This is Josie Rizal. The recently revealed character is Tekken‘s first Filipino character. For some, she’s not Filipino enough — or rather, Filipino at all.
Josie Rizal is named after one of the country’s most important national heroes José Rizal — something Tekken series producer Katsuhiro Harada confirmed.
Her outfit is red, blue, yellow and white, which mirrors the colours of the country’s flag. Josie Rizal’s fighting style is eskrima and kickboxing. Eskrima is the Philippines’ traditional martial arts. So what’s the big deal?
Some fans seem pleased, but others don’t think Josie appeared Filipino in either the way she looks or dresses. Well-known Philippine-born artist and poet Adonis Durado summed those feelings best to the Gulf News, “The problem with Josie Rizal’s character is too obvious: it doesn’t have any trace of Filipino-ness-neither in her physical attributes nor in her outfit.”
Continuing, Durado added, “If her fighting style is purportedly eskrima, where are the arnis sticks? So the Filipino-inspired name is simply a token.”
So far, it doesn’t seem like the character speaks Filipino or have a Filipino accent. As reported on the Gulf News, one fan hoped the character gets a Filipino dub and says things like “Aray!” (ouch) when fighting.
Filipino site GMA News reports that the country’s National Commission for Culture and the Arts expressed dismay over the character.
Dr Leodenito Cañete from the NCAA is quoted by GMA News (via Rouken at NeoGAF) as saying, “It’s hard for us to prevent other countries from making characters like this because Philippines is very popular around the world.”
The government body is considering looking into the matter to “correct” incorrect impressions Josie Rizal gives. Maybe it can do something about those deja vu attacks too.
Comments
13 responses to “Why A Tekken 7 Character Is Being Called A Phoney”
https://youtu.be/jNGZo5gn_tc
Summed up. 😛
bit racist if you ask me.
Do i sound Australian? I certainly don’t sound like them in the movies. Does that mean im NOT Australian?
It’s a video game character FFS. Do 2 things for me:
1- Have a glass of concrete and stop being so sensitive.
2- Chill out, be happy that a Japanese company is at least attempting to create character from different backgrounds and cultures.
pretty much this, people just need to stfu and play the games
Remember when Avalanche announced Mad Max, and Max didn’t sound Australian?
I do, however, Max was already an iconic Aussie character before the game (or details of it) arrived.
A better comparison would be Craig Marduk of Tekken. He was introduced in 4 I think??? Anyway, Marduk is Australian. I guess it’s supposed to be obvious because he’s really big? Does Judo? Has an American accent? Who knows.
The point is that Australia didn’t freak out when Tekken announced an Aussie character that doesn’t seem to be even remotely Australian did we?
Damn Marduk is supposed to be australian never realise that one.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Craig_Marduk
Hmmm.. I wonder how upset Korean fans were that Hwoarang never spoke Korean? Or that for some reason Xiaoyu spoke Japanese instead of Chinese (and that alone would piss off the Chinese) – and that she was best friends with the Japanese schoolgirls in Tekken 6?
How come Eddie and Christie never kick in with their Caribbean accents?
Steve Fox’s thick English accent?
Dragunov – does he speak Russian??
Did Michelle/Julia ever speak any of the Native American dialects?
Get over it internet. Its a freaking game.
I feel bad for Harada – first the Americans complain about the bubbly character and now this. Maybe it should just be 20 stock standard male characters who play the same way?
they could at least get the fighting style right, she’s not holding sticks used for escrima. at this point, it’s just a novelty, at least with some of the other characters they paid attention to the fighting style.
You don’t need sticks for escrima
After all the crap in japanese press lately about their Miss World entrant (or whatever competition it was) not being japanese enough for their own xenophobic tastes, I can see the point in some other countries cracking the poos about how japanese culture portrays them. And don’t forget this is not some random filipino name they’ve used, they have deliberately modelled her after a cultural icon.
I imagine australians might have given a crap about their terrible australian tekken character if he was called Ned Kelly or Don Bradman. Same with other countries if the tekken folks had decided to use local heroes for their game and had them far from authentic.
You don’t see anyone complaining about their Australian character Marduk. Even tho he lacks even a single Australian characteristic.
That’s not fair, he’s got a shark tooth necklace and is pretty tanned.
I was slightly offended when I first heard her name and thought that is was a mockery of some sort. When I finally saw what she looked like, I still wasn’t able what to make of their idea.
But eventually, she grew on me….
I realized that it’s somewhat not right to be disappointed with her design though.
I simply thought of it this way – Mari Shimazaki was appointed(I don’t know the correct word to use) to create a Tekken character, and it’s unlikely that she was also supposed to do an extensive background research about it so it’s not the designers’ fault that their depiction of a Filipina didn’t live up to most pinoy fan’s over-expectations.
Her outfit doesn’t look like it’s for fighting, unlike the rest of the characters, I know – if you ignore the gladiator-like sandals, it’s still nice to know that her top does look like a modern “baro” and a very skimpy “saya.” Not pretty out of place within the Tekken universe.
I still do hope that they’d come up with a more distinctively Filipino alternate costume.
Yeah I don’t know wat is d deal with the negativity there but I’m happy that there is now finally a filipino character in Tekken! ^_^ hope the next or filipino character can be based on manny pacquiao haha can’t wait for Tekken 7!
I’m a Filipino and frankly I don’t get my country. Here’s why, when some famous celebrity from a different country has just a hint of Filipino blood in him/her, they go all out and claim they are Filipino, even though the person themselves wouldnt even want to admit it. So what’s the big deal with her not being Filipino enough? Yeah I get that u at least have to get the Martial Arts right because Tekken IS a fighting game but come on, the looks?