It still feels a bit surreal to think that M. Bison, Terry, Mai, and Elena will be joining the Street Fighter 6 roster via the Year 2 Character Pass. With Terry and Mai, this will be the first time that third-party guests will be featured in a mainline Street Fighter entry.
We somewhat had a hint at this over a year ago when Director Takayuki Nakayama and Producer Shuhei Matsumoto declared themselves to be big fans of SNK fighting games. However, it turns out that the reasoning behind Terry and Mai’s inclusion in Street Fighter 6 goes beyond just that.
Nakayama and Matsumoto recently say down for an interview with Famitsu following the reveal of the Season 2 roster. The interview is in Japanese, so we had Nicholas ‘MajinTenshinhan’ Taylor provide translations of everything that was said.
During the interview, Nakayama acknowledges that some people might have a difficult time accepting all of this considering that it’s the first time that they’ve done this sort of thing for Street Fighter. Prior to the big reveal, Nakayama basically said that he was expecting fans to be flabbergasted to the announcement, and he was seemingly right about that.
Ultimately though, Nakayama believes that they’re doing this for the sake of creating a world where people have more fighting games to enjoy. It’s not just because they love only Street Fighter or Fatal Fury. This statement seems to imply that we could even see more guests later down the road.
Check it all out below:
Famitsu: Finally, please give a message for all of the fans who are looking forward to Street Fighter 6’s Year 2.
Nakayama: This is our first time doing something like this, so I think there are some people who have a hard time accepting it as well. But please rest assured, we are working hard to make sure that every character fits well with the world of Street Fighter 6 and that our users will be able to fall in love with them.
We are trying to create a world where people have more fighting games to enjoy. The more opponents you have, the more communication tools you gain access to. We love fighting games, not just Street Fighter 6 or Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves, and want to learn more through many titles and cultivate our own abilities as well, and that’s our aim for everyone.
With this announcement, there may be people out there who started playing Street Fighter 6 but are a bit afraid of fighting games as a whole, so we’re hoping to show them that there’s nothing to be afraid of, just relax and have fun.
Matsumoto: This is a pretty challenging title. It’s our first time doing a collaboration in a mainline title, and with so many people playing the game and it being such a big subject, we thought it was important for it to be NOW that we do a collaboration.
Looking at it through this lens, it’s also connected to our own creation and the quality will be there. You’ll be seeing footage of these characters in the future and we really believe that you’ll want to play them, please look forward to it.