Seth

"Power only has meaning if it's put into action... it defines you. Power like that is what rules the world."

- - Seth during his fight with Ryu in the Street Fighter IV movie .

Seth (セス) is the main villain of the Street Fighter IV series. He is the C.E.O. of Shadaloo's weapon division, S.I.N. According to the official Street Fighter website, Seth is one of many genetically engineered replacement bodies for M. Bison.

Appearance
Bearing chrome skin and an extremely muscular physique, Seth is a synthetic human that lacks clothing or hair; whether he is an android or cyborg is unclear. In his abdomen, enclosed inside a pattern consisting of the Eight Trigrams of Taoist cosmology, is an exposed area, which contains a rotating sphere known as the Tanden Engine, which appears to be the source of his power.

Concept
Seth is named after Seth Killian, the former senior manager of community at Capcom who runs the website Capcom-Unity.com. He was originally named Cain, in contrast to Abel.

Abel and Cain were the first sons of Adam and Eve. Abel was later killed by Cain. Adam and Eve then gave birth to Seth, who was considered a replacement of Abel, preserving the reference and explaining the correlation between the two (i.e. as replacement bodies for M. Bison).

Personality
Seth is just as intelligent as M. Bison himself, with ruthlessness and evil to match. Unlike M. Bison, Seth is generally very calm and concise, though he displays a fair bit of arrogance, often through his annoying-by-design tendency to laugh and gloat when using his more powerful moves.

Seth displays very little, if any, morality or respect for life through his lust for power, and plans to use S.I.N. to take over the world and display his superiority over humanity. Due in part to his ego, Seth will keep his subordinates in the dark in case they plan to betray him - insubordination is something he refuses to tolerate.

Seth has been shown to be well versed in philosophy, namely the philosophy of human nature and the pursuits of purpose and self-awareness. This unusual trait, coupled with his endless thirst for power, implies that Seth intends to become his own entity entirely and not be bound to M. Bison as his replacement shell. However, his desire for power and his philosophical pursuits are a one-sided and neutral affair, as he values people only for their usefulness to him.

Seth is also of the belief that any power is good power, as shown during his fight with Ryu in the animated film. In addition, he displays some form of disbelief in the mystic arts; his Arcade Mode win quote against Dhalsim states that if the latter's techniques were truly mystic, he could not possibly imitate them.

Notably, while Seth appears to be the only "sentient" enhanced being, his Arcade Mode win quote against another Seth implies that at least one other clone may have developed self-awareness.

Street Fighter IV games
Seth is the 15th of at least 26 enhanced beings that use data collected from the world warriors to create a deadly style of mixed martial arts. Seth claims to be superior as a result of his humanity, while the others are merely puppets. His storyline indicates that he plans to control the remnants of Shadaloo through S.I.N after M. Bison's apparent death at the hands of Akuma in Super Street Fighter II Turbo. He also attempts to use Juri Han, a woman who possesses the Feng Shui Engine in her left eye that his company created. She confronts him and unexpectedly offers to work for him, to which he agrees.

Seth hosts a World Warrior tournament in hopes of luring Ryu to him, and then using his Satsui no Hado to complete his BLECE project, but is dismayed at reports that M. Bison has once again returned from death. M. Bison finally encounters Seth and defeats him in combat, and afterwards tells him that in fact everything that has happened has gone according to M. Bison's plan. After M. Bison leaves, Juri tells Seth that she intentionally pitted the two against each other, but is disappointed that Seth was not more of a challenge for M. Bison. She then crushes his Tanden Engine, leaving him twitching on the floor.

He is then found by C. Viper, who finishes him off. After the tournament, C. Viper informs her superiors that the "remaining 26" are in her sights. Whether this statement takes the final bosses encountered by all characters into account is not clear; Ryu encounters what appears to be another "Seth" and defeat him, destroying the BLECE machine as well. It is possible M. Bison may have commanded the remaining "puppets" to wreak havoc on the fighters in and around the S.I.N. compound.

UDON comics
Seth appeared in UDON's Street Fighter IV comic, which focuses on the game's newcomers (himself included).

Project X Zone
Seth appears as an enemy in the crossover game, Project X Zone, where he plays a major role in the game. Seth hacked Alisa Boskonovich's systems to make her a weapon; he also took a V-Dural and mass produced it, creating 4 Dural stones. Seth also intended to destroy KOS-MOS to get her Vector technology. With the bioweapons of Resident Evil, he created clone capsules, which were Nemesis T-Type to guard it.

Seth planned to take down Juri, retrieve the Feng Shui Engine and use her body as a core for Dural; he also sought not only to copy other characters' moves in order to "become an ultimate weapon", but also to capture Ryu and Jin Kazama to use their hidden powers (the Satsui no Hado and Devil Gene) in the BLECE. However, he was defeated for good.

In the last chapter, he is revived by the Portalstone, only to be beaten once more.

Gameplay and fighting style
In Arcade Mode, Seth serves as the default final boss for all characters; as such, he is powerful enough to provide a greater challenge to them. Taunting at any point or defeating him during the first round increases the difficulty of the battle. Conversely, the playable version of Seth (i.e. #15) is significantly less powerful, and is the weakest character in the game in terms of stats and Ultra Combos.

Seth employs special powers and techniques from various combatants in the game, such as the Sonic Boom and Shoryuken. He also possesses a metamorphic body of sorts, being able to stretch his arms like Dhalsim and teleport similarly to him. Seth also puts his own "original" spin on many of the copied moves, explained below.

Some of his normal techniques are also notably similar to those of Abel, as well as Urien and Gill from Street Fighter III.

Copied Moves

 * Sonic Boom - The motion is identical to the Hadoken, but the projectile itself functions just like Guile's. Seth uses one hand for the attack, like Charlie did.
 * Shoryuken - Though it resembles Ryu Shoryuken somewhat, Seth can land up to 3 hits with follow-up motions.
 * Spinning Piledriver - Based somewhat off Zangief's version, Seth uppercuts the opponent into the air, then teleports above the opponent and piledrives them into the ground.
 * Hyakuretsukyaku - Seth does a single kick followed by a rapid flurry with his other leg if it connects.
 * Yosokyaku - While in the air, Seth kicks the opponent while upright, similar to Chun-Li, though it can be repeated three times with follow-up motions.
 * Yoga Teleport - The move is identical to Dhalsim's, and is named as such in his moverset, although he cannot use it in midair, making it slightly more similar to a Bison Warp.
 * Tenmakujinkyaku - While in the air, Seth dive kicks towards the opponent, similar to Akuma.
 * Focus Attack - A long-range tackle similar to Urien's Chariot Tackle in Street Fighter III.

The only uncopied techniques in Seth's arsenal revolve around his Tanden Engine, and seem to center around space.


 * Tanden Engine - Seth attempts to draw the opponent closer with the Tanden Engine.
 * Tanden Storm (Super Combo) - Seth produces a ball of energy that draws in his opponent and hits them repeatedly before blasting them away.
 * Tanden Stream (Ultra Combo) - Seth attempts to draw the opponent into his Engine and, if successful, ejects them into the screen.
 * Tanden Typhoon (Ultra Combo) - Seth twists his body into an arc, with his feet and head on the ground and his stomach facing upwards. He then unleashes a violent vortex diagonally upwards from his Engine.

Quotes

 * See Seth/Quotes.

Trivia

 * Seth's ability to use all of the fighters' attacks as part of his movelist seems to be inspired by the Sheng Long rumor. Sheng Long was said to have movesets from every character in the game.
 * Seth is the only character in the Street Fighter IV series, who is capable of resetting juggle.
 * Having a rather simplistic design, Seth is quite similar to some fictional characters outside the Street Fighter universe, particularly Doctor Manhattan from Watchmen, Geegus from World Heroes, the T-1000 from Terminator 2: Judgment Day, Tyrant T-103 from Resident Evil 2 and Dural from Virtua Fighter.
 * Coincidentally, he uses both Dural and Tyrants as minions in the crossover SRPG, Project X Zone.
 * The basis of Seth's design and fighting style possibility could have been based on the Shadaloo Cyborgs from the Street Fighter movie game adaptation for the home consoles as he was originally a nude cyborg whose fighting style was constructed from scanning battle data from Ryu. In one of the endings, the cyborg even wears apparel identical to that of Seth.