Akira Yuki

Unreleased

Akira Yuki (結城 晶, Yūki Akira) is the main character and mascot of Sega's versus-fighting series Virtua Fighter.

A hot-blooded Ba Ji Quan practitioner with an impulsive nature, due to a new partnership between Tecmo Koei and Sega for Dead or Alive 5, Akira will be making an appearance as a guest playable character in the up-coming title alongside Sarah Bryant.

Background
In the original Virtua Fighter, Akira serves as the assistant instructor at Yuki Budokan. After completing his training under his grandfather's tutelage at the age of 23, he went on a quest to test his abilities. When he got word of the first World Fighting Tournament, he decided to enter and test his abilities.

Role in Dead or Alive
Akira's role and relation to the Dead or Alive universe is currently unknown due to Dead or Alive 5 only being in early stages of development.

Appearance
Akira is a young, muscular man with a tanned complexion, brown eyes, and black hair that has been spiked-up and tied back with a long piece of white fabric. He appears to be average height and has quite wide shoulders and an oval-shaped face with a strong jawline and a squared-off chin.

His trademark outfit is a form of sleeveless Gi - a traditional uniform used for martial arts practice - which has frayed around the ends of the trouser legs and shirt holes. The Gi is slightly open to reveal his bare chest underneath. The outfit is complete with a black belt, a white headband, and black wristbands and feet covers. Overall, he bears a striking resemblance to Ryu, the main character of Capcom's Street Fighter series.

Personality
Akira strives for perfection and will drive himself relentlessly to master his techniques. He seeks worthy opponents to fight in order to find flaws in his skills to further attain mastery. While hot-blooded and impulsive, he can also be naive and intemperate.

Etymology
Akira is a unisex name with Japanese origin, which means "bright" or "clear." The name Yuki is also Japanese and can be used as a given name (usually for females) or a surname. As a surname, the kanji used mean "binding castle."

Gameplay
Details on how Akira plays have yet to be sorted, although it has been said that his commands are basically unchanged from Virtua Fighter. In the Virtua Fighter series, he is considered to be an extremely advanced character to master so that could be the case again in Dead or Alive 5.

Dead or Alive Series

 * Dead or Alive 5 - 2012 (TBR)

Virtua Fighter
Akira first appeared in the 1993 arcade title Virtua Fighter and was part of the series' original fighter line-up, which at the time only included eight characters. Since then, Akira has appeared in every installment of Virtua Fighter and became the series mascot.

He also appeared in the Virtua Fighter anime series but his personality was changed greatly from how he acts in the video games. His anime counterpart enjoys eating lots of food and slacking off. Akira fights only when he sees people getting into trouble but often gets into minor problems, which usually involve accidentally touching female fighters inappropriately and results in beatings.

Sonic & Sega All-Stars Racing
Along with fellow Virtua Fighter combatant Jacky Bryant, Akira appeared as an unlockable character in the 2010 racing game, Sonic & Sega All-Stars Racing. Akira and Jacky race together as a team in an Outrun inspired muscle car, representing the Virtua Fighter series.

Trivia

 * Akira was partly inspiraton for Kokoro. Dead or Alive creator Tomonobu Itagaki commented that Ba Ji Quan was first used in Virtua Fighter by Akira, which he called the "origin of 3D fighting games." Itagaki hoped to reproduce the martial art more realistically with Kokoro in Dead or Alive 4. In the E3 2012 trailer for Dead or Alive 5, Akira challenges Kokoro to a duel, which Kokoro accepts.
 * Akira is the fifth character from an outside series to appear in a Dead or Alive title, following on from Nicole-458 in Dead or Alive 4, Rio in Dead or Alive Paradise, and Samus Aran and Ridley in Dead or Alive: Dimensions.