The Inevitable Street Fighter V Story Thread: ARCADE EDITION!

[Super_Sonic]

To me, this will always be the best Guile stage:

[Cestus]

If you mean “later SF games”, you mean Street Fighter 2, you would be right. Otherwise, no. This shit has more or less been here since the beginning (since no one gave a crap about SF1).

SF1 was the only game that was more or less about “martial artists”.

Same with Dhalsim: He isn’t a freak. Stretching his arms and legs is part of his technique.
Unrealistic? Yes.
Out of place in comparison to the other characters? No.

Blanka, yes, he’s a freak. But they still established that he’s definitely human with his green skin and his overall look being the result of his surroundings. He isn’t some monster like Bigfoot.
Again, unrealistic, but still not supernatural within the context of the story.

As inspiration for them imho

DHALSIM
-Bad guy from Indiana Jones and the temple of doom
-Gandhi
-Indian fakirs
-Indian Yoga expert with stretchy limbs from some old kung fu movie

http://i.imgur.com/utsFRaP.jpg

BLANKA
-Tarzan
-Hulk (Ferrigno 80’s)
-chimps/orangutan (hair/fur color)
-Cobra clan dude from Hokuto No Ken

[Shockdingo]

Lots of interesting points from both sides on the Rose/what constitutes a martial artist.

Blanka was the first character my sister and I mained. Always dug the guy, but I never liked the explanation that he’s like that due to chlorophyll. As Ultima said he’s got fangs and claws, and not just normal claws, but in his jumping medium punch a different looking set of claws spring out. Also, didn’t he have pointed ears in the older versions? I have to check if the claw thing is in the original SF2 era or just alpha 3.

I always preferred the mutation idea depicted in the SF:TM, the base idea not HOW it was done.

Personally I’d stick to his original story, but since the plane was shot down, I’d say it landed near an old testing facility for Shadaloo and there was some form of mutagen. In his time exposed to that and animals, it gave him an adaptational advantage and, to steal an idea from @YagamiFire I’d say that in general Brazil is a wellspring for chi and spiritual prowess.

Even though Rose isn’t a martial artist, I still enjoy her. Sf has been getting weirder since the SF2 days and I never minded it till Ingrid showed up and Akuma kept getting a power creep. I like what Bison is now, but I kinda miss the days when some of the cast could be beaten (within reason) by some of the other fighters depending on certain factors.

I’m holding my breath for Necalli, but I don’t want DBZ levels of powercreep. Keep the martial arts and sci-fi, but don’t let it go crazier than it is now, or else we’ll really see the series suffer. If Akuma returns and starts splitting continents or eventually DOES get the ability to cross into the netherrealm, I’m gonna be sick.

[DarthEnder]

Even in SF1, we had flashy fireballs and teleporting ninjas.

Bison’s Psycho Power is just the logical extension to the fireballs. In a world where people can throw projectiles, some guy enflaming his body and spinning around isn’t too much out of place.

The difference is that in SF1, everyone’s magical powers were the direct result of martial arts training.

Bison’s Psycho Power isn’t. Neither is Blanka’s electricity, or Dhalsim’s fire. These are the first examples of characters with powers that didn’t seem to fit what the game was about. SF2 was still a martial arts tournament. And you had 3 characters whose fighting styles had nothing to do with martial arts.

I don’t think it’s necessary to change Ryu, Ken and Birdie’s artwork to Kiki’s. The pages are better off using their primary character artwork for the game.

The problem is that the primary character artwork in SF5 doesn’t fit. And I don’t even mean artstyle-wise.

A good profile picture for a character is clean, without extraneous elements, that clearly shows off what the character looks like. This is especially true in TVTropes where the image is there so the reader can easily reference it for any visual tropes.

The SF5 art contains background elements and after-effects that obscure the character, and often have characters in mid-action poses that distort their appearance.

[bakfromon]

I like Rose as a character and her whole story and how she connects with Bison, but I’ve never actually seen her as a “martial artist”. Sure she’s a “fighter”, but her style isn’t rooted in anything tangible to fighting. It’s like those concepts of the fighter who was supposed to use his philosophy/psychology as a means of fighting. A person can’t physically fight with their mind unless it were expressed through a kinetic force, *ie telepathy, which Rose happens to be a user of. Although would you call someone who solely relies on fighting with their mind a “martial artist” even if they have no history of a fighting style?

Also I even though I grew up thinking Blanka was a mutant I’m totally fine with him being completely human, his electric powers from wrestling eels, and using the jungle plants as natural camouflage (he’s just really dirty from rolling around in mud and jungle plants). It just shows you the determination and extremes it took for someone like that to survive all his life in the remote wilderness of the Amazon Rain Forests, without the need of saying; “yea he got his special powers from being a mutant (and not from training and devotion like everyone else)”.

That’s why imo even though Sim may give praise to his god Agni for the gift of flame, it was ultimately his strict devotions and through Yoga which established this “connection”, and it’s his skill alone which produces it. He doesn’t just say “Yoga Fire” and then Agni fills his body full of fire for him to blow out.

[AriesWarlock]

That’s why imo even though Sim may give praise to his god Agni for the gift of flame, it was ultimately his strict devotions and through Yoga which established this “connection”, and it’s his skill alone which produces it. He doesn’t just say “Yoga Fire” and then Agni fills his body full of fire for him to blow out.

You know, I would say true, yes, because the fire is already “inside” Dhalsim. it’s like in Marvel comics, you make a pact with one of the gods/magic principalities and then you already have access to their power. It’s why Dr. Strange can perform bands of cyttorak (his Lvl. 3 super in UMVC3) and you don’t see Cyttorak appearing every time. It would be silly. So I think that’s a possibility, too.

[Hawkingbird]

Even in SF1, we had flashy fireballs and teleporting ninjas.

Bison’s Psycho Power is just the logical extension to the fireballs. In a world where people can throw projectiles, some guy enflaming his body and spinning around isn’t too much out of place.

The difference is that in SF1, everyone’s magical powers were the direct result of martial arts training.

Bison’s Psycho Power isn’t. Neither is Blanka’s electricity, or Dhalsim’s fire. These are the first examples of characters with powers that didn’t seem to fit what the game was about. SF2 was still a martial arts tournament. And you had 3 characters whose fighting styles had nothing to do with martial arts.

I don’t think it’s necessary to change Ryu, Ken and Birdie’s artwork to Kiki’s. The pages are better off using their primary character artwork for the game.

The problem is that the primary character artwork in SF5 doesn’t fit. And I don’t even mean artstyle-wise.

A good profile picture for a character is clean, without extraneous elements, that clearly shows off what the character looks like. This is especially true in TVTropes where the image is there so the reader can easily reference it for any visual tropes.

The SF5 art contains background elements and after-effects that obscure the character, and often have characters in mid-action poses that distort their appearance.

I don’t think the background elements hurt the images. Their faint and don’t draw attention away from the character. I agree with the after-effects. Thankfully Alex artwork is free of fruit roll-ups.

[DRW]

Which is a bullshit explanation

Sure it is. And yes, Blanka is actually the one thing that somehow doesn’t really fit into SF2. But they still made him a real human after all. If Blanka was invented today, he would actually be a monster like Bigfoot, coming from an undiscovered species from the depths of the jungle.

In SF2: He was believed to be such a mythic monster. But just like in real life where zombies and werewolves probably stem from superstitions that have a totally mundane explanation, Blanka turned out to be just a normal human being.
Monsters don’t exist. Blanka was just a (supposedly American) boy turned man whose appearance was the result of him living in the jungle for years.
While his fighting style resembled that of a wild beast, he was an intelligent human being who was perfectly capable of the English language.

Dhalsim still sticks out because while you can train to jump higher or run faster, and they handwave all projectiles via various means, there is no logical sequence of training that makes “stretching really good” make you to turn into Mr Fantastic.

Not in the real world, but who says that stretching arms isn’t a staple of Yoga masters in the “Street Fighter” universe?

As I said: Yes, their fighting styles are unrealistic. But it was always presented as something that you can accomplish trough training or, in Blanka’s case, something that was based on the environment.

Clones, robots, resurrection from the dead and soul jumping, physical gods, that’s still a totally new level of fiction.
James Bond’s gadgets and the bad guys’ death lasers are unrealistic as well. But it still doesn’t mean that Bond should ever get involved in an alien invasion.

Bison doesn’t stick out as much in-game, but from even SF2, his back story definitely puts him on another level.

But he’s still a human.
O.k., his Psycho Power stems from hatred, just like Dhalsim’s floating stems from meditation and the whole fireballs stem from ki. So what?
In the end, he’s still only a man who just happens to be a very agile fighter, the boss of an international crime syndicate who knows a technique that’s a bit stronger than your usual run of the mill fireball.

It’s still miles away from the almost demon-like appearance that we see in SF4 where Bison travels through self-created wormholes and is basically unkillable, save for a huge explosion.

Remember Guile’s ending in SF2?
Bison: "Go ahead. Kill me quickly."
Yup, Guile could have broken Bison’s neck and he would have been dead.

This is the original M. Bison after he was beaten up by a single fighter in the tournament:

By SFA2, they had changed it to Agni, which is still early 1996/20 years ago.

O.k., then maybe they started the bullshit earlier than I thought.

I remember the curry eating story is claimed to be something devised by Capcom USA, and that Yoga and Agni had always been the Japanese explanations.

As far as I remember, it’s something from Complete File. Have a look at the relationships chart. If I remember correctly, Dhalsim’s connection to Bison is that Bison controls the world market price of curry.

The difference is that in SF1, everyone’s magical powers were the direct result of martial arts training.

Yeah, that’s a topic that I don’t have that much of a problem with: What does and what doesn’t constitute as a martial artist.

I don’t mind that Dhalsim, Blanka and Bison use stuff that aren’t based on martial arts/aquired through training.
That’s why it is a street fight: You can use whatever you want.

In the real world, you could have a person who specializes in throwing sand in your eyes, then beat you up. That’s stuff that can happen in real life.

So, fighters using non-martial arts techniques isn’t my problem since it doesn’t say anything about the universe that we get presented.

My problem is that the later stories present a vastly different world than what we get presented in the beginning.
SF1 establishes that fireballs and teleportation exist. So, electricity attacks, spitting fire and Psycho Power in SF2 are still within the universe’s rule of SF1.

So, the world presented in SF1 is: Our normal world plus some exaggerated special abilities.
The world in SF2 is pretty much the same, with Blanka being a slightly more exaggerated character: Spending too much time in the jungle can make your skin turn green etc.

SFA1 and SFA2 weren’t too bad either.
I don’t mind that Rose doesn’t have a conventional fighting style. That’s just how real life works: Just because Mike Tyson mostly fights other boxers doesn’t mean that he couldn’t encounter some moron who threatens him with a smoke bomb somewhere in an alley.
Nobody thinks that every person in the “Street Fighter” universe is a fighter, so a non-martial artist like Rose joining the cast might be a bad story decision, but it still doesn’t change the internal logic of how the universe works. Rose is someone who could exist in the world of SF1.

But then come along SFA3 and SF3: Now they tell you: Hey, our world isn’t just the real world + special moves. Instead, we’re right in a crazy Marvel-like comic book universe where clones and robots exist as well and where souls, gods and the afterlife are objectively-proven things.

This breaks the way the universe is shown.
That’s what I don’t like. If a universe is presented as relatively grounded, then they shouldn’t go too much overboard in the later sequels.

In the same way, I don’t like the idea of a more realistic “Mortal Kombat”. Reptile being a guy in a crime gang, Shang Tsung being part of the Chinese mafia etc. That’s totally uninteresting for me.

“Mortal Kombat” is the epic battle between realms, with gods and spectres and different dimensions.

“Street Fighter” should be fighters with flashy special attacks, but otherwise rooted in reality, with a Bond-style villain.
But I don’t care that the universe includes a character who challenges the martial artists despite not being a proper matial artist herself. Something like that can happen in real life.

[bakfromon]

That’s why imo even though Sim may give praise to his god Agni for the gift of flame, it was ultimately his strict devotions and through Yoga which established this “connection”, and it’s his skill alone which produces it. He doesn’t just say “Yoga Fire” and then Agni fills his body full of fire for him to blow out.

You know, I would say true, yes, because the fire is already “inside” Dhalsim. it’s like in Marvel comics, you make a pact with one of the gods/magic principalities and then you already have access to their power. It’s why Dr. Strange can perform bands of cyttorak (his Lvl. 3 super in UMVC3) and you don’t see Cyttorak appearing every time. It would be silly. So I think that’s a possibility, too.

This is why I had said originally it can be viewed both ways, given the difference between Agni and Cyttorak is a physical presence. So far no actual deity has made themselves apparent in the series and until that happens it should just be assumed that any one speaking about a deity has a personal belief. Akuma doesn’t draw his power from a kishin to become Oni, it’s just Akuma so twisted and corrupt by his own malignant energy that it distorts his body and mind beyond what is deemed human.

[DarthEnder]

I will say this, I didn’t have a problem with Bison at the time. But that’s because I didn’t find out that he wasn’t a martial artist until years later.

I always though I just didn’t know what his martial art was or(erroneously thanks to EGM) that it was Lerdrit. It wasn’t until much later that I found out he’s just psychic and his fighting style revolves entirely around his psychokinetic abilities.

Whereas I was always annoyed that Blanka was some kind of monster, and that Dhalsim’s fighting style was Yoga, which is essentially a pacifistic belief system, so making it a fighting style is actually kind of insulting. And that on top of that he’s basically a weird wizard skeleton.

[bakfromon]

I remember the curry eating story is claimed to be something devised by Capcom USA, and that Yoga and Agni had always been the Japanese explanations.

As far as I remember, it’s something from Complete File. Have a look at the relationships chart. If I remember correctly, Dhalsim’s connection to Bison is that Bison controls the world market price of curry.

@DRW
No, the relation chart just mentions that Dhalsim see’s M. Bison as the bad guy. Nothing more and nothing less. I’ve yet to go over his profile so maybe it mentions something there.

Dhalsim’s fighting style was Yoga, which is essentially a pacifistic belief system,so making it a fighting style is actually kind of insulting. And that on top of that he’s basically a weird wizard skeleton.

Now you understand why Dhalsim despises conflict, it insults his very nature. Also even though Yoga may be pacifist in nature it does have a lot in common with martial arts and many aspects parallel. Being that they both relate to the body and have a focus on balance through application of form.

[DarthEnder]

Now you understand why Dhalsim despises conflict, it insults his very nature.

And yet, that doesn’t stop him from showing up to fighting tournaments over and over again.

That’s why he’s a stupid character.

[Hawkingbird]

Lore-wise I found Dhalsim to be a useless character. Pre-SF4 the only plot relevance he had was undoing Cammy’s brainwashing and had no connection to other characters.

[PVL_93_RU]

Speaking of the whole “Street Fighter is about Martial Arts” argument - it almost feels like it’s a trend for Japanese media to deter from the original theme to include supernatural elements into it. For example:

Street Fighter - in the original game, you had just several guys who were very strong fighters, though a couple could throw fireballs because they knew to manipulate their Ki well enough to produce such projectiles thanks to years of training
Street Fighter II - there’s a electricity-using mutant, a fire-breathing teleportating Yoga master, and a mysterious evil Dictator with inhuman Psycho Power
Then it went into having more Psychics (Rose), Clones (Seth) and Fire/Ice manipulating 90% naked Men (Gill)

Metal Gear - in the original game, you had a supersoldier who was tasked with infiltrating a terrorist base to destroy their superweapon, with some typical story twists such as betrayal and lost friendship.
Metal Gear II played the same card
Then starting with Metal Gear Solid it went crazy with Robots, Genes and genetics, fucking vampires and all kinds of weird shit like The Sorrow from MGS3

Dragon Ball - started out as a lighthearted adventure series in which the heroes were faced with various villains, culminating in the ultimate battle of Goku against King Piccolo at the end of the series
Then with Dragon Ball Z, it went into having aliens, cyborgs, insane power levels that can’t even be properly calculated because they go into levels of 10000000000000 and such, and the series generally went batshit insane pretty much right duing the Frieza saga

You know, just a few examples

[Caio_Lins]

http://i.imgur.com/Zofi47S.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/VPu4GFk.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/QLGjGJA.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/c5Hzj96.jpg

Finally ended

(I will make alt costumes/artworks too, but are not priorities)

[Hawkingbird]

Speaking of the whole “Street Fighter is about Martial Arts” argument - it almost feels like it’s a trend for Japanese media to deter from the original theme to include supernatural elements into it. For example:

Street Fighter - in the original game, you had just several guys who were very strong fighters, though a couple could throw fireballs because they knew to manipulate their Ki well enough to produce such projectiles thanks to years of training
Street Fighter II - there’s a electricity-using mutant, a fire-breathing teleportating Yoga master, and a mysterious evil Dictator with inhuman Psycho Power
Then it went into having more Psychics (Rose), Clones (Seth) and Fire/Ice manipulating 90% naked Men (Gill)

Metal Gear - in the original game, you had a supersoldier who was tasked with infiltrating a terrorist base to destroy their superweapon, with some typical story twists such as betrayal and lost friendship.
Metal Gear II played the same card
Then starting with Metal Gear Solid it went crazy with Robots, Genes and genetics, fucking vampires and all kinds of weird shit like The Sorrow from MGS3

Dragon Ball - started out as a lighthearted adventure series in which the heroes were faced with various villains, culminating in the ultimate battle of Goku against King Piccolo at the end of the series
Then with Dragon Ball Z, it went into having aliens, cyborgs, insane power levels that can’t even be properly calculated because they go into levels of 10000000000000 and such, and the series generally went batshit insane pretty much right duing the Frieza saga

You know, just a few examples

Both your Metal Gear and Dragonball examples are wrong.

Metal Gear Solid took all it’s story beats from Metal Gear 2. The details changed but everything in Solid was also in Metal Gear 2.

Dragonball has animal people, androids, dinosaurs and mystical stuff such as the flying numbus. All DBZ do was add a heavier sci-fi element.

[bakfromon]

Now you understand why Dhalsim despises conflict, it insults his very nature.

And yet, that doesn’t stop him from showing up to fighting tournaments over and over again.

That’s why he’s a stupid character.

How else is a broke guy with stretch arms supposed to make quick money to support his teenage wife and son if not Street Fighting? His teaching out of charity won’t put the curry on the table.

[PVL_93_RU]

Now you understand why Dhalsim despises conflict, it insults his very nature.

And yet, that doesn’t stop him from showing up to fighting tournaments over and over again.

That’s why he’s a stupid character.

How else is a broke guy with stretch arms supposed to make quick money to support his teenage wife and son if not Street Fighting? His teaching out of charity won’t put the curry on the table.

Implying Street Fighter tournaments have money rewards in the first place

[DarthEnder]

Speaking of the whole “Street Fighter is about Martial Arts” argument

Look, I’m not actually making that argument.

I’m fully aware that Street Fighter isn’t, and hasn’t been for a long time, about just Martial Arts.

My argument is that it SHOULD be about just Martial Arts. And that the parts that aren’t, are the parts that suck.

[YagamiFire]

Yeah Metal Gear Solid II already had crazy (awesome) shit in it including enhanced ninjas and cyborgs.

I like the sci-fi and weirdness in Street Fighter…though I think it’s done better in King of Fighters where it’s much more developed and feels like a genuine part of the world. The amount of games to develop it (the NESTs saga for example) is a big help for that…but KOF just always seems to deal with scale better than SF which constantly gets bogged down and TOTALLY wastes characters. Oddly enough, KOF has a cast like…twice the size of SF but SF seems to somehow manage to waste twice as many character stories on useless nonsense.