Mobile Police Patlabor Minimum

Mobile Police Patlabor Minimum (aka Mini Pato) is a series of theatrical shorts released in Japan in 2002 alongside the film WXIII: Patlabor the Movie 3. Directed by Kenji Kamiyama, the shorts are written by Mamoru Oshii with mechanical designs by Yutaka Izubuchi, character designs by Tetsuya Nishio and a score by Kenji Kawai. The shorts utilize a “digital paper puppet theater” technique that combines paper cutouts with clay and CG to create a flat, 2D aesthetic similar to Nintendo’s Paper Mario games. The Mini Pato shorts were originally released on home video in North America by Pioneer Entertainment, but they have since been re-released by Sentai Filmworks’ Maiden Japan label.