Konata Izumi (Drillimation)

Konata Izumi (泉コナタ) is a fictional character in The Drillimation Series of video games and anime by Drillimation Studios. She is the female protagonist of The Drillimation Series, and first appeared in the 1981 anime Lucky Star by Drillimation.

In both the anime and games, she is the princess of the Lucky Star Kingdom, who was coronated at the beginning of the anime along with her father and her youkai mother. In addition, she is in love with Susumu Hori, whom she met at her coronation ceremony.

Concept and Creation
Konata was created in 1978 by Kagami Yoshimizu for a school project he had. Konata was originally going to have short, brown hair, but was scrapped due to striking similarities to Sally Yumeno from Magical Witch Sally, and Yoshimizu did not want to risk any legal action from Toei Animation. Takajima also found the design a little awkward. Yoshimizu joined Drillimation after graduating from college in 1979 and he used the character he created, along with his winning contest entry for Star Trigon, to help Takajima create the Lucky Star franchise.

Konata's name, when written in kanji (此方), means "this way" or "here", although there is no direct relations to both meanings. Konata's surname, Izumi (泉), means "fountain" or "spring", with it contrasting to her hair style.

Appearances
Since her creation, she has long, blue hair which comes all the way down to her calves, with a large ahoge that she grew from her mother's sacrifice and a beauty mark under her left eye. In her magical girl form, she wears a red jumpsuit with her belt and gloves being yellow and gray boots. As Princess Konata, she wears a red gown with yellow gloves and a matching pair of red slippers.

Lucky Star
"Susumu, I want to share one thing with you: it's love, of course!"

- Konata Izumi, to Susumu after meeting him for the first time

Konata made her first appearance in the anime as the female protagonist of the series. Since the first episode, she has been the princess of the Lucky Star Kingdom and is always close to Susumu.

Lucky Star series
Konata made her debut in the games starting with the pilot title Lucky Star. She uses lightning bolts for her bullets and thunderstorms for her spell cards.

Driller Engine Grand Prix series
Konata has appeared in every game in the Driller Engine Grand Prix series of kart-racing games as a middleweight driver. Her signature kart has always been red until Driller Engine Grand Prix 2x2, where her signature kart is the Lightning Star. Her favorite item is the Spiny Shell, despite it being negative. The instruction manual explains it as "thinking it will stop Keel from trying to break her relationship with Susumu". Her character item in Driller Engine Grand Prix 2x2 is the Lightning Rod, which summons an electric cloud which will give the kart boosts of speed until it shrinks the racer like the standard Lightning. The Lightning Rod appeared again in Driller Engine Grand Prix 6 as a special item that all characters can now get.

Reception
Konata generally received positive reception from critics and GamePro praised her as "the beautiful blue-haired lottie". Critics praised her for her hairstyle and relationship with Susumu but was criticized for her habits of watching anime and being lazy. Game Informer also stated, "it's always fun when she's a princess, but not when she's an annoying otaku in that moeblob anime of hers".