Everyone knows that Nintendo knows how to make stars, though it's rather literal in the case of Starfy. And yet, after introducing the world to the likes of Mario, Kirby, and non-musclebound Pokemon, who would have thought that they would dub one as being "too Japanese?"

The Legendary Starfy is bound for North American shelves on June 7th, but as many have learned, it isn't the first game in which the titular character has starred. Rather, it's his fifth (plus an Assist Trophy cameo in Super Smash Bros. Brawl as "Stafy"), leading to the question of "what took so long?"

Fortunately, six of the game's staff and a conference call were all it took to get some answers.

IGN posed the question at the gathering, to which Producer Hitoshi Yamagami jokingly replied "He was swimming all the way from Japan!"

He goes on to explain that Starfy was always developed for a Japanese audience, and though they had wanted to introduce the other side of the world to their games, Nintendo of America deemed the game "too Japanese" for American audiences.

As an aside, I really have no idea what that could possibly mean, as detailed above. The best guess I can hazard is that there must be some deep cultural elements in the game which go unsaid in the usual general descriptions of the games as underwater 2D platformers. Otherwise, I'm totally lost there.

Nonetheless, this fifth installment brought the opportunity for a new beginning for Starfy, as it was designed to be a game new players could get into. And apparently, that included Americans.

Yurie Hattori, Assistant Director for the Starfy games on the DS, explains that "It's a game that's really the result of all the great ideas we had in 1-4. This is a really accessible game and a great starting point to bring it to the US."

Director Kazuki Yoshihara adds that the game has matured over the years, making the fifth game ideal for U.S. players to start with. "Not only have the game mechanics become more reined," he says, "but as we've watched Starfy grow up, he's matured as well. In Starfy 1 he was kind of a crybaby. Now he's all grown up and helping out other character, so we're proud of him, too."

So, supposing that The Legendary Starfy lives up to his name when released here, what then? The developers say that they would be more than happy to bring the previous games to the U.S., and perhaps even expand Starfy's adventures into the realm of console play, but that depends on if fans can take to Starfy the way a fish takes to water.

IGN closes on that notion, saying "if you're a fan of the star shaped hero, sound off and buy the game."

Personally, I'd love to give it a shot... especially if we can see some of the wackiness Matt Green has spoken of, with Wario putting in an appearance out of Wario Land 4 in the third game.