Martial Myths; the dangers of the dark path and the dim mak. A 1UP classic from April 5, 2012

In adventure stories there was usually a great warrior or even king that had exceptional martial prowess. What made them important were the qualities that they demonstrated to audiences. These heroes were brave, kind, clever and acted as a moral compass for a society that had lost its way. In the adventure traditions there were usually villains that were morally opposite of everything the hero stood for. What made these villains scary was that they usually had far more martial prowess than the heroes and were willing to kill. In wuxia legends the heroes and villains mainly fought with their hands and occasionally a weapon. These archetypes followed the classic traditions, powers and origin stories.

What made Street Fighter special was that it brought the wuxia tradition to game players. It gave a generation that may not have been exposed to the same comics or films as the SF developers a way to experience the heroic traditions. It was more important to the traditions because it gave audiences a chance to play as the archetypes. By tapping into fighting mythology the developers at Capcom were able to create heroes and villains that could withstand the test of time. The heroic tradition has many parallels in Eastern and Western storytelling. What makes it unique in wuxia was in how circular the stories were. The basic plot goes as follows: tragedy begets a quest for revenge, the heroes are hopelessly overwhelmed by the villain and driven out of society, along the way the heroes train brutally and learn the techniques required to defeat their nemesis. The hero grows into a powerful martial artist and returns to redeem their name and fulfill the vow of revenge. This template was taken almost verbatim in martial arts cinema, manhua stories as well as in the origin story of Street Fighter.

As the Street Fighter universe was fleshed out through the 1990's the traditions of wuxia were used to make the characters more interesting and plot more dramatic. Ken and Ryu were the introduction to the universe. At first gamers did not know much about the characters, how they got such awesome powers or what they were fighting for. The designers at Capcom had actually been fleshing out the characters well before the first manga was ever published. 

"I wanted to add depth with a story. It just happened to be a fighting game, but I wanted there to be a story so it would feel like a movie. We even conceptualized details for the characters that we didn't put in the game itself -- what the characters might like to eat, do they have sisters, other family members, etc. Street Fighter was different from prior games in the amount of depth we gave the characters." - Takashi Nishiyama, the designer of the original Street Fighter.

As the universe was explored in manga and animé the classic themes began coming up. Ken and Ryu were part of a martial arts tradition. Their master was named Gouken, he along with his brother Gouki were taught by a kung-fu master named Goutetsu. It was not karate as many fans of the series had assumed. The main characters were learning but a form of Antsasuken, or an "assassins fist." Goutetsu brought this over from China and had distilled the most lethal techniques into an unstoppable fighting art. In manhua the setup was very familiar. Two gifted youngsters, raised as brothers would be trained, one with a level head and another more impulsive. The more impulsive one would tend to get himself in trouble with the master and disobey orders. In the Iron Marshall the master was Tienway Champ, the level-headed youngster was Iron and the impulsive one was his adopted brother Duke.

In order to create dramatic tension there had to be a terrible accident or a murder witnessed by the young students. In the Street Fighter mythos it was Gouki that assassinated his master. His brother was a witness to this terrible crime. Years later Gouki assassinated Gouken while Ken and Ryu were witnesses. Iron ran in on the assassination of Tienway by Duke. These things left the characters with emotional and in the case of Iron, physical scars. The tragic events galvanized the heroes' resolve and put them on a path toward revenge. This was difficult for the young martial artists to accomplish now that they were masterless. In order to become better fighters they must seek out new challenges and learn the difficult lessons without the aid of a mentor.

Similar tragedies were the origin stories for Western heroes like Batman, Spider-Man and Superman. It was a great plot device which helped hook the reader and made the hero sympathetic.

In the wuxia tradition, if a fighter was lucky they came across another master who was willing to teach them new techniques. More often than not however the fighter had to learn by teaching themselves. They had to fight masters of every style and learn how to defeat that style along the way. This made for great adventure writing, and a chance to explore the various martial arts schools. However for the sake of a self-contained story rather than adventure serial the fighter had to come across a new master.

The heroes of the stories were usually gifted fighters to begin with. They knew all the techniques and secrets of their original master and could quickly build onto these things in a relatively short amount of time. This helped speed up the plot and allowed audiences not to have to sit through months of training and humbling lessons.

Years after the death of Tienway Champ, and hot on the pursuit of the Bloody Duke, the Iron Marshal was aided by a hermit named the Great Thor. He promised to teach Iron his trademark Thunder techniques. These techniques could take a great fighter decades to master but Iron picked them up at a rapid pace. Similarly the SF games allowed for both classic wuxia traditions to be explored over the course of multiple games. Characters had new or more powerful moves and those techniques did not have to be explained, players assumed that they were becoming better fighters as the years went by. Story-wise Ken and Ryu travelled the world looking for challenges and becoming stronger fighters in the first two SF games. By SF III it seemed that the characters had reached their potential and could fight Gouki. At this point in the story the elderly fighter Oro decided to take Ryu under his tutelage. It seemed that the young master still could become more powerful and thus fill an even greater presence in the universe.

The manga and manhua stories would often take an aside to show the characters becoming stronger by highlighting the training regiments they endured. It was supposed to be inspiring but almost sad to see how characters had to suffer during these periods. Characters could sometimes be degraded and tortured just to become marginally better. Perhaps the writer and artists of the stories were a bit sadistic but in actuality were reinforcing the understanding that mastery of the martial arts required constant hard work. The end result would be worth all the struggles especially when revenge was involved (think of how Beatrix suffered under the cruel tutelage of Pai Mei in the Kill Bill movies).

These characters often learned secretive techniques known only to a handful of people. In many cases it was only the master and the one or two disciples that were privy to the ancient techniques. This exclusivity made the heroes and villains unique. They could do things that regular people, or masters of the traditional fighting arts could not do. The trust that the masters had in their pupils had to be absolute. There was often a danger associated with teaching these techniques to inexperienced or corruptible students. In the SF canon Gouken was once infuriated with Ryu with the nonchalance that he put behind the techniques. In one story Ryu recalled the first time he performed a variation of the Shoryuken, or rising dragon fist. Ryu had split a boulder with the punch to which Ken was bragging about what a powerful fighter Ryu was becoming. Instead of being pleased with his disciples Gouken was infuriated, he struck down Ryu. The two were being shown extremely dangerous moves, some were techniques that were not used for fighting but instead for killing, the fact that they did not treat the moves with more reverence had caused Gouken to react the way he did. Ryu recalled this lesson as he was on the verge of defeat at the hands of Sagat following their first encounter.

Ryu staged a miraculous comeback against Sagat thus becoming the greatest fighter in the world. This story became the stuff of legend in SF canon. It highlighted how a perfect technique could topple even the most powerful fighter in the world. When Masahiko Nakahira revisited the fight in the Street Fighter Zero manga he took a closer look at what was driving Ryu and it was neither brave nor honorable.

Ryu exploited that same killing technique he used to split the boulder on Sagat. The Metsu Shoryuken or "Destroying Rising Dragon Fist" was supposed to be a killing blow. If Sagat were not equally powerful then he surely would have been killed by the punch. The encounter had repercussions in the continuity of the universe. Gouken was trying to convey the gravity of the moves his pupils were learning. They should be taken in all earnestness and never used casually in a fight. Ryu could have accepted defeat and acknowledged that Sagat was a better fighter when they first met. It would have been his pride that would have suffered the most. He could have returned to fight Sagat in the future, older wiser and stronger. Instead Ryu gave into the temptation of exploiting the most powerful strike even if it would have turned him into a murderer. This made for a much more interesting story, especially for a jumping off point as the sequel had developed. Sagat returned as a boss character but had a grisly scar across his chest.

A shortcut to winning battles was not what Gouken was protecting his students from. By going for the lethal arts Ryu had exposed himself to the corrupting influences of techniques based in dark hadou, or evil chi. The philosophy is similar to the "dark force" from Star Wars mythology.

Again, to use an example of turning to darkness here was another quote from the Star Wars series.

Yoda: Yes, run! Yes, a Jedi's strength flows from the Force. But beware of the dark side. Anger, fear, aggression; the dark side of the Force are they. Easily they flow, quick to join you in a fight. If once you start down the dark path, forever will it dominate your destiny, consume you it will, as it did Obi-Wan's apprentice.
Luke: Vader… Is the dark side stronger?
Yoda: No, no, no. Quicker, easier, more seductive.
Luke: But how am I to know the good side from the bad?
Yoda: You will know... when you are calm, at peace, passive. A Jedi uses the Force for knowledge and defense, NEVER for attack.
Luke: But tell my why I can't...
Yoda: No, no! There is no "why".

Once a person set toward the path to the dark side it was all but impossible to find the path back. In doing so the hero would become exactly like the villain. For Star Wars Luke would symbolically become Vader. In Street Fighter Ryu would become Gouki. In wuxia traditions there was good and evil chi as well. The meridians in the body cycled through energy that could grant strength or heal. If a person succumbed to evil then they generated dark chi. This energy was poisonous and could grant practitioners tremendous strength but could also turn them into monsters. Tapping into this power could make a hero as powerful in a villain, but by doing so the hero could become just as reviled as the villain.

The martial arts myth did a good job at exploring the variables in the revenge plot. If a main character succumbed to darkness then they could become very powerful, but the cost of that is the humanity of the fighter. Getting revenge on an assassin by becoming a murder undid the purpose of the hero. It was the classic "two wrongs do not make a right" or "an eye for an eye" parable that was being explored in wuxia. The temptation to steer away from the honorable and righteous path was a constant in literary form. The hero was defined by being able to overcome strife and adversity without succumbing to temptation. In the SF mythos Ryu had to face the challenges of his own dark side. This storyline was explored in the SF Zero / Alpha series.

When a fighter became evil they traded in their humanity and compassion. The core of the martial arts was not learning how to fight, per-say, but how to defend from attacks. Even Shaolin Quan was created as a form of exercise to combat the fatigue of sitting for extended periods of time in meditation. It was also designed as a means for monks to fight off wild animals. The techniques and philosophies were designed to make a practitioner mentally stronger as well and make their spiritual cores healthier. In qigong this meant keeping the meridians clear and connected to the elements. By focusing on developing a higher consciousness the practitioners could see the importance of the fight, not to win or lose but to become examples of righteous living. By showing mercy to an opponent, even those who sought to fight for the wrong reasons, could often turn them into allies. This plot was explored in many wuxia legends and even contemporary Hong Kong films.

A hero defending his life from an assassin would not always seek to kill his opponent but to grant him mercy instead. The assassin, if he or she did not poison themselves, would give up crucial information to the hero. For the villains however this was the complete opposite. They were often cruel to opponents and demonstrated a lack of compassion. Mercy was for the weak and there was a great temptation to keep exploiting the most dangerous techniques that they knew. The most powerful of the evil techniques could often kill with a single strike. This legend was based on martial arts fact.

In the classic martial arts the lethal strikes were called the dim mak. These were death touches or death punches delivered to vital organs, or major meridians. The five point palm exploding heart technique from Kill Bill was an example of a dim mak, the metsu shoryuken was another. In manhua and manga the dim mak was often delivered in a spectacular fashion. Kenshiro from Hokuto no Ken for example punched villains in their pressure points and then walked away exclaiming that they were already dead. When a villain did this it had to be delivered more brutally. They wanted their opponent not only to die, but to suffer in death as well. In the Iron Marshal, the Bloody Duke performed a dim mak to the chest of a fighter named Elephant. This punch crushed Elephant's heart and went clean through his torso.

In the SF series the final punch of Gouki's Shun Goku Satsu aka "Instant Hell Murder" traveled through the opponent. He was not the only character to possess this technique in canon. Those that could perform moves like that were evil characters, such as Evil Ryu, Dark Hokuto and her brother Kairi from Street Fighter EX. What made the move awe-inspiring in the comic format was that the technique exploded in the shape of kanji, or traditional calligraphic characters. Street Fighter fanatics might be surprised to learn that this had been done years before SF in manhua tales like the Iron Marshal. The Bloody Duke did not only cause a heart to explode into a single character, he actually wrote out a challenge to the Emperor in blood, using punches and sword strikes on his opponents.

These techniques were exploited by the villains in wuxia epics to strike fear into the hearts of opponents. However what it did to the practitioner of the dark arts was even worse. This was the cautionary tale that went back thousands of years. It was shared by every culture around the world in poetry, spoken word, comic book, and film. As summed up by the character Harvey Dent aka Two Face in the 2008 film The Dark Knight; “You Either Die A Hero, Or You Live Long Enough To See Yourself Become The Villain.”  Were there any hero origins, major villains, or cautionary tales that you grew up with? I'd like to hear about it in the comments section please. As always if you 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!

How fight culture became fighting game history, part 43

Creating a great villain had been the challenge of storytellers since the dawn of humanity. The villain was historically face of evil and the hero was the force for good. The battle between good and evil was nowhere else better defined than in pop culture. The movies, cartoons and comics of the past century have been filled with amazing battles between these forces. The most dramatic of these battles however were not the fights between the main character and the villain, but instead between the main character and him or herself. Great films highlighted the dilemma for the main character. For example, in the original Star Wars trilogy Luke Skywalker was being trained by the Jedi Master Yoda to do battle against Darth Vader, at this point Skywalker did not know that Vader was his father. The evil Lord of the Sith was very powerful and the young Skywalker feared he was too powerful because he had harnessed the Dark Side of the Force. Yoda was the second master for Skywalker, as most readers know Obi-Wan Kenobi was killed by Vader. Skywalker had questioned Yoda and wanted to know which side of the Force was the strongest. The exchange was one of the most memorable lessons instilled by the feature.

Yoda: Yes, a Jedi's strength flows from the Force. But beware of the dark side. Anger, fear, aggression; the dark side of the Force are they. Easily they flow, quick to join you in a fight. If once you start down the dark path, forever will it dominate your destiny, consume you it will, as it did Obi-Wan's apprentice.
Luke: Vader… Is the dark side stronger?
Yoda: No, no, no. Quicker, easier, more seductive.
Luke: But how am I to know the good side from the bad?
Yoda: You will know... when you are calm, at peace, passive. A Jedi uses the Force for knowledge and defense, NEVER for attack.
Luke: But tell me why I can't...
Yoda: No, no! There is no "why".

Yoda was not willing to explain to Skywalker that the greatest battle he would perform would be with himself. Those gifted with control of the Force would have to be ever vigilant as to which side they wanted to remain on. The dark side was the easier path but would ultimately corrupt every user that tried to master it. A variation of that theme was explored in martial arts storytelling. When that myth was introduced into Street Fighter the balance between good and evil, right and wrong could be clearly seen by arcade players. It was not done in the first or second games but in the third, which was actually a prequel named Street Fighter Zero in Japan and Alpha in the USA.

Ryu and his techniques were like the good side of the force, wise, patient and understanding. He wore all white, a color used to symbolize purity and life. He was perpetually young and handsome. By comparison Gouki was the ambassador of evil. His features twisted and grotesque. He wore all-black, symbolizing the impure and death. Both of them actually practiced the same form of fighting, a Karate / Kung-Fu variation known as Ansatsuken or the "Assassin's Fist." The form learned by Ryu and his friend Ken was handed down to him by his master Gouken. The Chinese Goutetsu had refined the lethal style into a powerful form of fighting and took it to Japan. He tried to keep the killing strikes a secret from his students Gouken and Gouki. But as most gamers know he failed at that when Gouki went on a murder spree and killed his master and brother using the dark techniques.

The relationship between Ryu and Gouki was very much like that of Skywalker and Vader. The master of evil seemed too powerful to be defeated. Vader had killed Obi-Wan Kenobi in front of Skywalker just as Gouki had killed Gouken in front of Ryu, The fears for the young martial arts master were palpable because both villains were so well presented in their given titles. Whenever Gouki appeared in the game series a little bit of that fear and intimidation was passed onto new players. Capcom had done as good a job defining their villain as George Lucas had done for Vader.
The final trial for the young Jedi was something that Skywalker could only face by himself. Yoda would not be able to guide him but had to hope that he had taught Skywalker enough to carry him through his own path. This was symbolized in the film series by a battle that Skywalker had against an image of Vader. The two had a Lightsaber duel in a dream-like sequence. Skywalker conquered his fears and managed to gain the upper hand in the contest. He struck down Vader by decapitating him. The next portion was something that haunted Skywalker and audiences for the rest of the film. The mask of Vader blew up and his face was revealed. Behind a puff of smoke Skywalker ended up looking down at himself. This was foreshadowing the big reveal at the end of the film but was also meant to be a warning against the corruptive influence that the Force had.

Ryu had a similar crisis of conscience in Street Fighter Zero. He was not worried that Gouki might be his father, although many gamers had speculated that he may have been. Instead Ryu was worried that all the lethal strikes in his fighting style may begin to overpower his self control. The Dark Hadou was like the Dark Side of the Force. If Ryu set down the path of learning all the killing strikes then it would consume him. Ryu was finding it more and more difficult to maintain his composure during battles, especially after he had defeated Sagat in Thailand. What he failed to acknowledge was that he had used a killing strike in order to defeat Sagat in the original Street Fighter. Ryu would not have won the fight under normal circumstances. Sagat was fighting with everything he had, he was doing so knowing that the battle could very well kill him. Ryu was young and lacked the experience to realize what he had gotten himself into. The only way to stop Sagat was with a lethal blow. That was something that master Gouken had forbidden him from performing in battle. In a moment of weakness or rage depending on your interpretation, Ryu succumbed to his Dark Hadou. Even if it was only for a moment Ryu was not himself, he became somebody else. The Shin-Shoryuken or True Dragon Punch would have killed a lesser fighter. Sagat was so large and powerful that he managed to survive the punch but was left with a massive scar burned across his chest.

By exposing himself to the lethal elements Ryu had tapped into the Dark Hadou. That one act had begun to poison his soul and would slowly try to consume his body. If he were willing to disregard his training and value for human life then perhaps he had what it took to become a master of the Dark Hadou. Unfortunately this would mean that he would have to kill Gouki to truly claim this status. Ryu in his innocent "good guy" form seemed incapable of standing up to Gouki. With the newfound dark techniques he looked like a decent rival. This was the heart of the material that Capcom had created when they introduced Evil Ryu into Street Fighter Zero. The studio even gave him the Ashura Senkuu a familiar "teleport" move and Shun Goku Satsu to make him appear like the understudy of Gouki. This change to the character and canon excited players.

Although gamers were aware of the outcome of that storyline they were still surprised at the turn of events that Capcom had created. The story of Zero took place between the first and second Street Fighter Tournaments. In Street Fighter II Ryu was the pure hero and Gouki was the dark villain. Apparently Ryu had overcome the Dark Hadou and would never need to tap into it again. However for each of the Zero sequels (there were three games in all) the future of Ryu was in constant jeopardy. Several of the characters he crossed paths with tried to help him stay on the good side. Several of the villains tried to pull out his dark tendencies. Like Skywalker however this was a fight that Ryu could only face himself.

The best part for gamers was that they could play as Ryu or Evil Ryu in the game. They were allowed to explore the canon as if it were written for a villain rather than a hero. This was something that the movie-watching experience could have never accomplished. Imagine two cuts of the Empire Strikes Back, one that audiences knew and one where Luke turned against Yoda and joined Vader. George Lucas and Irvin Kershner had a hard enough time conceiving and directing the second film in the trilogy without having to worry about filming two concurrent story lines. The battle between good and evil, right and wrong and even the self was solid enough that it only had to be filmed once for the series. Of course fighting game fans would be at a loss if they were not allowed to pit good guys against other good guys and bad guys against other bad guys. The best possible scenario for the canon of SF was to allow gamers to have Ryu battle his own evil half. The stages where the fights between good and evil took place had developed a personality all their own. They helped place the gamer in the scene and made the struggle against dark and light forces have more of an impact. The next blog will look at these locations. 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!

How fight culture became fighting game history, part 9

Ancient Chinese medicine was based around the principals of Chi (spelled qi) in a collective form known as Quigong. It was internal energy, sometimes considered life force. It was constantly flowing through everyone and everything. It was the philosophical concept that George Lucas had based "the Force" on in the Star Wars film series. The most obvious example was that qigong was used as the root for the name of Qui-gon Jin, the mentor of Obi-won Kenobi. It was best reflected when Yoda gave Luke Skywalker the famous speech about the force flowing through all things. Substitute the Force with chi and the philosophies were almost interchangeable. "Size matters not. Look at me. Judge me by my size, do you? Hmm? And well you should not. For my ally is the Force, and a powerful ally it is. Life creates it, makes it grow. Its energy surrounds us and binds us. Luminous beings are we, not this crude matter. You must feel the Force around you; here, between you, me, the tree, the rock, everywhere, yes. Even between the land and the ship."

In the Star Wars films the Jedi that used the dark side of the force (the Sith) could shoot electricity from their fingertips. In manga and manhua some characters could generate similar powers in the form of chi and direct them at enemies. The fireball in SF was one of the most famous of the chi-based strikes. The origin of the fireball was based on qigong practice. The word Fa Jin best described the ranged special attacks in Street Fighter. The word roughly translated to “release of energy,” or in western circles "explosive power." Fa meant strength while jin meant energy. An example from popular culture would be Bruce Lee's one inch punch. This punch originated with the wing chung style of boxing and was featured as a technique in the Kill Bill movie. Lee was able to generate tremendous power for the strike at close range using a combination of rotational mechanics with his wrist and torso as well as a concentrated use of chi.

The way that fa jin worked was a focus of particular hard and soft qi techniques. Muscles had to be loose, chi had to be concentrated, tendons had to be contracted and the skeleton extended simultaneously. This released physical force and chi energy as one. Bruce Lee had a very loose and fluid style, he never tensed up before delivering punches or kicks and as such delivered strikes with tremendous power. In the film Enter the Dragon Bruce Lee explained part of his philosophy. "A good martial artist does not become tense, but ready. Not thinking, yet not dreaming. Ready for whatever may come. When the opponent expands, I contract. When he contracts, I expand. And when there is an opportunity, I do not hit. It hits all by itself."

The best martial artists were able to fight almost instinctively. They could observe a fight objectively as it was happening and look for nuances in spacing and angles of attack while trusting in their techniques and letting the strikes flow automatically. Practitioners of fa jin had tremendous mental and physical strength in order to perform these strikes. The average person could spend years developing one successful fa jin strike. In the Street Fighter series the characters could perform many types in rapid succession, demonstrating that they were far more than regular martial artists. The movement of the hadoken, and many other fireball attacks in manga and animé derived from the core of a person's chi and exploded from within, they were examples of ranged fa jin. Ryu's hadoken, Chun-Li's kikoken and Guile's sonic boom attacks were all types of this explosive energy.

The physical core of a person, near the lower abdomen, was the center of gravity. In qigong it was also the spiritual core as well. The meridians constantly cycled energy through the body and circulated at the core. The upper half of the body was closest to heaven and was constantly striving to clear the mind from distractions and elevate the consciousness. The lower half was concerned with expelling energy and satisfying physical impulses or Earthly concerns. This constant exchange of energy circulated and found a balance in the core. In a martial arts the full release of a strike originated at the core of a person. The focus of breath came up through the diaphragm and was expelled in a short but powerful burst, the resulting expel of energy was accompanied by a yell. In karate this was a “kiai” literally a spirit yell or a spirit meeting. This focus on breathing, generating energy and striking at the same time was passed down from Chinese kung-fu and distilled into Japanese karate. The concept of a core of energy and vitality existed in several schools of martial arts, and not solely in Asia. Strength and power were drawn from the core and could be expelled as fa jin. Study the art and animations for Ken and Ryu's hadoken, the energy came from the core, was gathered in the palms and was drawn out before the characters struck.

This concept was exploited in the boss character Seth in Street Fighter IV. He had a literal yin and yang sphere where his abdomen should have been. This "Tanden Engine" was generating power for him and allowing him to absorb the attacks of his opponents as well as sending energy out.

Fa jin explained the philosophy behind the ranged attacks but visually they were inspired by manga and manhua stories. The attacks used in the martial arts had various naming conventions. The first blog of this series mentioned how early Shaolin Quan used metaphors for nature to describe techniques like "flood sweeping the land and floating like a feather." Other schools of martial arts also had developed similar naming conventions for the attacks. These names were popularized in films like Buddha's Fist and Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon. In fact a character from the Four Constables manhua named Yuxia Tie aka Iron Hands used the crouching tiger hidden dragon technique as one of his moves. Another one of his moves, the Temper Fire Burning Fist was more reminiscent of a fireball attack featured in Street Fighter.

Street Fighter was filled with moves that were either metaphors or literal translations describing the attack. Hadoken was made up of three Japanese words (HA, DO, KEN) that translated to punch wave fist. In the original Street Fighter the attack was presented as a golden ball of energy. In Street Fighter II the same attack appeared as a light blue ball of energy with two palms traveling within it. The hands were in the same pose that Ken and Ryu had struck when sending out the energy blast. This was very similar to how ranged strikes appeared in manhua stories. A fa jin slash, chop or punch was actually drawn as a force of energy with the same position of the hands. The manhua titles that featured this artistic stylization predated those of Hokuto no Ken / Fist of the North Star.
The attacks of Kenshiro in Hokuto no Ken were not completely original either. The drawings featuring multiple hands in different poses were pulled from the Indic Mudra which were spiritual gestures featured in Hindu and Buddhist iconography. Each position of the hands and fingers in the mudra represented a state of consciousness. There were 108 poses in total. Whether the number had influenced the 108 heroes in the Water Margin or the 108 stars of destiny was not known.

Each of the punches delivered from the 100 Crack Fist of the North Star was drawn in different pose as well. These hand positions were not accidental but had been seen in earlier manhua stories. Hokuto no Ken featured a great deal of spiritual iconography based in Buddhism.

It was originally difficult to see the palms hidden in the fireball animation on the original SF II. The redrawn SFII HD sprites made it much easier to see how the attack was supposed to look.

The choice of color for the special attacks in the SF series was also done with forethought. The light blue color associated with Ryu's hadoken signified strength and purity. The attacks of other characters also had their own individual colors. In the previous blog I had mentioned how special moves in HNK had distinct colors and shapes as well. The more aggressive characters and fighting styles had moves that looked jagged, or appeared frightening like a ghastly specter, or elemental like fire and lightning. The good characters had attacks with smoother lines and softer colors.

Street Fighter enjoyed the use of fireballs with unique shapes and coloring schemes. The "Sonic Boom" from Guile rotated like a helicopter, which was appropriate for a military fighter pilot. The "Kikoken" of Chun-Li not only reflected her mastery of fa jin, but it also highlighted the grace and beauty of the character. Kung-fu was considered to have more superfluous moves than were actually required for fighting by the modern fighting schools. Styles like karate and muay thai focused heavily on direct strikes and maximum force whereas kung-fu seems caught up in preserving techniques and traditions even if the forms were redundant. This contrast and comparison to kung-fu might explain why Chun-Li's ranged attack was presented as a swirling multicolored force. It glided across the screen like a jellyfish. While beautiful to look at, it did not have the speed or range of the hadoken from Ken or Ryu.

In manhua stories these ranged attacks were constantly growing and evolving. Both good and evil characters were developing variations of their own techniques or even of stolen techniques.
In the Iron Marshal comic two of the main characters were pursuing ultimate forms of the Thunderbolt Techniques. Tienway Champ, the mentor of the Iron Marshal, stole these techniques from a maser named the Great Thor. When Tienway's dark chi was combined with the technique he was capable of forming Thunderbolt Blasts of evil energy, represented as a dark fireball. By comparison the Great Thor never stopped evolving his technique and formed a more powerful variation called the Thunder Wrath. This new blast was bright by comparison and could overpower the dark version.

In the SF series the characters had developed their own variations of striking moves as well. Ryu had a focus on more powerful hadoken strikes, in Super SF II his fireball attack had changed shape from palms-shaped to a glowing sphere of energy. In SF III Ryu's had several variations, one of his most powerful ones, the Denjin Hadoken had lightning effects added to the attack. A focus on the shoryuken (rising dragon punch) was put on Ken. These attacks began to be animated with fire effects and did more damage than a regular shoryuken. By SF III Ken had several variations of the move as well, including the Shoryu Reppa (rising dragon destroyer) and Shinryuken (divine dragon fist) to distinguish himself from Ryu. The use of effects like lightning and fire harkened back to the elemental inspirations of kung-fu. Qigong observed the elements as having chi and effecting the meridians of the body. If these forces could be tapped then the striking power could be stupendous.

The creator of the original Street Fighter, Takashi Nishiyama actually credits an animé series for inspiring these moves. Takashi stated in a 1UP interview "…the Hadouken was inspired by a Japanese anime called Space Battleship Yamato. In that, the battleship has a laser missile called Hadouho -- it collects energy and then blasts it into space, destroying the enemy. That that's where I got the idea for the Hadouken. The Shoryuken and Tatsumaki Senpuukyaku were original ideas -- I took martial arts moves and exaggerated them so they looked like special attacks."

The Space Battleship Yamato series was originally aired in 1974 and several remakes have appeared since. The battleship would gather cosmic energy like a martial artist would gather chi and then expel it in a brilliant flash of energy. The wonderful moves used in Street Fighter were pulled from the martial arts as well as things well outside of the culture. These influx of ideas and influences would continue shaping the world that the developers were growing up in. 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!