Pronunciation of long o (e.g. in Street Fighter)—"oo" or "ou"?


I have very little knowledge regarding Japanese, but I'm curious about the
pronunciation of the long o. In Street Fighter, according to my basic
research, the "ō" in "hadōken" is pronounced (roughly) like an elongated
and/or doubled-up English "oh" (and, as such, the "ou" transliteration is
considered suboptimal these days).

However, consider the Japanese localization of Super Smash Bros. for the Wii
U. It seems to my (admittedly untrained) ear that Ryu pronounces it a la the
English "oo" in this [voice clip](https://youtu.be/mNFEWteXAOU?t=55) (whereas
in the English [version](https://youtu.be/UQwgMf65Nm0?t=27), it sounds to me
much more like "oh"). For another example, consider Ken's
[English](https://youtu.be/yPA-89kOQb8?t=35) and
[Japanese](https://youtu.be/e9IMi9iZMKo?t=33) voices in Street Fighter V.

Capcom and Nintendo are obviously much more qualified in terms of
pronunciation than I am, so I'm confused as to where my understanding has gone
wrong. Are there maybe unspoken rules that native speakers know intuitively
but that educational material does't explicitly state?

**EDIT** I'm certainly no linguist, but here's my best guess at the IPA
transcriptions of what I'm talking about. By "English 'oh'", I mean /o/. By
"English 'oo'", I mean /u/. That is to say: In the English clips I hear
/hadoːkeꜜɴ/, and in the Japanese clips I hear /haduːkeꜜɴ/. (These are _very_
rough transcriptions, of course, but I hope they better illustrate my
question.)

**EDIT 2:** I asked (IRL) another (General American) English speaker what they
heard, and they heard the correct pronunciation both times. So... this might
be a phenomenon with a sample size of one (i.e. me), in which case I'm really
curious if that's even possible :-P

**EDIT 3:** I asked (IRL) two other (General American) English speakers what
they heard, and _they_ heard the wrong pronunciation both times. So... this
might actually be a _bona fide_ GenAmE phenomenon!




After some repeated listening I think I hear the difference you are pointing
out, but it’s basically unnoticeable/unnotable to Japanese speakers, because
both the ハドーケン (ō) and ハドウケン (ou) pronunciations are
acceptable/interchangable.

The former is the standard in regular speech because it’s easier to say, but
the latter is just fine if you are trying to add color to the pronunciation
like one might in yelling a move name like this, and perhaps even “sounds
cooler” to some extent.




After some repeated listening I think I hear the difference you are pointing
out, but it’s basically unnoticeable/unnotable to Japanese speakers, because
both the ハドーケン (ō) and ハドウケン (ou) pronunciations are
acceptable/interchangable.

The former is the standard in regular speech because it’s easier to say, but
the latter is just fine if you are trying to add color to the pronunciation
like one might in yelling a move name like this, and perhaps even “sounds
cooler” to some extent.

