Robert Garcia
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Robert Garcia, a practitioner of Kyokugenryu Karate, first appeared as the deuteragonist in Art of Fighting and currently appears in the King of Fighters video game series. Thus far, he has been a playable character in every edition of KOF except The King of Fighters XI; however, he has recently been added back in for the Playstation 2 version of the game.
Background
His beginnings
Robert is the son of Alberto Garcia, a wealthy Italian businessman and best friend of Takuma Sakazaki, the master of Kyokugenryu Karate. Alberto persuaded Takuma to teach Robert discipline through Kyokugenryu. While living with his new sensei, Robert quickly befriended Takuma's children, Ryo and Yuri. Ryo became his best friend, and Robert eventually developed romantic feelings for Yuri. He has held a special relationship with Yuri ever since he first met her, and would likely wed her if not for Takuma and Ryo, who either overprotect Yuri out of habit or suspect that Robert might take her for granted.
Art Of Fighting
Geese Howard secretly blackmailed Takuma into working for him after he kidnapped Yuri. Meanwhile, Ryo and Robert began searching Southtown's dojos, dives, and nightclubs for clues about Yuri's disappearance. In the process, they fought Southtown's toughest criminals, bouncers, and martial artists. They eventually learned that Mr. Big allegedly masterminded the kidnapping.One of Mr. Big's henchmen led Ryo and Robert to Mr. Big, and Robert defeated him. When he demanded that Mr. Big release Yuri, Mr. Big sent them to a dojo where his henchman Mr. Karate purportedly held Yuri. Exausted from his fight with Mr. Big, Robert stepped aside to let Ryo fight Mr. Karate. Ryo nearly used a haoushoukouken to finish him off, but Yuri, having escaped her captors, sneaked in and told Ryo not to harm him since Mr. Karate was really their father, Takuma.
Robert benefits from his father's wealth. He always wears fancy clothes and drives expensive cars. Despite Ryo and Takuma's constant scrutiny, he sometimes gives luxurious gifts to Yuri.
His Kyokugenryu movelist operates on the principle of Ryugeki, a class lower than the Kou-Ou principle but higher than the Raiou principle. Robert's style focuses upon lethal kicks, his signature move being the genei-kyaku or spirit kick.
King of Fighters Tournament
Rugal and Orochi Battles
In the 1994 King of Fighters tournament, Takuma, Ryo, and Robert participated as the Kyokugenryu Karate team. Against Ryo's wishes--Ryo fearing that she would poorly represent the Kyokugenryu school--but with Robert's support, Yuri entered the tournament with King and Mai Shiranui as her partners. After this and subsequent tournaments, Robert and Ryo snuck away or fled the venue to avoid Takuma's demands that they immediately renew and redouble their training.
After KOF '95, Robert visited Southtown to help Freya Lawrence, a childhood friend, save her brother Wyler, whose demonic power made him go berserk. He then returned to the Kyokugenryu Dojo where Takuma informed his disciples that he felt too old to fight in the next KOF tournament. To Ryo's opposition and Robert's favor, Takuma granted his slot on the team to Yuri. Ever since, Robert has represented Kyokugenryu Karate at KOF as best as he could, and has looked forward to fighting alongside Yuri every year. However, much to his chagrin, Robert has never had one moment alone with his crush thanks to Ryo's overbearing surveillance.
NESTS battles
With the arrival of KOF '99 and its teams of four, Robert had the pleasure of welcoming Takuma back to the Kyokugenryu team. Once again under the scrutiny of two Sakazakis, Robert worked harder than ever to prove his worthiness for Yuri. Part of that effort became Robert's drive to prove his mastery of Kyokugenryu to Takuma, which led to Robert's new and innovative kicking-based style.
Returning from his pre-KOF 2000 vacation, he learned that Yuri defected to Mai Shiranui's team. To make matters worse, with Takuma's blessing, Ryo invited his love interest, King, to join the Art of Fighting team. Robert initially refused to let Ryo fill Yuri's spot with some strange lady and her inferior muay thai discipline, and challenged King to test whether she would not blemish the name of Kyokugenryu Karate. She accepted and pushed Robert to his very limits, and he reluctantly acquiesced, welcoming King to the team with all the grace his wounded ego could muster. Though no longer fighting beside his love, he competed just as hard in KOF 2000 to impress her since she was still watching him. Unfortunately, Southtown's destruction due to the Zero Cannon overshadowed infatuations that year. The Sakazakis, left homeless, relied on Robert to support them until they rebuilt their dojo.
Unfortunately, as KOF 2001 approached, the Garcia Foundation went bankrupt due to the NESTS cartel's intrigues. Now just as broke and miserable as his adopted family, Robert turned to the Sakazaki family for help. The Sakazakis could not stand the sight of a distraught Robert, so Yuri announced her return to the Art of Fighting team to cheer him up. Ryo and Takuma also promised to help Robert win KOF 2001 and its prize money to revive the Garcia Foundation's finances. That year, with so many debts of money and gratitude to pay, Robert fought harder than ever before. Though his team did not win, it somehow received the prize money amid the confusion surrounding NESTS' destruction. The Garcias' fortunes partly restored, Robert repaid the Sakazakis for their support by rebuilding their dojo.
The Ash Saga
With the coming KOF 2003 adjusting teams back to three members, Takuma once again retired from competition to let Ryo, Robert, and Yuri form a team. Though the tournament passed otherwise uneventfully for the Art of Fighting team, they returned to find an assaulted Takuma sprawled across the dojo floor. Though he claimed to know the true plot behind the current KOF tournaments, he did not reveal it, nor did he reveal his attacker.
Though the Garcia Foundation no longer faced liquidation as it did in KOF 2001, it needed significant help to rebuild its prior fortunes. Though he wanted to help investigate KOF along with Ryo and Yuri, immediately before the KOF XI began, Robert's duties demanded that he devote all his time to his company. Takuma asked King to take the third spot in the Art of Fighting team to replace Robert since she had made a fine teammate before. In reality, Takuma had hatched a ludicrous plot to force the consummation of Ryo and King's still tentative relationship, a plot in which Robert played a very reluctant part.
Trivia
- Alongside an aged Ryo Sakazaki from Buriki-One, an aged Robert appears in Neo Geo Battle Coliseum with moves largely from KOF 2000 and KOF 2003. He also appears in this form in the PS2 version of The King of Fighters XI
- The comical Street Fighter character Dan Hibiki originated as a dig against Ryo, himself almost certainly an homage or rip-off (depending on perspective) of Street Fighter's Ryu, and Robert. Dan fights in a manner similar to Robert and has a similar ponytail. Another Robert (Robert in a keikogi like Dan's) appears as Robert's Another Striker in KOF 2000. Though typically white, when using Robert's alternate color, Another Robert's keikogi turns pink, and he becomes all but identical to Dan.
- Robert's Garcia Concern is one of the sponsors of Capcom vs. SNK 2.
- Robert's ethnicity puzzles some fans. Officially Italian, Robert has a typically Spanish surname and dresses the part of the Latin lover stereotype. Since Southtown is basically a pastiche of New York City, many people think he might be half-Italian with Latin blood. Another explanation would be that he descends from one of the handful of Garcias that left Spain for Italy in centuries past.
- Despite their non-Japanese origins, Robert and Sie Kensou speak the Osaka dialect of Japanese perfectly. In KOF '97 and KOF '98, before they battle each other, they perform a classic schtick from Osakan comedy.
- In years past, the eccentricities of the entire Sakazaki family, like Takuma's fondness for his Mr. Karate persona, have led Robert to angry frustration on several occasions. However, as of KOF XI, Ryo seems to be more of the straight man, and Robert seems just as nutty as the rest of the Sakazakis.
- Much Like Chizuru Kagura, Robert Garcia's move input changes constantly between games, though he occasionally reverts to his original moveset.
- Most of Robert's moves have the word ryu, for dragon, in them (e.g. hien ryu-jin kyaku, or dragon air-blade kick). Despite this, Robert's Kyokugenryu nickname is The Raging Tiger (Saikyou no Tora).
- When Robert was young, he's a tiger style user, But in order to make him push past his limits and complete the way of Kyokugen, so Takuma forces him to use dragon style moves. And after all the training was done, Robert seemed to like the dragon style moves more.
Related characters
External links
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