Miles “Tails” Prower character designer Yasushi Yamaguchi creates new artwork to celebrate the character’s 25th anniversary

Seen above (click for high res version) is new art from Yasushi Yamaguchi aka Judy Totoya, the character designer of Sonic the Hedgehog’s trusty sidekick Miles “Tails” Prower. Yasushi’s design came out of an internal competition at STI where numerous designs were submitted, including a rocket-powered turtle named Boomer, but in the end Yasushi’s two-tailed orange fox named Miles Prower won out. As Tails turned 25 years old with the 25th anniversary of the release of Sonic the Hedgehog 2 in November, 2017, Yasushi decided to create new art to celebrate. Yasushi also revealed some facts about the character’s creation, seen after the break!

The image was shared on pixiv.net, and Yasushi included some additional details (or should I say “de-tails”?) on the character’s creation. Yasushi put to rest the rumor that Tails was meant to be a girl, stating that – if my translation is correct – a game magazine mistook art of Tails with too much chest hair as breasts and stated he was a she. Yasushi also said that Tails originally didn’t have the white area around his eyes, just black pupils, and that the hair on the top of his head wasn’t meant to grow from the middle but rather from the side.

Also, while the games state that Tails is 8 years old, he was designed with 5-years-old in mind. This is interesting, as the American cartoon Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog has Tails age set at 4 and a half, closer to what Yasushi visually was going for. Finally, Yasushi revealed that Tails favorite car was the Lotus Super Seven. This was because internally, it was said that Sonic’s favorite car was the Lamborghini Countach, so Yasushi wanted Tails to have a car of his own. This is why Sonic CD‘s hidden art of Tails features the Lotus Super Seven.

It’s great to see new classic art of Tails, and I can’t wait to print out a high res image of the art for my wall!

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