Stay down.

Street Fighter II remains one of most iconic and famous video games of all time, and its visuals and music are etched in the memory of many a gamer. The colourful backdrops against which you fight have passed into gaming lore, which makes any piece of trivia regarding them incredibly interesting (for us, at least).

With that in mind, check out this fresh evidence:

It's not uncommon for video games to draw inspiration from movies, and in the '80s and '90s this was practically the norm. Still, it's fun to see how one piece of mainstream media can influence another so strongly and directly, and knowing that Ken and Zangief's backgrounds are based on a flick from the '70s somehow makes them even more appealing.

UPDATE: Kotaku has picked up on this too, and points out that Capcom artist Akira “Akiman” Yasuda has previously cited the movie as inspiration:

I remember stitching together a few movies to make a presentation. “Streets of Fire” and Charles Bronson’s “Hard Times” were the ones I used back then. Basically movies about fighting. I really took the chairman’s words to heart - “Use movies!” he said, so I took that to mean we should just openly plagiarize them (laughs).

It is also noted that Hard Times was re-titled The Streetfighter when it was released in Japan! Guess it was just us who didn't know this, then.

Have you spotted any similar moments of inspiration in classic games?

This article was originally published by nintendolife.com on Tue 20th March, 2018.