioch to the bewitching beauties group too.

Yeah.

The magazine editor-in-chief Yamada Gorou has said before something along the lines of: eroticism lies at the border between the skin and the cloth, that is why people who wear clothes with a lot of openings exude more feverish eroticism than naked people.

Exude more feverish eroticism (laughs). That’s definitely the case. This seems to me linked to something different though: a certain power still finding its way out to the surface. Well, I’d say my drawings are still mild in this regard. I have a feeling I need things that let you use your imagination more.

Do you believe eroticism lies in what is left to the imagination?

Yeah. For example, not all demons are virgins. There are a lot of times when they were drawn as pure, but I personally dislike that, especially when they are different from what I want to draw. It’s not that they necessarily like sex, but they do understand it and do it if they understand it; I love this kind of interpretation. Even tiny Pixie understands what it means. If it happens, how does it work? What does she do? You know, stuff like that.

Could it be that you…?

Sometimes  I do end up thinking if they do it.

Then are you interested in the women you draw in that certain way?

No, it’s not like that. I don’t like thinking about those things (laughs). I’d probably be taken aback a little if I saw that kind of cosplay. 

Then the beauties drawn here are not your actual sexual preferences, but conceptual ones.

That’s right. They don’t really come to me realistically because I’m a normal guy and my preferences don’t show up in my work. That is why for me people who don’t make a fuss are fine. People who won’t make future trouble. These kind of people are all right. Wait, what is this, a Junon [teenage girls oriented magazine] interview? (laughs)

Excuse me (laughs). By the way, it seems that lately the bizarre factor in your work has become stronger, is it on purpose?

Yes, it is. Well, I’m researching the bizarre, visually wise. I love stretch when it comes to western fashion, but that’s as far as I go. It’s not about fetishes or anything.

I find it interesting that when we categorise demons now, we can use specifications for sexual parts, such as hand fetish, foot fetish and so on.

Not at the moment. I’m thinking I’d like to introduce them in certain themes though. Well, if I had the chance to work together with Mr Shinjou [Kazuma(?)], for example, I’d probably try the fetish style with all my heart, so you could see the feet, that type of thing. Just a little would be nice. If you saw them as usual, you’d get bored. But I like these kind of situations. And then….

— We apologise, but we’ll need to omit some things…–

Ah, that’s right, there’s a limit to what you can write. It’s a problem with the publication code (laughs).

You can’t remove these ideas though. They are related to the main subject, from the moment we started talking about demons.

Then even though your own sexual preferences are not reflected, it depends on the person….

I wonder if they see demons as indecent. I’m interested in that. For example, if there are people who still follow Pixie’s style even though they don’t see her illustrations. I’d actually like to conduct a survey; whether people have used her as pleasure material or if she was the reason they started using this kind of material.

To think this discussion was about beauty and fear…(laughs)

Well obviously, they become beautiful because they are refined. They gain a unique shape, then they are polished, become a well-defined concept and end up as a beautiful image in my head.

Thus, they approach functional beauty and don’t even need to be women anymore. This time I have a feeling we can also talk about alluring male demons.

I am, after all, weak to fitting reason into functional beauty. It strikes home. However, I don’t know if there are demons who have that sort of functional beauty. Strange story, but male demons are needed because female humans also have sexual needs. But how does it work actually? The people who play this type of games love beautiful people and I do draw them more or less like that, but women have all kinds of passions as well. Hairiness, for one. Kind of like Freddie Mercury. I guess this would be better suited for men though (laughs). Nah, now that I look at it, he’s sexy. He looks so cool in Another One Bites the Dust. Well, there are some things I rather want to draw even if they’re directed at women. The erotic type. Don’t women suppress things, after all? We men can go to sex services, but usually there are no such things for women. They also can’t help but act passive most of the time. That is why I want to draw something that looks cool, just for them. I think there should be more sexy guys.

That’s an interesting idea.

Well, I have wondered whether this would end up like the Angelique dating games (laughs). I think being able to fulfil wishes is the best thing though. I wonder what it’s like. Might be difficult. You know, I’d better give up.

I would like to ask you now about a subtle problem we encounter: atypicality.

Atypical demons are the opposite of daily life. I personally see them as normal beings that lack something or the opposite, an upside-down version. If you stumbled upon a man standing upside-down you’d freak out. I try to capture this kind of feeling, even though a lot of these things were already pre established by mythology. Dantalian, for example, is intelligent, so it has a lot of heads. Its greatness can also be represented by their number.

There are also demons that are only parts of a whole.

Like Kanbari. It’s so strange, why would it only be a foot? I remember a book series named Jaguar Books about all kinds of subjects and the youkai I saw in it. There so many, it felt like a universal encyclopedia of demons. Truth is, they are more like existences peeping through crevices. It’s like urban legends nowadays. You go to the toilet and relax and when you look up, there’s someone glancing at you. But still, why a foot. Maybe because you plant your foot when you try your best. There are also one-eyed designs like Cyclops who are gods of crafts. When people saw an artisan close one eye at work, for example, they created a monstrous representation of his talent.

Unbalanced forms are the ones that make you uncomfortable when you look at them, right?

Right. I used historical facts and documents as sources rather than aiming for this in particular. Among them there may be creatures without a source illustration, so I drew them from my own imagination. It would be interesting if I drew them upside-down or had them swing and dangle. There are also the Hindu gods with lots of hands, you don’t even know where to put them. That’s why I had all kinds of places where I could attach them.

Taking all the steps needed in the act of creation. Not aiming to destroy daily life because of this unbalance, but aiming to offer peculiarities a logical sense in the context.

Exactly. But Dantalian’s heads aren’t normal (laughs). Well, if there are things to be taken out of context, then there are also things that can shift daily life a little, because it is also believed they are in a slightly shifted world. Look at Ubu. It’s supposed to be just a child, but I figured I should draw it upside-down.

An unexpected combination.

Perhaps. But I didn’t think about it too hard. I personally feel strange when I see people in the bridge pose. The bridge is scary. How about walking with that pose? Then turning their head to the side… they basically end up looking upside down and this upside-down pose might even become the basis of a new character. If I give them an inverted hand, for example, they can definitely stand out. If it’s not easy to see them in this light though, then it’s going to be difficult in the game too. That’s why I want to make people notice the subtle differences, like in taiga drama. For example, if one of the eyebrows is missing. Well, I also have the feeling it might end up feeling a little like a David Lynch production. I wonder if I can design these kind of game monsters.

Have you always been interested in this kind of thing?

I can’t say I love it, but it really brings out that abnormal atmosphere I aim for. It’s not like me though, but you can still get a feeling of great vitality. There was once a movie named ‘Freaks’ and more recently one named ‘El Topo’. They’re very stylish, interesting movies and they motivate you. There are a lot of people who are deeply troubled even though their physical health is fine, and it feels to me they are the type to have proper sensibility. I think they’d be able to put their lives in order if they tried. Leaving that aside, you understand what I mean. Take Elephant Man, for example. He is seriously troubled about people a lot and questions his own existence. It’s so pure, when you think about it. Well, since mentally underdeveloped children are portrayed abroad as little angels*, I think it’s close to that.

*Kaneko is probably referring here to the so-called ‘angel children’ (天使の子), a term used in Japan mainly for those suffering from Down’s Syndrome.

Can certain illustrations in the category mentioned above make you feel similarly?

Yes, perhaps.

We can also encounter the pattern of humans combined with other creatures. Pabilsag, for example, is a fusion between man and scorpion.

He’s from Sumer, I believe. I think he was one of the ten warriors Tiamat created. No one can say whether he was a scorpion man, though. I guess I just wanted to make him one. Scorpion men really have this strong Kamen Rider air, don’t they? It resembles Nirasawa’s [Yasushi] style a bit… all right, I just wanted to draw him that way, to be honest. There are people who love cyborgs, right? This type of combination has a certain aesthetic. That is why, as I just said, I love Nirasawa’s creature design.

Does this mean that this kind of fusion holds a certain kind of beauty, graphically wise?

Ah, no, I just personally find it cool. Like, this is how I would like to be. Truth be told, the ability to transform would be the coolest thing and the result of fusing with a scorpion would both make it easy to fight and look cool.

Is it the same for Ubu, since we talked about it earlier?

Yes, my demon baby form would look just like that.

Legion, for example, has numerous faces, would you also like to be remodelled into that?

That is being loyal to the mythology, rather than remodelling. There are many faces because there are both gods and evil spirits, ‘them’ and ‘us’. That is why it is a representation of the evil spirits’ numerous victims.

I see. Those faces have quite the impact. Seeing a face where it shouldn’t be is shocking.

I’d find it kind of disgusting, like a Pop-up Pirate (laughs). Heads can fly too, like Kanaloa. Their faces float. Aren’t there Heike crabs [Japanese crabs whose shell resembles a human face] in reality as well? It looks like Abalone shells have been getting a lot of praise lately. Well, the Heike crabs also benefit from their association with the battle of Dannoura [between the Heike/Taira and Minamoto/Genji clans].

Do you think the face fits this kind of design?

I think hands would fit as well. It basically needs a motif that’s easy to understand, like eyes. But what’s done is done. The main point are basically things you know very well coming out of different, unexpected places. I’m not talking about tentacles coming out of nowhere, but an extra hand or so; wouldn’t you freak out if you happened to see that?

Kikimora is the reverse, with the form of a human and an insect’s face.

She looks exactly like her traditional illustrations, the ones faithful to tradition. You can find her in Russian woodblock prints, you know. She looked cute, so I decided to draw her just like that.

We see you create strange shapes out of all kinds of patterns, but what do you actually enjoy drawing the most?

I do love creatures with a lot of faces or hands, but my number one favourites are people who wear a normal suit and whose faces have something off. I really want to draw that kind of thing. Didn’t they show up in Ultraman a lot? They were probably just cutting corners, but those characters looked really scary. They’ve got an abnormal atmosphere about them, but they also look like they could actually exist in reality if we’re unlucky.

Like in the original ‘The Fly’.

Yes, that’s right. Guys like that are scary, but are also perceived as attractive. It’s probably because of the headgear, with people thinking they’d also like to walk around wearing that kind of stuff. I guess we’re talking here about that kind of desire to change into something out of the exist. Costumes like the Jack Frost ones we used in CMs exist too, but putting something just on your head sounds fun.

And then you suddenly start making cute movements.

You do, you do. Being able to transform to that degree is good. Maybe it’s even the impetus.

What are your plans for future unusual designs?

Details, as I mentioned earlier, like one-point tattoos. I want to use a new method for these subtle differences. I don’t think I can get directly involved though.

Please tell us something about charming or cute designs.

Dragon Quest, one of Japan’s traditions, had one of these, and mascot characters like Slime have probably become the norm; it also makes you want one. And, well, if one of those cute things attacked you, you’d still get scared. Happens a lot in American movies, like Snowman. Jack Frost is Snowman’s original name. His nose is a carrot, but when he assaults women, it disappears completely. I wonder where it goes (laughs).

Do you like cute illustrations?

I enjoy the ones that feel a bit off, like the recent Ojarumaru.  It’s a style I’d like to adopt; then even if we’re talking about really different demons, like Kappa or Gnome, it would be interesting if everyone felt like they had the same origin somehow. When I make designs, a considerable degree of preparation is important.

In order to make them even cuter?

That’s right. Some say ‘I take my eyes off for a moment and they turn out cute’, but I can’t take my eyes off from what I draw and I end up wondering whether it’s is cute or not. I think impish beings are cute, so they end up looking like little rascals. The one that first comes to mind is Kabu from Sally the Witch. There’s also the fact that their expression never changes. I love it when they simply have the same look on their face – they seem to have an expression, but actually don’t. Pikachu’s cuteness feels like it’s got a different context though: the fact that the only thing he says is ‘Pikachu’. The type of cuteness reminiscent of O-jirou’s ‘bakeratta’ [Obake no Kyutarou].

There’s something special about your cute demons who don’t consider themselves cute, but frightening.

From our point of view, they’d kind of look like they’re throwing punches in the air while the enemy puts a hand on their hand and holds them down. The demon himself might be all serious, but everyone around him will only see him as cute. It also happens that I draw a cool guy who ends up looking just pretty. Like, you’ve got perfect guys, but they have this one silly spot that makes them impossible to hate. Nevertheless, if you show it in only one illustration, they seem weak, so in the end, small and with a child’s build is the way to go.

What’s the common point between cuteness and fear?

There are people who use their cuteness as a weapon in real life, but this does not apply to the ones who show up in games.

This is an actual in-game conversation, but having a cute face tell you ‘I’m going to kill you’ is startling.

Those scenes startled me too when I played in debug mode. I’d be so shocked if I were told ‘Bye, byeee, will you die for me?’. But this is actually a display of purity. Perhaps purity and fear are linked. The fear provoked by getting straight to the action, without any superfluous thoughts.

Do you mean the so-called ‘cruelty of children’?

No, I think it’s different from cruelty. They simply haven’t absorbed enough information, so their actions and words are straightforward. They have few choices to make and their period of activity isn’t long either. I don’t think you can call that cruelty. I do think that sort of feeling is very frightening though, not to mention that it’s not limited to children. There are also a lot of adults like this and the look in their eyes is scary. Perhaps this is also related to them not changing their expression too much. It’s experience that leads to a multitude of expressions, but pure people don’t have too many patterns of this kind.

Then are you saying they aren’t aware of their frightening or cute nature?

Exactly. I think they’re just as they were born. I’m thinking I’d be really scared if Mickey Mouse attacked me. There was this mascot character named Pipo-kun a while ago I turned into a motif in another game*. The person in charge with the PR got really mad at me (laughs). It was also missing a finger and he got mad at me again. There are a lot of things with less fingers than man. Mickey, kappa, all of them have four fingers. Little Grey as well. Well, there’s also a theory he’s got six fingers. I think it’s rather interesting.

*he’s talking about the dog mascot at the Kounan Police Department (Persona 2 EP)

Do you like real life cute things, separate from your illustrations?

I do. Cute animals and the like. They feel pure. If you call a dog, it will come to you with all its heart, right? Perhaps that kind of pure cuteness also has some loneliness in it.

When you talk about cute docile dogs, you do not differentiate between big and small dogs, right?

Exactly. It’s cute when the big ones come wagging their tail. On the other hand, I’d probably feel like teasing the small cute ones. Really, it’s kind of similar to lifting a girl’s skirt. Like when you try to be noticed and you end up hated instead.

Do you have any cute goods? How about the ones that appear in NHK’s educational programmes?

My house was flooded with palm sized Pikachu at one point. I don’t have them anymore though. I’m watching animal shows now. I find ‘Together with Mum’ rather eerie and those overreactions are kind of annoying. Those fluttering eyelashes… every time someone winks, you can hear them flutter. In this sense, I’ve always loved Ralph from the TV show Rank Kingdom, who’s also called a pervy dinosaur. It’s a pity his number of facial expressions has increased lately. I’m a fickle person, so I wasn’t able to keep up, as cute as he is.

You might say you get bored fast, but Jack Frost deserves the prize for perfect attendance in all games.

You see, I want to change Jack Frost’s design too, but I can’t right now. I want to go for an image change, like drawing him as a scary guy and turning someone else cute. But, you see, there are all kinds of circumstances. Poltergeist, for example, can move around all kinds of small furniture. Well, using those tools is also one of the typical Poltergeist images.

Now that we talked about the connection between the cuteness and childlike factors of the designs, could we also hear your opinion on real children?

I don’t really think children themselves are cute. I don’t have kids though, so I don’t really know. It’s just that I end up scolding little brats when I see them wandering around town. Might be because I grew up in the lower city, but I still do it. Also, if I’m around toy shops, kids call out to me: ‘Hey, mister, do you like Gundam?’ and I lie to them and say ‘Yeah, I love it. I work on Gundam.’ (laughs). I feel like a guy who starts a race with children, then falls down on purpose.

But the way you play with children shows your own cute side, you know that, right?

I kind of do it on purpose too. When it comes to women for example, I act indecisive on purpose, in order to appeal to their maternal instinct. The results show me I fail more often than not. Oh well, it’s all right if ‘cute demons’ are seen as an offshoot of myself. But things like these really exist and separation is inevitable. You may want them to remain cute, but it’s impossible for them not to change. A mascot is probably someone’s thing, but they will be separated one day. Perhaps this is the foreordained sadness of cute things. Well, it’s not like I thought too deeply about this.

You said you do not have your own children. What do you think about having descendants?

I don’t have any because it’s a bother, simple as that. If I were to leave something behind, then I myself am enough. The story gets a bit more complicated if I get cloned though. Ideally, I’d like to become a vampire. Immortal. Now that I think about it, I’m really selfish.

I have some questions about winged beings. Do wings symbolise flight, as in a superior, supreme existence?

Exactly. Something along the lines of ‘intelligence’. The ones with a lot of wings are strong. It’s not really established where exactly the thing about Lucifer’s twelve wings came from, but Milton’s ‘Paradise Lost’ had them. The original writings definitely didn’t say anything. Actually, I have a feeling there’s nothing written about wings at all. That is why I believe the wings of the angels were an image that was added in the Middle Ages. Maybe because they have the role of messengers, so they need to be fast or maybe because they come flying from the skies. I’m thinking it might be a symbol of spiritualism. They look cool no matter how you put it, even though they’re also really bothersome, not functional. You won’t be able to fly if you don’t flutter them and that makes them even more non-functional. Devil wings are much better. In the original ‘Devilman’ they were simply bat wings, but they really look the part. Perhaps that is the image I have in mind when I design them.

Then you definitely add wings depending on the image you have in mind.

No, if you research various myths, you’ll see there are a lot of demons with wings. From the point of view of the people back then, they could move extremely fast and knew everything; this kind of awe is what gave birth to the winged design, I believe. Now, speaking of angels, that happened in the Middle Ages, right?

The angel wings resembles the wings of birds of prey. Why not like those of insects or bats?

Bats and the like are the image of demons, while angels were first and they are opposites. Birds of prey are quite the topic, aren’t they. All in all, I simply think they look cool when they spread their wings.

Then you choose the types of wings depending on the design.

That’s right, but it depends on the creatures themselves. Fairies, for example, will always have insect wings. That was also started by some artist. Those really small beings live in the woods and when we think about woods, bugs naturally come to mind. It seems the people who saw their aura thought it looked like some sort of wings. Or maybe they extend like fins. This is, all in all, just a talk about potential auras. If you think big, there’s the Van Allen radiation belt around the Earth, electromagnetic waves in the shape of a donut that spread from the North Pole to the South Pole, induced by solar winds and that seem to spread like wings. It’s interesting to think about them that way.

They are basically god or angel wings.

It feels that way to me, yes. They are basically a symbol of wisdom, like the many hands in Hinduism. Hands or heads are considered intellectual, so their number has to increase gradually. Same thing here.

Would you like to fly?

I would really love to. I really feel like flying after watching the Superman movies. Just flying, not sky-diving, bungee-jumping or piloting planes. I don’t have dreams where I fly either, they are all about natural disasters: this really huge tornado comes in front of me or a big UFO lands in Shinjuku or I’m walking around Shibuya and a meteorite approaches like in Armageddon. I’m always saved just in time though. After that, MAX is pecking at nabe in my room (laughs).

Do you like drawing winged designs?

Don’t tell anyone, but I do them because they’re easy to draw. I said earlier that they’re a bother to me though and I like it better when there are no wings at all. I actually have a feeling that the smooth ones are stronger design wise. However, bosses or great demons have to show off their wings and it’s difficult, since sometimes there are things I don’t agree with. Category wise, I like demi-humans or spirits better than wings, mainly because I like drawing humans, including their pathos and cynicism. People who might be right next to you.

There are quite a few demons who also received wings, like Snappy the dolphin, but they seem to be something different.

An angel dolphin is straightforward and symbolises the desire to escape. Wings, however, have neither a positive, nor a negative meaning. They’re a symbol of wisdom or an expression of greatness. Well, Yatagarasu is another story; he might be a bird, but he is a considerably different case. He’s also got three legs. If it were in the future, its form would be made more of energy, it would be more of a symbol. Anzu, for example, is shown as a symbol of obtaining wisdom. He’s an enemy, but he obtained the wisdom of gods. Yatagarasu is YHVH’s messenger. Like PostPet’s Momo-chan. Like an e-mail.

Explaining a design in accordance with the setting.

For example, the Hebrew Gad clan came to Japan and became the ruling family.  Aren’t there a lot of these kind of wordplays?* I want to do some research and see if this is true or false, but it’s pretty difficult, so all I can do is simplify this information. It’s interesting to think about it, so if I’ve already gone that far, then I want to design it too.

 

*Probably ガド [Gado, Gad] – ミカド [Mikado, emperor]

Your ideas always make it. What about your plans for the future?

I have absolutely nothing resembling life plans, I don’t save any money, I live hand-to-mouth. Thinking about the future is scary. I’ve said this before, but there are scary things, like being a future parent or whether I am still going to have this job or whether there will be a major recession and I’ll have to worry about food. What about the house or toys, perhaps unthinkable times will come. I don’t really think about that kind of real future. I simply dislike doing the same type of work again and again, so I want to change it if possible. This applies to the Megaten series as well, I want to show a side that’s even a little different, show that we haven’t run out of ideas. I also want to create a completely different setting, like Maken X. I want to do more than drawings, I also want to be involved with the goods design. I would love to help young talents develop. My hope is that I too will be influenced by all kinds of people around me, and since my current job is here, I hope that in the future I will be able to influence others in turn. It would make me so happy. Then, years later, I would be so happy if a producer said ‘Megaten inspired me to create this work’.