Street Fighter 6 To Stop Sexualizing Female Characters

Capcom will be making a conscious effort to dial back the sexualization of female characters (and perhaps male as well) in Street Fighter 6.

Capcom will be making a conscious effort to dial back the sexualization of female characters (and perhaps male as well) in Street Fighter 6.

According to leaked documents (via ResetEra) from the recent ransomware attack, Capcom wants sex appeal in its games to be equal between all genders when going forward. If a character has to be still sexualized, there should be a good reason to do so in the context of the storyline or overall narrative.

The leaked documents see Capcom admitting its own past mistakes by citing the infamous “butt slap” of R. Mika during her Critical Art in Street Fighter 5. The said animation was later removed because the developer did not want something “uncomfortable” in the game.

R. Mika though continues to be a highly sexualized character based on her design alone. If her revealing outfit can be attributed to her wrestling background, she still sandwiches her opponents between her butt cheeks which has little to do in her context. Laura, as another example, is a Brazilian jiu-jitsu expert who fights with a revealing top that barely holds together. Cammy was trained in Special Forces but fights in an awkward leotard that may as well be bodypaint.

Capcom wants to improve gender representation, particularly for females, in its games. While Street Fighter 5 does feature an incredibly diverse roster of characters, Capcom appears to be moving away from overly sexualizing chacters just for the sake of it. Street Fighter 6 can hence be expected to have new character designs, at least for the female roster which should be less revealing.

Considering that Capcom even admitted to giving female hunters in Monster Hunter World more revealing armor compared to their male counterparts, Street Fighter 6 will probably cloth their female characters better.

Street Fighter 6 was rumored to be releasing in late 2021 but internal strifes apparently pushed the sequel back by another year. Many believe this to be why Capcom announced a new season pass for Street Fighter 5 which adds Dan Hibiki, Rose, Oro, Akira, and a mysterious fifth. Capcom needs to keep the fighting community busy while it continues to work on a next-generation sequel.

Saqib is a managing editor at segmentnext.com who has halted regime changes, curbed demonic invasions, and averted at least one cosmic omnicide from the confines of his gaming chair. When not whipping his writers into ...