98 Fun Facts About Street Fighter

The deluxe cabinet of the first Street Fighter replaced buttons with what?

Two pneumatic pressure pads, one for punch and one for kick, read how hard players hit them; players hurt themselves and broke the machines, so a six-button version was made instead.

Under what title was the original Street Fighter ported to the TurboGrafx-CD by Hudson Soft?

Fighting Street reached the PC Engine's CD-ROM add-on in 1988; with no six-button pad available, the strength of each attack depended on how long the button was held.

Who is the sole boss fight of the original Street Fighter?

Sagat, the eyepatched Muay Thai champion, waits at the end of the world tour as the final opponent; his chest scar, dealt by a Shoryuken, appears from Street Fighter II onward.

Ryu's creator Takashi Nishiyama drew inspiration from which real martial artist?

Mas Oyama, the Korean-born founder of full-contact Kyokushin karate, had his life retold in the manga and anime Karate Master; Nishiyama was a fan and based Ryu on its hero.

Ken first got the surname Masters on Hasbro's Street Fighter toys, reputedly to avoid a trademark clash with which toy maker?

Mattel's Ken doll, Barbie's boyfriend, is the usual explanation, though Capcom has never confirmed it; the toy name stuck, and the games later adopted Ken Masters as canon.

Which Street Fighter II fighter's home stage features a row of elephants?

Dhalsim's stage is a hall in India lined with elephants; the yoga master is a pacifist who enters the tournament only to raise money for his poor village.

How many playable characters did the original Street Fighter II: The World Warrior have?

Eight fighters were selectable, each with a home country and stage; the four CPU-only Grand Masters became playable in 1992's Champion Edition, which also added mirror matches.

Which fighting-game staple did Street Fighter II introduce by accident, after a quirk turned up during a bug check?

Combos began as a timing quirk that Noritaka Funamizu noticed while bug-checking the car-smashing bonus stage; the team left it in, and chaining hits became a standard feature of the genre.

Which game overtook the SNES port of Street Fighter II in 2013 as Capcom's best-selling single title?

Resident Evil 5, which pushed the horror series further into action with two-player co-op, ended the run in 2013: until then a 1992 cartridge had been Capcom's best-selling single game.

The boxer among Street Fighter II's four bosses was designed as a pastiche of whom?

Mike Tyson was the model: in Japan the boxer is called M. Bison, a nod so close that Capcom renamed him abroad for fear of legal trouble.

In Japan's Street Fighter II, the masked Spanish fighter known abroad as Vega goes by what name?

Balrog is the Spanish fighter's name in Japan, where the dictator is the one called Vega; Capcom rotated three boss names for the overseas release to steer clear of legal trouble.

What was the original Japanese name of Guile's fallen friend, renamed Charlie for the West?

Nash was the Japanese name; Western localisation called him Charlie from Guile's Street Fighter II ending onward, he became playable in Street Fighter Alpha, and Street Fighter V restored the Nash name.

Chun-Li works for which organisation?

Interpol is her employer: Chun-Li is an investigator pursuing Shadaloo over her father's death; her name means "beautiful spring".

Which country does the kickboxing musician Dee Jay come from?

Jamaica is Dee Jay's home; the musician-kickboxer was designed by Capcom USA's James Goddard, a rarity for a series whose cast was otherwise created in Japan.

Guile's hairstyle is based on characters from which manga?

JoJo's Bizarre Adventure characters Rudol von Stroheim and Jean-Pierre Polnareff supplied the flat-top, and Guile's name nods to another character in the same manga.

In his Street Fighter II ending, Blanka is recognised by which long-lost relative, who calls him Jimmy?

Mother: she knows him by the anklet she gave him for a birthday, and tells how her son Jimmy was lost as a little boy in a plane crash over Brazil.

Which country does T. Hawk represent in Super Street Fighter II?

Mexico is T. Hawk's homeland: the towering Thunderfoot warrior fights to reclaim his people's land from Shadaloo.

Which Street Fighter character is a Hong Kong action-film star modelled on Bruce Lee?

Fei Long joined in Super Street Fighter II as a movie star who wants to test his martial arts against real opponents rather than stuntmen.

Besides being a sumo wrestler, what business does E. Honda run?

A public bathhouse, the sento that doubles as his stage, is E. Honda's business; he left Japan for the tournament to prove that sumo wrestlers rank among the greatest fighters in the world.

What is the evil energy that M. Bison wields in the Street Fighter series called?

Psycho Power feeds on fear and despair: in Street Fighter V, Shadaloo launches its Black Moon satellites to spread both and make Bison invincible.

Which magazine's 1992 April Fools' article launched the Sheng Long hoax?

Electronic Gaming Monthly ran the hoax in its April 1992 issue, building on Ryu's mistranslated win quote "You must defeat Sheng Long to stand a chance"; publications worldwide reprinted it as fact.

Which secret character, linked to the Sheng Long hoax, debuted in Super Street Fighter II Turbo?

Akuma, known as Gouki in Japan, was designed to reward fans who had been fooled by the hoax; he debuted in 1994 as Super Turbo's hidden boss, an alternative to M. Bison.

Cammy debuted in which 1993 release?

Super Street Fighter II: The New Challengers added Cammy as one of four newcomers in 1993; Noritaka Funamizu felt the game needed a second female character besides Chun-Li.

Street Fighter Alpha (1995) serves as what in the series timeline?

A prequel to II: it shows the cast younger and introduces Dan, Capcom's send-up of SNK's rival series Art of Fighting.

Street Fighter III (1997) initially discarded every previous character except which two?

Ryu and Ken were the only holdovers, hence the subtitle New Generation; newcomer Alex led the roster and Gill took over from M. Bison as the final boss.

Which defensive mechanic was Street Fighter III's headline addition?

Parrying, called Blocking in Japan, replaced the air guard of the Alpha games: tap toward an attack at the moment of impact and it is deflected without damage.

Which player parried all 15 hits of Justin Wong's Chun-Li Super Art in Evo Moment #37?

Daigo Umehara, playing Ken with a sliver of health left, parried every hit and won the match, yet went on to lose the Evo 2004 Grand Final to Kenji "KO" Obata.

Street Fighter IV's Focus Attack is performed by pressing which two buttons together?

Medium punch and medium kick together trigger the Focus Attack, called the Saving Attack in Japan; it absorbs one hit and, if held long enough, crumples the opponent.

Which fan-requested character, born of the Sheng Long legend, is a secret boss in Street Fighter IV?

Gouken, the master who trained the series' two original heroes, was finally made real after years of Sheng Long rumours; he appears as a hidden boss after beating Seth under special conditions, then became playable.

What was Street Fighter V's free cinematic story expansion, released in mid-2016, called?

A Shadow Falls arrived as a free cinematic story update in mid-2016, months after launch; it pits the cast against Shadaloo's Black Moons satellites and ends with Bison's defeat.

Street Fighter 6's main new mechanic is called what?

The Drive Gauge powers Drive Impacts, Parries and Rushes; empty it and your fighter enters Burnout, taking chip damage on block. The game also added live tournament-style commentary.

Street Fighter 6's simplified four-button control scheme is called what?

Modern maps specials to a single button plus a direction and trims the layout to four attack buttons; Classic keeps six buttons, while the offline-only Dynamic scheme picks moves automatically.

Which fighter, rather than series lead Ryu, appears on the cover of Street Fighter 6?

Luke, the young American brawler introduced as Street Fighter V's last DLC fighter, fronts the cover; the game shipped worldwide on June 2, 2023, with a Japanese arcade version following that December.

Which actor played M. Bison in the 1994 Street Fighter film, his final theatrical role?

Raul Julia, already ill with cancer, took the role because his children loved the game; he died in October 1994, two months before release, and the film is dedicated to him.

Which pop star played Cammy in the 1994 Street Fighter movie?

Kylie Minogue was cast as Cammy after an Australian actors' guild pressed director Steven de Souza to hire a local performer; Cammy was the only part still open.

Jean-Claude Van Damme played which character in the 1994 Street Fighter film?

Colonel Guile, leading Allied Nations forces against Bison's Shadaloo City, was Jean-Claude Van Damme's role; the film recasts the two young heroes as con-men recruited to infiltrate the city.

Street Fighter II: The Animated Movie (1994) opens with which fight?

Ryu vs Sagat opens the film, with Ryu scarring Sagat's chest with a Shoryuken; the same studio, Group TAC, later made the looser TV series Street Fighter II V.

Who composed most of the soundtrack of Street Fighter II: The World Warrior?

Yoko Shimomura wrote most of Street Fighter II's stage themes before leaving Capcom for Square in 1993, where she went on to score Kingdom Hearts.

Street Fighter II ran on which arcade system board?

CP System, Capcom's 1988 arcade board, let each fighter take up a different amount of memory, which the developers credit for the quality of Street Fighter II's animation.

Which Capcom beat-'em-up, made by Street Fighter II designers Okamoto and Yasuda, was first titled Street Fighter '89?

Final Fight began as a Street Fighter sequel; Capcom renamed it after arcade operators said it was nothing like the original, and its success in the US made fighting games a company priority.

Roughly how many arcade cabinets of Street Fighter II were sold worldwide?

200,000 arcade cabinets is the usual worldwide estimate, making it one of the best-selling arcade games ever; across all versions the game is estimated to have grossed about $10 billion, mostly from arcades.

Which Street Fighter II fighter can shock opponents by electrifying his whole body?

Blanka gained his electricity, like his green skin, after a childhood plane crash left him to grow up in the Brazilian jungle.

Which Chun-Li move did the Street Fighter EX team restore in place of her fireball?

Spinning Bird Kick came back because the EX developers felt the fireball she had gained in Street Fighter II Turbo had pulled her too far from her original agile style.

In Street Fighter II, M. Bison's Shadaloo base is a temple in which country?

Thailand hosts Bison's Street Fighter II stage, a temple at his Shadaloo base, though the dictator's own nationality has never been revealed.

Street Fighter II Turbo: Hyper Fighting was Capcom's answer to what?

Unauthorised 'Rainbow Edition' cabinet hacks, bootleg Champion Edition boards with mid-air fireballs and instant character switches, spread through arcades in 1992; Hyper Fighting's faster official speed was Capcom's answer.

Street Fighter II was the first game released on an SNES cartridge of what size?

16 megabits made it the first Super NES cartridge of that size, yet parts of the arcade game still had to be altered or simplified to fit.

Which publisher released the flawed European Amiga, ST and Spectrum ports of Street Fighter II?

U.S. Gold published the Amiga, Atari ST, Commodore 64 and Spectrum ports; those machines' one- or two-button joysticks meant the six-button controls were lost.

Which two-button handheld got a 1995 port of Street Fighter II in which holding a button longer gave a stronger attack?

Game Boy owners got the port in 1995 with graphics based on Super Street Fighter II, but with three of the fighters missing.

Street Fighter II out-grossed every film of 1993, including which one, the year's box-office champion?

Jurassic Park ruled cinemas, yet Capcom's brawler was the highest-grossing entertainment product of the year, taking in about one and a half billion dollars.

Which martial arts star briefly became Chun-Li in a Street Fighter II parody scene of the 1993 comedy City Hunter?

Jackie Chan's character is thrown into an arcade machine, hallucinates the game around him and wins the brawl as Chun-Li after first failing as E. Honda.

After heavy cuts reportedly left 1994's Street Fighter film with a G rating, what was added to reach PG-13?

A swear word went in during post-production, the director says, after the cuts Capcom ordered to shed the first edit's R rating went too far.

Which actress, later the voice of Disney's Mulan, played Chun-Li in the 1994 Street Fighter film?

Ming-Na Wen had just broken through in The Joy Luck Club when she took the part, and she went on to long runs in ER and Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.

Which film seats Street Fighter's Zangief and M. Bison at a support group for video game villains?

Wreck-It Ralph puts the pair in the Bad-Anon meeting beside Bowser and Doctor Eggman, while Chun-Li, Cammy and Blanka turn up around Game Central Station.

Besides wooden barrels and oil drums, what do Street Fighter II's bonus stages ask the player to destroy for points?

A parked car is the first target, demolished bare-handed. Street Fighter IV left such rounds out of arcades, because a player who cannot lose earns the operator nothing.

Street Fighter's Fei Long, a Hong Kong film star who tests himself in real fights, is modelled on which actor?

Bruce Lee was the template for Fei Long, who arrived in a 1993 update of Street Fighter II as one of four new characters.

Street Fighter opened third at the US box office in December 1994, behind The Santa Clause and which Jim Carrey comedy?

Dumb and Dumber and Tim Allen's festive comedy both out-earned the Capcom adaptation, which took about $9.5 million over that Christmas weekend.

Capcom, the Japanese publisher of Street Fighter, takes its company name from which two-word phrase?

Capsule Computers was the firm's own term for its early arcade machines, and it likened its games to a capsule packed to the brim with fun and sealed against copying.

Street Fighter's cast first met which Marvel superhero team in a 1996 Capcom crossover built on tag-team battles?

The X-Men shared the bill in Capcom's third Marvel fighting game, whose two-character teams that swap mid-fight launched the long-running Marvel vs. Capcom series.

The 1994 Street Fighter film is set in fictional Shadaloo, but in which country was most of it shot?

Australia hosted most of the shoot, in Queensland around the Gold Coast, after three weeks of location filming in Southeast Asia.

In the 1994 Street Fighter film, Chun-Li travels with a sumo wrestler and a boxer while doing which job?

News reporter Chun-Li Zang has a private motive in the film: the villain killed her father twenty years earlier, and her two-man crew want revenge of their own.

The soundtrack album released with the 1994 Street Fighter film was filled mostly with which genre of music?

Hip-hop acts including Ice Cube, Nas and MC Hammer filled the Priority Records album, which peaked at No. 135 on the Billboard 200.

Which Smallville star played the title role in the 2009 film Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li?

Kristin Kreuk, Lana Lang on television, led a story set before the first game; released by 20th Century Fox, it was a critical and commercial failure.

Where did the 2014 live-action series Street Fighter: Assassin's Fist make its debut, before reaching TV and film?

YouTube carried it on Machinima's channel in May 2014, four years after its makers posted a short there as a proof of concept and won Capcom's blessing.

Which Namco fighting series shared the bill with Street Fighter in a 2012 Capcom crossover of two-fighter teams?

Tekken's cast was reworked for Capcom's 2D style of play, while the reply Namco promised in its own 3D style was never released.

Capcom marked Street Fighter's 25th anniversary with a free PC platform game starring which of its other heroes?

Mega Man, also turning 25, fights the World Warriors as bosses and takes their techniques; it began as a fan project that Capcom chose to release itself.

Street Fighter 6 runs on a Capcom game engine first built for a 2017 entry in which horror series?

Resident Evil 7 was the game the RE Engine was created for, and it has since powered Devil May Cry 5, Monster Hunter Rise and Capcom's flagship fighter.

Which joystick motion, followed by a punch button, throws the Hadouken fireball in Street Fighter II?

Quarter-circle forward means rolling the stick from down to towards the opponent in one smooth motion, an input so familiar that Kirby games borrowed it for a blast attack.

The Japanese name of Ryu's leaping Street Fighter uppercut, the Shoryuken, likens the punch to which rising creature?

A dragon: the name's three characters read 'rising dragon fist', which is why English-speaking players have long called the move the Dragon Punch.

Which Street Fighter Alpha 2 newcomer is a Japanese schoolgirl who idolises Ryu and wants him to train her?

Sakura took up street fighting after watching her hero win the first World Warrior tournament, and her sailor-style school uniform became her signature look.

Ultra Street Fighter II: The Final Challengers arrived in 2017 as an exclusive for which console?

Switch owners could play Capcom's update either in the original pixel art or in a redrawn high-definition style.

In which Japanese city is Capcom, the company behind Street Fighter, headquartered?

Osaka's Chūō ward houses both the head office and the research building of the company that Kenzo Tsujimoto established in 1983.

Street Fighter 6 hired esports voices such as Vicious and TastySteve for which series-first feature?

Real-time commentary has a cast of casters calling the action as it happens in English or Japanese, and a colour commentator can be added to cheer the player along.

Street Fighter II: Champion Edition was the first in the series to let two players do what?

Pick the same character and the game dresses the second copy in an alternate colour scheme, such as a red dress for Chun-Li, so the two can be told apart.

Which struggling Hasbro toy line was reworked to sell action figures of 1994's Street Fighter film?

G.I. Joe was not selling, the director recalled, so Hasbro thinly disguised it as movie merchandise, and the hero's tank was modelled on one of its vehicles.

Which Street Fighter 6 mode sends a player-made avatar through 3D city streets in a single-player story?

World Tour sends that avatar exploring with action-adventure play, and the skills it learns there carry over to avatar battles in the online lobby.

Street Fighter III first reached home consoles in 1999, as the Double Impact compilation for which machine?

Dreamcast owners got New Generation and its update 2nd Impact in one package, both first made for Capcom's CD-ROM-based arcade hardware.

Which screenwriter of Die Hard and Commando both wrote and directed the 1994 Street Fighter film?

Steven E. de Souza says he wrote the first draft overnight, on hearing that Capcom executives were in Los Angeles, having met the games through his son.

Playing M. Bison in 1994's Street Fighter earned its late star a posthumous nomination for which prize?

A Saturn Award for Best Supporting Actor went instead to Forrest Gump's Gary Sinise, and the film itself lost Best Science Fiction Film to Stargate.

Like Mortal Kombat, the 1995 arcade game Street Fighter: The Movie built its fighters from what?

Digitized film actors supplied 600 to 800 frames per fighter, although the villain was captured from the actor's stunt double rather than from the star himself.

In the 1994 Street Fighter film, how large a ransom does M. Bison demand for his captured relief workers?

$20 billion is his price for 63 hostages, payable within three days; the Allied Nations commander refuses and vows to put him on trial instead.

The American Street Fighter cartoon that began in 1995, borrowing plot points from the film, aired on which channel?

USA Network ran all 26 episodes across two seasons, as part of its Cartoon Express and Action Extreme Team line-ups.

The 1995 anime series Street Fighter II V recasts Ryu and Ken at which stage of their lives?

As teenagers of 17, the best friends set off on a journey to improve their skills after suffering a brutal defeat, in a story only loosely based on the games.

Dan Hibiki, Street Fighter's pink-clad joke character, was created to parody the heroes of which rival company?

SNK's Art of Fighting had a lead who resembled Ryu in an orange outfit, so Capcom answered with a feeble fighter in a similar one who can taunt without limit.

What did Street Fighter IV call its new cinematic attacks, fuelled by a meter that fills as a fighter takes damage?

Ultra Combo moves draw on the Revenge Meter, so a fighter who is losing badly earns the chance of a long, cinematic comeback sequence.

The famous 'Evo Moment #37' comeback of 2004 took place in a match of which Street Fighter game?

3rd Strike was the game in which Daigo Umehara, one hit from defeat, turned the match on Justin Wong, a clip often called the most iconic moment in competitive gaming.

The director of the original Street Fighter built it around the boss battles of which earlier game of his?

Kung-Fu Master, the 1984 brawler he made at Irem, has a number of boss fights, and he wondered about a game centred on nothing but such duels.

The Hadouken, Street Fighter's signature fireball, was inspired by the Wave Motion Gun of which 1970s anime?

Space Battleship Yamato calls its great energy weapon the Hadouho; designer Takashi Nishiyama kept the 'wave motion' half of the name and swapped the gun for a fist.

Which Street Fighter III boss, his body half red and half blue, leads a secret society that wants a utopia?

Gill presides over the Illuminati, wields both fire and ice, and can resurrect himself after a knockout, a trick that led one critic to call him the godfather of infuriating final bosses.

Capcom made which American grappler from New York the lead character of Street Fighter III, ahead of Ryu?

Alex was chosen because the team felt martial arts were more popular in America at the time, and early drafts made him a policeman who used to wrestle.

What nickname do Western fans use for Daigo Umehara, often called the greatest Street Fighter player?

The Beast is his name in the West, while fans at home in Japan know him simply as Umehara or Ume.

Which Capcom producer, a former composer, revived the series with Street Fighter IV in 2008?

Yoshinori Ono joined Capcom in 1993 and stayed in charge of the series through Street Fighter V, before leaving the company in the summer of 2020.

Which Canadian studio launched a Street Fighter comic in 2003 and later redrew the game art for HD Remix?

Udon Entertainment, named after the Japanese noodle, made the comic its first release and went on to draw the high-definition artwork for the 2008 remake.

Which studio, founded by a co-creator of Street Fighter II, developed the 3D spin-off Street Fighter EX?

Arika is founder Akira Nishitani's first name spelled backwards, and its 1996 arcade game was the first in the series to use polygon graphics.

The fights in Street Fighter II: The Animated Movie were choreographed by the founder of which Japanese promotion?

K-1 founder Kazuyoshi Ishii planned the bouts together with the professional fighter Andy Hug.

Which martial arts champion nicknamed 'The Jet' trained the cast of 1994's Street Fighter and appears briefly on screen?

Benny Urquidez often had only hours to drill each actor, because the shooting schedule was reshuffled around the failing health of the man playing the villain.

Which American studio, best known for Golden Tee Golf, developed the 1995 arcade game Street Fighter: The Movie?

Incredible Technologies was contracted by Capcom because it had already made fighting games of its own, though critics widely panned the result.

Which Seattle grunge band joins Korn and Silverchair on the English dub of Street Fighter II: The Animated Movie?

Alice in Chains and other Western rock acts replaced the original Japanese soundtrack in the English-language versions.

A hero design scrapped from the original Street Fighter was reused by its creator for which Fatal Fury star?

Terry Bogard debuted in 1991 after designer Takashi Nishiyama had changed employers, and decades later he crossed back as a guest in Street Fighter 6.