Balrog (Street Fighter)

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Balrog (M. Bison)
Balrog as he appears in Street Fighter IV
Game series	Street Fighter series
First game	Street Fighter II
Voiced by (English)	Joe Romersa (Street Fighter II V, Street Fighter II: The Animated Movie) Paul Dobson (TV series)
Voiced by (Japanese)	Kōichi Yamadera (Capcom vs. SNK series) Sōnosuke Nagashiro (SNK vs. Capcom: SVC Chaos) Tomomichi Nishimura (Street Fighter II V) George Nakata (Street Fighter II: The Animated Movie)
Live action actor(s)	Grand L. Bush (Street Fighter film) Michael Clarke Duncan (The Legend of Chun-Li)
Information
Birthplace	United States
Fighting style	Boxing
Likes	Women, Beer
Dislikes	Fish, Hard work, math
Special skill	Gambling
Affiliation	Shadaloo (former)

Balrog, known as M. Bison or Mike Bison (マイク・バイソン, Maiku Baison^?) in Japan, is a character from the Street Fighter fighting game series.

Balrog is depicted as an African American boxer wearing blue trunks with white trim and a torn white shirt under a blue tank top. He wears red boxing gloves and boxing shoes. His hairstyle consists of short hair cut in an odd pointing style in the front, similar to Mike Tyson's haircuts from the time Street Fighter II was made. In certain illustrations, his Japanese name, "Bison", can be seen on the waistband of his trunks, although it's usually removed when these illustrations are published outside Japan.

[edit] Background

Balrog was once a great boxing champion and prize fighter. He was banned from boxing for permanently injuring his opponents and killing one (as well as his illegal maneuvers, particularly his headbutt), so he joined the Shadaloo criminal organization, and worked his way up from the bottom, eventually becoming Bison's most powerful enforcer. While running errands for M. Bison (Vega in Japan), he killed Dhalsim's elephant with a single Gigaton Punch. In one mission, Balrog was sent to terminate Birdie. Although he did not know why, Balrog went anyway. Birdie told him about the Psycho Drive, and Balrog agreed to help him find it, thinking he could make money from it. When the Psycho Drive exploded, Balrog realized that he had not been paid recently. When M. Bison was killed at the hands of Akuma, ownership of Shadaloo was transferred to the former prize fighter. Unfortunately, he ended up running the entire organization into the ground in no time. After the fall of Shadaloo, Balrog became nothing more than a bum on the streets.

[edit] In other media

Balrog in Capcom vs. SNK

In Street Fighter II: The Animated Movie, he is portrayed close to his original role in the games, which is largely as dumb-muscle for Bison. He is voiced by Joe Romersa in the English dub and George Nakata in the Japanese version. In the 1994 live action film, Balrog was portrayed by veteran actor Grand L. Bush and was one of the good guys, more specifically the videographer in Chun-Li's news crew. Like the other members (Chun-Li and Honda), Balrog held a grudge against Shadaloo for ruining his boxing career. Near the end of the film, he dons his regular outfit from the games. In the 1995 animated series Street Fighter, he is a scientist for Bison, with his storyline intact. He is voiced by Paul Dobson.

In the upcoming Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li, set to be released in 2009, he will be played by Michael Clarke Duncan.

[edit] Gameplay

Balrog's special moves consist mainly of rushing punch attacks that are performed by charging (holding the joystick back or down for a few seconds before tapping it forward or up and hitting a button). Initially, his main moves were the Dashing Straight and Dashing Upper, which had Balrog rush forward a certain distance before attacking with a straight punch or uppercut, respectively. His signature move was the Turn Punch which was done by holding down all three punch or kick buttons for a certain amount of time. In Street Fighter II': Hyper Fighting, the longer the buttons are held down, the more powerful the attack is, doing up to 50% in one hit. It was also initially able to pass through many attacks, although this ability has been toned down and eventually outright removed. A particular conceit of the CPU AI from the Street Fighter games (In particular the Street Fighter II series of games) is that when controlled by the computer, Balrog sometimes uses special moves in ways that would not be normally possible, like performing many Dashing Uppers and Dashing Straights one after another, without charging first.

In Super Street Fighter II he gained the Buffalo Headbutt, an anti-air attack that can pass through fireballs, enhancing his manueverability. In the sequel Super Street Fighter II Turbo, he can also perform altered versions of the Dashing Straight and Dashing Upper which hit the opponent low and knock him down or crouch low under attacks before doing the uppercut, respectively. His Super Combo is the Crazy Buffalo, repeated dashing attacks which can be altered into uppercuts by tapping the Kick button. In Alpha 3, Balrog gained a Level 3 Super Combo called the Gigaton Blow, which sends an opponent flying away if it connected.

[edit] Development

[edit] Name change

When Street Fighter II was localized in America, Capcom was afraid of a lawsuit from Mike Tyson over a character with his likeness and a similar sounding name (Mike Bison). Additionally, when the designers presented the game to Capcom USA's marketing department, they believed that the name Vega was a weakling's name.^[1] They decided to rotate the names of three of the four boss characters in the following manner:

The boxer is known as M. Bison in Japan and Balrog elsewhere.

The Spanish assassin/bullfighter is known as Balrog in Japan and Vega elsewhere.

The evil dictator and head of Shadaloo is known as Vega in Japan and M. Bison elsewhere.

[edit] Reception

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[edit] References

[edit] External links

• Balrog's Street Fighter II and Street Fighter Alpha entries at StrategyWiki.org