Although she was originally announced back in August at Evo 2025 with Armor King’s gameplay trailer, this weekend we got out first proper look at Tekken 8’s final Season 2 character Miary Zo at Evo France 2025 in her own gameplay trailer.
I had previously speculated in a piece that Miary Zo had some kind of tie to Tekken 3’s boss character Ogre which the trailer clearly showed to be the case, but a new blog post from the Tekken development team shares more light on their mysterious connection.
In her trailer, we are first introduced to her somewhat animalistic fighting style coupled with her ability to summon a pole of energy to interact with. The blog post specifies these abilities by saying “Miary Zo was created with the keyword “Fighting God Reborn,” and characterized as curious and cheerful. Her fighting style doesn’t fit into a single mold; instead, she battles with boundless energy. In addition to incorporating Morengy—a traditional martial art of Madagascar—along with authentic strikes unique to African fighting techniques, she also uses charming attacks that mimic the movements of ring-tailed lemurs.”
It goes on to state “in addition, she can attack using a spear summoned through the “Power of the Fighting God,” as well as moves reminiscent of Ogre from past titles—such as strikes with snakes, a tail, and horns. With such a wide variety of offensive options, she excels at keeping opponents from focusing on her tactics, skillfully switching between them and then launching a decisive assault when the moment is right.”
On top of her acrobatic abilities and animal inspiration, Miary Zo also adapts elements of other African fighting styles. While her main focus is Morengy, which originates from Madagascar, the blog also notes that she uses aspects of other martial arts such as Dambe which is of Nigerian origin.
These are evident as Miary Zo’s core abilities, but as the trailer goes on we get to see flashes of Ancient Ogre and True Ogre from Tekken 3 and then we see Miary Zo manifest mystical powers, which allow her to use some moves reminiscent of the Tekken 3 boss character.
Given her fighter title of “Fighting God Reborn” coupled with this, understandably this led to many to assume she was essentially a reincarnation of Ogre from Tekken 3 — similar to what the Dead or Alive series did with Nyotengu, as a sort-of reintroduction of the Dead or Alive 2 boss character Tengu, but a lot more easy on the eyes.
However, with Miary Zo this is not actually the case. As had been mentioned by Harada some time ago, and which I highlighted in my previous speculation article, there are many different Ogres in the Tekken world.
As per Katsuhiro Harada’s own words, it goes like this: “In the Tekken 3 era, the official setting materials included in the strategy guide stated that Ogre is not a singular being—instead, there is at least one Ogre in every continent, archipelago, and island nation.”
In my speculation piece, I used this to argue that I believed Miary Zo to be connected specifically to the Ogre of Madagascar, as it is its own island nation, and the Tekken blog reinforces this as well when speaking about her connection to Ogre.
“Miary Zo can use attacks similar to those once employed by Ogre, such as extending multiple snakes from her right hand, striking with a tail, and swinging upward with a horn. However, the “Power of the Fighting God” dwelling within her originates from a different deity than that Ogre. This Fighting God is characterized by a tail resembling that of a ring-tailed lemur and a single horn,” read the developers’ words.
In short, Miary Zo is specifically tied to a separate Ogre entity which was more reminiscent of a lemur, further explaining all of the lemur references in her movement.
That said, she still summons snakes and breathes fire which are direct references to moves we saw from Ogre in Tekken 3, so presumably there are some general Ogre abilities that they all possess, which is why Miary Zo is able to use these as well.
As for her visual design, it was deliberately designed to evoke the Ogre imagery since it was a core part of her design.
The developers explain this by saying “the design was developed to clearly and attractively convey Miary Zo’s concept of being cheerful and full of vitality through her costume. Another key point is that the design incorporates many elements of her background, particularly her connection with the Ogre of Madagascar.”
Further, the blog states “to embody the keyword “Fighting God Reborn,” the large ring-shaped accessories on her arms and legs incorporate elements from Ogre of past titles. Her earrings and top are adorned with jacaranda flowers, an iconic plant of Madagascar, while her spear is designed to resemble entwining baobab trees.”
In an extra fun detail, her Costume 3 is apparently designed by Mari Shimazaki, perhaps best known as the character designer of Bayonetta.
This costume was designed to be distinctive but also feel stylish in a sense of how modern clothing would and was also focused on the color scheme being the same as Madagascar’s flag which has white, red and green.
The blog also clarifies that her stage, Baobab Horizon, is very focused at conveying the image of Madagascar’s landscape and architecture such as their brick houses and even ox carts and the stage will have both daytime and evening settings.
Music was also very important when developing the stage which was inspired by a musical genre called Salegy from Madagascar while also incorporating a phrase from Ogre’s Tekken 3 theme to highlight her connection to the Ogre lineage.
For the full details on Miary Zo as shared by the development team, you can check out the blog post about her here.
For any Ogre fans who were worried that Miary Zo’s inclusion meant that we’d never see Ogre as we knew him from Tekken 3 again, this should at least assuage their worries as she has connections to him but is definitely not any reincarnation of him (which wouldn’t have made sense with the timeline anyway — only about 3-4 years should have passed since Tekken 3 in-universe).
How do you feel about Miary Zo after learning more about her? Let us know in the comments.
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