Samurai Shodown's next DLC fighter is from Tencent's Honor of Kings

It’s been all the rage for a few years now to have unexpected guest characters grace a new fighting game as DLC. From King of Fighter’s Geese Howard and The Walking Dead’s Negan landing in Tekken 7 to the absolute crossover insanity of the Super Smash Bros. Ultimate DLC lineup, guest characters are big. Even stylish SNK series reboot Samurai Shodown isn’t immune to the allure of a guest character, having revealed and released The Warden from Ubisoft’s For Honor just last month as a DLC character. It seemed like a surprising one-off thing for the weapon-based fighting game, but it turns out that we’re getting another guest character soon.

The silhouette for our newest DLC character has been revealed! Plus, they'll be completely free to own as a special thanks to our fans out there! We hope you look forward to it! #SNK #SAMSHO #HonorofKings pic.twitter.com/jlQAFKpBmd

— SNK GLOBAL (@SNKPofficial) July 24, 2020

SNK revealed the silhouette of their newest DLC character on Twitter, with the attached picture teasing a crossover between the fighting game and Chinese game company Tencent’s long-running MOBA Honor of Kings. The character will also be free to own for everyone, a welcome spot of generosity from SNK.

Who, exactly, is this new Samurai Shodown character though? Honor of Kings isn’t a major title in America, but it’s a huge game in China, and plenty of fans flocked online to share their theories on who this silhouette could belong to. The biggest hint seemed to be the maple leaves floating through the teaser image. Those leaves show up in the official in-game character art for GongSun Li, a bunny-eared warrior who also seems to have her arms posed similarly to how the silhouette in the DLC teaser is posed.