Bret Hart Vs. Diesel (Survivor Series '95)
& Ryu Vs. Akuma (Street Fighter Alpha 2)
Many professional illustrators use inspirations from movies, magazine covers, or real life photos for their 2D artwork, and sometimes cleverly mimic other forms of art... like pro-wrestling. Any creative person who enjoyed watching television in the 90's was
definitely watching the crazy things happening in the World Wrestling Federation. The early WWF had so many great characters and legends.
As you probably know, many fighting game characters take direct inspiration from these real life wrestlers. In this case... a popular headlining photo / magazine cover of Bret Hart Vs. Diesel from Survivor Series (1995) made a statement worldwide. Releasing only a few months after this iconic photo, DAI-CHAN's iconic Street
Fighter Alpha 2 poster clearly takes
direct inspiration from The Hitman and Kevin Nash!
Hulk Hogan Vs. Andre The Giant (1987)
& Alex & Hugo Andore (SFIII: 3rd Strike)
Wrestling was getting HUGE in the late 80's...
worldwide! In Street Fighter III: 3rd Strike, Capcom decided to recreate the iconic standoff between Hulk Hogan and Andre The Giant from Wrestlemania III (1987)
with Alex and Hugo
- further cementing the idea that both
characters take heavy inspirations from the WWF / WWE legends. "NO BABY OIL!" ~Andre The Giant
Rey
Mysterio & El Blaze
Virtua
Fighter 5's El
Blaze shares a striking resemblance to not only Luchadores in
general, but especially Rey Mysterio. and probably one
of the few intentional tributes by Sega. I suppose they thought a light and
speedy Lucha Libre wrestler would fit in well with the VF cast, and they
were spot on.
Don
Frye & Mike Haggar (Submitted by Chris S.)
I can't think of a better man to play
Mike Haggar of
Final Fightthan legit mixed martial arts legend and
former pro-wrestler, Don
Frye. Don Frye won the freestyle and Greco-Roman wrestling events during
an Olympic qualifier in 1987 and made his professional boxing debut in
1989... (interestingly, the same year Final Fight was released). Did someone over at
Capcom see Frye in the ring and become inspired to create Mike Haggar? It's quite possible. All I know is that if a live action Final Fight movie
starring Don Frye existed, life would be significantly better.
[UPDATE: July 16th, 2018]
Life is significantly better.
After many years of this
character / celebrity comparison existing on the internet, in June 2018,
the Frye himself was cast as Mayor Mike Haggar in a fan film: "The
Broken Gear: A Final Fight Film". Thank you Game Basement Productions
for turning our childhood dreams into a reality. Enjoy the full 30-minute
martial arts flick below.
Raiden & Big Van Vader
.
Raiden
(also known as Big Bear) was based off of real life pro-wrestler, Leon
Allen White, better known by his ring name, Big Van Vader! Vader also
did a lot of wrestling in Japan back in the day, so clearly, some of
SNK's designers went and saw Vader at one of the shows and was inspired!
Raiden and Vader share a lot of similarities as "big men" in
the wrestling business, and while Raiden's mask isn't a direct copy of
Vader's... it's similar.
Big Van Vader was definitely a
badass and memorable pro wrestler (and WWE Hall of Famer!), which
actually makes Raiden a bit cooler as a design than he may seem at
first. It's
Vader Time! Sadly, Leon White passed away in 2018. R.I.P. Lord Vader.
You're a legend.
Andre
the Giant & Hugo/Andore
I never thought one
of the classic "baddies" from Final Fightwould actually cross over to
Street Fighter. My jaw pretty much hit the floor when I first saw Hugo
in SFIII: 2nd Impact. He wasn't a very popular character back then,
so Hugo's appearance in SF3 was a huge fan service for old school Capcom fans. Capcom kept his visual design nearly identical to his
original Final
Fight appearance, yet managed to fleshed him out further thanks to SF3's
awesome art style. The 3rd Strike artists set out to create a huge, clumsy pro-wrestler, who looks slightly
off balance at times, but hits very hard.
It's sheer brilliance what they did with his animation and
design in SF3.
The late great Andre The Giant is a legend... and Hugo (Andore) is a great homage
to the iconic pro-wrestler. Andre deserved more than just being a generic Final Fight bad
guy, and his Street Fighter appearances really make a statement. As one
of the "biggest" big guys in Street Fighter, Hugo never
fails to entertain the audience... just like Andre did.
Hulk
Hogan (Hollywood) & Bass
Bass-amania
brother!!!
...yeah, that's all there is to say about this one. Tecmo Koei clearly
based their visual design for Bass on Hollywood Hogan in Dead
or Alive 2.
Bill
Goldberg & Craig Marduk
.
The
iconic WCW/WWE wrestler Goldberg was an obvious inspiration to Tekken's
designers when they came up with Craig
Marduk, a Vale Tudo fighter. They have
strikingly similar appearances, moves and taunts. In Tekken 4, Marduk
actually performed some of Goldberg's trademark "arm raises"
in his win pose. Those animations were removed in the later games.
However, Marduk still has some of Goldberg's iconic moves, such as his
spear and jackhammer.
Joe
Weider & Clemence
You
may (or may not) have heard of the famous Canadian bodybuilder and
entrepreneur Joe Weider. The same goes for Clemence, a pro-wrestler from
the obscure fighting game, Fighting Layer. All I know is that the
first time I saw Clemence, I immediately thought of the Weider logo
(pictured above) as it appears on my home gym. What makes this
interesting is that Weider is clearly famous for the "arms
folded" pose, the same pose Clemence is seen in (in the only
artwork for Clemence that exists). Also, somehow I always see an
eyepatch over Weider's right eye in the logo now. lol.
Golddust
& Exodus
Here's
another one from Fighting Layer. The odd-looking wrestler,
Exodus, is clearly
partially inspired by WWE icon and infamously bizarre-looking
wrestler, Golddust (AKA Dustin Rhodes, son of Dusty Rhodes). As a WWE
fan since the 90's, I gotta say Golddust was always pretty underrated
and an interesting character. I
definitely enjoyed his stuttering gimmick while it lasted. *HOH* In the
same way, Exodus was a pretty interesting character on the Fighting
Layer roster.
Darun
Mister
& The
Great Gama
The Great Gama is a
Pehlwani wrestler from India who was famous in the early 1900's. Darun
Mister's design appears to be
heavily based off of the Great Gama. Nuff said? That's an intimidating mustache if
I've ever seen one!
Rock
& Triple H
It's
likely Namco would've used pro wrestlers as reference when they were
illustrating & rendering
the "big guys" of the Soul Calibur series. How else would
they achieve such realistic-looking character models? Namco seems to
have taken it a step further particularly in Soul Calibur 3 (2005), as
Rock's facial structure
eerily resembles Triple H's... both in the official artwork and in the
actual game.
The ironic part is that Triple H is known for using a sledgehammer (especially since 2005?), and Rock
has always used a battle axe / hammer. After seeing Triple H
doing his trademark pose next to Rock's SC3 artwork, it's hard to label this one as just a coincidence. To
add to the irony, Triple H's WrestleMania 22 entrance featured him
sitting in a throne in full barbarian attire, with a huge battle hammer next
to him. There's no doubt about it... Rock and Hunter are indeed
separated at birth.
Mike
Tyson & Balrog
This is
one of the first, and one of the most well-known
likenesses in fighting game history. For those of you that don't know: Balrog's name in
the Japanese version of Street Fighter 2 is none other than "Mike Bison"...
which obviously has the same ring as Mike Tyson. Capcom purposely changed his name
to "Balrog" in America to avoid any potential lawsuits... funny
stuff.
And in case you didn't notice, Balrog's SF2 character select
artwork is practically based on that photo of Mike Tyson with the white
background (above).
Cary-Hiroyuki
Tagawa & Feng Wei
Tagawa played
Shang Tsung
in the first live-action Mortal Kombat movie and Heihachi
Mishima in the live-action Tekken movie. Too bad Feng Wei wasn't created when Tagawa was
younger, because if they made a Tekken movie back then, this guy would've
made a perfect Feng (perhaps if Tagawa bulked up a bit). Both dudes have
such a convincing "angry face".
It's not officially confirmed, but I personally believe the Tekken
5 designers based Feng Wei's facial structure off of Tagawa's.
.
And in case you didn't notice, Balrog's SF2 character select
artwork is practically based on that photo of Mike Tyson with the white
background (above).
It's not officially confirmed, but I personally believe the 
FOLLOW
