Heavy-D!

Heavy D! (ヘビィ・D！, Hebī Dī!) first appeared in The King of Fighters '94 as the leader to the American Sports Team. Heavy D! was designed with the intent to create a unique type of pugilist. He was added to the series in spirit of other boxing characters popular at the time and gained his tall stature to separate himself from the rest of the cast. He was named after M.C. "Heavy D", a former hip hop artist from the group Heavy D & the Boyz.

Story

Heavy D! was once a famous boxer, but was expelled from normal competition due to seriously injuring a fighter during battle. He, Lucky Glauber, and Brian Battler received an invitation to the KOF '94 tournament, and formed the American Sports Team (originally known in The King of Fighters '94 as the U.S.A. Team). Like his teammates, Heavy D!'s invitation is unluckily snatched by opposing teams in this series and other games as a running gag.

Personality

Heavy D! is seen hanging out with Duck King and Ryuhaku Todoh during The King of Fighters '95 tournament in King's club. Unlike most fighters, D! has a mild streak of brashness that borders on being outright cocky. Nonetheless, D! is a good-spirited guy who believes in sports as a positive transitional force in people's lives, as he likes to visit poor regions in order to teach children the benefits of sports and encourage them on following this path to keep them away from criminality and other bad influences.

Powers

High-Speed Punch - Heavy D! can deliver punches at superhuman-like speeds.
Tornado Punch - Heavy D! can deliver punches surrounded by a tornado-like aura.
Energy Sparks - Heavy D! can fire energy sparks with an uppercut.
Energy Geyser - By punching the ground, Heavy D! can create a small geyser of energy.
Cannon Punch - Heavy D! can fire a strong projectile of energy with his punch.

Fighting Style

Heavy D! is an unorthodox shadowboxer with an extremely unique fighting style. D! relies heavily on defense and countering. He has an arsenal of textbook jabs, straights, hooks, straight hooks, uppercuts, undercuts, and crosses at his disposal. Heavy D!'s '98 stance is even tighter defensive-wise than his '94 counterpart, nearly tucking his face completely behind a set of massive forearms, with very few holes in his guard. He also has a small array of short-ranged, fast punches that can be buffered to become unblockable.