More and more fighting game franchises are beginning to take their lore, characters and story more seriously. That doesn’t divorce most franchises from their silly and less serious roots.
Some game franchises continue to include comical arcade endings, and Street Fighter is no stranger to that, even with their most recent entry Street Fighter V. Here are some strange but funny arcade endings from Street Fighter’s history.
10 Bison Dollars Are Canon (Street Fighter V Arcade Edition)
This is more of an Easter Egg, but still funny if you look at the context of where they came from.
In one of Balrog’s endings for SFV: AE, he gains enormous fame and fortune. In the first panel, he is throwing around dollar bills. These aren’t normal dollar bills, however – they are Bison dollars from the live-action Street Fighter movie.
Like most media adaptations of the 90s, the Street Fighter movie was campy, ridiculous and handle the source material in interesting ways. Unfortunately, it was hilariously bad and got panned badly. The best part of the movie was Bison’s portrayal as an overlord with a city, Bisonopolis.
9 El Fuerte’s Mysterious Recipe (Super Street Fighter IV)
Curiously enough, El Fuerte’s ending is something straight out of an anime. The entire scene is the Hispanic wrestler and a young chef disciple cooking an awful recipe. While the chef gags, El Fuerte is constantly looking for “delicious” ingredients to add to the “death stew.” By this point, the young chef is a self-insert for the audience. El Fuerte claims that “adding one delicious thing to another delicious thing always equals… more deliciousness.” He then attempts to add a chocolate bar to the soup. Just when you think the craziness couldn’t get worse, it gets worse.
8 Karin’s Triumphant Laughter (Street Fighter V Arcade Edition)
A princess unleashes a Hammer of Dawn on M. Bison. No, seriously.
Karin, Sakura’s rival and the heir to the Kanzuki Zaibatsu, hates Shadaloo with a burning passion. She calls someone to execute a kill order on the Shadaloo base from the Kanzaki Family attack satellite.
Moments later, M. Bison and the Shadaloo base are vaporized, exploding behind Karin as she does the ojou-sama laugh. It’s so perfect, yet so deliciously random!
7 Abigail The Repairman (Street Fighter V Arcade Edition)
Abigail is a larger than life character, both literally and figuratively. This Mad Gear Gang member is actually a guest character from the Final Fight series, but he fits into the SF world very well. Can players imagine him being a repairman and provide customer service in one of his arcade endings?
Patience clearly isn’t one of Abigail’s strong suit. By the end of the panel, he is tearing up trucks and his office space out of rage and frustration. If that isn’t enough, Abigail has another ending where he straps a Cody to a chair – a chair with dynamite attached to it. Geez, and people thought customers were crazy…
6 Alex Is A Hypocrite (Street Fighter V Arcade Edition)
Alex is an American wrestler and kickboxer who, according to this ending, likes to stick to routines. “Fight. Eat. Sleep. These are the only things a man truly needs, but don’t forget to eat your vegetables,” he said in his ending. But he said this without eating his broccoli. He can’t be bothered to keep up with his own advice?
Good thing one of his family members literally points this out to him. Sheesh! It’s also a good way to reward the player for actually paying attention to the comic-style panels of the SFV endings.
5 Balrog’s Disappointing Dream (Street Fighter V Arcade Edition)
We return to poor Balrog. The American boxer was having a dream about his victory in the tournament. Instead of the journalists and media flocking to him, they run past the boxer to interview a person named Mike. Angry and frustrated, Balrog awakens from his dream – wearing his boxing gloves in bed. What’s funnier: how pitiful the dream was, or the fact that this man wears his gloves to bed?
4 Poison (Ultra Street Fighter IV)
Poison’s ending in this game is pretty off-the-walls. A former member of the Mad Gear Gang, Poison loves being the center of attention, and her ending is fitting.
She forms a “KISS-style rock band” with Hugo, Rolento, Cody, and Guy, and calls the group the Mad Gears. She even manages to get Ryu and Ken to do pyrotechnics with their Hadoken technique. Talk about ridiculous!
3 Dee Jay Becomes A Star (Street Fighter II)
It’s pretty common for arcade endings to end with certain characters becoming famous or gaining some international renown. This doesn’t just apply to SF; this happens in most fighting games.
For the Jamaican boxer Dee Jay, he cares for his musical work as much as his training. While it is fitting for his Street Fighter II arcade ending to have the boxer achieve worldwide popularity as a pop star. But what is funny is the means. He defeats M. Bison and gets an inspiration for a song. Such a simple result created overwhelming acclaim for this man; it’s equal parts amazing and hilarious.
2 Ibuki Never Catches A Break (Street Fighter III 3rd Strike)
Ibuki is a kunoichi and has been training all of her life. In her arcade ending for Street Fighter III 3rd Strike, the female fighter finally gets a reprieve. She starts attending her “dream” university, joins a club, and finally gets the normal life she craved.
Until her club instructor turns out to be a ninja, who “holds her neck at kunai point and makes fun of her for how gullible she still is. It’s so ridiculous in Street Fighter fashion, but it is also funny in an anime-sort-of-way. Poor Ibuki! She should know that a “normal life” shouldn’t be that easy!
1 Zangief Dances With Gorbachev (Street Fighter II)
This ending epitomizes Russian pride. Zangief is a classic character and known as the “Red Cyclone.” His Street Fighter II arcade ending has Mikhail Gorbachev, yes that Gorbachev, appears from a helicopter to congratulate the Russian wrestler on winning the World Warrior tournament. To celebrate, Zangief, Gorbachev, and three KGB agents start doing the Topak dance! Interesting how the Capcom was able to get away with that back then. Show that Soviet spirit!
While Street Fighter has a lot of serious and even downright dark moments, it doesn’t stray away from humor and lightheartedness. It keeps it in an interesting position amongst its competitors. The arcade endings manage to flesh them out while keeping the audience entertained. Hopefully, Capcom continues this approach to the series moving forward.