Despite speculation to the contrary, Sawada is unarmed in the game. The "katana" shown was intended at the time to be a "motion blur"; given a conflict between the two Capcom branches, however, flicker transparency was not applied and it was instead left solid. His slashing attacks were intended to have an ethereal appearance to them, akin to the Hadoken. The designers argued for the flicker effect but were instead denied, and as a result opted for a look based on Mortal Kombat's effects at the time.