Inked on Screen: The Rise of Tattoo’s Within Video Games

To many people, tattoos are considered a work of art or beauty that can be used to represent different things. Many people get tattoos for memories, to display something(like a family name), or other important reasons. Well who would have thought that tattoos appear in video games too?! Some video game characters have tattoos that represent many things, and here are some well known characters that wear them.

Guile
Hailing from the Street Fighter series, Guile sports a pair of American Flags on his deltoids/shoulder area. These complete his intense American patriotism as a soldier.

Vega
Also coming from the Street Fighter series, Vega has a body tattoo, something often worn by Yakuza members. However, Vega himself is not of Yakuza status. Vega sports a purple snake tattoo that looks like it is wrapped around his body.

Jin Kazama
Coming from Tekken, Jin Kazama sports a tattoo on his upper left arm. This is the representation of the Devil Gene that the Devil used to mark him.

Kratos
The spartan from the game series God of War, Kratos sports a huge red line tattoo that begins below his left eye goes over the top of his head, down his neck and back, up his torso, and ends on his left shoulder. Some people could see this as the blood-image that he brings in God of War(a hella bloody game) and gives him that overall image of brutality.

Agent 47
Also known as the Hitman, Agent 47 has probably one of the weirdest tattoos. He has a barcode on the back of his head, with numbers 640509-040147, and it serves multiple purposes. It works as both an identification tool and a security key.

Zell Dincht
Coming from the famous Final Fantasy Series, this character appears in the eighth installment of that franchise. Zell sports a black tribal tattoo on the side of his face that is highly noticeable.

RED XIII
Although not the first character to come to mind when it comes to tattoos, REDXIII actually is a cat with a tattoo(or moreso a brand) from Final Fantasy 7. It has the roman numerals “XIII” on them, hence his name being Red XIII.

Kazuma Kiryu
From the video game Yakuza (loved it), comes main character Kazuma Kiryu, who openly(I mean its the effing cover lol) has a HUGE tattoo on his back. It is of a dragon, which represents his status as the “Dragon of the Dojima Family”.

Sheva Alomar
Coming from Resident Evil 5, this girl sports a tattoo on her left arm. It is a tribal design with the word “shujaa” in the middle. “Shujaa” means “warrior” or “hero” in Swahili and “brave” or “courageous” in Arabic.

Tai Kaliso
Another wielder of tribal tattoos, Tai Kaliso has this stuff basically all over him. Just by looking at the tattoos all over his face you know this character is someone not to mess with. I mean, he does come from Gears of War after all.

Although video game characters do have tattoos, some people in real life take it one step further. Check out this quick small gallery of pictures I found of people sporting video game tattoo replicas.

All those above are real, with the exception of the Yakuza one. I think that might just be a henna. But yes, the guy with the barcode on the back of his head is real. He even goes by the name 47. Legit. Do you think you would ever get the same tattoo as another video game character? If so, what do you think you would get? I think I would go for something similar to Red XIII’s, except a little more relating to myself.