Yoshi Racing
Yoshi Racing[1] is a rejected pitch for a 3D game in the Yoshi franchise. The game was revealed in an article by Eurogamer detailing Argonaut Games' involvement in the development of Star Fox[2] where the game was described as a 3D platformer and left unnamed, while a message board post by an Argonaut employee named the game "Yoshi Racing" and described it as a character racing game.[1]
Following their successful collaboration with Nintendo on Star Fox, British game developer Argonaut Games pitched a 3D game starring Yoshi and made a prototype for it.[2] However, Nintendo did not follow on the offer, with one Argonaut employee speculating this was because the company did not want to let third-parties use its characters.[3] Following this setback, Argonaut decided to retool the prototype as an original IP, Croc: Legend of the Gobbos.
Argonaut's Jez San believes that the refusal to pick up the Yoshi pitch was the final blow to Nintendo and Argonaut's relationship, which was previously damaged by the cancellation of the nearly completed Star Fox 2.[3][4] San further claims that the prototype influenced Super Mario 64, stating that "Miyamoto-san went on to make Mario 64, which had the look and feel of our Yoshi game - but with the Mario character, of course". Jez San also recalls an occurrence where Shigeru Miyamoto came to him and apologized for not picking up the Yoshi game.[4]
References
- ^ a b inpHilltr8r (December 29, 2016). http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p=227362239&postcount=351
- ^ a b Born slippy: the making of Star Fox (Retrieved July 5, 2013)
- ^ a b In "Born slippy", Jez San is quoted as saying: "The end came when we pitched to do a 3D platform game, the likes of which had never been done before. We mocked up a prototype using Yoshi. It was essentially the world's first 3D platform game and was obviously a big risk - Nintendo had never let an outside company use their characters before, and weren't about to, either. This is the moment the deal fell apart."
- ^ a b In "Born slippy", Jez San is quoted as saying: "Miyamoto-san came up to me at a show afterwards and apologized for not doing the Yoshi game with us and thanked us for the idea to do a 3D platform game. He also said that we would make enough royalties from our existing deal to make up for it. That felt hollow to me, as I'm of the opinion that Nintendo ended our agreement without fully realizing it. They canned Star Fox 2 even though it was finished and used much of our code in Star Fox 64 without paying us a penny.
