Capcom designed the Blanka-chan costume in Street Fighter 6’s upcoming Outfit 3 set to hopefully not be banned in tournament

Street Fighter 6’s first batch of additional DLC costumes is slated for release this Friday. Among the pack we’ll find new outfits (outfit 3, to be specific) for all 18 of the game’s launch cast, and that includes a new look for Blanka.

As many expected and hoped, Blanka is getting a wearable Blanka-chan costume that you’ll now be able to use for the fighter in actual matches instead of just for your avatar in single-player modes. Capcom recently shared some details on this particular outfit in Street Fighter 6, and by the sound of it, they made it a point to design this costume to actually be used in battle — and hopefully not see it get banned in tournament again.

If you’re unfamiliar, Blanka-chan is the persona Blanka created inspired by himself that is cute and cuddly. He invented Blanka-chan in hopes of marketing himself and promoting his tourism business, and he created small plush dolls of it that he sells to visitors.

Blanka-chan was first invented back in Street Fighter 5, and the look and design of this little character was made into a full alternate outfit that Blanka could use in battle. Blanka-chan returned initially in Street Fighter 6 in the form of a small doll that Blanka actually utilizes in battle, tossing it out onto the field, electrocuting it, and using it as a projectile and for tricky mix ups.

But come this Friday, Blanka-chan makes his grand return as a full-on alternate outfit that Blanka will be able to wear in actual matches.

As far as this look goes, Blanka essentially becomes a giant plushy with big, bulging cartoon eyes, a large toothy smile, and his new Street Fighter 6 overalls. While this costume certainly looks cool, it did bring about some controversy back in Street Fighter 5.

Fortunately for Blanka players (and unfortunately for everyone else), the plushy style of this costume back in Street Fighter 5 made it so that certain attacks were very hard to decipher in motion. The costume was overall distracting, and players quickly found that some moves appeared obstructed and were difficult to react to and/or punish.

As a result, Capcom banned the costume — along with 12 other costumes — for the 2020 Capcom Pro Tour. With all of that having been said, you can imagine that players have similar concerns for the Blanka-chan costume in Street Fighter 6 here before it launches.

Capcom released a tweet this past weekend that shares a quick blurb from Street Fighter 6 game director, Takayuki Nakayama. The director notes that this time around the Blanka-chan outfit was designed to “respect the ease of battle,” which essentially translates to “it can be used for actual competitive play.”

“This Blanka-chan Outfit 3 was created to respect the ease of battle, along with his story setting,” Nakayama said. “We worked with the battle team to make sure everyone is happy.”

Based on the footage we’ve seen of this outfit so far, it does look like some alterations were made to it as a means of making things easier to see. Blanka-chan’s hair seems to have been pulled up and back more, with less hair falling forward and being in the way.

Funny enough, Blanka also had a highly distracting alternate costume in Street Fighter 4 as well. Often referred to as his “Carnival” costume, this particular outfit gave Blanka giant feathered wings on his back that terribly obstructed the view of him when fighting, and it was so bad that in 2013 Capcom actually nerfed the costume and reduced the feather size by 30%.

Despite the new Street Fighter 6 costumes being released later this week, we still do not have pricing information on them just yet. We did, however, put together an analysis of what we think they might end up being priced at.