Jake Kazdal is the Swiss Army Knife of 17-BIT. In addition to being the CEO of 17-BIT, he is the creator, director, artist and lead designer of Skulls of the Shogun. Not only did Jake design a good portion of the levels, but he created the final art for all of them. In fact, Jake also did most of the art and animation throughout the game, and created all the characters.
After working on realistic, dark sci-fi concept art for a few years, Jake wanted to work on something different and smaller-scale (and preferably cartoony and goofy), returning to his roots as an animator and character designer.