RECIPE FOR SUCCESS

A signature character that makes a cinematic appearance is the Palico cat known as the Meowscular Chef…

“He was the scariest thing about this whole show going into it and one of the things that I’m most proud of,” reveals Mr. X VFX supervisor Trey Harrell. “If you talk to a fan our version is instantly recognisable as that beloved character. There is this fine line between honouring the original art direction and making it sit in a photoreal world. Straight up it’s a talking cat. He’s a gym rat chef that looks like a pirate.”

“The Meowscular Chef has a distinct gruff character in the game and I based my direction on Toshiro Mifune, who you might know a lot from Akira Kurosawa’s samurai films,” remarks Harrell. “He’s got this Charlie Chaplin or Jackie Chan physicality where you really read his body language and can shift from utterly sympathetic to terrifying in the same look. We took a lot of inspiration from him and then our animators took it and ran with it.”