The
Fire Emblem series has undergone some dramatic visual changes since its 1990 debut on the Nintendo Entertainment system with
Fire Emblem: Shadow Dragon and the Blade of Light. The illustrators responsible for
Shadow Dragon and the Blade of Light and
Fire Emblem: Gaiden remain unknown, but the games art is often mistakenly credited to Katsuyoshi Koya, a name that has consequently become synonymous with the
Fire Emblem series.

Koya joined Nintendo in 1994 and headed the character design for the Super Nintendos
Fire Emblem: Mystery of the Emblem, and reprised his role as character design lead in 1996s
Fire Emblem: Genealogy of the Holy War. When development for
Fire Emblem: Thracia 776 began, Koya stepped down. Shouzo Kaga, the series director who left
Intelligent Systems after that game, noted in the
Fire Emblem: Genealogy of the Holy War art book that Koya and I both thought his contributions werent quite up to par, pointing to differences between Kagas own drawings and Koyas original designs.
Above are some images from the art book. You can view more of Koya Katsuyoshis work from the
Fire Emblem: Genealogy of the Holy War art book
in this gallery.
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Video of Bealphareths introduction
After stepping down, Koya joined the development team for Bealphareth, an action-RPG developed for the PSone by Zealsoft, as the lead character designer. He worked closely with Masaya Kuzume (
Panel de Pon,
Tetris Attack), the sound composer for
Mystery of the Emblem whom he knew from his time with Nintendo and Intelligent Systems. After the games release in 2000, Koya was approached by NTT Publishing Co., Ltd. and asked to provide illustrations for the newly dreamed up
Fire Emblem Trading Card Game. This is where the bulk of Koyas legacy was formed.

The Fire Emblem Trading Card Game was never released outside of Japan, and it didnt include characters from Fire Emblem Gaiden, The Binding Blade, Fire Emblem, The Sacred Stones, or Path of Radiance. Instead, the series focused on Genealogy of the Holy War, Thracia 776, and Mystery of the Emblem. Though he was not the original character illustrator for these titles, his illustrations for the TCG have widely replaced contemporary representations of the games.
In fact, some of the Unit Portraits for characters from
Genealogy and
Thracia 776 used in
Fire Emblem: Awakening for DLC and SpotPass characters feature Koyas work over the original character designers. Koyas final contribution to the
Fire Emblem videogame series was artwork for Lena and Barst, who appeared in the GBA version of
Fire Emblem: Shadow Dragon.
Tomorrow, well talk about Mayumi Hirota.
Read more stories about
Fire Emblem on Siliconera.