Evil Ryu is one of Street Fighter’s coolest characters and it’s not hard to see why. He strikes a chord that resonates with everyone as all of us have entertained what it’d be like to give into the devil on your shoulder. When you pair that relatable theme with the kinds of badass beatdowns he dishes out and you get a character who’s seen a slow but effective burn over the years.
Unfortunately, Capcom’s execution of the latest version of Evil Ryu might have wound up being a straight up execution of the character himself, thanks to some, shall we say unthoughtful storytelling that completely deflates everything cool the character has ever been.
Much of Ryu’s struggle throughout the course of Street Fighter sees him wrestling with the uncontrolled use of the Satsui no hado as he first discovers it within himself when he accidentally taps into it to deliver the scar-causing uppercut that nearly kills Sagat at the end of Street Fighter 1.
Ryu develops his relationship with the killing intent in Street Fighter Alpha wherein Akuma, who is wholly infatuated with this power and seeks to give himself completely over to it, senses it within Ryu and urges him to also give into it so as to become as powerful as possible. Ryu resists but Capcom decided to manifest a version of him that hypothetically gave in by creating the secret and non-canonical Evil Ryu.
Evil Ryu hasn’t been present in every Street Fighter entry, and actually didn’t appear again for some 13 years after 1998’s Alpha 3. Capcom decided to bring him back in a 2011 update to Street Fighter 4, and though it took a bit, he wound up becoming one of the most competitively viable characters in the entire game.
Usage from top level players like BT|Daigo Umehara further fueled fervor for the character as fans couldn’t help but applaud the crazy and massively entertaining beat down sequences Evil Ryu was capable of.
This excitement was noted by Capcom, who wouldn’t bring the character back in Street Fighter 5 right away, but instead would add him in a few years after the game released. This time, however, instead of having him show up as a non-canonical hypothetical, they actually wrote him into the story.
Instead of “Evil Ryu” we got “Kage,” (which translates to “Shadow”) a clear successor with plenty of the same moves and movements. Kage was fairly well designed as he retained a lot of the flash and pizazz of Evil Ryu’s fighting style, hitting opponents noticeably hard and even garnering the ability to combo directly into the Raging Demon.
What wasn’t all that great about Kage, however, was the way developers chose to write him into the story. The core of Ryu’s arc is his struggle with finding balance between the Satsui no Hado and its opposite: The Power of Nothingness (violence vs diplomacy).
He finally synthesizes the two in Street Fighter 5’s story, which implies that he’s integrated his inner shadow.
Despite this integration, Kage manifests and challenges Ryu, Sagat, and Akuma to battle. Not only does this sort of fly in the face of one of the potent and important character arcs, but all three characters are widely apathetic to Kage when they meet him.
Evil Ryu was an absolute force to be reckoned with and feared, both for his violent physical potential as well as in the very concept of our hero giving into his shadow. All the relevant characters see Kage as a meaningless shell whom they have either already conquered or stand to gain nothing from fighting with.
We get into more detail in terms of the character’s history, legacy, and canonical execution in the full video below. As always, if you enjoy what you see we’d greatly appreciate a like, a comment directly on the video, and a subscription to our YouTube Channel to help us make more content just like this.