But only recently, it has come to people's attention that his legendary Japanese voice actor Norio Wakamoto won't be returning this time around, potentially signalling the end of an era for the iconic character (h/t: EventHubs).
Norio Wakamoto has voiced the character for over 20 years now, with his first appearance believed to be on 2000's SNK VS Capcom: The Match of the Millenium, where he took over from Tomomichi Nishimura. He will replaced by Taiten Kusunoki, who voiced the character in the Japanese dub of Wreck-It Ralph, though no official reason was given by Capcom for this change in actor.
Instead, the information was simply communicated via M. Bison's character bio on the Japanese website for Street Fighter, where Kusunoki is credited as his current voice actor, without further comment.
Because of this change, some fans have begun to speculate that the 79-year-old Wakamoto may be retiring from voice acting, but this is still unconfirmed at the moment.
Wakamoto recently appeared in Guilty Gear Strive (as Johnny last year) and seems set to feature as a voice actor in the upcoming RPG Reynatis, which is due out next month. It's not known, however, when these voice lines were recorded.
In other news, Gerald C. Rivers has been confirmed as returning for the English dub, via the English version of the site.
