Firstly, let's take a look at his Fighter model. In the scene where he clashes with Raoh, their physiques are notably similar. As Koryu is acknowledged in the manga as Ryuken's mighty rival who is said to even surpass him, we based his design on Raoh's physique.
As we were able to get his physique from the manga, this bit was a piece of cake. On the other hand, piecing together his color scheme took much longer.
It's a lot easier to find color schemes for Fighters who have many appearances in the manga because famous scenes are included on special feature pages of the Ultimate Edition in full color.
We couldn't find any resources to indicate his color scheme. No color models of him existed in any other products of the Hokuto series at the time. For that reason, we based his appearance on the grayscale scenes of the original manga and narrowed down the color scheme from there.
Once Tetsuo Hara gave us his opinion, we ended up using a blue color scheme. As Koryu fought against Ryuken for the title of Successor, we wanted to associate the two with each other. This color scheme was set as Koryu's color scheme for all future products in the series.
Let's move on to his Secret Technique. In the original manga, Koryu unleashes his Secret Technique "Big Dipper Obliteration" at Raoh, but Roah overpowers him, crushing his fist so that he is unable to land the attack.
This was an issue. How do we implement a technique in the game that is never actually shown in the manga?
By studying his movements and speech before and after he tried to unleash the attack, we brainstormed the unique nature of it and eventually managed to create a final form for this Secret Technique. Here's what we discovered about this technique's unique characteristics:
"A self-sacrificial technique! He’s giving up his own life to take mine," observes Raoh as Koryu readies his fist.
The concept of this Secret Technique is that it's self-sacrificial. If Koryu succeeds in hitting his opponent, he also takes damage. Therefore, we made it so that upon finishing the technique, he puts his hand on his chest, gasping for breath. His HP is also reduced.
As Raoh observes, just a single attack from either Fighter could be enough to knock them out for good. As this technique is unsuccessful anyway, we decided to limit the extent of the damage that Koyru incurs.
Now, let's look at the animation of the technique. Koryu holds both his arms out in front of him. He rushes at Raoh with his hands pushing out from his chest in a crossed position. The motion of his Secret Technique makes reference to him sacrificing his life for it.
Many discussions with Tetsuo Hara and a series of revisions later, we arrived at the final idea. After Koryu traces the seven stars of Hokuto with his arms, the Death Omen Star shines. Koryu channels the power of the Seven Stars into the Death Omen Star for a symbolic finish that reflects the self-sacrificial nature of the technique.
Thanks to Tetsuo Hara's guidance and feedback, we were able to overcome the hurdle of not having enough resources to recreate Koryu.
Here's our final treat for reading this far - check out this idea for Koryu's Outfit that was created before he was implemented in the game. The Outfit debuted in December 2019 as the first ever Christmas Outfit. If you don't have it, you can still view it by tapping the Outfits icon under Fighter Details.
As this Outfit was released in the very early days of the game's launch, its association with the Christmas season is strong. What's more, it's a very fitting outfit for one who spent his life shut away in the mountains! Despite this, something wasn't quite right.
In the first draft, he's the spitting image of Santa Claus. Way too Claus for comfort. Not only did we take the motif way overboard and just recreate Santa Claus, but this design did not fit with the manga's apocalyptic theme whatsoever.
After making the design fit more with the manga's apocalyptic theme, we toned down the Santa motif, successfully completing the design. We made sure to maintain the shape of his original Outfit as seen in the manga because his ferocious size is very crucial to his design.
Draft 1 Draft 2
That wraps up today's Developer's Diary update. Stay tuned for more!
Fought with Ryuken over who would become the 63rd successor of Hokuto Shinken. Although he is said to have defeated Ryuken, he yielded the title to him, deciding to retreat to a secluded location in the mountains to seal his own powers. There, he continued to hold a vigil for the men who died in the competition for succession.
