Fighting Games Continuity

[Radaketor]

How exactly does it work?

Fighting games tend to have multiple characters to choose from, each with their own fighting styles and rich backstories (you know, if they're good) so the player gets variety and a run for their money, but when you have so many characters how are you supposed to know how the story flows from game to game?

I'll start with Street Fighter since it's the best example i can think of, it says in the wiki that Ryu went to the first World Warrior tournament and got to the finals where he fought Sagat, he gets his ass kicked by him and thinking he's won the battle, Sagat tries to help Ryu up, best of intentions in mind and all that shit, Ryu uses that weird power i don't know the name of and beats Sagat, scarring him for life.

Except while watching a playthrough of the first Street Fighter game online none of that happens, he beats Sagat fair and square, then the game's over. How the fuck do people then know Sagat tried to help Ryu get up and shit?

Furthermore, there are dozens of characters we know will never win the World Warrior tournament in canon, for example Dan, yet we can play as him and win every tournament he's in, but how will we know canonically what happened to him in the previous tournament? Is there like, some sort of comic, manga, movie that i'm supposed to read/watch that'll finally let me know how some of the non-main fighters handled themselves?

[Wegra]

You know it's funny you bring that up I still dont know where all the canon comes from in these games. Like I mostly just got my info off of TV tropes, Street Fighter WIki and Youtube, I know the canon ending to II is that Akuma used the raging demon on Bison and he was assumed dead by that time. Where does it say ? Fuck if I know

You think that's bad? Try making sense of BlazBlue or Guilty Gear

[ClockworkCopper]

The only fighting games I play are Mortal Kombat and Soul Calibur which do have more story continuity than most (although still not a lot).

[Sense-Offender]

When you win Mortal Kombat (in the new ones, arcade/classic tower w/e) I think each ending is like a "what if?" non-canon thing except for one that may carry over. I guess I'd look at the rest of fighters sort of like that. A lot of hypothetical stuff. Pretty sure Heihachi did not drop Kazuya in a volcano. It's also off screen stuff you're just being told happened.

Now's a good opportunity to plug this. I love Swaim.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=Eto3TevXmAs