Poison, the female thug, was simply intended to be a female gang member to contrast all the large bulky male fighters and add variety to the game. An American playtester working at Capcom objected to the player hitting females, to which Akira Yasuda pointed out that the females were actually transvestites, as stated in Poison's profile that she was born a man, but dresses as a woman. This wasn't enough for North America, so Poison and a recolor of her character, Roxy, were replaced with two male characters called Billy and Sid on the Super Nintendo.

Poison was also censored in the Sega CD version to increase the size of her shirt, so that less of her breasts were revealed in several poses.