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Sol Badguy (ソル＝バッドガイ, Soru Baddogai) is the main character and namesake of the Guilty Gear fighting game series. By initial appearance, he is an aloof bounty hunter anti-hero who fights with an oddly rectangular sword called Fuuenken, or the Fireseal. However, his brash and somewhat abrasive exterior conceals a genius and emotional depth. He has dedicated his life to the destruction of Gears, a race of magical bioweapons that plunged the world into a hundred-year war known as the Crusades. In particular, he shows a particular zeal to destroy their creator, an individual known only as "That Man". Sol is also a fan of Queen, and his foil in the series is Ky Kiske.

Character design

Creator Daisuke Ishiwatari designed Sol in many way to reflect as his alter ego and also recorded Sol's in-game voice acting (the voice actor for GGXX's story mode and drama CDs however, is done by Hikaru Hanada). Ishiwatari's favorite band is Queen, and he thus named Sol Badguy, whose "real" name is Fredrick (or Freddie for short), after Freddie Mercury, whose nickname was 'Mr. Bad Guy'. Like Ishiwarari, Sol's favorite band is also said to be Queen, with Sol's favorite album being Sheer Heart Attack.

Sol's normal character design depicts him with reddish brown hair and eyes wearing a tight, black undershirt with the top half covered by a red, sleeveless jacket along with white pants. His headband bears the words 'Rock You', a reference to the Queen song "We Will Rock You", while his belt buckle has the word 'Free', possibly a reference to the Queen song "I Want to Break Free". Sol's character design also contains a pair of black, fingerless gloves, red shoes, a drape of red cloth hanging down beneath his buckle and a multitude of belts, including a lone one on his left forearm. Sol fights using a blunt, rectangular sword known as Fuuenken (Fireseal) through which he releases a range of fire-based attacks.

In other cultural references, Sol's instant kill move "Napalm Death" is named after a British grindcore band, and his theme song "Keep Yourself Alive" is named after a song by Queen. Also, Sol's Guilty Gear X arcade extra was drawn in the style of Yoji Shinkawa's Metal Gear Solid artwork.

Story

Background

His exact history is unclear, but it is known for certain that Sol's real name is Frederick, who not only was one of the lead scientists of the Gear project, but is also the prototype Gear from over a hundred years before the events of the Guilty Gear games. As a prototype, he is immune to the orders of Commander Gears. He was personally acquainted with That Man and Justice prior to the Crusades. His headband is actually a Gear-suppression device which prevents him from giving into his Gear nature and losing his rationality, at the cost of suppressing much of his power. The headband also conceals the glowing red brand on his forehead, the telltale mark that would expose him as a Gear.

As Frederick, Sol created the "Outrage", which he called a supreme Anti-Gear weapon. The Outrage is actually not one weapon but several - eight components called "Jinki", which greatly amplify their wielders' magical ability. Only three Outrage weapons are currently known to be active - Sol's own Fuuenken, Ky's Fuuraiken (Thunderseal), and Anji Mito's twin fans, Zessen. The other five are supposedly in the custody of the United Nations, although some believe Paracelsus, A.B.A's living key, to be a jinki.

Frederick also saved Kliff Undersn (one of the leaders of the Holy Orders and the one who named Ky leader of the Holy knights) when Kliff was still a young boy. Roughly half a century later, he was himself recruited into the order, as a bounty hunter named "Sol Badguy." Sol took part in the Crusades, ironically becoming one of the best fighters on the human side. At this time he was a member of the Sacred Order of Holy Knights (Seikishidan). He acquired the nickname "Corrupted Flame" during that time, a name that such figures as I-No and Justice use for him later. However, he later became disenchanted with the methods of the Sacred Order. At an unspecified time, Sol fled the order, taking with him the Fuuenken, which the Holy Knights had come to consider a sacred treasure. The theft earned him Ky's enmity.

In 2175, Sol faced Justice directly. The two fought, and Justice won - in the process, discovering that Sol was a Gear (but not his true identity as a creator of the Gears). Justice attempted to assert her power as a Commander Gear to control Sol, but was unable to do so. Exploiting her confusion and weakness from the fight, the Holy Order, led by Ky Kiske, sealed Justice away, bringing the war to an end.

Guilty Gear: The Missing Link

Canon states that Sol was the winner of the Tournament, and it is here that Justice discovers that Sol is, in fact, Frederick. Justice, in her dying words, comments that she wishes that "the three of us" could talk one last time, and Sol swears to kill That Man.

Guilty Gear X: By Your Side

Sol has three endings, all of which involve a fight against Dizzy, who has a half-million World Dollar bounty on her head. However, he spares her life in all of them, losing against her in his second ending, and judging that she isn't a threat to the world in the other two. In his third ending, we see a conversation between That Man and one of his servants, in which That Man cryptically says, "To think there was a daughter...most interesting."

Guilty Gear XX: The Midnight Carnival

His storyline here involves chasing down I-No. His first ending, after he defeats I-No, leads to a direct confrontation with That Man. That Man casually deflects all Sol's attacks, and says that Sol is needed because soon a greater battle than the Crusades will occur. In Sol's second ending, Slayer informs him of the Post-War Administration Bureau's interest in Dizzy, which catches his interest. In the third, he fights Dizzy, who had been possessed by Necro after I-No knocked her off the ship, and sends Dizzy on her way to meet Johnny and May.

Holy Order Sol

Holy Order-Sol (聖騎士団ソル, Seikishidan Soru) is an alternate version of the original character. Sol was indeed a part of the Sacred Order of the Holy Knights, this is a take on what Sol looked like during that time and how he fought before beginning to use his now-trademark sword, Fireseal (or "Fuuenken"). This form also shows a glimpse of Sol's true Gear form (where he sports a pair of demonic wings and a tail) when performing the original version (without the aid of Fuuenken) of his Overdrive move, Dragon Install. His EX Destroy is called All Guns Blazing and is basically the original Destroy of Sol Badguy from the first game.

Holy Order-Sol uses a different attack system than the other characters do. He uses a Charge meter with 3 levels. By pressing HCB back along with Dust, Order-Sol will begin charging his meter. At each level, all of his command techniques gain extra strength or new properties. He also has his own kind of Burst, which doesn't give the same properties of Bursting (full tension if offense, interrupting moves if Defense), but it does some damage and knocks back like the Burst. His moves seem like prototypes of his former moves, but with extremely different looks and effect, like the Bandit Revolver Prototype and his Gun Blaze. The Dragon Install also changes from an ability that augments Sol's strength and speed into a special move of its own. It can only be done in level 3 of the Charge Meter, and when performed, can be linked to Sekkai, which is a combo move done like the Deadly Rave by Geese Howard. Sekkai can only be linked after the Dragon Install's Stagger, but can do tremendous damage. When the full move is perfomed - which requires precise timing on all parts of a 10-hit combo - Sol transforms into his true Gear form for the finishing blow. Also, his Blockhead Buster (Tyrant Rave Prototype) changes effect with the Charge Meter.

Thus far, he has only appeared as a playable character in Guilty Gear XX Slash and Guilty Gear XX Accent Core.

In addition to being playable, Holy Order-Sol has a "boss mode" version that appears as a final boss of Guilty Gear XX Slash's Arcade Mode. In this form, his speed and power are increased, and he gains a vastly improved form of the original Dragon Install. This move increases Sol's strength and speed even further and improves many of his special attacks for a limited period of time. While Dragon Install is active, Order-Sol constantly regenerates health, and his attack speed increases to the point where he can easily chain together Overdrive techniques.

It should be noted, however, that the boss mode and normal Holy Order Sol, are different. In fact, is his debut appearance, the playable form was classed as a bottom tier character, and was compared with Chipp Zanuff in that his speed and evasive moves were his strong points, even though he, unlike Chipp, has much higher defence (character program hacks prove he actually takes less damage than most characters roughly 0.98 of the original damage), none the less, his gameplay set-up has been much debate among the Guilty Gear players, some favour him, saying he is a good compliment to Sol, and plays more like Sol did in the original Guilty Gear, some however, argue that it takes to long for him to build up the charge to compete with higher tier characters in competitive matches and tournaments. He appears to have improved in Accent Core, with new Overdrives and a seemingly faster rate of charge, how this will effect his tier is unknown.

As of Guilty Gear XX Slash, Sol's Dust Loop has been removed, as it was thought to be too powerful and too easy to confirm from many set-ups. A new move was added to make up for this, the "Sidewinder" attack, which could be used much like the Dust Loop, without the additional requirement of being in the corner. However, it has a great deal more damage scaling than the dust does, and in order to perform any loops with it, a player must achieve a "Clean hit" for each repetition, which makes the attack untechable, and requires maddeningly precise spacing. Due to his numerous looping combos and high damage and priority, Sol is now considered one of the top tier characters of Guilty Gear XX Slash.

Notes

I : Occasionally Sol will be depicted with different eye color, such as yellow on the cover for the North American PS2 release of Guilty Gear X2: The Midnight Carnival (the same art is used for the cover of the Japanese manual). However, this is the exception to the norm, and his eyes are almost always reddish-brown.

II : The Guilty Gear Bible states that his jacket is made of denim, but it is rarely drawn in a manner to resemble such.

III : A red brand tag with the word "Riot" can be seen on the back, right pocket of Sol's pants in the design sketches shown in Guilty Gear Bible. However, this brand tag is not visable for any other artwork or in-game sprites. Instead of on a brand tag, the word "Riot" is shown on the back belt loop of his pants in Sol's 2nd story ending in Guilty Gear XX though. In the same image, another word can be seen on the back of Sol's jacket, but it isn't clear enough to make out.

References

• Guilty Gear X Drafting Artworks (in Japanese). Enterbrain. January 13, 2001. ISBN 4757703015.
• Guilty Gear XX: The Midnight Carnival PS2 manual (in Japanese). Sammy. 2002. p. 23.
• Guilty Gear X2 Reload Characters and Their Moves. Majesco. March 2, 2006. p. 12. {{cite book}}: |access-date= requires |url= (help); |format= requires |url= (help) (Obtained from here.)
• Guilty Gear Bible (in Japanese).

1. While some may argue that there is no main character or that Ky shares the status of main character with Ky, the Guilty Gear Bible calls Sol the 主人公, which translates as 'protaganist' or 'main character'.
   Guilty Gear Bible p.157
2. Narrator "Sol, the Guilty Gear, stared at his bloodstained hands and prayed..."/"...prayed for the soul of the grotesque sacrifice lying at his feet." (Arc System Works, Guilty Gear, English version (October 31, 1998), after Sol's battle with Justice)
3. Note: Mr. Bad Guy was also the name of Freddie Mercury's solo album, but it appears that Sol was named in reference to it being Freddie's nickname instead.
   Guilty Gear X Drafting Artworks, p.5
4. Guilty Gear X Drafting Artworks, p.6

• American video game characters
• Fictional bounty hunters
• Fictional centenarians
• Guilty Gear characters
• Video game anti-heroes