7 characters? Seriously?
*Goes to Wikipedia*
Chief Thunder, Cinder, Fulgore, Glacius, Jago, Sabrewulf, and Spinal
None of them are women... I don't know, isn't that pretty much a requirement these days? Sure, KI only had one female character in 1994, I never played the sequel because fighting games on the N64 were the antithesis of fun but apparently it had two or more female characters added to its roster, and now in 2013 they're down to none? I'll assume, just to be generous, that they plan to add one or more later at your expense.
Still... even ignoring my general sentiments regarding the marginalization of women in video games, from a PR standpoint you'd think they'd at least want someone for fan-service.
Besides, you're actually sticking with Chief Thunder not-Rare? I mean, yeah, stereotypes have been a big part of fighting games for easy character design, but he was over the top even by those silly standards.
I mean, fuck, look at him
The mohawk, the tomahawks, the paint, the fact that he's glowing red -- all the other characters are eldrich abominations or modern-ish looking humans, even Jago is just Jean Claude Van Damme in generic Asian-ish attire...so why make this racist anachronism? Seriously, why?
In comparison, here's Nightwolf
Not great, but not quite so... gauche. He's human looking and the native paraphernalia compliments his look rather than just looking so goofy it hurts. Furthermore, there's his backstory, if you bother to read it, which is far more developed to make him less of a cartoon and more of a character. Stereotype? Sure. Just more intended as a fond representation than bargain-bin cheap exploitation. Nightwolf could be a superhero written in the last ten years, whereas Chief Thunder would be in the 60's... and be a villain.
Come to think of it, why not just stick with your monster theme and ignore humans? It worked for Darkstalkers for the most part. Take out the good Chief and Jago, throw in Riptor and maybe invent a new goddamn character based off of vampires or something, and *poof* you're done.
I don't mean to rag on it, but I don't see imagination here, just brand recognition and fairly uninspired use of an IP which was novel at the time.
