Ryuji Yamazaki - Appearances

Appearances

Starring in Fatal Fury 3: Road to the Final Victory, Yamazaki is hired by the Jin brothers to help them search for the Secret Scrolls of the Jin in order to obtain immortality. He appears after as a mid-boss character to have one round after the player fights four fights. After six fights, Yamazaki will have a full battle against the player as a sub-boss or final boss depending on the grade average from the player. In the following game, Real Bout Fatal Fury, he competes in the tournament King of Fighters in order to obtain the Jin scrolls for himself. Although a regularly selectable playable character, Yamazaki is one of three final opponents the players face against. He also appears in Real Bout Fatal Fury Special and Real Bout Fatal Fury 2: The Newcomers as a regular character. Despite not being featured in the first Fatal Fury game, Yamazaki was added to the 3D game Fatal Fury: Wild Ambition, which retells the events from said game, with Yamazaki being against the boss Geese Howard.

Yamazaki would appear in The King of Fighters series as a member of the '97 Special Team in The King of Fighters '97, along Blue Mary and Billy Kane. In the backstory of the game, the three fighters are arranged into the same team due to the manipulations of Geese Howard. The game also establishes Yamazaki as one of the Eight Heralds of the Orochi Clan. However, Yamazaki has no interest in serving Orochi, engaging the other Heralds in combat. In order to have all of the eight servants from Orochi confirmed by this game, Yamazaki was chosen to be the new member as the staff noted him to be a good villain and liked that he was similar to a snake (as the ancient Orochi was a giant snake). Although the '97 Special Team was disbanded in the storyline at end of KOF '97, The team would be featured in later "Dream Match" (games without storylines) installments in the series such as The King of Fighters '98, The King of Fighters 2002 and The King of Fighters Neowave. Ryuji and Billy would also return in The King of Fighters 2003, only this time they team up with Gato (from Garou: Mark of the Wolves) and forms the "Outlaw Team" in order to conquer Southtown. Although he is not playable in other games from the series, Yamazaki appears as an assistant character (dubbed as "Striker") in The King of Fighters '99: Evolution and The King of Fighters 2000. While in the former he appears as a Striker for every character, in the latter he is the "Another Striker" for Blue Mary. He is also a recurring opponent in the spin-off The King of Fighters: Kyo, normally allying with the Orochi servant Yashiro Nanakase into attacking the lead character Kyo Kusanagi although Yamazaki is only interested in fighting. His character was also added to the crossover game Capcom vs. SNK: Millennium Fight 2000 and its sequel, Capcom vs. SNK 2, developed by Capcom.

Yamazaki is also featured in the volume 7 from the soundtracks series SNK Character Sounds Collection released by Pony Canyon. The CD features several songs based on his character such as monologues and soundtracks from the games in which he appeared. He also appears in The King of Fighters 2003 manhua adaptation authored by Wing Yan, fighting against Ash Crimson prior to the 2003 tournament, but he is interrupted by Geese. In the tournament, however, the Outlaw Team is defeated by Ash's team.