is a character in Capcom's Street Fighter fighting game series. The character was first introduced in the 1987 title Street Fighter as an alternate fighter to Ryu. While Ryu is devoted to testing his power, Ken instead focuses on developing a family with his wife Elisa. Ken becomes a mainstay in the following Street Fighter games. An alternate brainwashed version of him, , has also been featured in a few of his appearances. Ken's presence is in several sequels to the Street Fighter series in addition to its related media. He has also made crossover appearances in Namco × Capcom, Project X Zone, and Super Smash Bros.
Capcom designer Takashi Nishiyama created Ken when developing the first Street Fighter game. However, due to budget problems, Ken could only use Ryu's moves, which later resulted in their characterization as friendly rivals and fellow students of Gouken. Shoei Okano eventually redesigned the character in later games. Seeking to make the character more unique, Capcom redesigned Ken's red gi in Street Fighter V and Street Fighter 6, though the latter resulted in changing his entire character depicting his life as less stable.
Despite being recognized as a clone of Ryu, Ken develops a more social life rather than devoting his life to his training like Ryu. Their similarities inspired the term Shotokans in other fighting games besides Street Fighter. The evolution of his gameplay and design has been popular among gamers for becoming more unique. However, some critics were critical of his role in Street Fighter 6, which was significantly changed due to the sudden increase in depression resulting from losing his family.
Creation
Capcom designer Takashi Nishiyama created Ken's character as he became Street Fighter director when coming up ideas with a project. Inspired by Spartan X, Nishiyama took notes about the needs of Street Fighter. Planner Hiroshi Matsumoto was influenced by martial arts which led to the usage of multiple styles. Nishiyama thinks the most regrettable experience of the game was the fact that, they had all these ideas for coming up with different playable characters that they wanted to put into the game, but due to budget concerns, scheduling concerns, among others, eventually that got reduced to only Ken and Ryu. Nishiyama would have loved to have more playable characters, but Capcom were only able to put in just the two of them.
In Street Fighter II, Ken and Ryu were originally going to be Y.S.'s characters; however, he ended up taking over in the early stages. Okano remembers making the dot patterns for the Shoryuken and the Hadoken special moves first. After that, he moved away from game design and created a design room for the illustrations and manuals. Akiman recalls having drafts for most characters except Ken and Ryu. Y.S. eventually finished the characters. From there, the first move he made was the Hadoken. Ryu and Ken "are the so-called standard characters in the" game, and since they were coming from the first Street Fighter game, they could have the other characters be "weirdos". He gave them a stoic feel. Numerous spinoff products were made as well during the game's popularity: when Capcom licensed Hasbro to produce a line of action figures, Ken was given the surname "Masters" to avoid trademark conflict with Mattel's Ken dolls. The full name Ken Masters was used in the animated Street Fighter II movie and in the Street Fighter II V series before being canonized in the video games with Street Fighter Alpha 2.
The first decision when making the prequel Street Fighter Alpha was keeping Ken, Ryu and Chun-Li. Capcom did not want to end up with just Japanese and Asian characters. As much as we could, they wanted to think in terms of creating a good balance, with all sorts of different skin colors. The secret of Street Fighter Alpha is the Ryu and Ken vs. Bison team up mode, where if word did not get out, we figured we would just stay silent. However, the staff spoiled it. While they found such idea fun, it eventually became a troublesome mode. This eventually inspired more team up fights involving characters who wear opposing colors like Ryu and Ken. Yasuda disliked the handling of Ryu and Ken as old characters, resulting in the creation of Sakura Kasugano as a response to a younger, cooler fighter that contrast the others especially in outfits. In the prequel Street Fighter Alpha Capcom did not want to end up with just Japanese and Asian characters. As much as we could, they wanted to think in terms of creating a good balance, with all sorts of different skin colors. The secret of Street Fighter Alpha is the Ryu and Ken vs. Bison team up mode, where if word did not get out, we figured we would just stay silent. With Street Fighter IV, the producer said that while Ryu comes across as an ordinary man, Ken contrast him with a more well-defined face. Furthermore, they said he has "a cool, fun-loving guy." which made him easier to design.
In both SNK vs. Capcom: SVC Chaos and Street Fighter II, game designers created an alternate persona called "Violent Ken" with stronger moves than the regular Ken Masters. Despite similarities with Ryu's evil persona caused by not being able to control his dark powers, Violent Ken is the result of the villain M. Bison manipulating Ken with his Psycho Power. This exploits Ken's hidden side including fears or hatred, most notably his inferiority complex over Ryu. Further, Ken starts wielding purple flames alongside all of his attacks. Eventually, Ken recovers his original persona when seeing his best friend's red bandana which is a present the character gives him in Street Fighter Alpha 2. Though Ken did not undergo several changes in Street Fighter IV, he and Ryu Rufus were meant to be have an acrobatic bald slender black male wearing a gi named "King Cobra", meant to be a more, the character became Rufus. Reuben Langdon voiced Ken in Street Fighter IV, Super Smash Bros. Ultimate and Street Fighter V. David Matranga took over in Street Fighter 6, feeling responsibility for it as a result of the series' popularity. He also regarded Ken as iconic based on how he gets the chance to yell his attack's names which required lessons of screaming and grunting.
The character's inclusion in the SNK fighting game Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves over Ryu was done because producer Yasuyuki Oda said in the Capcom vs. SNK crossover games, Ken's character was often promoted alongside Terry Bogard, who originated in Fatal Fury. This was in contrast to Ryu, who was marketed alongside Kyo Kusanagi, who originated in The King of Fighters '94. This reasoning was also done with fellow character Chun-li who tends to be promoted alongside Mai Shiranui.
Designs
In the original Street Fighter, Ken fought barefoot and wore yellow arm bands without gloves. Ken and Ryu were designed to be nearly identical and share the same moves despite their different races. Y.S. was in charge of Ken and Ryu in Street Fighter II. Ken has neck-length dyed-blonde hair, black eyebrows, and wears a red sleeveless keikogi with a black belt. By the time of Street Fighter V, Ken's appearance underwent a design change. Ken's gi top now hangs around his waist and he wears a black v-neck training shirt with several red linings in its place. He sports black sparring gloves and has his hair tied back in a topknot instead of hanging loose which it was grown into medium length after the events of Street Fighter III series and now wears black ankle wraps with red linings instead of barefoot. For this game, Capcom wanted to differentiate Ken and Ryu's moves since they have been seen as "clones". According to Street Fighter V Senior Manager Matt Dahlgren, "Ken's more of the hothead. He's the one that's gonna rush you down and be in your face, so his V-Skill is a run move that can be used to constantly pressure your opponent." In Undisputed Street Fighter: A 30th Anniversary Retrospective, it was noted that while Ken was already a popular character in previous games, his redesign in Street Fighter V helped to improve it thanks to its more original take. This also was helped by the fact that Ken's special moves have flames in contrast to Ryu's electric Denjin Hadoken. After 30 years in Street Fighter V, the moves and new designs help Ken look his own. For the crossover game with Tekken, Street Fighter X Tekken, Ken was given an alternate costume based on Tekken fighter Lars Alexandersson, while several fashionable American-like clothing was scrapped.
While still performing similar moves in Street Fighter 6, Ken and Ryu were designed to play different; Ken became more aggressive and dynamic whereas Ryu was more defensive and strategic. By this game, Capcom decided to alter Ken's design far more than in Street Fighter V dropping his red gi. Takayuki Nakayama and art director Kaname Fujioka addressed this change in the character claimed that with every installment Ken's life became more stable and wanted to create a reason. When comparing the two heroes in Street Fighter II, Fujioka says "Ken as a fiery and explosive character" when compared to the serious Ryu. In the Alpha series, he was a little more playful and lighthearted in a way. Capcom wanted to contrast Ken to the new lead Luke. As a result, Capcom decided to give Ken a more serious situation in the story compared to his previous appearances as he can no longer see his family. In writing this, Capcom closely worked with Udon Entertainment to write Ken's decay. Fujioka believes the team were successful at changing Ken's character.
Gameplay Ken and Ryu shared the same moves despite their different races as a symbol of being rivals and fellow students. However, Ken was given a more competitive personality than Ryu. The special technique energy wave attack was based on the wave motion gun from the titular spacecraft in the sci-fi anime series Space Battleship Yamato, which Nishiyama watched during the seventies. Ken and Ryu's other two techniques from the first Street Fighter game, and were inspired by actual martial arts moves, which were exaggerated for the character. These three moves were reused in Street Fighter IV by master Gouken but stronger based on Kamei's desire to make the master more skilled in comparison. Ken and Ryu develop stronger versions of the Hadoken due to a desire of Akira Nishitani and Akira Yasuda in regards to the size of the move in Street Fighter II. Shoei Okano animated the new Hadoken. The Karate duo which coined the term Shotokan for sharing the same moves and similar designs. Shotokans were created in other franchises and more in Street Fighter follow ups. This includes the antagonistic Akuma, the young Sakura Kasugano and the parody character Dan Hibiki.