Well, the mighty AAC lists Mike as a different character. However, there is some reference to M.Bison there. I’ll translate it later.
Yea, I heard that AAC listed him as a different character, so I asked around, and got that explanation about how they were supposed to be the same character but Capcom of Japan officially denied it publically to avoid the lawsuit, even though even Capcom within itself considered him the same character… or at least wanted to… or something like that. Exactly who I was talking to, who I heard it from, even the more exact specifics (as you can see) etc, at the time, er… I don’t remember exactly. This was researched by me when the plot guide was in the making (I forget whether or not it was brought up in the storyline thread, though, but it was in the plot guide when it first came out), so it was a very very long time ago. I recall it was a reliable source/person but that was such a long time ago that I dunno how much my memory can be trusted.
Here is Chris’ text about it:
“> It’s said Mike is Balrog, based on the fact that Balrog is called M. Bison in
> Japan, and the M. is short for “Mike”, so people say Mike is Balrog; However,
> there is very little similarity between Mike’s style ( all normals ) and
> Balrog’s ( Rushing Punches ), plus they look different in their portraits and
> the Capcom sketches, so they could also easily be different. Also, Capcom, in a
> 1996 survey, offered both Balrog and Mike as possible character choices in a
> future Street Fighter game, and if both were the same, it would make no sense to
> do this. Were people to vote for both, they’d be extremely disappointed to see
> only one of them included.”
And in another quote:
“That’s exactly why CAPCOM USA switched the SFII Boss names – the Mike
Bison parody of Mike Tyson is fine in Japan, but bring it over to
American arcades, and it’s just a little to close to lawsuit material.
Now granted, it would have been simpler to switch M. Bison’s name with
just one of the other Bosses (rather than involve 3 names in the
switch), but I suspect that CAPCOM USA wanted to give the Spanish Ninja
the “Vega” apellation since “Vega” is a Spanish surname. Switching the
way the game displayed 3 character names was still a simpler bit of
programming than reprogramming each occurrence of “M. Bison” to read as
a completely original name (like simply “Mike,” for example – another
reason not to change M. Bison’s name to just “Mike:” the Street Fighter
Series already had a character named “Mike” – the boxer from the
original Street Fighter; and, in spite of what a number of erroneous
websites will tell you, M. Bison and Mike are not the same person –
they are two totally separate characters).”
He also lists AAC as supporting this, but sadly fails to include the page numbers.
In any case, if Capcom Japan says so in AAC, we must take that as a fact. Otherwise we could just as well start disputing the Poison or Zangief facts. There is always room for speculation, of course, but to keep it simple on Fighter Mania I’ll just state what CJ says. We’ll leave the rambling to your FAQ ^_^.
Dammit, this is starting to sound like a religious debate. Preach the AAC, brothers! 
The text that has the “>”'s for each line are not Chris’s own words and are from the message he was replying to. So the words about Mike and Balrog in the Street Fighter poll as two different characters are not Chris’s words but someone else’s. Not that that means much (since Chris agrees that Mike isn’t Balrog anyways then cites sources that give evidence), but just in case, I decided to point this out. I REALLY had to look out for that while sifting through a mailing list log a long time ago and figuring out which words were by reliable people (mainly Saiki) and which were stated by people who weren’t as certain. Along the lines of anal word sifting and filtering, he doesn’t list AAC as giving evidence that Balrog is different from Mike but does list All About Street Fighter Zero 3. And… whoa, what would evidence be doing there? Now I’m really curious to see what AASFZ3 has to say about it since I’d have thought that whether or not Mike was Balrog would have probably (though not 100% certainly) been out of the scope of that book.
At any rate, I’m certain that Balrog and Mike were listed as separate characters in many different things… I’m just hoping to get clarification on if that explanation I had for it all these years was right or not. Yeesh, Capcom sure gets sloppy in these types of things…
By the way, I disagree with whoever stated that Balrog’s fighting style does not look like Mike’s (again, to clarify, it wasn’t Chris that stated that). Although Mike didn’t have any rushing punches, I think that was more an engine thing than anything. I mean, really, a rushing punch looks the same as a normal punch except there’s a quick move forward before the punch is thrown. So just because Mike doesn’t have a rushing punch isn’t enough to really warrant saying they have completely different fighting styles. The animation of Mike’s punches from what I could see while playing SF1 was that they were the exact same thing as Balrog’s for the most part. The fighting stance certainly is. And the attributes are the same, too (no kicks, EXTREME power. Mike KO’s you in very few hits, which is very similar to Balrog in SF2, I think). And I also disagree with that person that Balrog and Mike don’t look similar. Yea, Mike doesn’t look very similar to Balrog with his in-game face portrait (though neither does Ryu to Ryu or Adon to Adon or Gen to Gen, really…), but this SF1 art looks a HELL of a lot like Balrog, IMHO.
http://www.gamegen.com/fightgen/characters/2mike.jpg
I can disagree with those statements without disagreeing with an authority like Chris because to my knowledge, those statements weren’t Chris’s.
At any rate, to be on the safe side, I’ll just list Mike and Balrog as different characters with rambling disclaimers included. It’s similar to how Capcom of Japan last stated that Poison was a guy, but I believe they’ve changed her into a girl with Final Fight Revenge and just didn’t tell anyone in spelled out words (course, I also believe that was storyline-wise surgury instead of a retroactive change, but whatever), yet have no definitive proof, so I’m listing them as separate characters for the time being. Yeehaw.
Of course, if someone can give definitive proof, then I’d be happy to take it faster than a rabid vulture, as always 
I ordered AASFZ3 and AA Vampire Savior from Ebay yesterday. From Chris’ description:
“32-page “Story of ZERO 3” section, 26 pages of which is devoted to the Ending sequences of every Chara (complete Ending screenshot collection with all the original Japanese Ending text). The last 4 pages of this chapter provide a basic timeline for the Street Fighter Series, a listing of each Chara appearing in the Series and a synopsis of their goals and Endings in each game, and a chart of every Street Fighter Series Chara indicating all the games in which each has appeared”
Every character? That might be why…
I know that this thing on Balrog/Mike expired already, but, ill just state my opinion…
THEY ARE THE SAME GODDAMN FIGHTER…
His name is M Bison in every game in Japan that he has appeared in from SF1 all the way to CvS2
The US branch of Capcom didn’t want Tyson to come over and bite their ears off so they did a name swap.
Don’t let shitty graphics throw you off. Remember, Ryu from SF1 had a white headband and in SF2, he had a red headband…hmmmm…Ryu…has a brother?..NO NO NO…that guy HAD to be his master…!! :lol:…
Well, technically his name is only Mike in SF1.
Anyway, I totally agree with you, I’d rather just consider them the same character as well, but some people are just anal retentive about things and have to over scrutinize pointless details. No matter how well documented and accurate you make things, you know that some raving fanboy is going to try and one up you with his/her “incredible SF knowledge” (like that’s something to be proud of anyway). Tiamat’s just trying to cover his butt. I consider them to be one in the same, but even if they weren’t, would it really matter?
-Clay
Uhmm…
not to be rude or anything but have you considered that the books(ie AAC) have typo? or error?
I stated this before when the whole Hugo/Andore thing came up, but the thing about AAC is that it works on the names the characters are given in the games. For example, Shin Gouki is listed seperately from Gouki even though no one disputes that they are the same exact person. This probably goes for the Mikes as well. It’s not like SFI’s going to be re-released anytime soon so I’ll just go on thinking it’s the same person myself.
I was going through AAC in an effort to find other characters that are listed twice but are the same exact person (Wolverine with Adamantium and Wolverine with Bone Claws, Ryu and Satsui No Ryu, etc.) When I noticed something VERY INTERESTING.
I can’t read Japanese, but IN THE LAST LINE OF MIKE’S BIO THE NAME M.BISON APPEARS! I noticed this because the “M.” was written in English while the rest was in Japanese, which I of course checked with M.Bison’s Bio. What does this line read?
Does it clearly state that Mike is not M.Bison? Because if this is what Dash meant and he wasn’t just going by the fact that he’s listed seperately I’d have to agree. Of course, it can very well state that he is in fact M.Bison.
Can anyone who can read Japanese and has this book please translate this? If you need a scan of the pages, you can list your address here or contact me at -
- and I’ll get the images scanned and send them to you as soon as I can.
Quick question about one of my favorite characters here.
Does Sagat leave Shadowlaw after the Alpha series???
And if so, does he ever extract true revenge on Ryu??
I thought that the Alpha series was before the original sf series?
I just have one question though in Alpha 2 Sagat dies by Akuma’s hand. How is it that he lives in Alpha 3? It’s like the entire series has been screwed up in different patterns.
Sagat leaves Shadaloo during the Alpha series. And no, he does not exact revenge on Ryu because that desire died when he lost to Adon (unfocused) and when he first met Dan. He and Ryu are still rivals, but more like friends now who want to battle each other for the thrill of fighting.
No, it takes place after the first SF and before SF2.
I don’t want to be rude to you, but who the fuck you this?! :wtf:
First time I heard about Gouki killing Sagat myself. Do they even meet each other as Mid Bosses in SFA2? Can’t remember but I don’t think so. Anyway, it would be silly of Capcom to kill a character in a prequel series that shows up in SF2. Well, they did it with Vega(Dictator), but officially his body was reconstructed for SF2.
Perhaps your confused, or the source of your information is confused with Kairi killing Gouki in the unofficial SF EX series? Well, Kairi’s pretty scarred up too…
Yeah that’s my bad I read the ending scene to Adon’s in Alpha 2 Akuma kills his challenger before the fight and asks his disciple what he looks like and he gave him the discription of Akuma. And thats the entire reason of him wanting him to face Akuma in Alpha 3 because he wanted to prove himself to the world.
That’s alright. If the old Thread didn’t die, you could of read all the dumb Ass stuff I wrote when I started posting at SRK.
Playing SF3 Second Impact with Gill and got to fight Gouki. Usually before the Gouki match in the U.S. version, the dialog goes like this -
Your Character -
“Who are you?”
Gouki -
“I am power made flesh. Feel how truly weak you are!”
Just like the Alpha games. But with Gill the Dialog goes like this -
Gill -
“…”
Gouki -
“…”
- I wonder if this is in the Japanese version where the characters actually had seperate dialogs with Gouki. Well, at least I know Ken’s conversation with Gouki was different.
Or is this Capcom USA making Gouki mysterious once again removing his dialog. Well, the “…” conversation also happens with Q and Gouki in Third Strike, but that probably happens in the Japanese version as well since we know a lot more about Gouki than we do about Q.
Mostly just rambling. I suppose this whole post should be replaced with “…!”
Yeah we do don’t we they say Q started off way back in sf2, they say Q was in the background but I don’t remember I haven’t played that version of street fighter in years. And if it is Q can’t believe capcom would be able to start a character from back then. And finally put him in 3rd strike. If it was all apart of there plan I give them props!!
Don’t give Capcom so much credit. I wouldn’t really call that character in the background “Q”.
Anyhoo, Sagat and Ryu are both currently (after ST) training to have one match to settle the score. They’ve reconciled their past history.