Boxing is one of the most historic and popular sports of all time and it's smooth transition to Video Games hasn't gone unnoticed, especially when you take into account the amount of charismatic and hard hitting characters that have been conceived. It has been used as a fighter's style of choice in a number of popular and iconic 2D and 3D fighting games since the genre's birth. In fact the first game to include fist fighting was arcade game Heavyweight Champ in 1976.
In 2013 we gave recognition to some of the best boxers in video game history but regrettably the list was incomplete and was missing several boxers from the video game world, fortunately we have redeemed ourselves and updated the list with some of the most baddest mofos in video game's fictional boxing circuit.
Street Fighter series
The Street Fighter series has featured quite a few black characters but in total three of them have been boxers. Mike is a non-playable character from the first Street Fighter game one of the ten CPUs challengers. He's a heavyweight boxer who battles before Mt. Rushmore. He was kicked out of boxing because he ended somebody's life.
Many people think that he's the black fighter that was knocked down in the intro to Street Fighter II by what fans consider to be Joe. Mike is also believed to have been Balrog (whose Japanese name is Mike Bison). Capcom, however, because of lawsuit issues, have been very insistent that they were always meant to be two different characters.
In 1991 Capcom introduced their second boxer, a man who rose from a childhood of poorness. At one time Balrog was a prominent boxing champ and prize fighter. He was banned from boxing for permanently injuring his opposition and unintentionally killing one (as well as his prohibited tactics, specially his headbutt), so he joined the Shadaloo criminal organization and climbed the ladder to success in the company, in time becoming M. Bison's chief enforcer.
Balrog is a huge black man with large red boxing gloves. Distinctly his name in Japan was M. Bison, an unmistakable play off of real life boxer Mike Tyson. In Capcom's tie-in comic he is soundly beat by Ryu, who then states that a combatant who disregards his entire lower physical structure and two of his limbs has zero right to call himself a martial artist.
Dudley from Street Fighter III is a British boxer who's a 'British Gentleman', although he has a couple unconventional boxing techniques up his sleeves. He's never been seen without his tremendous large blue boxing gloves and is potentially based on real-life Black British boxer Chris Eubank.
Other Fighting Game series
Soon after many other video game companies would follow suit and produce some hard hitters to represent their initial fighting game rosters, most noticeably SNK who have produced a quite few boxing characters including a legit Mike Tyson clone.
Nintendo's Punch-out!! Series also created a few bad-ass boxers including their most famed fighter Little Mac, who is the main protagonist of the series.
T.J Combo from Killer Instinct is an expy of Balrog from Street Fighter II. Although in the reboot of Killer Instinct, he's much more of a mixed martial artist, adding holds and strong kicks to his array of moves.In the first game, Tj combo at once time was the undisputed heavyweight champion of the world for five consecutive years. He was stripped of his title for his use of cybernetic enhancements in his arms, he fights to regain his fame and fortune.
Steve Fox made his debut in Tekken 4, and he has returned for every future title in the Tekken series. Steve is a well mannered and gentle-manlike individual who's primary inspiration is to fight in the ring.
Join us as we countdown 10 of the baddest boxers of all time in and outside of the virtual four sided square ring of video games. These chosen fighters carry dominance, mainstream appeal and have achieved legendary status. There are a lot of boxers in video games, from KOF all the way up to street Fighter, but just who's the baddest? Find out below.
