Jibanyan

Prior to becoming a Yo-kai, Jibanyan (then named Rudy) was the pet cat of a young girl named Amy. One day, Rudy was run over by a truck.[2] As Rudy was dying, he mistakenly thought he heard that Amy was disappointed with how easily he died, which caused Rudy (who had then become the Yo-kai Jibanyan) to actively fight trucks at an intersection in Uptown Springdale in order to make it up to Amy.[3] One day, Jibanyan meets Nate Adams while fighting trucks at an intersection. After hearing that Adams believes Jibanyan was brave for his actions, the two form a friendship. Later, Jibanyan spends the majority of his time at Adams's house.

In a distant future from when the Yo-kai Watch games take place, Jibanyan is transformed into Robonyan (ロボニャン), a robotic version of himself.[4]

Jibanyan's backstory of being run over by a truck is based on an actual event experienced by Level-5's CEO and designer of Jibanyan, Akihiro Hino, when he was a child.[2] During Jibanyan's English localization, some people at Level-5 thought that Jibanyan's backstory of being hit by a car should be changed, however, Hino refused as he thought it was crucial to Jibanyan's story.[5] Jibanyan's future robotic self, Robonyan's, catchphrase is a reference to the T-800 Terminator from the Terminator franchise.[4]

In an interview with Game Informer in 2015, Hino stated that Jibanyan was his favorite Yo-kai Watch character.[6]

A toy of Jibanyan at Hasbro's Yo-kai Watch space at Toy Fair in 2016.[7]

Hasbro released multiple toys featuring Jibanyan during their partnership with Level-5 from 2015 to 2016.[8][9] Similarly, Bandai (who releases the Yo-kai Watch toys in Japan) have also released merchandise of Jibanyan.[10] A licensed party board game based on Jibanyan was released by Megahouse in April 2015.[11] The GameStop pre-orders for the first Yo-kai Watch game came with a Jibanyan pin.[12] A limited edition Nintendo 3DS XL featuring Jibanyan was made available on July 10, 2014.[13] A Jibanyan Nintendo 3DS theme was made available on My Nintendo on September 16, 2016.[14] In January 2016, the chocolate bars Jibanyan eats in the series were physically released for a limited time.[15]

Jibanyan appeared in the form of a mecha in the Nintendo 3DS game Little Battlers eXperience.[16] Jibanyan was at the center of artwork for the 2014 holding of the World Hobby Fair.[17] Jibanyan has appeared in multiple collaborations between Level-5 and the fast food company McDonald's.[18][19][20] In 2015, Jibanyan was chosen as the kids goodwill ambassador of the Hawaii Tourism Board in Japan.[21] In 2018, Jibanyan, along with other Level-5 characters, appeared as crossover characters in a Japan-only collaboration between Level-5 and Everybody's Golf.[22] In 2019, Jibanyan and Lord Enma appeared as crossover characters in Monster Strike.[23] Jibanyan was one of the 8 "Olympics Ambassadors" for the 2020 Summer Olympics. Jibanyan also appeared on merchandise promoting the event.[24] In 2016, 2017, and 2020, Jibanyan and other Yo-kai Watch characters appeared as crossover characters in an event in Final Fantasy XIV.[25]

Jibanyan is widely considering "cute" and "adorable."[26][27][28] Brian Ashcraft, writing for Kotaku, noted how Jibanyan was Yo-kai Watch's most popular character.[29] Darren Nakamura of Destructoid listed Jibanyan as one of the best video game characters introduced in 2015.[30] Niconico News ranked Jibanyan as the best character voiced by Etsuko Kozakura.[31] Destructoid's Chris Carter praised the Jibanyan T variant of Jibanyan that debuted in Yo-kai Watch Busters 2.[32] Nintendo Life praised the conversations that the player could have with Jibanyan when riding the train in Yo-kai Watch 2.[33] GamesRadar+ stated that Jibanyan was one of their most wanted characters for the crossover fighting video game series Super Smash Bros.[34]