History: Main / RyuandKen

A common trope seen in {{Fighting Game}}s, where two characters are given equal or similar abilities/appearances, and often wind up as being the main characters for the series. In some cases, the two characters may have an implicit [[TheRival rivalry]], if not outright hatred for one another. However, sometimes [[FriendlyRivalry their competitive spirits don't stop them from being friends]]. They usually are colour coded to represent RedOniBlueOni scheme.

If both characters are playable, both may be JackOfAllStats. Even if they have the same movesets, they can't be considered {{Ditto Fighter}}s, since they only emulate one other character.

In many cases, a game's Ryu And Ken are {{Shotoclone}}s; however, this is not always the case, and not every {{Shotoclone}} is a Ryu And Ken.

The Ken might later be subject to DivergentCharacterEvolution to differentiate him from the Ryu.

'''Some games will even expand the concept further with other character types: '''

* The ''Sakura'' is also similar to Ryu and Ken, but is overall smaller (usually a kid or teenager), weaker, and usually has less effective attacks. They may add new twists to the attacks to compensate, however, such as [[FragileSpeedster being faster]] or having moves that the Ryu and Ken do not. They will often be female (typically presented as the smaller but faster female counterpart to the male Ryu and Ken), though this is not a universal rule. 
* The ''Akuma'' is basically the same character type upgraded to a GameBreaker. He has the same moves, but he will move faster, hit harder, and more often than not has much higher priority for his moves ''plus'' nasty little tricks and variations added to them. They will usually be the FinalBoss or BonusBoss of the game before they are playable, and will be [[SNKBoss hard as hell to beat]].
* The ''Dan Hibiki'' is the JokeCharacter or LethalJokeCharacter version. Expect weak yet hilarious attacks.

Troperville

Tools