Sodom (Final Fight)

General CVG character
name=Sodom


caption=Sodom in "Street Fighter Alpha 3", as drawn by Bengus.
series="Final Fight" series, "Street Fighter" series
firstgame="Final Fight"
artist=Akiman
voiceactor=Wataru Takagi
japanactor=
inuniverse=Street Fighter character
birthplace=flagicon|USA United States of America
fightingstyle=Self-taught martial arts
likes=Collecting various Japanese items
dislikes=Guy
specialskill=Water performances, driving big trucks
affiliation=Mad Gear

nihongo|Sodom|ソドム|Sodomu is a video game character from the "Final Fight" and "Street Fighter" series. He was a top member of the original Mad Gear gang. A caucasian male born in the United States, Sodom is obsessed with Japanese culture. He is well-versed in many elements of Japanese culture, though his usage of the language is somewhat dubious.

In the English-language localization of "Final Fight" for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System and Sega CD, Sodom was renamed Katana. The name change was repeated in the SNES version of "Street Fighter Alpha 2" to maintain consistency. The initial namechange was likely sparked by its close resemblance to the words sodomy, or Sodom and Gomorrah, from the Christian Bible.

Appearances

Sodom made his first appearance in the beat-em-up "Final Fight" (vgy|1989) as the boss of the second stage. In his backstory, Sodom is an undefeated underground wrestler and promoter working for Mad Gear who challenges opponents in a wrestling ring hidden within the subway of Metro City.

Sodom would re-emerge in the "Street Fighter" franchise in "Street Fighter Alpha" (vgy|1995) and its sequels, "Street Fighter Alpha 2" (vgy|1996) and "Street Fighter Alpha 3" (vgy|1998). In the storyline of the "Alpha" sub-series, Sodom seeks to rebuilt the Mad Gear Gang under his new leadership by defeating his old nemesis Guy (also from "Final Fight"). In his ending in the original "Alpha", he gathers some of the other former members of the gang (including Rolento, who appears in both "Alpha" sequels as a fighter), only to be ridiculed by his Mad Gear peers due to the new name he chosen. In "Alpha 2", he travels to Japan, seeking new members for his gang and finds himself in a Sumo ring, where he is challenged by Edmond Honda. In "Alpha 3", he finds himself involved against M. Bison's criminal organization Shadaloo and ends up destroying his Bison's base (along with the "Psycho Drive" machine) by driving his truck into it. Over the course of the series, what remains is the deep respect he has towards Rolento and Guy as warriors.

Sodom also appears in "Final Fight Revenge" (vgy|1999), a 3D fighting game spinoff of the original "Final Fight". The story is set shortly after the original "Final Fight" and around the same time period as the first two "Alpha" games.

Characteristics

Sodom wears tabi and geta, samurai gauntlets, blue jeans, body armor, and a samurai kabuto with a mask. On the front of his outfit, Sodom has scrawled the Japanese kanji "shi" (死), meaning "death". However, this kanji is not written properly, and actually has no meaning. Sodom's failed attempt at Japanese calligraphy emblazoned across his chest at all times is meant to be humorous. He is never seen fighting without a pair of jutte or katana blades, making him one of the few characters to appear in the "Street Fighter" series to use weaponry. In "Final Fight", his Katana blades are referred as "Muramasa".

In the "Street Fighter Alpha" games, Sodom is an American character trying to speak Japanese, he is a comedic object of ridicule in his failed attempts at the language. In the Japanese version of "Street Fighter Alpha", Sodom's inability to speak fluent Japanese is portrayed in his win quotes by having him use English words that are pronounced similarly to whatever Japanese words he's trying to say with a Japanese translation below. For example, his attempt to call his opponent "truly pathetic" in Japanese is rendered to "SHOW SEA SEND BANG", which is somewhat close to what he's trying to actually say (Shoushi senban): this can be somewhat likened to a reverse version of ateji. American releases, however, show Sodom's misheard wordings of Japanese words, but with loose romanizations of what he was trying to say.

In his "Street Fighter Alpha" ending, Sodom unfurls a scroll that is meant to read "Mad Gear", using Japanese script. However, the humor lies that Sodom failed to write the scroll in katakana, and instead used the kanji "魔"-(ma), "奴"-(do), "義"-(gi) (miswritten) and "亜"-(a) to phonetically spell out "Mado Gia" (Mad Gear). Because each kanji has meaning, this appears to the Japanese reader to be a nonsensical coupling of characters: "devil", "guy", "honor", and "to come after" as in a rank or position. "亜" can also mean "Asia" or "mute."

Techniques

Sodom was notable for being fairly difficult to defeat head-on in the original "Final Fight", due to his dash attack being nearly invincible and quite damaging. However, it is possible to defeat him without actually taking any damage at all if the player approaches him along a vertical axis and uses grabbing and throwing moves, since his dash attack can only move horizontally or diagonally. Successful application of the above method can allow the player to easily defeat Sodom without harm, since he is the only boss character in "Final Fight" who does not have henchmen to back him up during battle.

In the first two "Street Fighter Alpha" games, Sodom uses a pair of jitte as weapons instead of his katana blades from "Final Fight". However in "Street Fighter Alpha 3", if the player plays as Sodom in X-ism mode, then Sodom will use his katana blades from "Final Fight" instead of the jitte.

Sodom's "Alpha" techniques have names which are pairings of Japanese and English words, such as "Jigoku Scrape", "Butsumetsu Buster" and "Daikyo Burning". His is not considered a particularly good character in the game by any standard.

Promotion and Reception

For Capcom's 15th anniversary of "Street Fighter", SOTA Toys released a series of action figures, amongst which was Sodom. The figure was fully posable with 16 points of articulation, and modeled after his "Street Fighter Alpha" appearance. [ [http://www.toymania.com/columns/spotlight/sotasf1.shtml Series 1 Street Fighter Action Figures] . Toymania. Retrieved on 2008-07-02]

External links

* [http://strategywiki.org/wiki/Street_Fighter_Alpha/Characters/Sodom Sodom's Street Fighter Alpha] entry at [http://strategywiki.org/ StrategyWiki.org]