Forgotten Gaming Mascots #13: Zero the Kamikaze Squirrel

On 02/15/2021 at 10:29 AM by The Last Ninja

Game: Zero the Kamikaze Squirrel (Gen, SNES/1994)

Mascot for: Sunsoft

Zero is a side-villain character that first appeared in the Aero the Acrobat games. So this is actually a spin-off game. In the game, Zero can perform his trademark kamikaze slam (although you'd think Sunsoft would know what a "kamikaze" is). He can also throw shuriken and do double jumps. The story has Zero trying to stop the evil Jacques Le Sheets from deforesting his home Stony Forest (and he has to save his girlfriend too). The game was mostly well received, and is indeed a much better Sonic rip-off than most.

What happened: The big problem here is with the character himself. "Every aspect of Zero reeks of dated racist caricature, from his slanted eyes to his buck teeth (almost cleverly disguised by placing them on a squirrel) to his occupation--kamikaze!--to the fact that he was named for a Japanese WWII fighter plane. America's '80s-era fear of a resurgent Japan was shattering right around the time of this game's release as the so-called 'bubble economy' began to implode, leaving this ill-conceived mascot an uncomfortably dated reminder of the ugly side of globalization. The weird part? Zero came into the world courtesy of Japanese publisher Sunsoft" (Jeremy Parish).

Matt Snee Staff Writer

02/15/2021 at 11:19 AM

This is definitely one of the best BaD series ever.

The Last Ninja

02/16/2021 at 12:18 AM

Wow, thanks, Matt! I'm really glad I thought of it (I could probably do two months because there are SO MANY mascots)

daftman

02/15/2021 at 05:18 PM

Naturally the game is better when the character is doomed to fail. Irony strikes again! But I'm not surprised the game was decent. Sunsoft knew their stuff.

02/16/2021 at 12:19 AM

Yeah, Sunsoft made good games (certainly better than others like LJN or Jaleco)

Super Step Contributing Writer

02/15/2021 at 06:44 PM

See, now that review has me wanting to play Yakuza 0, but I shouldn't cause I don't wanna contribute to more rolling blackouts here in TX.

I guess the Japanese devs just kinda figured, "well, this is what Americans know about us, so we'll just pump all that into this character."

02/16/2021 at 12:21 AM

The choice on behalf of Sunsoft is baffling, but also hilarious.

KnightDriver

02/15/2021 at 08:19 PM

I guess Americans really love their racist stereotypes. I don't know though. I think he's kinda cool.

02/16/2021 at 12:23 AM

He's definitely cool (not sure if kids even got all the racist stereotypes, although I'm sure adults saw some of them)

Cary Woodham

02/15/2021 at 08:37 PM

I never thought to play the racism card for the game's failure. Maybe Sunsoft Japan just didn't find those stereotypes on a silly cartoon squirrel all that offensive to themselves. I think its failure stems more from the glut of mascot characters at the time, and the fact that there was a more popular 16-bit hero with the name Zero. That being the character from Mega Man X.

I'm surprised they didn't change the name of Zero the squirrel because of MMX Zero, though. Video game companies do that a lot. It's why Mario Kart R was changed to Mario Kart 64 because they didn't want it associated with Sonic R. Another interesting change was with Pac-Man World. I got to follow that game with the developers from start to finish when I was writing for the newspaper, and the pirate ship boss was named H.M.S. Hanky in one of the preview builds. But South Park was gaining popularity at the time, and had an awful character in it named Mr. Hanky, so the PMW team changed the name of their boss to H.M.S. Windbag in the final version.

02/16/2021 at 12:28 AM

I'm sure Sunsoft didn't see them as offensive. After all, in a way they were making fun of themselves, which is always fine. It's like if an American developer made a mascot that was obese and ate hamburgers; it would seem offensive, but actually it's just making fun of the American stereotype. Zero just didn't having staying power, and I'm sure the racist stuff wasn't the cause (although it probably didn't help either).

PixlBit