Twin Hand Waves

Abridged move description courtesy of Suka Pass:

This move involves advancing a step forward and striking the opponent's chest and jaw with the palm and entire forearm while deflecting the opponent's attack downward with the other hand. This doesn't merely involve hurling the opponent's body backward as with a sumo arm thrust. The impact creates a shockwave that affects the opponent's internal organs.

Originally, it was a move devised in the Warring States Era to strike down samurai wearing armor. Not only was it ineffective to strike the hard torso of an opponent's armor with the hardened edge of the fist or elbow, it also injured the practitioner. For that reason, the softer, fleshier palm of the hand and the entire forearm was used to attack.

I was unable to find an exact 1:1 copy of the move, though there are a fair amount of similar looking moves in traditional martial arts (comment below if you know any real life moves that resemble the in-game Twin Hand Waves).

Top: Xing Yi Quan style splitting technique

Bottom: A forearm strike done during a Tai Chi push hands drill

The idea that the palm and forearm were used to avoid injury to the practitioner does hold some merit. While the description mentions the move being used against a person in armor, hitting even an unarmored person can cause injury to the user's hands if struck wrong. Many boxers in the bare knuckle boxing bouts the 18th and 19th centuries were common working men and could not take matches often as their hands would be too injured for them to use at work the next day. In modern revivals of bare knuckle boxing such as BKFC, broken and/or extremely swollen hands are common injuries. The palm and forearm are comparatively less fragile.

Palm strikes are effective strikes and Ryo has quite a few in his repertoire, so we'll be saving those for a future installment and instead focus on the forearm component of Twin Hand Waves. 

Forearm strikes are rare in modern striking competitions. In boxing, intentional forearm strikes are illegal and forearms are mainly used for defensive purposes to help shield against incoming punches. Though striking with the forearm is illegal, they can still be used to create opportunities to continue punching.

Though it doesn't count as a strike if you hold your forearm out and they run into it, as Conor McGregor discovered.

Floyd Mayweather Jr is a master at using his forearms to control his opponents. He creates a frame with his forearms that he can use to place on and push against the opponent's head. This framing gives Floyd control of the opponent's head and makes it very difficult for them to move effectively (as in the old grappling adage "control the head, control the body"). Floyd can use this to deny an opponent from countering him after he has thrown his combos, prevent or be used to break free from a clinch, and can smother an opponent's hands for a free shot at their unguarded head.

In this sequence, Conor attempts to enter a clinch after avoiding a flurry from Floyd. Floyd uses his left forearm to frame on Conor's head, preventing him from coming forward. Simultaneously, Floyd's right hand covers Conor's left, preventing Conor from throwing his vaunted left hand or link his hands together for the clinch. With Conor's left hand covered, Floyd throws a right hand at Conor's now-unguarded head without fear of reprisal.

Even in striking arts where forearm strikes are legal to use, they are still pretty uncommon.The use of forearms in sports such as Muay Thai or MMA trends more towards defensive uses such as blocking or framing as it does in boxing. At the range that forearm strikes are used, elbows tend to be more effective due to being able to generate more power or potential cuts (as well as being legal in nearly all the competitions that forearm strikes would also be legal in). The forearm strikes I've seen in MMA and Muay Thai seem to occur off of missed elbows or punches rather than intentional use, though committed attempts at forearm strikes do happen on occasion.

Former Rizin/Bellator BW champion Kyoji Horiguchi uses a lead forearm strike to stun Ali Bagautinov

Despite the description for the move explicitly mentioning it being different from sumo arm thrusts (called "tsuki-dashi" in sumo), the person closest to using Twin Hand Waves in real life is ironically a sumo wrestler. Hakuhō is arguably the greatest sumo wrestler of all time, having reached Yokozuna the highest rank possible as well as holding multiple all-time wins and championship records. One of Hakuhō's effective opening move combinations is the harite (open hand strike or slap) and kachiage (forearm strike).

Hakukō parries the initial charge and drives a forearm into his opponent's chest, forcing their posture upward and leaving them more susceptible to follow-up attacks

While technically legal, it's frowned up in sumo, especially by a wrestler of Hakuhō's caliber. However, it's practically as close to the in-game description as you can get and damn does it work.

Another example of Hakuhō slapping the head of his opponent to deflect the momentum of their charge and driving in his forearm. This time, his forearm connects with his opponent's chin, leading to a knockdown.

Tiger Knuckle

 

 Abridged move description via Suka Pass:

The Tiger Knuckle is a punch aimed at the jinchu, a pressure point located between the nose and the mouth.

The Hazuki Style is a martial art style that dates back to the time of the Warring States Era which focused its moves for hand-to-hand combat against warriors that wore body armor.

Because warriors who engaged in Kendo (the art of Japanese swordsmanship) wore helmets, these ancient moves did not focus on a general area, but instead, focused on parts of the body unprotected by armor. The jinchu is one of these unprotected area, and originally, a fatal twisting blow was delivered using a Caltrop Fist, formed by extending the index finger at the second joint.

 However, as is the case with ancient martial arts in general, the Hazuki Style evolved, changing from its historical background as a martial art for fighting in body armor against those who wore body armor to one that was practice in everyday clothes, a so-called 'naked martial art.' Through the inventive ideas of the practitioners who handed down the moves from generation to generation, moves from other martial arts were incorporated and the Hazuki Style was transformed from the lethal martial practiced during the Warring States Era to one with strong characteristics of self-defense.

Currently it is the self-defensive moves that are known to the public, but through traditional style oral instruction, these moves can easily be turned to their lethal counterpart martial arts of old.

 

The Tiger Knuckle is a jab (kizami zuki in Japanese karate), a basic lead arm punch that is ubiquitous in virtually every striking martial art with punches ever. As there are many articles and videos out there extolling the virtues of the jab in modern combat sports, I'll instead focus on the more unique aspects of the Tiger Knuckle and touch upon the elements of Japanese martial arts that are mentioned in the description.

One of the aspects that separates the Tiger Knuckle from the common jab is the targeted area of the jinchu pressure point. Strikes that target pressure points are very common in traditional martial arts, so that parts not that unusual in and of itself. The part that is surprising is that the jinchu is actually a real pressure point that goes by the same name and is located between the nose and the mouth.

A mannequin pointing out the location of the jinchu (under the acupuncture/acupressure designation GV26)

Another aspect that separates the Tiger Knuckle for the jab is how it was originally delivered by striking with the second joint of index finger. While I haven't seen the name "Caltrop Fist" appearing anywhere outside of Shenmue, the concept of striking with a raised index finger knuckle does appear in multiple martial arts. The phoenix eye fist used in Chinese kung fu styles such as Praying Mantis and Wing Chun and the shōken used in Okinawan karate styles such as Uechi Ryu both involve curling the forefinger to the second joint and locking it in place with the thumb. It is then used to jam into soft targets such as pressure points, eyes, throat, solar plexus, etc.

Kanei Uechi demonstrating the shōken

The use of the word kendo in the description to describe Japanese swordsmanship seems like a translation mistake. Kendo typically refers to the modern Japanese martial art/sport that's practiced with bamboo swords. Kenjutsu is the umbrella term for Japanese swordsmanship and is normally used to refer to the older sword styles pre-Meiji era, which the Hazuki style from the Warring States/Sengoku period would qualify for. However, the traditional martial arts of the time period did indeed encourage targeting the gaps and unarmored/less armored spots of an armored opponent (and that principle of "going around the armor" is present in other martial traditions where armor was used both in Asia and Europe). A typical samurai of the Sengoku era would be wearing a helmet and many would also wear varying degrees of facial armor such as the somen (full face mask) or menpo (half face mask). Even the somen leaves the jinchu area exposed to make breathing easier, leaving it open to a Tiger Knuckle. The purported effectiveness of striking there is dubious though and it would make more sense to aim for the eyes which are equally exposed.

An antique Moyomama period menpo

The description is broadly accurate with regards to the transition from battlefield martial arts to self defense arts, though there are many factors involved that are outside the scope of this article (weapon restrictions and laws, Neo-Confucianism, etc.). The line about the self-defense moves being what is known to the public also holds water. Many Japanese martial arts schools displayed certain techniques out in public and reserved a set of hidden techniques that was only taught to those initiated into the school. Like a Dragon Ball character hiding their power level, schools would avoid showing all their techniques so they could surprise or mislead an opponent in a duel or challenge match. I can't vouch for the term 'naked martial art' being legit though as I couldn't find any non-porn results to look at.

The Tiger Knuckle is the first of many of Ryo's moves that delve into Japanese martial traditions. Like the Google Support guy who has to remove naked martial art links that show up when SafeSearch is on, you can expect more content in the future.