Sakurai Holds 45-Minute Stream To Announce Terry And Gush About SNK

Masahiro Sakurai has become something of a god to fans of the Super Smash Brothers brothers series. He has proven very responsive to fans' complaints and requests, and in Super Smash Brothers Ultimate has seemingly worked to give fans everything they ever wanted in a Smash game. Ridley, Banjo-Kazooie, Joker have all made their Smash debut, and every character who has ever appeared in the series is in the game as well. This and the game's impeccably tight mechanics have helped make Smash Ultimate the best-selling fighting game in history, and this is all thanks to Sakurai, who has remained beloved by a rabid gaming fanbase, which is no small feat.

Today, Nintendo published a video in which Sakurai discussed the latest character added to the Ultimate roster, Terry Bogard from the Fatal Fury and King of Fighters series. This has become standard practice for every DLC fighter announced thus far, but today's stream was particularly noteworthy. Whereas Sakurai usually pops in to discuss some of the new fighters' moves and mechanics, his Bogard session became a 45-minute history lesson on games in the SNK franchise and arcade fighter history.

The stream provided a fascinating look at Sakurai's love of the SNK games, as well as his process for selecting new fighters for the Smash series. The video seemed to be a counterargument to critics who were disappointed that Bogard was added to Smash ahead of other characters fans have asked for, such as Waluigi. This led to notable moments like Sakurai saying that when the original Smash debuted, people asked him who Samus was, which is unthinkable nowadays. He also stated, "It's more important that a character is fun to play, not just recognizable," which earned him praise and respect online.

For many, however, the highlight of the stream was Sakurai stating Mai Shiranui from King of Fighters wouldn't make a cameo in the game because "is a game for good boys and girls of different ages." Mai Shiranui, for those who don't know, is a notable character because of, well, two big reasons.

Twitter users absolutely ate this up, and the majority of memes coming out of the stream involved Sakurai essentially saying Shiranui was too lewd for the game.

The entire stream is a fascinating and endearing look at the creator of the Smash series, one of the few video game execs that's universally loved by fans of the game. Also you can see him absolutely crush at the game. The man is an absolute legend.