If Nintendo of America had its way, Pikachu could have been given “huge breasts” and Pokemon would have “kind of looked like the characters from the Cats musical,” according to a recently unearthed interview.
The interview is from around the launch of Pokemon Gold and Silver and is between Nintendo and The Pokemon Company CEO Tsunekazu Ishihara, who still serves as the company’s president and CEO today. In the interview (dug up and translated by Japanese gaming outlet Game*Spark), Ishihara said when Pokemon was first shown to Nintendo of America for localization, it thought it was “too cute.”
Nintendo of America staff then shared some of their own, alternate Pokemon character designs. The designs were apparently so traumatic that Ishihara said he “won’t show those illustrations to anyone as long as I live.”
