Blaze Fielding

Blaze Fielding (ブレイズ・フィールディング) is one of the protagonists of the Streets of Rage series, having appeared in every game as a playable character.

Biography

Personality

Blaze has the role of "the female brawler": volunteering, determined, and ready to put her life in jeopardy to bring an end to the Syndicate. She is strong with a sense of justice but is ruthless towards her opponents, mercilessly beating them up on the streets and bloodying them with her fists. Some of her quotes from the Bare Knuckle III Battle mode shows that she can't stand perverts and will often remind male opponents to stay focused on the fight, not on her body. She also seems to be somewhat proud and doesn't like to lose.

Story

Streets of Rage

Blaze makes her debut in 1991's Streets of Rage as one of the three cops who quit the city's corrupt police force, in order to settle the rampage that has plagued the city and find out those responsible behind those events. Along with Adam Hunter and Axel Stone, she manages to defeat the syndicate leader, Mr. X in his own headquarters.

Streets of Rage 2

A year after the SOR1 events, Blaze, who has moved out of the city and became a dance teacher, discovers along with Axel and Adam's kid brother "Skate" that Adam has been kidnapped by Mr. X, who was believed to be dead in the previous battle, in order to lure Axel and Blaze to him in retaliation for his prior defeat. She and Axel set out to rescue their friend with Skate and a professional wrestler named Max Thunder who is also one of Axel's friends. They manage to reach the hidden headquarters of the Syndicate on an isolated island and defeat Mr. X once again and free Adam in the end.

Bare Knuckle III

In the original Sega of Japan produced version, Blaze, along with Axel, had rejoined the police force after the events of Streets of Rage 2. During the events of Bare Knuckle III, Axel and Blaze are being assigned to the leading two cases that will actually reveal to be interconnected: a Rakushin explosion in the Wood Oak city that could be related to the Syndicate's activities, and the disappearance of General Petrov that could lead to a war between the Lima Nations. They're being assisted by Adam (story-wise only), Skate and a mysterious ex-researcher named Dr. Zan.

Streets of Rage 3

The Sega of America produced version (with a slightly altered storyline to lighten the game's tone, but also a representative of the harder difficulty compared to the original version) had Blaze stay in the city after the events of Streets of Rage 2 and become a private detective. When informed by ex-researcher Dr. Zan that the next victim of the Syndicate's evil scheme will be her old friend, the Chief of Police, she writes a letter to Axel, who had moved out of the city now working as a Martial Arts sensei requesting his help (as seen in the intro sequence) & immediately sets up a task force to go to his rescue.

Streets of Rage 4

Blaze ended expelled from the police when she refused to take anger management classes after entering an argument with the Commissioner which ended with her punching him in the face.

Spending her days as a dance instructor, Blaze still kept in touch with the rumors and gossips, eventually learning about the rise of a new Syndicate trying to take control of the city. Taking immediate action, Blaze called all of her old friends to help her.

Gameplay

Blaze is depicted as an all-round character of the series, making the most of her speed, long-range jump attacks, powerful slams, throw moves and efficient blitz attacks to overcome difficult situations.

Signature Moves

Kikou Shou: Blaze projects a powerful short-range burst of energy which gets stronger (and more hits in) the closer the enemies are to the attack. (An attack completely adopted by Street Fighter's Chun-Li, sharing both the same attack name and similar execution of the attack)
Embukyaku: Blaze perfoms a cartwheel kick which knocks down surrounding enemies and allows her to dodge their attack.
Vertical Slash: Blaze performs a forward somersault in order to crush enemies with her fist.
Subliming Double Slash: One of Blaze's upgraded moves, she performs a ranged somersault that strikes enemies down with multiple hits. Can be completed by a long-ranged slide kick.

Fighting Style

Blaze kick — Blaze's jump kick was one of the very few things censored in Streets of Rage 2. Her white thong is visible in the top animation. The bottom animation shows the censor in the U.S. version.

Blaze is a master of judo and sambo. Her fighting style consists of powerful judo throws combined with gymnastic moves and efficient jump attacks. She also uses powerful kicks and knee attacks, punches, uppercuts, and can also suplex her enemies when behind them, dealing massive damage. In SOR1, Blaze uses chops to attack her enemies. In the later games, she uses her fists instead. Blue energy is used to give some of her moves a visual psychic effect, a possible reference to the famous Hadouken move performed by Ryu and Ken in the Street Fighter series. Blaze is also shown to have tremendous physical strength and technique, as she is capable of using the suplex on men significantly bigger and heavier than she is.

However, she can't suplex obese opponents in SOR1 and SOR3, as they are too heavy and will fall on her, dealing her damage instead. In SOR2 and SOR4, Blaze can eventually suplex even the heaviest enemies, though in 4, heavier enemies will take more time to suplex or throw. She can knock her opponents out with her fists, kicks, knees, slams, and throws and send them flying multiple feet. She is also strong enough to fight multiple enemies at once by herself, all of whom are big, burly men, and defeat them all.

Character Evolution

Blaze started in SOR1 as a stereotypical female character, faster and weaker than the male characters. She differs from her teammates with her trademark throw move which has a larger range. Her combo is also the hardest to use because of the necessary timing in which the B button must be used to perform the combo. The delay between her kick and her somersault makes her vulnerable to enemies' counterattack.

In SOR2, she returns with slightly better stats, making her more of an all-around fighter. She gains efficient new moves such as her famous Kikousho and, as opposed to SOR1, she uses her fist instead of horizontal chops and high kick instead of back flip.

Blaze's character design was based on the archetypal attractive and strong woman. She has long brown hair, slender body type, and muscular but lean thighs and legs.

Her attire also changes drastically throughout the series. She wears a red leather jacket, skirt and boots attire with a bandana in SOR1. In SOR2, she wears a very revealing red tube top, skirt, and elf shoes. BKIII expands on this look by replacing the shoes with knee high boots and adding gloves/gauntlets. SOR3 edited this, with a white/silver clothing color instead of her trademark red. Bare Knuckle Mobile has her using a edited version of the SOR2 look, editing the Streets of Rage look onto her sprite set. In all games, she wears a white thong, as seen in the animations for her jump kick.

Blaze's Judo Slams are slightly stronger in SOR3 than in SOR2.

SEGA Heroes

Blaze Fielding appears as a playable character in SEGA Heroes. She is a Red hero and utilizes a few moves from her own games, such as stabs.

Moves and ability

Normal attack: Blaze rushes forward and attacks with a chop.
MAX Skill - Triple Strike: Blaze gets in three swift hits with her knife.
Star Skill - Embukyaku Kick: Blaze Fielding leaps into the fray to perform a cartwheel kick.
Passive - Blitz Fighter: Blaze's lightning speed gives her an edge over her opponents.
Shard
Triple Strike
Embukyaku Kick

Game Appearances

Other Appearances

SEGA Heroes

Trivia

Blaze was the only canon female playable character and female heroine in the series, until Cherry Hunter (Adam's Daughter) joined the cast in Streets of Rage 4.
Certain animations in the first 3 games will allow for a brief peek at Blaze's thong.
Contrary to her teammates in SOR2, Blaze is the only character that kept her famous idle move (runs her hand through her hair).
She's also the only character that performs a special weapon move in SOR2, a double hit with a knife. Triple if the receiver is standing at a certain distance.
She's the only one to have her fighting standing position changing drastically in the series, as they appear to be incorrect in SOR1 and 2 because they do not belong to judo art.
Her color palette was changed from red to silver due to her attire being sexually suggestive. Curiously enough, her SOR3 duel palette still uses a red outfit.
She also wears her SOR1 outfit in the ending of SOR3/BKIII, a little easter egg for the players who have followed the series since its first episode.
In Streets of Rage 3, Blaze and Zan are the only ones without a Super attack compared to Axel and Skate. Even in Game Genie codes, she is the only one out of the three without a super attack.
Blaze's outfit is very similar to the main character of FlashGal, another Sega beat-em-up developed in 1985.
While Blaze has brown hair in-game, the SOR1 main screen, portrait and ending scene clearly show Blaze with black hair. The reason behind this is unknown.
In the first two SOR games Blaze's eyes were brown but were drastically changed to blue in SOR 3.
Onihime and Yasha, the bosses of the SOR1 stage 5 and of the last section of the stage 8, use Blaze's sprite with a different palette.
In both Game Gear and Master System versions of Streets of Rage 2, both endings vary with Blaze: Bro Shaking with Adam and talking with the team.
Despite being one of the weaker characters in terms of strength in SOR1 and SOR2, Blaze is shown to be strong enough to send her significantly heavier and larger male opponents flying with her punches and kicks and is strong enough to throw and suplex them to deal massive damage.
- This means Blaze is strong enough to lift around 300 lbs.
- Interestingly, she cannot suplex or throw obese enemies in SOR1 and SOR3, but she can in SOR2. It is possible that Blaze might have been physically strongest in SOR2.
- However, she can suplex and throw obese (or heavyset) enemies in SOR4, suggesting that the mentioned above is more of a gameplay quirk than anything else.
Blaze is the owner of the shop in the Streets of Rage Remake Fan game, where the player can buy extra items and unlockables after they beat the game.
- In the Streets of Rage Remake fan game, depending on the time of day, she will either be awake or asleep. If she's asleep, the player have a 50/50 chance of stealing an item. If they fail, Blaze will kick the player out of the store and they won't be able to buy anything until they beat the game again.
- Her attire here is the same as in SOR2, but instead of wearing a red tube top, she wears a revealing red bra instead.
Blaze appeared as a playable character in the mobile game, SEGA Heroes.