Through most of his development, Kyo was meant to be called Syo Kirishima ( 霧島 翔 Kirishima Shō ?), and was dressed in martial arts clothing common with fighting games at the time. When designing characters for the first King of Fighters game, developers wanted a new, "snazzy" hero who would easily fight against Fatal Fury and Art of Fighting characters. A variety of collectibles based on Kyo have been created, including key chains and figurines. Within Gamest's 1997 Heroes Collection, Kyo was voted as the staff's second favorite character.
Reviewers noted him to be a necessary character to have in every video game from the series and commented of him to have the best winning pose. Video games reviewers have praised his design and fighting style as one of the best from the series. Aside from the main series, Kyo also appears in several other media series such as spin-offs and crossover video games as well as comic adaptations of the series. He enters every The King of Fighters tournament representing Japan and uses his clan's fighting style to combine fire with kenpo. Due to his clan's past, Kyo fights against the Kusanagi's enemies his rival Iori Yagami, the last member of the Yagami clan, and the Orochi's soldiers. In The King of Fighters universe, his clan is one of the three clans that sealed the legendary snake entity, Yamata no Orochi. Kyo is first introduced as a cocky delinquent high school student who is the heir to the Kusanagi clan, who can use pyrokinetic powers. Due to the fact he was highly popular and his outfit changed along the series, the designers created a few clones with his old appearance. His name and abilities were designed in order to relate him with the Yamata no Orochi legend. He is one of the iconic characters of the series and regularly appears on publicity material and merchandise. Kyo Kusanagi ( 草薙 京 Kusanagi Kyō ?) is one of the main characters in SNK Playmore's The King of Fighters video game series he was first introduced in The King of Fighters '94 as the leader of the Japan team.