Balrog



Balrog, known as M. Bison or Mike Bison in Japan, is a character from the Street Fighter fighting game series.

Story
Balrog was once a great boxing champion and prize fighter. He was banned from boxing for permanently injuring his opponents and killing one (as well as his illegal maneuvers, particularly his headbutt), so he joined the Shadaloo criminal organization, and worked his way up from the bottom, eventually becoming Bison's enforcer. While running errands for M. Bison (Vega in Japan), he killed Dhalsim's elephant with a single Gigaton Punch. In one mission, Balrog was sent to terminate Birdie. Although he did not know why, Balrog went anyway. Birdie told him about the Psycho Drive, and Balrog agreed to help him find it, thinking he could make money from it. When the Psycho Drive exploded, Balrog realized that he had not been paid recently. When M. Bison was killed at the hands of Akuma, ownership of Shadaloo was transferred to the former prize fighter. Unfortunately, he ended up running the entire organization into the ground in no time. After the fall of Shadaloo, Balrog became nothing more than a bum on the streets.

Appearance
Balrog wears blue boxing trunks with white trim and a torn white shirt under a blue tank top. He wears red boxing gloves and boxing shoes. His hairstyle consists of short hair cut in an odd pointing style in the front, similar to Mike Tyson's haircuts from the time Street Fighter II was made. In certain illustrations, his Japanese name, "Bison", can be seen on the waistband of his trunks, although it's usually removed when these illustrations are published outside Japan.

Name Change
When Street Fighter II was localized in America, Capcom was afraid of a lawsuit from Mike Tyson over a character with his likeness and a similar sounding name (Mike Bison). Additionally, when the designers presented the game to Capcom USA's marketing department, they believed that the name Vega was a weakling's name. They decided to rotate the names of three of the four boss characters in the following manner:


 * The boxer is known as M. Bison in Japan and Balrog elsewhere.
 * The Spanish assassin/bullfighter is known as Balrog in Japan and Vega elsewhere.
 * The evil dictator and head of Shadaloo is known as Vega in Japan and M. Bison elsewhere.

In Other Media
In Street Fighter II: The Animated Movie, he is portrayed close to his original role in the games, which is largely as dumb-muscle for Bison. He is voiced by Joe Romersa in the English dub and George Nakata in the Japanese version.

In the 1994 live action film he was portrayed by Grand L. Bush and was one of the good guys, more specifically the camera-man in Chun-Li's news-crew. Like the other members (Chun-Li and Honda) Balrog held a grudge against Shadaloo for ruining his boxing career. Near the end of the film he dons his regular outfit from the games. In the 1995, animated series, Street Fighter, he is a scientist for Bison, with his storyline intact. He is voiced by Paul Dobson.