Street Fighter III 3rd STRIKE ~Fight for the Future~
Bonus Article:  A possible origin for the character design of Q
Q, one of four new Chara created for Street Fighter III 3rd STRIKE ~Fight for the Future~, has a design which should be familiar to fans of Japanese manga and anime.  Q's appearance seems very reminiscent of a type of robot, referred to as tekkamen [literally, "iron mask"], which appeared in the manga Babil Nisei ["Babil the Second," or "Babil II"] by Yokoyama Mitsuteru.

Yokoyama-sensei is one of Japan's most prolific mangaka, with a career that began some 45 years ago.  He is the creator of some of Japan's best-known and best-loved manga, including Tetsujin 28-gou (known in America as Gigantor), Iga no Kagemaru, Mahou-tsukai Sunny (later renamed Mahou-tsukai Sally), Kamen no Ninja Akakage, Giant Robo, Daimos, Mars, Suikoden, Sangokushi, and Tokugawa Ieyasu.

Babil Nisei appeared in the manga magazine Shuukan Shounen Champion ["Weekly Boys Champion"] from July 4, 1971 to November 12, 1973.  A 39-episode anime TV series based on the manga was broadcast from January to September, 1973, and a 4-volume "reinterpretation" OAV (Original Animation Video) series was released from March to October, 1992.  The story's main character is Kouichi, a young Japanese boy who discovers that he is the descendant of Babil, an alien who was stranded on Earth 5000 years ago and was responsible for the construction of Babil's Tower (later known as the Tower of Babel).  In addition to the advanced technology within the Tower and three monstrous servants, Kouichi's extraterrestrial heritage has given him incredible psychic abilities.  Babil Nisei's plot focusses on Kouichi's battles with a mysterious underworld organization, led by a man named Yomi -- a powerful psychic who also has genetic ties to Babil.

In Chapter 10 of Babil Nisei, Kouichi and a pair of police detectives are attacked by several of the aforementioned tekkamen robots.  One by one, each tekkamen erupts from beneath the ground and closes in on the trio.  The robots are human-shaped and very tall.  They wear dark-colored overcoats, pants, shoes, and fedora-style hats, with light-colored gloves, belts, scarves, and hatbands.  The only portion of their mechanical bodies left exposed are their metal faces.  The design of the faces is very simple, featuring a rudimentary mouth and nose, with a vertical row of rivets beneath each of the two large, glowing eyes.  The detectives' bullets have no effect on the robots, until Kouichi's abilities reveal that their eyes are their weak point.  Kouichi succeeds in destroying two of the robots by shooting them in the eyes at point-blank range, but is forced to surrender when the two detectives are captured by the remaining tekkamen robots.
 

The tekkamen design (from Babil Nisei)
 
The tekkamen design (from Giant Robo The Animation)
 
 
On July 23, 1992, Bandai Visual and Amuse Video released the first volume of the 7-volume OAV series, Giant Robo The Animation ~Chikyuu ga seishi-suru hi~ ["~The Day the Earth Stood Still~"].  Based on Yokoyama Mitsuteru's manga, Giant Robo, the cast of characters and robots included designs taken directly from a number of his other works, including Suikoden, Sangokushi, Tetsujin 28-gou, Mahou-tsukai Sunny, Kamen no Ninja Akakage, and Mars.  At the beginning of volume 1 of Giant Robo The Animation, Gin-Rei -- a female member of the Experts of Justice -- rescues Professor Shizuma from the agents of the organization known as "Big Fire."  When she first appears, she is disguised by a costume that looks exactly like the tekkamen design from Babil Nisei.

With the exception of his shirt, tie, and slightly more modern overcoat, Q's design is very similar to that of Yokoyama Mitsuteru's tekkamen robots.  We shall have to wait for the game's release to see if any of Q's animations, poses, or alternate color schemes bear further resemblance to the robots of Babil Nisei.

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