You may not know Japanese developer Yoshiro Kimura by name, but you likely do know of someone who does: Toby Fox, who credited Kimura’s 1997 Moon: Remix RPG Adventure as an inspiration for Undertale. For as much obvious Earthbound DNA there is in the massively popular Undertale, there’s also a critical bit of Moon in there, too. After working on some RPGs at Squaresoft early in his career, Kimura satirized the genre by having you go around healing monsters with kindness instead of killing them. Fox’s love for Moon helped convince Kimura to get it translated and released on Steam and Switch after two decades.
Their friendship, I realized within a few minutes of talking with Kimura in Tokyo last month, also makes him careful to avoid piggybacking off of Undertale’s popularity even if he’d have a good case for doing so.
“The most important thing for me when talking about Toby Fox in public is that I really like him, and because I really like him and respect him. I don’t want anyone to get the impression I’m trying to use his name,” Kimura told me. “Undertale itself is a great game—playing it really moved me. It hit me in the soul, rather than the feels. As such, I can’t say Undertale has absolutely no relation to Stray Children. There’s some inspiration there, of course.”
