Mr. Karate elevates the art of fighting in Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves

Robert Garcia would absolutely love City of the Wolves' newest DLC character. I wonder if they've ever met?

Kyokugen Fist Karate is alive and well in Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves. Marco Rodriguez was already carrying the torch in a big way as alumni from Mark of the Wolves, but now the legendary Mr. Karate has returned. With franchise boss characters like Mr. BIG, Nightmare Geese, and Wolfgang Krauser appearing as DLC, it only makes sense that the final challenge of the original Art of Fighting would also appear, even if the guy under the mask looks a little more suave and sophisticated than usual. He also features a strong alternative to Marco’s Karate exemplified by a focus on special move-cancelling dash step chains and a parry with multiple defensive and offensive options.

The guy with the big beak is…

Whoever the new Mr. Karate is, he seems to have a very strong understanding of all the things a Fatal Fury or Art of Fighting fan would expect out of Kyokugen Karate master. He has the typical fireball, the uppercut, the jumping straight kick, and both the projectile and rushdown supers.  He even has a version of Marco’s machine gun punches in his Gen’ei Kyaku, though specializing in kicks as he does, this version has longer range at the cost of coming out just a pinch slower. In fact, a lot of Mr. Karate’s attacks feel like heavier base versions of Marco’s kit. For instance, his fireball can’t be comboed off of most normals without a counter hit, but they knockdown on hit and the Heavy version of his fireball can be charged to the size of a proper super fireball just by holding it, though it hits half as hard as a super in its Heavy form.

For being heavier, and somewhat slower moves, Mr. Karate’s kit has special conditions that allow him to chain better. The Dragon Burst is a command dash that can be activated after Heavy and REV versions of most of his moves. It can be used simply for getting into better position, but it can also be used to chain out of his fireballs and the jumping straight kick into an uppercut, his machine gun kicks, or even his supers. The timing can be tight, and mixing so many cancels into a combo feels stressful on the hands, but when you get it right, Mr. Karate looks destructively debonair.

Another important move to be aware of is Mr. Karate’s Drago Supremo. It’s a parry stance that chains into a variety of options. The Drago Supremo stance is unique in that it not only parries melee, but projectiles as well. And if you time it frame perfect, you can even use the Drago Supremo stance to hit a devastating counter on your opponent in both situations. Yes, you can kick your opponent’s fireball back at them with this move. The other cool side of it is out of REV version, you can counter into combos that can lead to your full super move setup if you want to cash in. The best part is that if you find yourself in a bad spot with it, you can used one option to dash backwards out of the stance. Drago Supremo easily feels like it’s going to be dangerous in good hands.

As a sidenote, I have to applaud Fatal Fury’s devs for working Art of Fighting’s Spirit Gain and Razz mechanics into Mr. Karate. By holding a button, Mr. Karate can charge to reduce his REV meter, which is insanely good on its own for managing meter, but his taunt also raises enemy REV meters, meaning you can actually manually burn-out your opponent at range with it. Both of these options need space to work, but with REV being such an integral mechanic in City of the Wolves, it feels like an awesome addition to the character that pays homage to their Art of Fighting roots.

Only the strong inherit the mask

In past Art of Fighting games, Ryo Sakazaki, Yuri Sakazaki, and Robert Garcia looked to their mentor Takuma Sakazaki for training, but he also once donned the Mr. Karate mask to test their resolve. It should be obvious to any fan that this Mr. Karate isn’t Takuma, but the implications of that are cool anyways. He offers a hard-hitting and even more technical foil to Marco’s version of Kyokugen, and he looks cool as heck doing it. It makes me curious to see what he did to inherit the famous Tengu Mask, but hopefully those answers come in Episodes of South Town. For those interested in a cool new character, Mr. Karate has the chops to blow your opponent away in a storm of kicks. Just mind your fingers on those constant dash cancels.

These impressions are based on an early build of the game with the character available. Mr. Karate comes to Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves on PC, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X/S on May 27, 2026.

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