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Satoru Takizawa

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Satoru Takizawa (born 1972) is an art director at Nintendo EPD's Design Management Group. Along with Yoshiki Haruhana and Yusuke Nakano, he has been one of the main character designers and art directors for The Legend of Zelda series starting with Ocarina of Time.

Biography[]

As a kid, Satoru was interested in drawings comics rather than playing the Famicom (NES). In fact, the only times he'd ever play video games was at his friends' house, as he himself didn't own one. After constructing a comic, he'd pass it around his class at school for the others to read.

In college, Satoru would develop CG effects for his friends' projects, but still wasn't interested in video games. After being introduced to the Super Famicom and The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past, he apparently knew that he had to work at Nintendo after seeing the possibilities video games had.

Unagi

Unagi was one of Satoru's earliest creatures.

When he finally got a job at Nintendo in 1995, his first project was a minor task - to create the logo of the international version of Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island for the SNES. When the Nintendo 64 was released, the company needed a lot of people for 3D design, and they turned to none other than Satoru Takizawa, whom had worked on 3D designs prior to coming to Nintendo. His first works on 3D design were enemies in Super Mario 64, including Klepto the Condor, Unagi the eel, and the Manta Ray.

Come Star Fox 64, he was already working not only on bosses but landscapes as well. The bosses he designed include Goras in Titania, Bacoon in Aquas, Sarumarine in Zoness and Mechbeth in Macbeth. According to him, the technology that he used during Star Fox 64 was unheard of while he was attending university.

One of his most important tasks during the Nintendo 64 era was creating Ganondorf and other enemies in The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, notably Twinrova. Designing Twinrova was apparently a challenge for him, as the scenario writer made the scenes with the characters funny, and he was afraid that he couldn't live up to that standard, though Shigeru Miyamoto liked it and ultimately put it in the game. While he claims that that was one of the more challenging moments, he also says that designing a cel-shaded Moblin was also hard work. Ganondorf has held a special place in his heart with a more conventionally attractive design starting in Twilight Princess and he was given freedom to make him as "awesome" as possible in Tears of the Kingdom.[1]

For The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess for the Wii and GameCube, Takizawa was the art director for the game. After having a mostly supervisory role in other titles of the franchise, he reprised that role in The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, and later on The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom.

Games[]

Special Thanks[]

Gallery[]

Interviews[]

  1. ↑ https://www.theverge.com/23721063/zelda-tears-of-the-kingdom-interview-aonuma-fujibayashi
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