Samurai Shodown is getting a 3rd season which fans of the series are joyed over. But who will be joining the roaster? While we don’t know what SNK has got planned Eventhubs.net does have an idea as to who we might see. You can see who below.
Cham Cham
By far the main pick for Season 3, Cham Cham stands out as an extremely popular character who simply ended up facing a bad matchup — namely the fact that Mina Majikina and Iroha were both slightly more popular.
The first season of DLC was obviously decided upon before the poll results were final and while SNK had a fairly good read on who to add (you can find the top 20 placers in said poll here), it’s inevitable that a few characters will slip through the cracks, though in at least Mina and Iroha’s case it was probably knowingly so.
Whether Cham Cham’s popularity took the developers by surprise or not, the fact of the matter is that she didn’t make the cut for the first pass, likely losing out to Rimururu since they’re a similar archetype as far as character and personality go, and they felt forced to include Mina and Iroha in the second pass since they hit 1st and 2nd, respectively.
That makes it the prime time now for Cham Cham to enter the fray, seeing as she is the highest placer (fourth overall) who isn’t currently in the roster. On top of this, her main relation in Samurai Shodown, Tam Tam, is already there which gives her an anchor to attach herself to as far as plot relevance goes, though I’d honestly say that “wait, what are you doing here?” becomes kind of a moot question once Warden showed up on the character select screen.
As for Cham Cham as a character, she’s very primal much like her older brother, though as you may expect from her appearance she’s also more cutesy, appearing more like a cat than the feral beast Tam Tam portrays. When unarmed, she will walk on all fours and her taunts see her adopting catlike mannerisms like stretching herself out or scratching her ear with her leg. In short, you may as well think of her as SNK’s Felicia (though I must stress that she appeared only two months after Felicia’s debut with Darkstalkers, so it’s unlikely to be any form of plagiarism in play).
She fights with a boomerang which she can throw away and stay unarmed until it returns, though she’s fairly adept at unarmed combat so it doesn’t leave her at an entire disadvantage. This means she plays a game similar to the recently added Gongsun Li in some aspects, namely that she has to balance using her weapon and being without it, which is fairly rare in the Samurai Shodown reboot.
She also has a monkey with her called Paku Paku, who is actually Tam Tam himself who ended up being cursed for failing in his mission. No, I’m not making that up. Fighting game stories used to be way crazier back then, I’ll tell you what.
Princess Suzu (Suzuhime)
Suzu is an odd pick but a somewhat likely one since she’ll practically function doubly as a brand new character to the Samurai Shodown series but also one with an established fanbase who have asked for her. She comes from the highly unpopular Samurai Shodown Sen from 2008 in which SNK decided to remake the series into a Soul Calibur clone to disastruous results.
Despite the game being reviled across the board, the main protagonist Suzu still managed to amass quite a large amount of fans, as evidenced by her ending up in 7th overall in the official poll (and out of characters who aren’t in the roster yet, she’s 2nd right behind Cham Cham). Quite a feat for someone from a game that’s looked as an absolute disaster by the fanbase at large.
Given the radically different gameplay and approach to the series that Samurai Shodown Sen had this also gives them ample opportunity to rework Suzu as a true Samurai Shodown character, bringing people the best of both worlds with a beloved design and personality but also adapated to what fans want from Samurai Shodown as a series.
Storywise, Suzu is a princess from a foreign country who ended up orphaned and washed ashore in Japan, where she was adopted and raised. She wields quite a large sword and does big, extensive swings with it, making her go against the playstyle archetype you may expect from just looking at her. Getting a new slow-paced heavy hitter in the form of Suzu would be interesting to say the least, and I’m hopeful that SNK take her large popularity into account and decide to take a chance on her again.
Neinhalt Sieger
The dude has a gigantic metal arm he whacks you with. That should be enough for you.
… No? Okay, let’s get into Neinhalt as a character, then. This guy originated in Samurai Shodown 2 and is from the Kingdom of Prussia which spanned across the majority of Europe, though given his name it’d be fair to say by today’s views that he’s a German character.
Deliberately made to appeal to overseas players with his raw power and to female players by virtue of the macho traits developers infused in his character, he actually ended up being a highly popular character in SNK’s native Japan when all was said and done.
Despite having very few appearances in the series, he ended up placing in 8th overall (3rd of the characters not yet in the roster) clearly showing that he made a significant impact upon players even with his limited screentime.
While you may think a character like this seems out of place in a samurai game, you’ll hopefully change your mind once you see him make a fiery explosion which takes the form of a beautiful woman. That’s right — strength and style, Neinhalt has it all.
Genan Shiranui
The sole alumni from the original first Samurai Shodown game to not be in the roster of the new one, Genan Shiranui (no relation) is definitely a character you’d remember if you played it. He’s a sneaky ninja who employs gas, fire, claws and strange kicks which he can chain together to overpower his opponent.
Genan is without a doubt a comic relief character, extremely full of himself but quickly retreating at the first sign of resistance and even has a strange habit of parodying Haohmaru in his win poses and story.
Although he definitely seems like a no-good villain, and maybe even wants to be one as well, he’s actually a devoted family man who simply wants to take care of his wife and children above all else.
An ongoing gimmick with the character is that he encounters characters from other SNK series (Fatal Fury and Art of Fighting) in his endings, further cementing his status as a joke character.
To be honest, there isn’t really much in the way of Genan in the roster right now, with the majority of characters being varying degrees of deathly serious. I think there’s ample area to have someone who’s just a riot of laughter as well, especially since his gameplay is unique enough and he’s been in the series from the very start.
He ended up being shelved back in the older games, but so was the entire series for over 10 years. Now that Samurai Shodown has been brought back from the grave, so should Genan and his wacky antics be. It’s clear that fans want him back since he managed to reach 9th place (4th out of characters not yet in the roster) in the official poll as well.
Shiro Tokisada Amakusa
Okay, so saying that Genan was the sole alumni from the very first game was a slight misrepresentation but not entirely untrue. Shiro Tokisada Amakusa is also from the very first Samurai Shodown game, though he wasn’t a playable fighter (except in some console versions) but was the game’s boss character.
His flamboyant personality and fantastic moveset solidified him as a highly popular character, and from Samurai Shodown III onwards became a regular fighter who was present in the cast of every main game from thereon out. He was popular enough to end up in 11th (6th out of characters not yet in the roster) place in SNK’s official poll.
Although the current Samurai Shodown technically takes place before the first game, we have tons of characters who shouldn’t have showed up yet despite this (such as Shizumaru and the Kazama brothers) which makes it a weak argument to keep Amakusa out. It becomes even weaker when Amakusa was eventually added to the Samurai Shodown V Special and Perfect rosters, which take place even further in the past than the current game does.
A highly charismatic villain, Amakusa is based on a historical figure of the same name who lived in Japan during the 1600s and was a Roman Catholic who rose up against the Japanese shogunate.
As is the case with the vast majority of villains in the Samurai Shodown series, Amakusa was resurrected and possessed by the evil spirit Ambrosia and was sent to bring destruction upon the world.
Through later titles in the game, Amakusa’s soul is split up in good and evil halves, with the good Amakusa staying in the roster. Although he still retains narcissistic tendencies and his flamboyant nature, he’s a much more caring person than he used to be during his boss battle days.
Whichever version of Amakusa SNK decide to go with (it’d likely be the evil boss guy given the timeline), he’s a fantastic character who really shines on the screen whenever he’s present and undoubtedly lives on fonldy in many fans’ memories.
Amakusa fights by using mystical powers and has the ability to both levitate and teleport, as well as summon fiery attacks at will. His main weapon is his gem (kind of looks like a crystal ball) which he also has levitate during battle. Due to this, he can be a very long-range fighter if need be and harrass his opponents with the gem.
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