Mai

Mai Shiranui
Mai's Capcom-style (Capcom Groove) portrait from Capcom vs. SNK: Millennium Fight 2000 by Kinu Nishimura.
Characteristics
Species	Human
Height	5'5" (165 cm)
Weight	106 lbs (48 kg)
Eye color	Amber/Brown
Hair color	Brown
Blood type	B
Measurements	B87 / W55 / H91
Personal
First Game	Fatal Fury 2 Capcom vs. SNK: Millennium Fight 2000 (Capcom debut) Street Fighter 6 (Street Fighter debut)
Title(s)	Alluring Kunoichi
Birthdate	January 1st, 1974
Birthplace	Japan
Fighting style	Shiranui-ryuu Ninjitsu
Likes	Ornamental hairpin (kanzashi) that is a keepsake of her grandmother's, spending time with Andy, heavy metal music, zōni (Japanese soup with mochi), botamochi (Japanese rice cakes covered in azuki or sweet red bean paste)
Dislikes	Spiders
Occupation	Shiranui Ninja, main heiress of Shiranui clan
Affiliation	Team Women Fighters (co-founder, all King of Fighters titles except '99) Team Fatal Fury (The King of Fighters '99)
Rival(s)	Chun-Li (friendly)
Skills	Traditional Japanese dressmaking
Moveset	Kachō Sen, Ryuuenbu, Hissatsu Shinobi Bachi, Musasabi no Mai, Kagerou no Mai, Chou Hissatsu Shinobi Bachi, Suichou no Mai (all CvS 2, yet to be confirmed in SF6)
Alignment	Good
Status	Alive
Relationship	Hanzo Shiranui (grandfather, deceased) Unnamed grandmother Andy Bogard (love interest) Avatar (pupil)
Behind-The-Scene
Japanese voice actor(s)	Akoya Sogi (Capcom vs. SNK: Millennium Fight 2000, Capcom vs. SNK 2: Mark of the Millennium 2001, SNK vs. Capcom: SVC Chaos) Ami Koshimizu (Street Fighter 6)
English voice actor(s)	Rebecca Rose (Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves, Street Fighter 6)

"You must have been intimidated by my strength, attractiveness and beauty!"

—Mai (Capcom vs. SNK 2: Mark of the Millennium 2001)

Mai Shiranui (不知火 舞, Shiranui Mai^?) is a guest character from SNK's Fatal Fury and The King of Fighters series who is also playable in the SNK vs. Capcom series. At Summer Game Fest 2024, it was announced that she would make her debut in the Street Fighter series in the second year/season of DLC for Street Fighter 6 as she was announced alongside Elena, M. Bison and fellow Fatal Fury and KOF castmate and sometimes teammate Terry Bogard.

Biography

Appearance

• Fatal Fury
• The King of Fighters

Shinkiro's official art of Mai's outfit from Real Bout Fatal Fury Special, the basis of her outfit from the Street Fighter 6 Season 2 DLC trailer

Mai's outfit variation in the New Age Saga games of The King of Fighters games, with its flower patterns used as her outfit in the Street Fighter 6 Season/Year 2 DLC trailer. Render originate from The King of Fighters XV.

Mai is fair-skinned with long, waist-length brown hair tied into a ponytail in a tight and high topknot style with parted bangs. She has many admirers (both in-game and in real life) due to her face and figure. According to an issue of Neo Geo Freak, Mai's breasts were modeled after Fumie Hosokawa's while her bottom was modeled after that of the late Ai Iijima. Both women were famous idols by the time she debuted.

Her famous outfit is a red and white traditional Shiranui kunoichi (female ninja) dress with red tassels at the back fastened to an obi around her waist and forming a pelvic curtain at the front. Most of the time, she also has circular white ropes secured around her shoulders, with red and black colored tabi for footwear. However, in the SF6 Season 2 DLC trailer including in her portrait at the end, she appears as she does in Real Bout Fatal Fury Special – the ropes around her shoulders are not present, her heels and toes are exposed and her fingerless gloves are black. Furthermore, her outfit in the trailer has floral patterns that are seen in her appearances in New Age Saga King of Fighters games (The King of Fighters XIV and XV and also the spin-off SNK Heroines: Tag Team Frenzy). She also usually uses a traditional white Kachō Sen or "butterfly fan" as her primary weapon, which she can also use as a projectile.

Personality

Mai is a very cheerful and temperamental girl skilled in stealth, climbing and the use of fans in combat and with power over fire. She tends to also be somewhat of an airhead and admires any kind of beauty or attractiveness, which sometimes comes across as being vain. She is actually a classic Japanese beauty, known as a Yamato Nadeshiko, but her pride as a Shiranui ninja and her infatuation with Andy Bogard – her self-styled fiancé – usually keep her from fitting the mold completely. She can also cook – her specialty is Japanese bento, but she can also make osechi (traditional Japanese dishes for New Year).

Concept

Mai's nickname of the Alluring Kunoichi or Alluring Ninja Girl (魅惑|みわく Miwaku no Kunoichi) dates back to at least The King of Fighters XIII and KOF Maximum Impact 2. She was also originally not included in Fatal Fury 2, but when SNK developers decided to include an idol character, they utilized a fighting style for a male ninja for her. Her characteristic "bounce" was loosely modified from a kunoichi method of assassination: to be sensual to their unassuming prey before they strike.

In an interview, current Capcom designer/artist and famous SNK designer/artist Shinkiro said that Mai was the most difficult character to illustrate, commenting, "I thought she was going to burst out of her costume..."

Character Relationships

Terry

"I can't bear Andy not being here for much longer!!"

—Mai

"He's got his plate full with other things. And you can stop hitting me while you're at it!"

—Terry

(Corresponding Japanese version character-specific win quotes as teammates from Capcom vs. SNK 2: Mark of the Millennium 2001)

Mai is friendly to her boyfriend's brother, though sometimes she will be demanding to him whenever Andy is nowhere to be found.

As for Terry, he looks after her, being his brother's girlfriend, as well as a longtime ally. She has only officially been on Team Fatal Fury with him, Andy and Joe Higashi once, though, in The King of Fighters '99.

Chun-Li

Kinu Nishimura's official art of Mai, Chun-Li, Sakura and Yuri Sakazaki (Art of Fighting 2) for Capcom vs. SNK 2: Mark of the Millennium 2001.

"I'm glad that our team is brimming with fellow beauties."

—Mai

"I suppose so, especially with how it's an easy win after our opponents' eyes are led astray."

—Chun-Li

(Corresponding Japanese version character-specific win quotes as teammates from Capcom vs. SNK 2: Mark of the Millennium 2001)

Mai and Chun-Li are often featured together in official Capcom vs. SNK art considering that they respectively are SNK's and Capcom's original and most iconic female fighting game characters. Character-specific win quotes with her as a teammate or opponent (exclusive to CvS and CvS 2's Japanese versions) indicate that Mai respects Chun-Li's beauty but does not want to be outdone.

The two were also compared in media and online before Mai was announced for Street Fighter 6, including in the following:

• In June 2002, French magazine Hardcore Gamers compared the two in a spread.
• In June 2003, Frederick Badlissi of Diehard Gamefan remarked that one of the appeals of Capcom vs. SNK was "The question of 'anatomic supremacy' between Mai Shiranui’s breasts (the 'North') and Chun-Li’s thighs (the 'South') would finally be answered."
• In 2011, Rooster Teeth pitted the two against each other in Episode 16 of their Death Battle YouTube video series.

Blue Mary

Blue Mary is one of Mai's best friends, as Mai and Andy usually have double dates on vacations with Mary and Terry. In the King of Fighters series, Mary took Mai's place on Team Women Fighters when Mai joined Team Fatal Fury in The King of Fighters '99. They have only been teammates once in The King of Fighters 2003.

Story

Fatal Fury Series

Mai first appears in Fatal Fury 2 as the only woman to enter the new King of Fighters tournament held by a mysterious nobleman. The nobleman is revealed to be Wolfgang Krauser von Stroheim, who has been searching for the person who defeated Geese Howard.

It is also revealed in her background information here that she met and fell in love with Andy when she met him while he was training under her grandfather Hanzo.

The King of Fighters Series

Mai is the one of the founders alongside Yuri Sakazaki and King, both from Art of Fighting 2, of Team Heroines (also known as the Women's Team or Team Women Fighters), which competed for England in the original King of Fighters title, The King of Fighters '94. She also has led the team in two KOF games: The King of Fighters 2000 and non-canonically The King of Fighters 2002.

Most of her, Yuri and King's teammates over the years on this team are female fighters who are either from South Town or someone related to those who are famous in that city, with the exception of Chizuru, Hinako and Athena:

• Kasumi Todoh (Art of Fighting 3: The Path of the Warrior)
• Chizuru Kagura
• Mary "Blue Mary" Ryan (Fatal Fury 3: Road to the Final Victory)
• Li Xiangfei (Real Bout Fatal Fury 2: The Newcomers)
• Hinako Shijo
• May Lee Jinju [non-canon in 2002]
• Alice Garnet Nakata (Garou Densetsu: The Legend of Wild Wolf)
• Athena Asamiya (Psycho Soldier)

Street Fighter 6

Arcade Mode

Mai: TBA

TBA

World Tour

TBA

Quotes

Mai/Quotes

Gallery

Mai/Gallery

Trivia

• Street Fighter is the second fighting game/series where Mai is a guest character, after the Dead or Alive series via Dead or Alive 5: Last Round and Dead or Alive 6.
• Mai and Terry are both the first 3rd-party characters to appear in a mainline Street Fighter game.
• Compared to Chun-Li, Mai is nearly 6 years younger. Fatal Fury 2 was released a year after Street Fighter II: The World Warrior, but she was 19 when she made her first appearance.
• In Capcom vs. SNK 2: Mark of the Millennium 2001, Mai has a special introduction against Chun-Li. In it, Mai cosplays as Chun-Li before revealing who she is by taking off the cosplay, making Chun-Li laugh at the flashy entrance. Vega also has a special introduction against her, but she reacts no differently.
• In Terry's Super Smash Bros. Ultimate presentation, Smash director Masahiro Sakurai justified the absence of Mai by jokingly stating that "Super Smash Bros. Ultimate is for good boys and girls of many different ages". The statement quickly gave rise to a widespread meme making fun of Mai.
  • In the Japanese version of the presentation, Sakurai additionally mentions that Mai's omission complies with Ultimate's CERO A rating. This mention was removed entirely in international localizations.
  • In Japanese posts related to the meme, Sakurai is depicted as a hero from preventing children from meeting such a character early in their lives.^{[citation needed]}
  • Because of this, Mai's exclusion from her cameo background in Smash indirectly serve as a response for the creation of her new default outfit in Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves.
• Both she and Ryu dislike spiders.
• She shares her birthday (New Year's Day) with Juri Han, who ironically has a spider motif.
• Street Fighter 6 is the second time where both Mai and Terry are included in a same DLC pack for a single game, with the first being Fall Guys.
  • Both Mai and Terry have also been featured in the SNK games Metal Slug Defense and Metal Slug Attack, but Mai is the only one who returned for Metal Slug Awakening.
• Her cameos include Samurai Shodown, where she appears in both Haohmaru's and Genan's endings, However, the special dialogue between her and Haohmaru in The King of Fighters XV confirms that the kunoichi in Haohamaru and Genan's endings is not Mai, as Mai lives in the present day and has not met either of them.
• Unlike in Dead or Alive 5 and 6, Street Fighter 6 marks the first time that Mai gains a proper new English voice actress, but ahead of upcoming Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves.
• Mai is the Japanese word for "dance", while Shiranui is the Japanese term for "phosphorescent light" – light that glows softly in the dark and that does not produce heat.
• Mai was announced for Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves on August 20, 2024, the opening night of Gamescom 2024, when Terry's Street Fighter 6 gameplay trailer was also released. Her voice was previously teased when a brief gameplay trailer of COTW was released.

External Links

• Mai Shiranui on Wikipedia
• Mai Shiranui on the SNK Wiki
• Mai Shiranui on the Metal Slug Wiki
• Mai Shiranui on the Dead or Alive Wiki