is a series of

boxing Boxing is a combat sport and martial art. Taking place in a boxing ring, it involves two people – usually wearing protective equipment, such as boxing glove, protective gloves, hand wraps, and mouthguards – throwing Punch (combat), punch ...

video games created by Genyo Takeda and Makoto Wada, and published by

Nintendo is a Japanese Multinational corporation, multinational video game company headquartered in Kyoto. It develops, publishes, and releases both video games and video game consoles. The history of Nintendo began when craftsman Fusajiro Yamauchi ...

. The main protagonist and

player character A player character (also known as a playable character or PC) is a fictional Character (arts), character in a video game or tabletop role-playing game whose actions are controlled by a player rather than the rules of the game. The characters tha ...

of the series is

Little Mac is a fictional boxer and the protagonist in Nintendo's ''Punch-Out!!'' series of video games. He first appeared as a nameless boxer in the Arcade game ''Punch-Out!!'', then was given a name and redesigned in the NES game of the same name. He ...

, a short boxer from

the Bronx The Bronx ( ) is the northernmost of the five Boroughs of New York City, boroughs of New York City, coextensive with Bronx County, in the U.S. state of New York (state), New York. It shares a land border with Westchester County, New York, West ...

who climbs the ranks of the fictional World Video Boxing Association (WVBA) by challenging various opponents. These opponents come from different countries and feature various ethnic stereotypes associated with their place of origin. In the original ''

Punch-Out!! is a boxing video game series created by Genyo Takeda, and published by Nintendo. The player controls Little Mac, a boxer who aims to become the World Video Boxing Association (W.V.B.A.) champion. The original '' Punch-Out!!'' arcade game w ...

'' arcade game, the characters were named by Genyo Takeda, who chose names with the intention of appealing to the American market. The developers used the two screens in the cabinet to be able to display the opponents' face, which they intended to ensure that players would have a more vivid recollection of their faces. The characters in this game were animated in conjunction with Studio Junio, who used art by

Shigeru Miyamoto is a Japanese video game designer, video game producer, producer and Creative director#Video games, game director at Nintendo, where he has served as one of its representative directors as an executive since 2002. Widely regarded as one o ...

as reference for the animations. Many of the characters in the 1984 title ''Super Punch-Out!!'' are similar to each other by design because they are variants of the same programming; the code recycling and the lack of character differentiation outside of crude nationalistic stereotypes is a result of the game's limited development time and storage resources. For example, Soda Popinski's obnoxious laughter is also used for Mr. Sandman, Bald Bull, and Super Macho Man, and in other Nintendo games, such as for

Ganon is a character and the main antagonist of Nintendo's ''The Legend of Zelda'' video game series and franchise, as well as the final Boss (video games), boss in many ''Zelda'' titles. In his humanoid Gerudo form, he is known as A massive and male ...

in the Game Over screen of the game '' Zelda II: The Adventure of Link''.

Overview

Introduced in ''Punch-Out!!'' (1984)

Introduced in ''Super Punch-Out!!'' (1984)

Introduced in ''Mike Tyson's Punch-Out!!'' (1987)

Introduced in ''Super Punch-Out!!'' (1994)

Introduced in ''Punch-Out!!'' (2009)

Merchandise

Topps and Nintendo of America made a series of trading cards featuring characters from the ''Mario'', ''The Legend of Zelda'', ''Double Dragon'', and the NES ''Punch-Out!!'' series. The ''Punch-Out!!'' cards depict Little Mac's various opponents. The cards have scratch-off spots on them, which determine loss or win. As in real boxing, but not in this video game series, a "cow blow" is slang for the highly illegal blow to the kidneys and causes the scratch-off card to be an instant loss.

Stereotypes

''Punch-Out!!'' extensively utilizes racial and ethnic stereotypes, particularly in the opponents faced by the player character. The stereotypes featured in the games are an important facet of ''Punch-Out!!'' visual and aesthetic identity and have received substantial recognition and criticism.

History

Graphical advancements in the early-mid 1980s enabled the ''Punch-Out!!'' arcade game to display human-like characters with exaggerated features and animation. Writing for ''

Kotaku ''Kotaku'' is a video game website and blog that was originally launched in 2004 as part of the Gawker Media network. Notable former contributors to the site include Luke Smith, Cecilia D'Anastasio, Tim Rogers, and Jason Schreier. History ...

'', journalist Kevin Wong wrote that the 1984 ''Punch-Out!!'' "lacks cultural sensitivity, to put it mildly — the characters range from being slightly offensive caricatures to highly offensive caricatures." Notable stereotypical characters in the 1984 arcade game include Glass Joe, a French boxer who is easily defeated in combat, and Pizza Pasta, whose name was described by Wong as "just incredible; a shining testament to just not giving a shit. It's like naming a Chinese boxer

Chop Suey Chop suey (usually pronounced ) is a dish from American Chinese cuisine and other forms of overseas Chinese cuisine, generally consisting of meat (usually chicken, pork, beef, shrimp or fish) and eggs, cooked quickly with vegetables such as bea ...

Wonton A wonton ( zh, t=, s=馄饨, p=húntun, j=wan4 tan4, first=t) is a type of Chinese dumpling commonly found across regional styles of Chinese cuisine. It is also spelled wantan or wuntun, a transliteration from Cantonese zh, j=wan4 tan1, ...

, or a Thai boxer

Pad Thai Pad Thai ( or ; , , ISO: ''p̄hạd thịy'', ), also spelled phat Thai or phad Thai, is a stir-fried rice noodle dish commonly served as a street food in Thailand as part of the country's cuisine. It is typically made with rice noodles, shrim ...

Curry Puffs A curry puff (; Jawi: ; ; , , ) is a snack of Southeast Asian origin. It is a small turnover containing a filling of curry, often of chicken and potatoes, in a fried or baked pastry shell. The consistency of the curry is quite thick to prev ...

. ''Mike Tyson's Punch-Out!!'' continued the trend of using characters with "distinct stereotypical exaggerations." The 1987 game is widely recognized as a landmark of racial stereotyping in video games: Brandon Mendelson described the boxer opponents as "a cavalcade of racial and ethnic stereotypes," and Sam Machkovech described them as "a veritable

United Nations The United Nations (UN) is the Earth, global intergovernmental organization established by the signing of the Charter of the United Nations, UN Charter on 26 June 1945 with the stated purpose of maintaining international peace and internationa ...

of stereotypes." Writing for '' The Escapist'', Sumantra Lahiri detailed the Japan-developed NES game's extensive stereotyping: Of particular note in ''Mike Tyson's Punch-Out!!'' is the stereotypical Soviet Russian character Soda Popinski, representing the stereotype of Russians as brutish alcoholics obsessed with

vodka Vodka ( ; is a clear distilled beverage, distilled alcoholic beverage. Its varieties originated in Poland and Russia. Vodka is composed mainly of water and ethanol but sometimes with traces of impurities and flavourings. Traditionally, it is ...

. In Soda Popinski's entry for the 2017 publication ''100 Greatest Video Game Characters'', Rahima Schwenkbeck analyzed the character's Russian tropes within the context of contemporary international relations in tandem with localized pressures faced by Nintendo in their attempts to penetrate the American consumer market. Noting the pervasiveness of unflattering tropes about Soviet or Russian people in popular culture in the West, Schwenkbeck pointed out that this is not a phenomenon unique to American media, citing the historically turbulent

Japan–Russia relations Relations between the Russia, Russian Federation and Japan are the continuation of the Bilateralism, relationship of Japan Japan–Soviet Union relations, with the Soviet Union from 1917 to 1991, and Empire of Japan–Russian Empire relations, wi ...

and the predominantly negative image of Russia among Japanese society based on the findings of a

Pew Research Center The Pew Research Center (also simply known as Pew) is a nonpartisan American think tank based in Washington, D.C. It provides information on social issues, public opinion, and demographic trends shaping the United States and the world. It ...

survey in 2015. Schwenkbeck observed that Popinski's continued depiction as a caricature of a vodka-loving Russian, regardless of changing political climates and expectations of improved character development with the advancement of technology, reflects a larger narrative about long-standing negative stereotypes of Russians prevalent in both American and Japanese culture. The 2009 ''Punch-Out!!'' game for the Wii heavily uses ethnic and national stereotypes like its predecessors, largely through the use of recycled boxers from previous games. In addition to old stereotypical characters such as Glass Joe and Soda Popinski, the newest ''Punch-Out!!'' game also features the stereotypical boxer Disco Kid, portrayed as a

Black American African Americans, also known as Black Americans and formerly also called Afro-Americans, are an Race and ethnicity in the United States, American racial and ethnic group that consists of Americans who have total or partial ancestry from an ...

preoccupied with music and clubbing.

Reception

In contrast with ''Punch-Out'' mainstream popularity, critical reception to the series' stereotypes has generally been negative. Davey Nieves and Wong condemned ''Punch-Out!!'' ethnic and national stereotypes as offensive and mean-spirited. John Speerbrecker described the stereotypes as "much worse" than those featured in ''

Street Fighter II is a 1991 fighting game developed and published by Capcom for arcade game, arcades. It is the second installment in the ''Street Fighter'' series and the sequel to 1987's ''Street Fighter (video game), Street Fighter''. Designed by Yoshiki O ...

'', another popular fighting game whose stereotyping is often compared with that in ''Punch-Out!!''. Machkovech characterized ''Punch-Out!!'' ethnic and national stereotyping as part of a broader lack of meaningful racial diversity in Nintendo video games and general bias in favor of white characters. Schwenkbeck unfavorably compared Soda Popinski to the ''

Street Fighter is a Media mix, Japanese media franchise centered on a series of fighting games developed and published by Capcom. Street Fighter 1, The first game in the series was released in 1987, followed by List of Street Fighter video games, six other ma ...

'' character

Zangief Zangief (; Japanese: ), often called the , is a character in Capcom's ''Street Fighter'' series. Considered to be the first grappling-based fighting game character, he made his debut in '' Street Fighter II: The World Warrior'' (1991). In the ...

, calling the former "pure stereotype" while the latter is referred to as a "solid character." Despite the generally negative reception to ''Punch-Out!!'' stereotypes, some critics have also expressed more forgiving views of the stereotypical characters. Brett Elston characterized the depictions as "friendly jabs at everyone's equal expense," and Wong argued that "the developers took a '

scorched earth A scorched-earth policy is a military strategy of destroying everything that allows an enemy military force to be able to fight a war, including the deprivation and destruction of water, food, humans, animals, plants and any kind of tools and i ...

' approach to their stereotyping; every ethnicity was equally lampooned, which pre-empted any accusations of 'singling out' anyone."