No, this isn’t about actual real life tournament rules, but rather the rules of the fictional martial arts tournaments within fighting games. Sparked by remembering the fierce arguments me and my friends had about whether Yoshimitsu was cheating or not by using a sword (oddly enough, we never argued about Jack, Kuma or Alex) when we were kids.
So, what are the rules for the various tournaments? I mean, the King of the Iron Fist allows cyborgs that apparently can take tank rounds to the chest and be fine. The World Warrior tournament allows Rolento to just bring goddamn hand grenades and Ibuki to throw kunai at people. Could I just bring an assault rifle to take out Honda? Speaking of which, am I allowed to kill people? Because a lot of stuff seems like it would be pretty fatal, like Ibuki straight up snapping your neck. Not to mention how many participants seem to be wanted for pretty serious crimes.
Rugal clearly gives no fucks and dips dudes in molten metal, but there still has to be some kind of process in order to enter since everyone adheres to the team format rules and Japan had a selection tournament for their team. So show your lore knowledge, or just speculate on what the rules for various tournaments might be. Because seriously, they have to be pretty fucked up.