The cast of the upcoming Street Fighter movie appeared at the Game Awards 2025 to present one of the many awards given out during the night — specifically Best Ongoing Game, which was won by No Man's Sky. During their humorous skit prior to the presentaiton of the award, the cast took a moment to acknowledge a classic fighting game rivalry by throwing some shade at Mortal Kombat franchise.
The Street Fighter Movie Cast Threw Shade At Mortal Kombat At The Game Awards
The presentation of the Best Ongoing Game award at the 2025 Game Awards featured a who's who of the 2026 Street Fighter movie cast. Present on stage was pretty much the entire cast of the highly anticipated fighting game movie: Andrew Koji (Ryu), Noah Centineo (Ken), Callina Liang (Chun-Li), Roman Reigns (Akuma), David Dastmalchian (M. Bison), Cody Rhodes (Guile), Andrew Schulz (Dan Hibiki), Vidyut Jammwal (Dhalsim), Orville Peck (Vega), Olivier Richters (Zangief), Rayna Vallandingham (Juli), Mel Jarnson (Cammy), and Jason Momoa (Blanka).
Prior to the cast's appearance, host Geoff Keighley showed off an exclusive sneak peek of the film. Liang confirmed that the movie, which will release on October 16, 2026, had recently wrapped filming. Jason Momoa joked that, as a long-time fan of the Street Fighter series, he had threatened violence towards the production team were he not cast in the role of Blanka. He jokingly referred to Koji's character as "Rih-yu," which caused Koji to retaliate, "It's pronounced RYU, you know that!"
Before announcing that No Man's Sky had won Best Ongoing Game in 2025, the cast shouted out Street Fighter fans, stating that the upcoming movie would not be possible without significant support from the fan community. Schulz then went on to throw some shade at the Mortal Kombat franchise, jokingly announcing that the cast of th e Mortal Kombat 2 film was also present, before saying that he was kidding and the cast "don't care about you" — meaning the players and fans — and "only care about money."
Schulz then added, "We care about money AND you" before shouting, "Street Fighter forever!" The rest of the cast primarily joined in with the cheering, although Liang stated that Schulz was "joking" and "cannot be trusted." Following that, No Man's Sky's win was announced, and the Street Fighter film cast departed the stage to raucous cheers.
The Street Fighter and Mortal Kombat games have been rivals since the first Mortal Kombat game was released in 1992. One key element of the rivalry is the fact that the two franchises have never crossed over, despite the fact that both have appeared in a number of other crossovers. Street Fighter has crossed over with Tekken and appeared in Marvel vs. Capcom and Project X Zone, while Mortal Kombat has been host to guest characters such as The Boys' Homelander and Scream's Ghostface, as well as many more. Perhaps the fact that the two sets of characters have never been allowed to truly face off inspired the Street Fighter film cast to make the comments they did on the Game Awards stage?
Currently, both the Mortal Kombat 2 and Street Fighter films are scheduled for a 2026 release, although the Mortal Kombat 2 film is coming out several months earlier — May 8, 2026, compared to Street Fighter's October release date. Has debuting in the same year, combined with Schulz's comments at the Game Awards, reignited the ongoing rivalry between the two franchises? With the two films being months apart, there seems to be space at the box office for both video game adaptations, but the Street Fighter cast may have just thrown down a gauntlet. It remains to be seen if the Mortal Kombat 2 cast will have any response to these teasing statements — perhaps a rebuttal may appear on social media in the coming weeks.