“Those who cross Andross will die!”

One of the largest of my recent Star Fox pieces, and certainly one of my favourites, this week we have the representatives/lieutenants/bosses of Andross’ Empire, as seen in Star Fox 64 and Star Fox Zero.
This was a fun one to work on, trying to portray the different personalities of each of the pilots from what little we see of them in the games as well as sprinkling a few little extra details in. The primates were so much fun, I think they’re my wife’s favourites from the games so I had to do them justice. The reptiles were more challenging but thanks to this I got a lot more practice drawing them, but they all needed design updates.
Here are some added details about each one since I have a lot to say about this piece:
-The Meteo Crusher Pilot is one of the shortest of the lieutenants. Due to his superiority complex he compensates for this by wearing a larger helmet and broad shoulder pads.
- Caiman’s in-game design is notably a recolour of Granga, so he looks rather goofy for a reptile. I made his face and snout more crocodilian and I believe it worked quite well for him.
- Granga is my favourite (I believe he’s also my wife’s favourite too), so loyal that he won’t hear a bad word against his mighty Emperor.
- Benjamin, the engineer of the Forever Train, posed a challenge. With all the glowing eyes shown on the boss characters, my theory is that it’s a stylistic choice from them wearing helmets. Benjamin doesn’t wear a helmet. I’m not overly keen on having every member of Andross’ army mechanised like I’ve seen in some interpretations, so I had to find a way to give him those blank glowing eyes. Solution? His eyes are in the shadow of the brim of his cap. Also Nintendo are cowards and need to give back his bear and Alabama accent.
- The Area 6 commander is one I feel suffered in the transition to HD. His snout just doesn’t look right to me in SF643D or Zero, far too short and narrow. Therefore he also had to be more crocodilian, especially with the gravelly voice 64 gave him.
- Shogun I headcanon as a hotshot pilot who’s even more cocky than the cocky little freaks he always complains about. His uniform is more directly based on a flight suit in comparison to Granga or Caiman.
- The Attack Carrier pilot, like the commander, I feel suffered the most from the jump to HD. In 64 I always saw him being very lizardy with a long snout, but Nintendo decided to just make his face completely flat. I had to give him back his nose when I drew him. You also can’t quite see his tail thanks to the others around him.
- The Sarumarine captain is of course very pirate-themed. His helmet was challenging as I couldn’t quite work out what it would look like. Not only did I give back his beard from 64 (like with Benjamin), but I also gave him a buck-tooth which I always interpreted him having thanks to the lighting in his comms channel image.
- Andross himself is more heavily based on his Adventures design, especially with the darker hair and flesh hands. I’ve always liked how wrinkled and scarred he looks in that game, makes him even more monstrous than a disembodied head and hands can be.

We’ve got through all the heroic characters, now we’re starting on the villains. Next week will not be who you’re expecting though.