Highlights

  • Diversity is necessary in the world of gaming, as it allows for the expansion and evolution of popular franchises.
  • Fighting games rely heavily on diverse characters to appeal to different audiences, including the LGBTQ+ community.
  • Many fighting games have featured LGBTQ+ characters, offering representation and opportunities for players to connect with characters that reflect their own identities.

Despite some gamers' complaints about “diversity,” it’s necessary for the media to press forward. Without it, Final Fantasy would still be aping Dragon Quest. Every Mario game would be a 2D side-scrolling platformer. And every fighting game would still look like International Karate+, with identical karate men in different colors.

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In fact, fighters perhaps depend on diversity the most. They need big rosters of interesting characters to appeal to different audiences. With LGBTQ+ no longer being dirty letters, the genre has had a few characters representing each initial over the years. These are just some LGBTQ+ characters in fighting games worth taking pride in.

Updated September 13, 2023 by David Heath: 2023 has been a strong year for fighting games, with Street Fighter 6 wowing fans in the summer, and Mortal Kombat 1 due to tide them over for the rest of the year before Tekken 8 starts 2024 off with a bang. That's without mentioning King of Fighters 15, Granblue Fantasy: Versus Rising, Guilty Gear Strive, and more.

Each of them has brought a broad range of fighting game characters, each with a wide variety of playstyles, designs, and backstories to appeal to people. But they're not just looking for the cis and the straights. There are more out and proud LGBTQ+ characters around than people realize, and they've now been added to the list for players to seek out.

14 Eagle (Street Fighter)

LGBTQ+ Fighting Game Characters- Eagle

Street Fighter 1’s Eagle was originally based on Petrov, the suited fighter from Bruce Lee’s The Chinese Connection (aka Fist of Fury). There wasn’t a lot to him beyond his escrima sticks. Thus, when Capcom dusted him off for Capcom Vs SNK 2, they decided to spice his character up by making him gay, albeit somewhat subtly.

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The biggest clues were in his win quotes and ending, where he mentions being immune to Morrigan’s charms, and literally checking out the competition. His expanded escrima stick move set made him fun to play, even when he got to return in Street Fighter Alpha 3 Upper. It would be nice to see him come back for Street Fighter 6, but after 20 years, it feels unlikely.

13 Juri (Street Fighter)

street fighter 6 juri leak

Juri Han became an instant hit on her debut in Super Street Fighter 4. Despite being a chaotic evil, Tae Kwon Do-using punk, there was a sad side to her that made her sympathetic under the psycho act. It's why the other SF characters, notably Chun-Li, keep offering her ways to reform. But she's the embodiment of the phrase "be gay, do crimes."

While she's generally bisexual, mixing flirts with threats to everyone, she leans more towards women than men. She's worked off-screen with Crimson Viper, keeps getting in Cammy and Chun-Li's faces, and had "big breasts" cited as one of her Likes on her original SSF4 profile. Chances are, in the rare event that she ever settled down, it would be with another woman.

12 Marisa (Street Fighter)

LGBTQ+ Fighting Game Characters- Marisa

If Juri is a little too scary, SF6 has a new character who's less intimidating, despite being a mountain of muscle. Marisa is an Italian who claims Greek descent and practices pankration. Outside the ring, she’s a jewelry designer who likes art. Inside it, according to a behind-the-scenes video, she uses combat to show “her affection for both men and women in her own special way”. In the early days, people thought it was just a creative description of her heart-shaped punches.

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Yet Arcade Mode shows her having a tender moment with Manon and an amorous one with Zangief. Then one of her World Tour missions sees the player help her decide between a male and a female fiancée, only for her to settle on both and invite the player to be a third. With her willingness to share her heart with anyone regardless of gender, she may be the genre's first polyamorous pansexual.

11 Kung Jin (Mortal Kombat)

LGBTQ+ Fighting Game Characters- Kung Jin

SF isn’t the only series to feature LGBTQ+ characters. Mortal Kombat X introduced the “Kombat Babies,” the younger relatives of classic characters. Sonya and Johnny Cage had their daughter Cassie. Jax had his daughter Jacqui. Kenshi gave Scorpion a student in Takeda. Then Kung Lao had a nephew in Kung Jin, who happened to be openly gay.

It is revealed in a scene with Raiden, where he recruits the wayward youth into the White Lotus (“They care only about what is in your heart, not whom your heart desires”). However, he couldn’t quite stand out over his fellow youngsters, going MIA from Mortal Kombat 11. Whether he’ll appear in Mortal Kombat 1 is up in the air, but since it’s another reboot, the chances are low.

10 Mileena & Tanya (Mortal Kombat)

LGBTQ+ Fighting Game Characters- Mileena Tanya

Wholesome moments are rare in MK and rarer still among its villains. Mileena’s a monster clone of Kitana that likes to eat people alive. Tanya’s an Edenian who’ll betray anyone to get ahead. They’ve both flirted with guys, including Kung Jin (“Barking up the wrong tree, sister!”). Then, when Mileena came back for MK11, she gained a new dimension to her character. She wanted to avenge her death in MKX (she got better), and the death of Tanya.

She wasn’t just an aide to Mileena’s claim to Outworld’s throne, but her lover too. When she takes over the Hourglass in her Arcade ending, she rewrites history to revive Tanya and rule the Realms as queens with their child. For two bloodthirsty killers, it’s a surprisingly heartwarming ending. The relationship even got carried over to Mortal Kombat 1 as an affair between the heir to Outworld's throne and her Umgadi guardian.

9 Venom (Guilty Gear)

LGBTQ+ Fighting Game Characters- Venom

The Guilty Gear series is one of the more open fighting games in terms of sexuality and identity. I-No is like Juri in her flirty attitude towards every gender. Elphelt skips the flirting in favor of marriage proposals. Kum Haehyun and Justice are women in otherwise butch-looking robot shells. Venom, a gay Egyptian armed with a cue and billiard balls, feels grounded by comparison.

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Debuting in Guilty Gear X, Venom had an unrequited love for Zato-One, the leader of the Assassin’s Guild, and did all he could to serve him. When Zato died in Guilty Gear XX, Venom took it hard and took it out on Zato’s killer and former lover Millia Rage. If anyone was expecting a love triangle with queer elements in a video game, they probably weren’t expecting it in a 2D fighter. He's since settled down with Ky Kiske's mechanical doppelganger Robo-Ky.

8 Bridget (Guilty Gear)

Guilty Gear Strive Bridget

That said, when people think of Guilty Gear and the LGBTQ+, they likely think of Bridget. She was one of a set of twins, and assigned male at birth. Her superstitious townsfolk believed twin boys were a bad omen, so to save Bridget from being killed or exiled, her parents claimed she was born as a girl and raised her as such.

Her parents felt bad for seemingly making her live a lie, so she thought becoming a successful male bounty hunter would make her parents feel better. However, by Guilty Gear Strive, she learned she was pretending to be something she wasn't. Her parents didn’t have to be guilty because they lucked in on the truth: Bridget is a trans girl, and happy to be one.

7 Testament (Guilty Gear)

LGBTQ+ Fighting Game Characters- Testament

Many people have roundabout journeys like Bridget's in finding their identities. However, others wish it had less focus on fiction in favor of the character's other dimensions. Like there's more to them than their identity. Which is what happened with Testament. Before Strive, they looked like a masculine goth and used he/him pronouns. Afterward, they got a more feminine, Zatanna-ish look.

Their "new" status didn’t play a part in their role as the Gear getting past their anti-human bias either. It was just a background detail. According to Daisuke Ishiwatari, “They’ve transcended human existence.” Since gender is a human construct and not one recognized by Gears, Testament doesn't follow it. Humans may call Testament non-binary, but to them, they're just being themselves no matter the label.

6 Mai Natsume (BlazBlue)

LGBTQ+ Fighting Game Characters- Mai Natsume

Bridget may be GG’s first trans character, but it took ten years between her last appearance in 2012’s Guilty Gear XX Accent Core Plus R and her return as DLC for Strive for that to be confirmed. For most of that time, fans thought Bridget was a femboy rather than just plain femme. BlazBlue decided to be less ambiguous with the character Mai Natsume.

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Making their playable debut in 2015’s BlazBlue Centralfiction, Mai used to be a nondescript male who had trouble socializing as the heir to the noble Hazuki family. But then a grimoire turned her into a woman. In this new form, she got more confident, made new friends, and began enjoying life more. She had highs and lows throughout her journey, but she ultimately realized she was always a woman at heart, and her friends accepted her as such.

5 Makoto Nanaya (BlazBlue)

LGBTQ+ Fighting Game Characters- Makoto BlazBlue

BlazBlue has been compared to its sister series Guilty Gear since day one, right up to the point where it was considered a temporary replacement while that series was in legal limbo. However, once people gave it a go, they'd soon find out it was a different beast entirely. One similarity might be in that the spear-wielding trans woman Mai and bisexual squirrel girl Makoto feel ordinary next to whatever Arakune is.

Debuting as a playable character in BlazBlue: Continuum Shift, she was racially abused since childhood for being a beastkin. But she found solace in her friends Noel and Tsubaki, remaining chirpy and cheery. Her sexuality came to light when series creator Toshimichi Mori tried but couldn't convincingly portray Tsubaki as a lesbian. So, to fill the gap, he made Makoto as a fun-loving bisexual who has a crush on a man (Naoto) while being flirty towards women like Mai and co.

4 Katalina & Belial (Granblue Fantasy: Versus)

LGBTQ+ Fighting Game Characters- Katalina Belial Granblue Fantasy Versus

While BlazBlue and Guilty Gear have had their fair share of LGBTQ+ characters, they face a new challenger in Granblue Fantasy Versus. Starting off, it has two different bisexual characters. Katalina Aryze, the guardian of Lyria, inadvertently attracts Lowain, Farrah, and Vira. Though she isn't open about it, the only one she likes back is Vira, who's devoted to her.

Then one of the game's antagonists, Belial, is a fallen angel who likes to stoke chaos wherever he goes. Basically, if anyone's familiar with Marvel's Loki, they know Belial's archetype. Like that demigod, while he may be more for thinking with his head than his heart, Belial's heart is attracted to both men and women.

3 Yuel (Granblue Fantasy: Versus)

GBVS Beginners Yuel about to release her Skybound Art

The problem with a lot of media is that they often like to tease a character's sexuality rather than state it outright. King of Fighters' King and Street Fighter's Cammy have made fans' tongues wag about their leanings. But King got settled as heterosexual, and Capcom's still teasing with Cammy. So, who can put the "L" in "LGBTQ" here? Enter Yuel, a treasure hunter who seeks a way to restore her family's royal lineage.

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She's often seen with her childhood friend Societte, the demure, shy type to Yuel's tomboy. The two have gone on dates, bought each other gifts, and even have the same ideas. Like when they tried to prank each other into swimming together for longer by hiding their clothes. The game shies away from using the "L" word, but thus far they're the only women in fighting games to have a romantic relationship with each other.

2 Ladiva (Granblue Fantasy: Versus)

Cagliostro and Ladiva in GranBlue Fantasy

Granblue Fantasy: Versus has also had trans characters, like the DLC character Cagliostro. She was born a boy but used her alchemy to make herself a female body to get around her terminal illness. But when people think of the game and transgender characters, they think of Ladiva, who's a more complex take on the trope. At first, she seems like a stereotype, like a delicate Zangief (who's also rumored to be gay but hasn't been confirmed as such).

But she's never treated like a joke. She's more of a wholesome character, using her size and wrestling moves to defend her younger siblings at the orphanage. Cagliostro offered her the chance to gain a more feminine form via her alchemy, but she refused because she saw her beefier form as a gift from her parents. Even if it doesn't help her "pass," it helps her protect her loved ones, who are more important to her than satisfying closed minds.

1 Leo (Tekken)

LGBTQ+ Fighting Game Characters- Leo Kliesen

Last but not least, there's Tekken 6's baji quan expert Leo Kliesen. Hailing from Germany, their life was turned upside down when their mother was killed by an unknown assailant, and the police refused to investigate. So, they decided to do the police's job for them, seeking answers from their mom’s boss Kazuya Mishima.

Leo left fans wanting to know whether they were a pretty man or a masculine woman. Sure, they were born “Eleonora,” and could be dressed in a bikini in Tekken Tag Tournament 2. But they could also be dressed in male swimwear. They wore masculine clothes by default right up to Tekken 8 and used masculine German phrases. Ultimately, Bandai-Namco settled the matter before T6 was released and has stuck to their guns: Leo's non-binary, and will stay as such.

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