Rare 1994 lawsuit exhibit video comparing Street Fighter 2 and Fighter’s History characters resurfaces

In 1994, Capcom U.S.A. Inc. sued Data East Corp. on the basis of copyright infringement, seeking 623 million yen in damages. More specifically, Capcom claimed that seven characters from their Street Fighter 2 were copied into Data East Corp.’s Fighter’s History.

According to Capcom, a significant number of elements from Guile, Sagat, Ryu, Vega, Ken, Zangief, and Chun-Li were copied from Street Fighter 2 to create Matlok Jade, Samchay Tomyamgun, Makoto Mizoguchi, Jean-Pierre, Ray McDougal, Marstorius, and Fei-Lin respectively in Fighter’s History.

It turns out that a lawsuit exhibit video was recorded that goes over the case, seemingly in Data East Corp.’s. For example, while Guile is described to obviously be a solider from the United States’ military, Matlok instead has British punk rocker influences.

Funnily enough, Matlock is demonstrated throwing a projectile that’s quite identical to Guile’s Sonic Boom. Though there are obviously disparities between the two characters, there do appear to be elements borrowed or inspired based on Capcom’s Guile.

Ultimately, Judge William H. Orrick Jr. did conclude that there was strong evidence that Data East Corp. did set out to to imitate Street Fighter 2’s success, but Capcom ended up losing the case since many of the alleged copied elements were too broad or generic to technically be owned by Capcom.

The VHS tape not only goes over the designs for Street Fighter and Fighter’s History characters, but also broadly goes over how some of the mechanics differ between the two games. In particular, Fighter’s History has a unique system where character specific weak points can begin glowing. Upon being hit at this weak point, the character can be stunned.

Check it all out below: