Ash Crimson
Ash Crimson is a character in The King of Fighters fighting game series developed by SNK Playmore. His first appearance was in The King of Fighters 2003 as leader of its Hero Team. Ash, a teenager, participates in the series' fighting tournaments. He employs a personal fighting style that involves pyrokinesis with green flames. Despite being the series' protagonist during its third story arc, Ash's behavior is generally antagonistic and he tries to steal powers from several recurring characters, leaving them powerless. His identity and intentions are further explored in the 2011 title, The King of Fighters XIII, and he has been featured in print adaptations and a drama CD based on the games.
SNK Playmore staff created Ash as an evil main character, in contrast to previous main characters. His moves have been reworked in every game in which he has appeared, gaining new techniques as a result of his actions or modified to balance the character roster. Critical response to Ash has been largely negative due to his androgynous appearance and his technique. In interviews and press releases, video game publisher UTV Ignition Entertainment noted that he was unpopular with Western gamers and his design was better suited to Japanese fans. Reception in later years has been slightly more positive, with the character's relationships and tragic story arc being well received.
Appearances
In video games
Introduced in The King of Fighters 2003, Ash leads the New Hero Team of Duo Lon and Shen Woo which participates in a new King of Fighters tournament. After the tournament, he ambushes host Chizuru Kagura and steals her powers, telling Iori Yagami he will be his next opponent. In The King of Fighters XI, the character teams up with Oswald and Shen Woo. At the game's end Ash leaves his teammates to fight each other, after disclosing that Oswald's price for joining him was finding a drug he can only obtain after defeating their pharmacist's enemy, their own teammate Shen. He later finds a berserker, Iori, defeats him and steals his powers. When Ash's comrade Elisabeth Blanctorche accuses him of abandoning his original mission and becoming obsessed with power, he leaves after saying that Kyo Kusanagi will be his next victim. Ash also appears as an available fighter in the KOF: Maximum Impact 2's update KOF Maximum Impact Regulation A and The King of Fighters XII, games without a storyline.In The King of Fighters XIII Ash is the only character not part of a team, and it is learned that he works for Those From the Past. However, he has a conflict with organization leader Saiki at the end of the game, with his real plan revealed. Ash is the final boss in The King of Fighters XIII as "Ash driven insane by the Spiral of Blood" with power stolen from Saiki, who is trying to possess him instead. He ultimately sacrifices himself to destroy Saiki, his very own ancestor. While Ash's memories start disappearing from almost every people who knew him, he still makes cameos in some endings.
It is revealed in The King of Fighters XIV that Ash is trapped in a time vortex, with an entity known as Verse enveloping him. With Verse's defeat as his reality manipulation energy spreads around worldwide, Kukri and Elisabeth finally found Ash alive. Due to the ongoing multiversal crisis which revives many deceased fighters like himself in his home universe, he returns in The King of Fighters XV, accompanied by his childhood friend Elisabeth, and their new ally, Kukri, and manage to survive the event without ceasing from existence, thanks to Kukri's confirmation of the outcome on defeating Otoma=Raga, thus finally live peacefully with Elisabeth once again.
Outside The King of Fighters, the character appears in a dating sim part of the Days of Memories series.
In other media
Ash has made appearances in various other King of Fighters media as well. In the fourth chapter of the anime The King of Fighters: Another Day, he sets fire to a city to lure Kyo into a trap. He is also prominent in the manhua adaptations of The King of Fighters 2003 by Wing Yang and King Tung. In the 2003 tournament, Ash's team is defeated in the final by K' but later helps him defeat the demon Mukai. Although he is not part of the recurring tournament in The King of Fighters XII manhua, he briefly confronts Kyo in an attempt to steal his powers. Ash also appears in the CD drama KOF: Mid Summer Struggle, which has a mock King of Fighters tournament.Creation and development
Ash was designed as an "attractive evil character", in contrast to previous King of Fighters heroes. The supervising designer created the character as desired, with few changes since conception. When The King of Fighters 2003 was released and Ash introduced, the staff did not want to disclose information about him, instead telling fans to look forward to his "exploits." His canonical height is 178 cm and he weighs 59 kg. According to a staff member, Falcoon, the goal was to make Ash an ambiguous protagonist who made players "feel bad" for cheering for him. Although Falcoon did not design the character, he added details while illustrating him. Akihiko Ureshino said Ash has the weakest relationships among protagonists. Although it is not clearly depicted, these three are probably just friends who happened to be in Shanghai at the time of "2003" and became acquainted with each other. One of them is a traitorous teenager with no sense of ethics, and the other is a thug that the yakuza would avoid and an assassin possessed by a vengeful spirit, so there is no room for friendship to be born there. However, the ending of XIII was written to stand out their connections. Since the "Ash arc" and the Maximum Impact games were developed at the same time, Ureshino decided to write a subplot in the latter work where Ash is depicted as a puppeteer who manipulates Kyo Kusanagi and Iori Yagami at the same time, most notably in the original net animation Another Day. His moves were named after months from the French Republican calendar.Due to Ash's late appearance in The King of Fighters 2003, the staff joked that teammate Shen Woo seemed more like the series' main character than Ash did. One of three reasons for the title of KOF: Maximum Impact 2 Regulation "A" was Ash's introduction to the spin-off series. Falcoon called the character "really wild" because of his role in the series and his personality. Artist Nona said that of the original King of Fighters characters, he liked Ash and looked forward to his development.
Elisabeth, who first appears in XI, is written by Ureshino as Ash's former guardian and older sister figure, a woman who believed in the clan's mission and guided Ash in a similar fashion Chizuru Kagura from the Orochi arc video games. It is more affectionate towards Ash, and feels something similar to familial love or even romantic feelings. In The King of Fighters XII Ash was the character the staff worked on the most, reworking his movements and speech to be more consistent with the rest of the cast. The King of Fighters XIII producer Kei Yamamoto jokingly called him a character players could use to "show off". His EX version in the game makes more multiple hits than his regular form, and the "disgusting" style of his "La Fête du Génie move is said to fit his character. Since his introduction, Ash has acquired new moves in accordance with his action in the series. After The King of Fighters 2003 Ash gained Chizuru Kagura's "Germinal, a move allowing him to steal his opponents' special moves. After defeating Iori Yagami, the character acquired the "Fructidor" Neo Max move. During the game's development, the staff considered returning Fructidor's animation style to an earlier version they had tested.
For The King of Fighters XIII, producer Kei Yamamoto wanted gamers who had played previous titles with Ash to consider the character's motivation and whether they could relate to him. Artist Eisuke Ogura stated that designing Ash's final form was conceived shortly after he saw early designs of Saiki. Following this, Ogura tried drawing Ash's possessed form from The King of Fighters XIII where he was careful in showing that while the enemy's body is Ash's, the one fighting is Saiki as represented by his black flames. Despite early pressure about that, once seeing Saiki's similarities with Ash, Ogura managed to draw the Evil Ash easily. The idea behind this character was giving an vibe of a repulsive person.
For The King of Fighters XV, designer Tomohiro Nakata said several fans already knew The King of Fighters XIV would tease his return. In his reappearance in XV, Ash was given a new design reminiscent of the original one. While SNK looked forward to his interactions to his previous enemies Chizuru and Iori, they were also glad that he managed to join his friend Elizabeth for the first time in the franchise due to their close relationship. During the development stage, there was a plan to introduce a beautiful girl character who would make fans suspect, "Maybe this girl likes Ash?", so if that girl had actually appeared, Elizabeth might have become more like Chizuru, or conversely, more like Ash's girlfriend. In any case, with Ash safely returning in XV and the trouble that came with it being cleared up, the relationships between Ash and Betty, or between Ash and Shen and Duo Lon, may change in the future. After all, unlike the Sacred Treasures, who are forever haunted by the shadow of Orochi, Ash and his friends no longer have their nemesis, Saiki. Looking at it from another perspective, it could be said that he is unlikely to enter future KOFs unless he has some kind of strong motivation, but Ureshino feels that it would be fine for Ash to just relax and make a flower crown for Elizabeth rather than take part in a tournament.