BIO:

Also known as "Big Bear", Raiden is a heel professional wrestler who made his debut in the SWF. He is known for his ruthlessness and strength in the ring. He moved to Southtown to find competition and was approached by Geese Howard, who ended up hiring him as one of his henchmen for a short period of time. After he disassociated with Geese, Raiden entered the King of Fighters tournament to relive his glory days of pro wrestling. Raiden has fought many of the greats, such as Terry Bogard. Raiden's design is based on the real life pro wrestling legend, Big Van Vader.
 
                                                       
 

                                                       
 

Page Updated:  Apr. 17th, 2024
It's Vader Time!!! Big Van Vader wrestled in New Japan Pro Wrestling from 1987-1992... so it's likely someone over at SNK was a fan of his during that time period, and created Raiden / Big Bear in his image. Raiden began as a stereotypical and somewhat generic wrestler design, but he was nicely fleshed out in later games like FF: Wild Ambition and Capcom Vs. SNK.  He has an overconfident and goofy personality, which pretty much became the meat of his design in CVS. FUN FACT: Alexander from Saturday Night Slam Masters is also based on Vader. It was a nice surprise to see Raiden return in KOF12 and 13. His new 2D sprite is badass to say the least. He's as fat as ever, but damn he's big... much like the real Vader. For the record, Vader was (is) a badass pro-wrestler in real life... that guy knows how to throw a PUNCH! RIP Vader.
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