Hiding the master in plain sight, the genius of SNK's character design...part 2

Fatal Fury introduced audiences to the SNK school of fighting game design. Audiences could now choose between traditional masters like Joe Higashi, street fighters like Terry Bogard, or a hybrid fighter like Andy Bogard. By contrast the Capcom school of design was rooted closer to featuring only martial arts archetypes. The fighters all wore costumes that looked classic, they each represented a certain school of fighting. Almost none of the characters in Street Fighter II wore street clothing, whereas many of those in Fatal Fury did. This boiled down to the people that were developing the games. Takashi Nishiyama and Hiroshi Matsumoto put literal street fighters in the original Street Fighter. People like Mike, Joe and Birdie fought in their everyday clothing. These things carried over into Fatal Fury’s cast. It was Yoshiki Okamoto, Akira Nishitani and Akira Yasuda that decided to focus on archetypes for Street Fighter II. SNK boss Eikichi Kawasaki wanted his fighting games to be the biggest and the best, his new title, developed by Mr. Matsumoto was the most ambitious.

 

Mr. Matsumoto wanted The Art of Fighting (AoF) to be more cinematic, to look and feel like an action movie. To be more visceral than any game before it. Like Street Smart and Fatal Fury there was a mix of the traditional martial arts master and the street fighter as playable characters. The fictional Kyokugenryu Karate style was placed on both Robert Garcia and Ryo Sakazaki. The two were evolved from the Ken and Ryu template respectively. This new game was really pushing the power of the Neo Geo console. It featured more color, more detail and sprites bigger than the competition’s. Not to mention that it had graphics that zoomed in and out of the action. These sprites could also reveal damage. Characters bruised and their clothing tore from round to round. There was even a slight RPG element as characters could grow and evolve thanks to the lessons learned in the bonus stages. The genius of this game came in the planning stages. If SNK wanted to dethrone Capcom as the best fighting game developer then they had to offer the best experience. Although Fatal Fury and the Art of Fighting looked and played differently they were part of the same shared universe. This meant that at some point there would be a crossover game featuring a massive library of established characters.

 

The entire cinematic feel of AoF was not lost on audiences. The figures in the game had more realistic proportions and looked less cartoonish than their rivals. It was much easier to get pulled into this world as bits and pieces of the story were revealed in between every stage. Yuri Sakazaki, the young sister of Ryo had been kidnapped. It was up to Ryo and Robert to find and save her. Every person that the duo faced had been hired or bribed by Mr. Big, a South Town mob boss. Each encounter brought them one step closer to the truth. At the end of the journey Ryo found out that the kidnapper was a martial arts master known as Mr. Karate. At the climax of the game Yuri stopped her brother from killing Mr. Karate. She cried out that man was their father. This was an exceptional plot twist and something that set up a sequel. It turned out that both Mr. Big and Mr. Karate answered to Geese Howard. Now that Yuri was safe there would be a reckoning between the Sakazaki family and Howard. Imagine how confident Geese must have been in his abilities by also starting a war with the Bogard brothers at around the same time. Story points aside the AoF game is one of the perfect examples of the SNK school of design. I’ll begin with one of the best masters hidden in plain sight.

 

A while back I talked about how the traditional Muay Thai master ended up in fighting games. I called Chompoo the first notable female Muay Thai master in a fighting game. This angered a lot of SNK fans because the character King predated her by more than 20 years. In context I was talking about actual Thai fighters that dressed in the traditional fighting uniforms. Chompoo had the shorts, taped up hands and feet and even headdress. I was not talking about characters that knew Thai boxing. With that said let’s actually look at the elements that went into making King and why she had a fantastic design. First off she wore a suit, close to that of a bartender in a high class restaurant. She had the familiar stance, hands up for striking and moving on the balls of her feet. If you had asked any other designer to create a female Muay Thai master you probably would have ended up with someone that looked more like the character by Saeed Jalabi. Saeed hit all of the traditional notes perfectly. The shorts, headdress and even wrapped cords of older, classical forms of the Thai boxing arts. Any audience member could look at the design and know instantly this was some sort of fighter. Even if the gamer was not familiar with the fighting arts they could still tell a few things about her. The athletic frame, toned muscles, wrapped hands and feet were meant for striking. This was not a ceremonial costume but one for competition.

 

By contrast look at the design that Toshiaki Mori came up with. The SNK designer would become one of the most influential artists of all time. Most people would recognize him by his pen name, Shinkiro. He didn’t approach his designs the way one would have expected. What made his work so great was how down-to-Earth every figure was. When he was helping create the costumes for the AoF cast he knew to make each character fit the story. As Robert and Ryo made their way through South Town the people they fought reflected a certain part of the city. The thugs looked like biker gang members, those in the military wore fatigues. Having a half-naked Muay Thai fighter in a classy restaurant would not have made any sense. But what about one dressed like a bartender? The uniform was central to the character. Modern martial arts movies featured characters that wore deceptive clothing. One the first examples was the tuxedo that Robert Baker wore when he fought Bruce Lee in Fist of Fury (1972). Bruce Lee helped bring classic wuxia or Chinese hero stories into the modern era. The same thing was true of the suit that Benny Urquidez wore when he fought Jackie Chan in Wheels on Meals (1984).

 

The suit was deceptive but that was only one layer of Shinkiro’s design. King looked like an effeminate man, or perhaps a boy. Audiences had been conditioned to expect 99% of the people they fought to be men. Up until that point Fan from Yie Ar Kung-Fu was the only female opponent in a fighting game and Chun-Li from Street Fighter II was the only playable female character. Audiences expected a female martial artists to be wearing a traditional dress. That whole idea was turned upside down if players tore the blouse off of King with a special attack. That was when it was revealed that she was wearing a bra underneath. That violent act made the game feel far more mature than any other title. This sort of turn was something that you would expect in a movie and certainly not in a game. SNK hid the reveal right until the end, going so far as to name the character King instead of Queen. In doing so it made the design very memorable. This master of the fighting arts was hiding in plain sight. She would be the perfect example as to what set SNK apart from the competition.

 

If you have been reading my blogs for a while then you know that I like to dig into the influences behind the various characters. For King the most obvious comparison would be with the martial arts star Cynthia Rothrock. Since 1985 Cynthia had been featured in a string of movies, mostly produced overseas. Women hadn’t really been considered for leading roles in most Western-produced martial arts films. There have been exceptions of course in other action films such as the Black Widow from the Avengers films, Furiosa from Mad Max or Gazelle from the Kingsmen. Those characters were almost always in a supporting role and not the stars of the film. In Hong Kong however women could be the stars of the film. This was a tradition going back to 1928. Heroes came in all shapes (see the chubby Sammo Hung), sizes, and colors even. When Cynthia couldn’t land a role in a US film she was almost always guaranteed to find a spot in Hong Kong. The same thing was true for Ron Van Clief. As a black martial artist, and Army veteran he faced tremendous racism in the USA but was a welcome star in Hong Kong cinema.

 

Cynthia’s trademark short haircut, lightning fast kicks and array of martial arts moves made her a stand out star. She had been actively involved in martial arts for a long time and was trained in different schools, including Tang Soo Do, Tae Kwon Do, Eagle Claw, Wu Shu, and both Southern and Northern Shaolin. She was able to hold her own against many men and women artists from Hong Kong, some of which learned fighting and acrobatics from the Chinese Opera, just like Jackie Chan. Cynthia often played a street smart cop, nicknamed China O’Brien in one of her more famous recurring roles. She was such a formidable figure that I would argue she not only influenced the design behind King but also Blue Mary, who turned up in the Fatal Fury series. This made Cynthia one of the rare real world figures that inspired the creation of more than one character, in more than one game series.

 

Cynthia was not shy about using her good looks in the roles she played. When the part called for it she would show some skin, tastefully of course. The people working at SNK were keenly aware of how the actress sexed up some of her parts or modeling shoots. Shinkiro did not outright try to make King a voluptuous, overly sexualized character. It would have destroyed any surprise waiting for audiences when they first saw her. It was the other artists working at the studio that started putting her in form-fitting suits, they turned her vest into a bustier and starting pushing her breasts out further and further. She would not longer appear androgynous following the AoF. Blue Mary had always been presented as the more sexualized of the designs. She was top heavy with an exposed midriff, wearing uniforms that were not standard law-enforcement. A very skimpy white top and denim bottom was created as an alternate costume for her in King of Fighters (KOF): Maximum Impact 2 Regulation A. This costume was inspired by an outfit worn by Rothrock in a modeling shoot. However we should confuse the two. The design behind King and her planning extended far into the lore or the SNK universe.

 

On the surface King was a very simple design. She had the skills and grace of a top bartender but with the power of a no-nonsense bouncer. On top of everything she was not going to remain as a bit player in South Town. The figures in the SNK universe had room to grow and the did in the various KOF sequels. The Sakazaki family opened Kyokygenryu schools, with Ryo entering tournaments to help spread its name. Andy and Terry Bogard travelled the globe following the trail of Geese Howard and making new allies along the way. King made fast friends with the other leading females in the KOF series. She partnered with the ninja Mai Shiranui and Kyokugenryu prodigy Yuri Sakazaki to form an all-women team. This was a first in fighting game history. She also partnered with them to open a club in a later timeline. King had taken her experience, including learning from Capoeira master Richard Meyer and his infamous Pao Pao Cafe, and applied it to her own business. She was ambitious and was destined to be a major player in South Town, yet unlike Geese Howard she was going to do this without resorting to extortion. King was an exceptional character design and easily one of the greatest fighting game characters ever created, female or otherwise. Artists and developers try to break into the genre should learn from SNK and see how they were able to hide these martial artists in plain site. The studio was able to hide masters in many ways. We will explore the ways they were able to do this in the next blog. As always if you enjoyed this blog and would like to sponsor me please visit my Patreon page and consider donating each month, even as little as $1 would help make better blogs and even podcasts!

The legend of Blue Mary, or girls in fighting games, part 1...

Competition is good for health, good for business and good for the arts as well. Competition helps create an incentive to work harder, to work smarter and in some cases to offer something new and unique. In the fighting game universe there have been many okay games but only a few truly exceptional games. The greatest games caused the other studios to take notice. Those that worked hard and took a chance on a new idea were sometimes rewarded for their hard work. Competition created rivalries between some of the biggest publishers. Some of the rivalries were friendly and some were filled with tension. The worst of the rivalries were celebrated with legal battles. For the most part there were a few studios that could be considered on par with each other. Capcom and SNK had the 2D fighting game arena on lockdown while Namco and Sega were the two studios constantly pushing the envelope in 3D. Some of the design choices by one studio team would be ridiculed by another. Yet sometimes a good idea would be copied and refined by a rival studio. There was a fine line between parody and poaching. Capcom and SNK had a history of trading jabs with their earliest games. Street Fighter II was the undisputed king of fighting games when it debuted in 1991, however when SNK released the Art of Fighting (AoF) in 1992 Capcom thought that the main characters looked and fought very similar to Ken and Ryu. The star of the game, Ryo, even sounded too close to Ryu for comfort.

   

The masters of Kyokugenryu "Extreme Utmost Limit Way" Karate had very similar moves to both Ken and Ryu, including a leaping kick, rising uppercut and fireball attack. Arcade audiences saw these as the SNK version of the hurricane kick, dragon punch and fireball. Even the button and joystick moves required to perform these attacks were very similar to the control scheme created by Capcom. The artists and programmers working on the Street Fighter II updates didn't take too kindly to the AoF. When they were working on updated character art they made sure to let fans and SNK know exactly what they thought of their new fighters. Sagat was presented holding the head of a defeated opponent. Players could see blood, a dislocated elbow and a costume that was eerily similar to Ryo's but with the black hair and ponytail of Robert. The shots were fired but it didn't end there. A few years later they decided to make good on their comparison and created a sprite of the same character that would be featured in Sagat's opening animation. This defeated figure would become to be known as Gou Hibiki. Sagat was now going through the Street Fighter universe fighting all the karate masters so that he could gain an edge against Ryu. He killed Gou in the fight and that started a new round of shots aimed at SNK.

 

When Capcom was creating the intro animation for Sagat they had a bigger goal in mind. They were going to introduce an entirely new karate fighter into the universe. Someone who was an amalgamation of the two AoF stars. The result was Dan Hibiki, a square-jawed, long-haired karateka that appeared in Street Fighter Zero / Alpha in 1995. He wore pink because the color was somewhere in between Ryu's white and Ken's red gi. At first audiences didn't know what to make of him. In the original arcade release he could only be unlocked if you knew a secret code. This was rare for a Capcom fighting game, and especially for a Street Fighter title. The studio tended to shy away from time-release characters or secret characters for fear of upsetting the balance they had worked so hard to achieve. In the end it worked in favor of this new character. Dan was hopelessly underpowered when compared to the other fighters and this was all on purpose. His one-handed fireball didn't travel very far across the screen. Nor did his leaping triple kick or uppercut strike. It was obvious that Capcom was telling the team at SNK exactly what they thought of Kyokugenryu practitioners and their moves. Serious competitive players tended to stay away from Dan while the rest of the community chose him because of his unique move set.

 

Dan was not the only character that Capcom was calling out. Sakura, who would become the most popular new character, was designed to be a girl version of Ryu. Yet even this character was not completely original. In the original Art of Fighting both Ryo Sakazaki and Robert Garcia were after Mr. Big and Mr. Karate because the young Yuri Sakazaki had been kidnapped. In the end she revealed that Mr. Karate was Takuma Sakazaki, the father of Ryo and herself. In 1994 SNK released a sequel which now made Yuri a playable character. The little sister had her own variation of the Kyokugenryu moves, they were not as strong as the men's attacks but were much faster. She even had her own unique look. Rather than wearing a traditional gi, she wore the top but mixed it with more contemporary leggings and sneakers. The design of her and her brother remained fairly consistent over the next 20 years. The sprites evolved, the aesthetics between games changed as new art directors were brought on board but very little changed between the siblings.

 

Street Fighter Zero / Alpha had gotten off to a great start but it felt lacking. Capcom revised it, added some familiar faces from Final Fight, the original Street Fighter and Street Fighter II. The newest face, Sakura, was the breakout star. She debuted in Street Fighter Zero 2 in 1996. Long-time fighting game fans saw the inclusion of Dan and Sakura a sort of jab at Ryo and Yuri. After all, if Capcom was going to call out their rival in a game why not go for broke? Yet there was a certain charm to the pair that was undeniable. They were far more than parody characters, they were far more than clones of SNK fighters or derivative Street Fighters. They were instead a blend of different influences that worked within Street Fighter continuity. Dan was the overly dramatic rival to Sagat, like a movie character he was driven by an intense feeling to avenge the death of his father. Dan was someone who was so outclassed he didn't even realize it. He also idolized his father and his fighting form "Saikyo-ryu" aka the "Strongest Style" even though it didn't stand up to the other forms in canon. Sakura on the other hand did not hail from a martial arts family. Her parents were regular people and little brother enjoyed playing video games more than anything. Her stage was even set in her own backyard instead of some fancy building , which reinforced that idea that she came from a regular household She was driven by a desire to achieve greatness and patterned her life after Ryu, her hero. She came a long way despite a lack of formal training and Dan decided to insert himself into her training routine even if she was technically a greater fighter. The inclusion of these two added some dimension and humor to a sometimes overly-serious plot. It didn't take long for the new characters to be embraced by the community. Fans all around the world drew art and used cosplay to let Capcom know how much they enjoyed these faces.

 

SNK should be remembered for their many, many, many contributions to the fighting genre. They are sometimes overlooked for how they changed the roles of female characters in fighters. Mai Shiranui from Fatal Fury / King of Fighters fame was arguably the most famous female character designed by the studio. She was the busty ninja that left little to the imagination. In the pantheon of female stars was was second only to Chun-Li in international fame. Yet Mai was far from being the only notable character created by the studio. King, who also debuted in the original Art of Fighting way back in 1992 was important for being the first androgynous character. Modeled loosely on the martial artist and action film star Cynthia Rothrock the blond striker was a force to be reckoned with. King would become more feminine in every subsequent game but in her original appearance players assumed that she was a effeminate young man. They thought that anyhow until her jacket top was torn, revealing that she had taped down her breasts to be a bouncer. Yuri was neither the sexy archetype, nor was she the tomboy but instead something in-between. She was a girl trying to be more than a girl version of her brother. She was trying to find her own voice and fit into the series.

 

Sometimes Yuri would be a little too enthusiastic, a little too vocal of her superior techniques. The team at Capcom picked up on these cues and instead of assigning them to Sakura they placed the mannerisms on Dan, which made him all the more comedic. Audiences could appreciate what the developers were going for with Yuri. She was the young upstart, eager to show the world what she was made of. Maybe she got herself into hot water but the other females in the series were often there to help out just as much as the male stars. Players could tell that when Yuri matured she would become a force of nature. The designers at SNK had a unique approach to the genre and the lessons they learned from their male cast would help color their female counterparts. We'll explore one of these characters in the next blog. I hope to see you back for that. As always if you enjoyed this blog and would like to sponsor me please visit my Patreon page and consider donating each month, even as little as $1 would help make better blogs and even podcasts!