The ESRB has been incredibly strict about slapping high ratings on video games that feature anything out of the ordinary. This can include several different things, but basically, if you're not covered up enough, they won't let you have a low rating. These rules are even harsher in other countries, like Germany and Japan, where any console game that shows skin will face censorship or even an outright ban.
Not all video game characters are limited to appearing in games. If a character becomes famous enough, then they can become a multimedia entity that stars in comic books, movies, and TV shows. This means that a video game character isn't always limited by the rules of the game rating boards. The freedom of other forms of media has allowed famous video game characters to appear in more adult situations than they would normally be allowed to be seen in.
We are here today to look at the video game characters that waited until the Game Over screen to disrobe. From the Italian plumber who dropped his overalls in a manga series, to the greatest example of one of the fighting game trends of the '90s.
Here are Fifteen Famous Video Game Characters Who Showed Too Much Outside Of Their Game!
15 Sniper Wolf Kept Her Jacket On At Least
The Metal Gear Solid series has come under fire for the outfits worn by many female characters in the games. Quiet in Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain drew considerable ire in the gaming press, due to the fact that she was running around a battlefield while wearing only a bikini and a torn pair of tights.
Sniper Wolf from the first Metal Gear Solid title also wore a strange outfit for her profession. She was a famous sniper who operated in frozen climates, yet she kept her top zipped down to her navel. Her outfit in Metal Gear Solid was a step up from what she is seen wearing in the concept art for the game, where she is seen wearing only a jacket and a single boot.
14 Red's Poké Balls
The oldest adaptation of the Pokémon video games is a manga series called Pocket Monsters, which actually predates the anime. Pocket Monsters is a gag manga that debuted in 1996 and is still going strong. Pocket Monsters follows Red on his journey to complete the Pokédex, who uses an obnoxious Clefairy as his main Pokémon.
One of the reasons why Pocket Monsters never saw an official English release was due to a scene in the early issues where Red drops his trousers in front of Clefairy, who had just told him that he needs to use his balls to catch a Pokémon.
The scene of Red was meant to show how naive and innocent he is, which is a common trait in Japanese anime/manga. Goku also appeared unclothed during the early chapters of Dragon Ball, for the same reason.
13 Chun-Li Sets The Trend
The rising popularity of fighting games in the '90s led to most of the major franchises receiving their own animated movies. The most popular of these has to be Street Fighter II: The Animated Movie, which is still considered to be one of the best video game movies of all time.
Street Fighter II: The Animated Movie has lots of exciting fight sequences, but the most famous scene in the movie is the one when Chun-Li appears while she showers. Seeing a video game character like this was almost unheard of in the days before the Internet, which made the Chun-Li scene stand out and brought a lot of attention to the film. This shower scene led to numerous different editions of the film being released across every region, with Chun-Li being the biggest point of contention.
12 Triss Merigold Is A Cover Girl
It should come as no surprise that there is a lot of artwork of Triss Merigold from The Witcher series, considering how often she appears unclothed within her own games. What you may not know is that Triss became a cover girl in Poland, where The Witcher series originates from.
Triss Merigold appeared on the cover of the May 2011 issue of the Polish edition of Hef's magazine and was depicted unclothed within the pages. A real model was used for the base image and Triss' body was added over her. This was meant to promote the upcoming release of The Witcher 2: Assassin of Kings, which took about five minutes to depict Triss like this in a cutscene, so at least the shoot was true to the content of the game.
11 Anna Williams Followed In Chun-Li's Footsteps
The Tekken franchise has long been seen as a rival to the Street Fighter series. Tekken started out as a visually impressive 3D fighting game that embraced the changing technology, while Street Fighter remained in the 2D sprite realm for a long time.
One of the ways in which Tekken emulated Street Fighter was with a highly regarded anime film. Tekken: The Motion Picture was an adaptation of the story of the first two Tekken games. Tekken: The Motion Picture also copied Street Fighter II: The Animated Movie by showing one of the characters from the game in a shower scene. In Tekken's case, it was Anna Williams who was chosen to represent the series during the OVA wars of the 90s.
10 Unei Holds The Record Here
The Final Fantasy series has always shied away from fully showing it, as Square Enix wanted the games to avoid a high age rating. The only Final Fantasy game to receive an M rating was Final Fantasy Type-0 HD, and even that had some of its fan service censored from the original PSP version of the game.
One Final Fantasy character has appeared unclothed in another form of media: Unei from Final Fantasy III was shown like this in the official manga adaptation of the game. This was the young version of Unei that was depicted in Yoshitaka Amano's concept art for the game, not the elderly version that you actually encounter in Final Fantasy III. Unei and Doga are depicted as lovers in this version of the story.
9 Bloodrayne Set The Trend
It wasn't until the 32-bit era of gaming that video game characters were being promoted due to their physical attractiveness. This is because it took a long time for the technology that could depict semi-realistic women to become available for video games. Lara Croft might be the most famous example of this, as her career was launched from her triangular polygon chest.
It took a while for legitimate publications to start embracing cartoon women. In the case of Hef's magazine: they started out with Bloodrayne. Bloodrayne was chosen to appear topless in the October 2004 edition, which began a trend of them featuring digital women. This led to them creating special editions of the magazine that were dedicated to the women of video games.
8 Aya & The Best Review Ever
If you want to read Hef's magazine but don't want to use the cliche excuse of saying that you read it for the articles, then you could always say that you read it for the reviews. They've featured video game reviews in both the print and the online editions of the magazine for a while now. It is due to these reviews that we were able to see images of Aya from Onechanbara series.
When preparing to review Onechanbara: Bikini Samurai Squad, the people at the magazine asked the developer of the game for some exclusive images. What they received was images of Aya that were created for them alone, which probably helped to inspire the positive review that they gave to the game.
7 Shaundi Will Do Anything For The Saints
The Saints Row franchise earned a name for itself by simply being more fun than Grand Theft Auto was being at the time. This was due to Grand Theft Auto IV trying to be more serious than its predecessors, which ultimately didn't gel with the kind of game that it was. The Saints Row games were fun and silly by comparison and they never took themselves seriously. This was also reflected in the numerous elements of the series which were played for comedy.
When Hef's magazine requested a piece of artwork to represent the series in their magazine as part of their "Virtual Vixens" of December 2008, they were given a picture of Shaundi from Saints Row 2. This image could be seen in later games in the series, which makes the fact that Shaundi did a shoot for this magazine canon.
6 Elly On The Cover
Xenogears was an RPG released for the original PlayStation that has become infamous due to the fact that it wasn't finished. The second disc of the game has little content and is more of an extended cutscene that tells the players what was planned but couldn't be implemented in time. The Xenogears fans who are looking for more information about the story can always turn to the official art book for the game. Xenogears Perfect Works -The Real Thing- features a lot of information about the story that never made it into the game.
Xenogears Perfect Works -The Real Thing- was never released outside of Japan, so you will have to rely on a fan translation to get the scoop about the story. The reason it wasn't released may be due to the fact that Elly (one of the main characters) is shown totally unclothed on the cover of the book.
5 Mario & His Mushroom
That's right: Mario has bared it all for the fans.
There was once a popular Mario manga series that ran in Japan, called KC Mario, which tied the story of all of the Mario games into a cohesive narrative. KC Mario was essentially a gag manga that satirized the video games.
KC Mario has since become infamous for a scene where Mario jumps out of his clothes after being bitten by a Fish Bone. This gave us the only canonical depiction of Mario's area. Mario continues to prance around with no pants on, as he is unaware that Princess Peach is watching him, as she is masquerading as a robot at the time. You would think that Nintendo would be the most strict when it comes to their first-party characters, yet Mario isn't the only one of their big names to appear on this list...
4 The Succubus That Hides On The Sega Saturn Disc
We have all at some point in time been tempted to put a console game disc inside of a computer, just to see what happens. This will usually come to nothing, as most game discs that are intended for the use on a PlayStation or Microsoft system will only have a few unreadable files on them.
The Japan-exclusive version of Castlevania: Symphony of the Night for the Sega Saturn did have something special for the fans. A Windows computer could find a folder full of concept art for the game on the disc. This folder contains a no-top picture of the Succubus boss, which is usually censored when it appears in other parts of the series. It's possible that the Succubus appears like this in Symphony of the Night, but the sprite art is so basic that it's hard to tell.
3 Sonia Belmont, In A Game That Wasn't Even Released
There was once a Castlevania game in development for the Sega Dreamcast called Castlevania: Resurrection. This game was going to star a new character named Victor Belmont, as well as Sonia Belmont from Castlevania Legends, who has been brought back to life under mysterious circumstances.
As one of the few canonical female members of the Belmont clan, Sonia has often been the source of fanservice when it comes to her concept art. This was taken to the next level in the concept art for Castlevania: Resurrection, where she was depicted in no costume as part of a montage of her planned costumes. These costumes were also highly suggestive in their designs. Castlevania: Resurrection was eventually canceled due to the death of the Sega Dreamcast.
2 Link Has Ken's Anatomy
Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild was one of the most highly acclaimed games of 2017 and has been called the greatest Zelda game of all time, which is no small praise. Breath of the Wild also helped to inspire interest in the Nintendo Switch, due to the game appearing as a launch title.
A lot of the concept art for Breath of the Wild has been released over the past few years. A book was recently released in Japan called Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild - Master Works, which shows off even more of the artwork.
An unclothed picture of Link appears in Master Works, though those fans hoping for a glimpse of his Master Sword will be disappointed, as he is given a similar anatomy to a Ken doll.
1 Chun-Li Was Actually Following In Mai Shiranui's Footsteps
The first rival to the Street Fighter series was Fatal Fury, which eventually evolved into The King of Fighters series. One of the ways in which Fatal Fury tried to defeat Street Fighter in the arcades was with a higher emphasis on fanservice, which took the form of Mai Shiranui.
The Chun-Li shower scene in Street Fighter II: The Animated Movie may be infamous, but Mai had already beaten her to it. This is due to the fact that Mai appeared unclothed during a shower scene in Fatal Fury: The Motion Picture, which was released two months earlier than Street Fighter II: The Animated Movie in Japan. This is one of the few trends that Fatal Fury managed to start, with Street Fighter looking like it was the one copying them for a change.