Street Fighter III was going to be a completely original game. It would take the elements that worked between the original SF and SF II and make a new game out of them. This meant that only Ken and Ryu would be returning and a whole new cast of supporting characters would be introduced into the uniiverse. Those characters would all be facing a new boss as well. As I mentioned in the previous blog sometimes the designers try to create an archetype for a specific function in the universe rather than create many different characters and try to develop the best ones. The core concept of SF III was the "New Generation" which meant that many of the new fighters were going to be young. Designers had to think of a solid Archetype and then try to see how young they could make that character and still keep them viable fighters. The game pushed the elements of youth on many of the characters. It was not enough to present a young person, their design, canon and endings all had to highlight some level of immaturity and innocence. Elena, the capoeira Archetype was a young woman with many playful animations and mannerisms. Sean, the karate understudy was also young and presented as a bit immature.

The twins Yun and Yang represented the action sports or "extreme" generation. One was a skateboarder and the other an inline skater, two activities which were usually associated with adolescents.

The ideas for Chinese twins, kung-fu Archetypes to balance out Ken and Ryu had been in the works since Super Street Fighter II. Yun and Yang were a completion of that idea. The ideas of youth that complimented Ibuki was her inexperience with the dual role of school girl and ninja. Of her clan she was one of the youngest and prone to making mistakes as demonstrated by her ending cinemas. The original design actually presented the character as a boy. A young man might have been able to have a more convincing Ability than a young woman at the same age. However the ninjitsu Technique was about stealth, accuracy and speed. Hence a young woman serving as the ninja Archetype was a welcome change.

The character of Ibuki was actually made more interesting by changing her gender. In one way design choices for her Costume could be explored. As a girl she could wear long hair which would help the artists convey movement. She could also wear a more form fitting outfit which allowed animators to know where her arms and legs were during strikes. In another way great female designs were rare in the series and having a recognizable Archetype would help preserve the Timeless Design of Ibuki. The concept for a ninja boy was solid and was probably transferred onto the character of Yuta Homura, Ibuki's sparring partner.

Alex was the new hero of the game. He represented a different kind of Archetype, not quite large enough to be considered the super-heavyweight in the game (the Zangief) and yet larger than the heavyweights Ken and Ryu. His design demonstrated that the Archetype should not be limited to preconceived proportions, as body types came in different sizes. He was a hybrid fighter with qualities of a striker and wrestler and was physically more imposing than even the muscular Ken and Ryu. Although not the first MMA fighter in the series he was probably the youngest. The super-heavyweight for the game had to be even larger than normal because he was meant to counter a character bigger then the legendary karatekas. Even a massive character like Zangief would not have looked as imposing fighting Alex. This was why Capcom went through their legacy titles and brought back their largest fighter.

Hugo was a revised version of Andore from the Final Fight series. He was a character whose Costume spoke volumes about how massive he was. He was so big that his pants were actually sewn together from two separate pants. Notice the belt tied around his ankle? His shoes were cobbled together from two boots, with the seam running down the middle of his foot. The chain around his waist could be used to anchor a ship. The only character that came close to his scale was Titan the Great / Titanic Tim from Muscle Bomber / Saturday Night Slam Masters. However not as many people were as familiar with that wrestler, even if they had heard of his tag team partner...

But I digress.

Hugo was given an assortment of wrestling Moves that complimented his frame. A huge lumbering clothesline which mimicked the rush attacks he had in Final Fight as well as a slam move, the Moonsault Press which rivaled the brutal Spinning Piledriver. Given his size it was plainly obvious that he had the Ability to perform all of his power moves. He was very slow given his size, much slower than Alex or the karatekas. He did not have moves faster than the small and light characters like Ibuki, nor struck with the speed of Yun or Yang. There was not one action which stuck out as to break the Suspension of Disbelief. All of his attacks were about power rather than finesse. He maintained the Consistency of the large character Archetype. As great of a character as Hugo was, he was not originally going to be modeled after Andore. In fact he was supposed to keep with the theme of the New Generation. Hugo was going to be a massive teenager. A giant that was larger, stronger and younger than Alex.

The German was going to be unlike the other Archetypes because he would have simply been a mountain of muscle. His design would have lacked experience and techniques and supplemented them with power attacks. What these moves would have looked like we can only imagine.

Street Fighter III was not the first game in the series to pursue the idea of youth as an element of design. Street Fighter Zero was created around the premise of seeing most of the World Warriors before they had become full-grown adults. As such the designers at Capcom had to try and create a cast that had elements of youth in their design. For that they turned to possibly the most influential designer they had, CRMK aka Bengus. He pioneered a style that showed the most iconic characters just entering adulthood. To achieve these things he used exaggerated Proportion. The SF cast already had exaggerated proportions. The size difference between their muscles, hands, head and feet were disproportionate to real human body types. The reason for these things were twofold. One to make them more aesthetically pleasing to gamers. The animated SF characters had to be consistent with the muscular appearance of anime and manga fighters. But the other was more of a function decision. The larger hands and feet were easier to track when creating animation and the larger heads allowed for expressions to be shown on the faces. For Street Fighter Zero the use of Proportion was even more exaggerated. The muscles were angular, faces youthful and hands and feel more disproportionate on longer and lankier frames. Those awkward-looking fighters were supposed to recall memories of adolescence, like teenagers that had just experienced a growth spurt.

While Ken and Ryu weren't skateboarding or wearing inline skates they did appear much younger than before. Their faces were more rounded and their haircuts were different as well. Some of the returning World Warriors had a change applied to their Costume to help with the youthful cues. Chun-Li as a young agent did not have the body shape or frame to fill out the costume most gamers recognize her from. She needed a wardrobe change that maintained many familiar elements from her original Costume and yet had the stylings of modern youth. What elements can you pick out on the young Chun-Li design? Can you identify any cues inspired by Bruce Lee?

It was a challenge for designers to present the iconic characters without making them unrecognizable. It also served as an example for designers that want to create the next generation of SF character. How did the team at give the world younger versions of the SF II cast? What cues did they use? What changes in Proportion were exploited to make the characters appear younger? Did the use of large, bulbous muscles on characters like Zangief and Vega make them appear younger? What about the angles used on Gen and Rolento? Did the change from pseudo-realism to anime presentation for the in-game sprites make it easier for the gamer to accept the age changes? What about the visual changes to the Moves used by Ken and Ryu?

It was through the use of Revision that the team at Capcom was able to convince the gamer that these changes were acceptable. Potential character designers should be able to challenge themselves and their character designs and try to create a version of their character 5, 10 or 20 years older or younger while still maintaining the cues of their vision. In doing so an artist or designer might actually discover that their character works better when presented a little older or younger. It allows the designer to see not only what an alternate Color choice would be, but how potential alternate Costume would work as well. It also allows the luxury of knowing how the character will appear down the road and whether or not they can maintain Timeless Design as the series progresses.

There is an alarming trend in Japanese character design. Specifically with female fighting designs. The women are being presented much softer in body type with larger eyes and rounded faces. Elements that make them look younger than their stated age. It was something that I had spoken about regarding Capcom and SNK in my Growing Pains... blog and also explored more in my Compare and contrast blog. I would recommend reading those to become more familiar with the trend. The warning that I gave designers was to be able to create a strong character and to be prepared to age them as the canon allowed. Street Fighter IV fell too hard into the trap of pandering the character designs. Insisting that every fan-voted character had to be exactly the way the fans remembered them. Meaning that the World Warriors from SF II were mixed with characters from SF Zero / Alpha. Instead of getting young versions of Ken, Ryu and Chun-Li, Sakura was brought forward in time without having aged a day. The idea of a perpetual schoolgirl shoud concern any designer. The rest of the cast matured and grew in Ability while one was kept young and nubile, to serve what purpose exactly?

Designers and artists alike must be willing to push the series forward, even if it means having to age a fan-favorite girl.

SF characters do not have to age as fast as real people. Each game could only be a year or two in the lifetime of the characters and thus allow for the fighters to remain at the peak of their physical ability for a much longer time. However there was something that made the SF series much more interesting than the other fighting games. Capcom took creative risks with the series and moved the titles forward and backward through time between the original game and Super SF IV. Showing gamers how the characters matured, why some masters were no longer alive and how Ken and Ryu eventually ran across the next generation of fighters and rivals. Cammy had aged between SF Zero and SF II, as did Chun-Li, why was Sakura left out of that Revision? Very few fighting games were able to age their characters, or tell a story in the past and do it well. Most of the fighting games that are longer than three or four sequels simply keep adding one or two pop character designs into the cast every revision. Never bothering to age the characters and doing all of their progression by telling it in canon rather than showing the changes in game. The King of the Fighters series is an example of a title locked into a series of sequels where very little changes with the main characters and supporting cast.

How had Sagat changed between the original SF and the sequel? It was not enough to bring the character back with a new attitude, he had become scarred and had new techniques at his disposal. Kairi had a clear Evolution in his character design and purpose within SF EX and EX 2. These characters did not simply get a facelift. The changes were drastic and dramatic. However Capcom would always allow the SF series to have an out for dramatic plots or controversial bosses. They could revise canon and move forward or back in time to introduce new fighters and a different plot. None of the games having to continue from the events of the previous title. The series was not tied down to a series continuous battles, characters and bosses, giving it more breadth and depth for design exploration than any rival fighting title.

Potential designers and artists must be able to challenge themselves and be willing to accept that a character must evolve. They must be able to understand and revise the entire cast without falling too far from the Consistency of the classic designs. They must be able to see where and how there own character will change through the series. Most important, they must not settle for playing "dress-up" with their favorite character and not trying their best to contribute a character withTimeless Design to the legacy. That was something that separated SF character designers from their contemporaries. The new legends, the new icons of fighting were not created from complacency. There was a lot of insight, dedication and hard work to create a great cast of World Warriors. How could you contribute to that legacy? The next blog is the beginning of the end for my series. I will go over designs from Capcom, ARIKA and Dimps. The studios that had artists and designers that worked on SF II. I will highlight where they created great contemporary characters as well as some that would not have worked in SF. I hope to see you back for that.