Results tagged “Street Fighter” from Damage Control

While I was looking through the list I made of ideas for Street Fighter articles, it occurs to me that one of them unfortunately didn't make the cut. This happened either because (1) I planned for each entry to only have one feature a day, and this one unfortunately didn't make that, or (2) I was too damn lazy to write it. I'm pretty sure it was the latter, though. Whoops.

So anyway, that brings us to this entry now, just a little late. The Street Fighter franchise's arcade entries have had numerous ports to home consoles, some perfect, and some slightly less than perfect. But there's a subset of them that usually aren't mentioned too often: intentionally imperfect ports. These were the ports that no one in their right mind expected to be anywhere near perfect, but the developers intended for them to be something we could make do with on lower-end platforms. However, they were still perfectly playable and enjoyable, despite their compromises.

On the surface, you'd think the team of people who thought porting Street Fighter II to the Game Boy were crazy. A fighting game that relies on six buttons for input on a system with two? It seriously sounds bizarre, but Capcom was able to make it a pretty solid, but not spectacular, diversion from its big brother. Place extra emphasis on diversion, because there's definitely not enough here for it to replace the original. The monochrome iteration didn't leave much potential for anyone to show off the dazzling combos they could do on the console versions; especially if your favorite character was either Dhalsim, E. Honda, or Vega, since they were cut from this version.

Due to the Game Boy's incredibly limited memory, the backgrounds also weren't as vibrant as the console version, though you could get a partial picture of the color background if you played it through the Super Game Boy; though that's a little redundant if you're playing it on a system that has three great Street Fighter II titles. Don't expect any of the franchise's token voice samples here either, though the nearly 8-bit music samples actually turned out pretty well. This was something you played to keep yourself occupied outside of the house, or merely played for novelty's sake.

It was 1996, and the Playstation, Saturn, and Nintendo 64 (and those other systems that died a quick death) were now on the market. But some of us were still stuck in last-gen with our Super Nintendo's and Genesis', unable to plead to our parents that those new consoles were well worth the asking price. While the Street Fighter franchise had moved on to having a home on the Playstation and Saturn, Capcom thankfully looked out for anyone who hadn't upgraded yet, and made a version of Street Fighter Alpha 2 for SNES. A shame they decided to pass on releasing it outside of Japan for some reason, but Nintendo decided to publish it in America and Europe. The port was expectedly not as good as the PSX and Saturn versions -- which also weren't arcade perfect, by the way -- but it was an incredibly good replica.

SFA2 was one of the few SNES games to have loading times, a testament to how much data was needed to fit into the cartridge. Every character from the game made it into this version (except for a few admittedly silly alternate versions), and unlike SFII for GB, it was a very good alternative to the other versions. Most of the sound effects made it in, and the SNES had six buttons, enough for a player to use every combo they used in the other versions. Though it was a little tough to perform techniques that required pressing all three punches/kicks, but there were arcade sticks made for the SNES. There's no way music on a cartridge could match CD-quality material the other ports had, but the replica the SNES game has is pretty good. It was well worth your time if you still hadn't decided which system to purchase yet.

For the three of you who wanted to know how the original Street Fighter Alpha: Warrior's Dreams would look on an NES, Capcom answered your pleas with a port of the game to Nintendo's short-lived Game Boy Color. In a way, it's kind of similar to the Game Boy version of SFII, in that you're hindered by only having two buttons (you won't be showing off your fancy chain combos here), most of the sound effects and music are left out, and it really only works as a diversion. However, it's not similar in that this game is two-times better than SFII for GB.

The best thing about the port is that it feels fluid, like your moves actually have an impact on your opponent. The main problem with SFII for GB was that it felt like your moves didn't have enough "oomph," but you can actually perform combos here. Also, every character from the original version made it into this game with most of their techniques. Even Dan! All of the stages made it in too, though the original didn't have many to begin with.

Really, the only crippling flaw is that it doesn't allow for link cable battles. It's single-player only. I don't even...what?

Next, we have Super Street Fighter II Turbo Revival for Game Boy Advance, the first really stellar portable port of a Street Fighter game. Actually, calling this merely a port is doing it a disservice a little, as it goes slightly beyond that. Capcom added quite a bit to this version, including new special effects (the super-triggering effect is ripped right from the Alpha games), alternate stages for 1/3 of the cast (Chun-li has her Alpha 2 stage, Ken has his SFIII: 2nd Impact stage, etc.), and the character portraits have all been completely redrawn - a sample of which is included in the banner. The fan-favorite bonus stages were also re-added to this version, which were absent from the original. The gameplay is just as balanced as the original, and this time you're only hindered by having four buttons instead of two.

But there always has to be a problem, and the issue here is that ST Revival comes jam-packed with so many glitches that you'll wonder if this game had any QA. In the original game, you had to fulfill specific conditions in order to face Akuma as the final boss instead of M. Bison. That's included here, but instead of fighting him, you're greeted with the game freezing while the background music plays Akuma's theme. There are also other bizarre instances, but the aforementioned one is pretty inexucsable.

That still doesn't stop ST Revival from being a great port of the original, though. It's the best version of the game available on a portable system.

The last portable compromised port we have is Street Fighter Alpha 3 for Game Boy Advance, which is even more of a faithful port than ST Revival. Somehow, Capcom was able to jam most of the console version's features into a GBA cartridge. That includes all 32 characters from the console version; heck, they even added a few - Maki from Final Fight 2, Eagle from the original Street Fighter, and Yun from Street Fighter III. Most of the voice samples didn't make it in, though that's not surprising considering the plethora of sound effects the console version has.

That didn't stop this from being a great version, though, with the game's flow being precisely similar to the console version. Anyone with experience with previous Street Fighter games could easily jump right in with minimal problems (excusing the fact that the GBA only has four buttons). It was the best portable version of SFA3 until the PSP version would come along a little more than three years later.

Anyone who knows Capcom well knows that they're definitely no strangers to porting all of their games everywhere, and Street Fighter was nowhere near an exception here. The good thing is that they did a great job with most of their ports, which shows how much they were concerned with quality and money; pretty different from too many other companies that just love to cash in with haphazard ports that don't work to a specific console's advantages and disadvantages, and that's, sadly, too many companies to name.

By the way, I'll try not to post anything Street Fighter related here for a while. OK? OK.

You can now completely tell that the fighting game genre is back from its extended period of dormancy: we're now starting to see yearly sequels. But the fortunate thing is that it's nothing as bad as the multiple iterations of Street Fighter II, which took things a bit too far for the average consumer - though the price of cartridges back then certainly didn't help either. Quite a few people around the internet are surprised to see updates to games released as little as less than a year ago, but I don't see why. Heck, we already knew about some of them, like an update to Blazblue: Calamity Trigger.


Though it was merely hinted at by developer Arc System Works earlier in the year - even before the console release of the first game - Blazblue: Continuum Shift was officially revealed within the pages of Famitsu a few weeks ago. But what ostensibly seemed like an update that could easily be provided via downloadable content turned out to be much more. It's actually a sizable upgrade over Calamity Trigger; too sizable, that is, for them to release it as a DLC pack. It not only contains at least two new characters, but new stages (while the older ones are revamped a bit) and quite a few balance changes. The last point is the primary focus for them, and it really should be since the first game's biggest problem was the serious character balance issues.

The funniest thing is that people are shocked to see that Blazblue is getting a new iteration so quickly, but I'm wondering if they were even paying attention during the last generation. That's OK, though, because it's only been a year since the genre returned to a sense of relevancy. Do you know how many releases and updates the Guilty Gear franchise had last generation on PS2?

From left to right:
(Top) Guilty Gear X Plus, Guilty Gear XX, Guilty Gear XX #Reload, 
(Bottom) Guilty Gear XX Slash, Guilty Gear XX Accent Core, Guilty Gear XX Accent Core Plus. Whew!

Yup, that's six games. Ridiculous? Definitely, though Continuum Shift seems like more of an upgrade than lots of these, save Accent Core. Look forward to four more Blazblue games after this one!

(No, I don't think there will be that many. At least I hope not!)

It's going to take a while before this one hits home consoles. It's currently in playtesting stages in Japan, with an ambiguous release date of "this winter" for the actual arcade game. Given the time games like this usually stick to arcades, and given how popular Calamity Trigger was in Japanese arcades, I'd say summer 2010 is a good estimate...which would make it precisely a year after Calamity Trigger hit home. I hope it's not full price.

Oh hey, and there's also an update to Street Fighter IV coming soon as well, and they're calling it, well, Super Street Fighter IV. I believe the reason why they're calling it that is to signify how big of an update it is. It's nothing completely related to semantics, but the thing is that Super Street Fighter II was the first significant upgrade out of the four Street Fighter II received. So far, they seem to be capitalizing on that point, though most of what we know is through interviews with Capcom staff. I have no doubt, however, that they'll fully realize them.

But a lot of people definitely doubt that thus far, and think this move eerily parallels Street Fighter II and Street Fighter III's multiple iterations. They've already confirmed that they're not going to make the same mistake by saying it won't be a fully-priced release. That was precisely the reason why SSFII was a colossal bomb at retail, releasing at a whopping - if memory serves -- $79.99. Yeah, I sure miss buying cartridges! For a more recent example of this, just look at Virtua Fighter 4: Evolution's sales in Japan. It tanked badly, despite its arcade iteration being incredibly popular. It was released for full price initially, but retailers slashed the price in half upon realizing copies would never move at its introductory price. Fortunately, they had the sense to release it in America at a budget price.

Back to SSFIV, what we have seen so far is three characters. Two of them, T. Hawk and Dee Jay, are returning characters, while there's a new character named Juri (that's her pictured). Reaction to her has been mixed so far, though it's been surprisingly a tad negative in South Korea. I say "surprising" because Juri is a Korean character, the first for the franchise. Me? Oh, I think she's perfectly fitting for a Street Fighter game, and the internet reaction is pretty similar to when C. Viper was revealed for the original SFIV. So yeah, par the course.

There's not much known at this point, as you can see. But rest assured that Capcom is making sure they divulge every piece of information as slow as excruciatingly possible. In other words, they're building it up just like the previous game, which is pretty good for marketing purposes. Apparently, they don't know whether it will receive an arcade release or not, but it'll hit PS3 and 360 in spring 2010.

Yet in all of this talk, there's still one game that's regrettably left out of most conversations about the genre: Virtua Fighter 5 R. VF5 R is, well, an enhanced version of Virtua Fighter 5, originally released on PS3 and 360 - the latter of which with online play. Some vocal fans of the franchise outside of Japan have been clamoring for the game to receive a console release, but Sega won't budge. It's a shame, given all of the rebalancing and enhancements R has - including the inclusion of one returning character and one completely new - but it's perfectly understandable that they haven't. You see, the fanbase for this game is vocal, but it's undeniably niche, and a console port would be a hard sell anywhere. It's popular in Japanese arcades, but usually that doesn't equal brisk console sales, and the franchise was never that popular in America or Europe. It would be a gamble, and it's definitely one Sega isn't willing to take. It's a shame though, given how well balanced it apparently is, and how good VF5 is online.

With this, I think you can really say that the genre is back among the living. We've received plenty of games in the genre this year (admittedly with some misfires), and Tekken 6 is due for a release at the end of this month; further proof that the genre isn't letting up -- unless it's also a misfire; Tekken 5: Dark Resurrection and Soul Calibur IV don't give me much hope. There will be quite a few to juggle, so it's a good thing they're not coming out right on top of each other like the five we had between June and July.

Of all of the characters that have been revealed after Street Fighter II, there hasn't been one more memorable than Dan. That's because of his unique appeal, and the fundamentals that gave birth to his origins.

Relating to that, Dan has something no other character has: parodical qualities. When Capcom gave birth to the 2D fighting game genre we know it as today with Street Fighter II in the mid-90s. Considering that, it's not particularly surprising that other companies would like to help capitalize on that success with making similar-though-different-enough alikes. Some of them naturally turned out terrible, like Fighter's History, but the best of them came from SNK. Art of Fighting was one of the most popular ones from SNK, and Capcom thought they'd strike back with a subtle sense of humor. This is what gave birth to Dan.

(Though honestly, SNK's World Heroes was far more of a rip-off of Street Fighter than Art of Fighting ever was.)

Art of Fighting has two main characters named Ryo Sakazaki and Robert Garcia (to the left and right of the above picture, and on the left side of each screen shot), who are definitely intended to be that franchises Ryu and Ken. That's not where their similarities end either. Ryo, as you've probably noticed already, has a similar name to Ryu, but he also has moves similar to them as well. So does Robert, who also comes from an incredibly wealthy family, just like Ken. Yeah, you can see where this is going.

So the empire decided to strike back and create a character that made fun of theirs, with hilarious results. Something Art of Fighting established was incredible amounts of taunting, and Dan does it with as much style as they did. In fact, in the Alpha games, he was the only character that could taunt as much as he wanted to (every other character could only do it once per round), and he was the only one that had multiple taunts. Heck, he even has a super technique that's a gigantic, elaborate, and long taunt. It's definitely one of the best and hilarious moves in the franchise.


In terms of canon, Dan was once a student of Ansatsuken karate, but was banished when Gouken, the same man who trained Ryu and Ken, discovered that his motives were getting in the way of his learning. This was a fantastic move, it seems, as it begat the introduction of the legendary Saikyo-ryu, literally translated as "Strongest style". By the way, Ryo and Robert use the Kyokugen-ryu, which is translated as "Extreme style." Hmm.

He also, naturally, has some fighting techniques similar to them. Ryo doesn't have a fireball that doesn't go very far? Dan has that! And it looks comical compared to any other fireball the rest of the cast usually has. He has an uppercut that has horrible priority in nearly every game he's been in. And he also has a hurricane kick-like move that, in most games, is kind of useless because its start-up is way too long. For supers, he has a super fireball that doesn't go that much farther than his normal one, a super uppercut attack that has horrible range, and something that's incredibly unique: the Hisshou Burai Ken. The literal translation for that is Certain-Victory-Relying-On-Nobody-But-Myself Fist. It does pretty good damage, and it's hilarious to watch in motion, but good luck landing the full thing on an opponent. Though, chances are your opponent won't be too happy if you land it on them. You know who to use if you want to witness the omnipotent bile of kids on Xbox Live in Street Fighter IV! So yeah, he definitely isn't one of the best characters in the game.


But that doesn't matter, you see! Judging him solely on those qualities is missing the point of using the character entirely. Dan can be used in two ways, expertly though a lot of training and practice with human match-ups, or if you want to be suicidal. Though you can also use him to psyche out your opponent if they think you're picking him as a gesture to say they're not very good. If you want to get some rage from your opponent, now you know who to pick.

In case people still didn't realize that he was a parody, Capcom thought they'd go for a less subtle approach in some of their future games:

Subtle!

There's also his ending in Marvel Super Heroes vs. Street Fighter, which is probably one of -- if not the -- most clever aspects of the game. I'm not talking about his unique taunt to this game, which is fantastic on its own (and even does a little damage to the opponent).

First is Art of Fighting's ending (keep in mind that only Ryo and Robert were playable):

And here's Dan's ending in Marvel Super Heroes vs. Street Fighter:

I don't know about you, but they look pretty similar.

Yeah, so he's a pretty terrible character to use in most games (but only in terms of fighting ability!), but there are a few where he's pretty capable. He's actually worthwhile in SNK vs. Capcom: Mark of the Millennium for Neo Geo Pocket Color, which was the first crossover game between those two companies. And this particular one was also developed by SNK, which probably says something. His Street Fighter IV iteration also isn't too bad, though he still pales in comparison to most characters. I decided to use him when if first started playing the game to take on a bunch of people in Player Matches, and I did pretty well. But that was when everyone was new to the game; I wouldn't dare do that now.

His iteration in SNK vs. Capcom: SVC Chaos is also pretty different. That doesn't necessarily mean he's a capable fighter here (he isn't), but it was worth seeing how SNK would treat Dan in the game's conversation exchanges. SVC Chaos has something unique about it: each character exchanges a healthy amount of dialogue before each battle begins. Their dialogue will either range from entertaining, to hilarious, to seriously awkward. Dan's are hilarious, of course, but other characters react to seeing him pretty hilariously as well.


Dan made a pretty hilarious impact on not only Street Fighter, but the entire 2D fighting game genre. No, that's not only because he's been in quite a few crossover games, but because of how innovate and appealing he was to everyone who adored - or flamed people over the internet over - the rivalry between Capcom and SNK. There are more parodies and knock-off's in fighting games, but no one will ever be as great as Dan can be. That isn't an easy task, but Capcom sure did it well.

Over the last few weeks, I've been going back into this site's archives and looking at my earlier writing in an attempt to better my abilities at transcribing my thoughts. Always a frightening ordeal, I know. But when I did, a few features stuck out as feeling unfinished and, worst of all, totally phoned in. The fact that some examples include a couple of the Street Fighter related posts disturbs me greatly. I think an extended director's cut edition here would be silly, so here's an excuse to do the Street Fighter Alpha thing again with a review of the PS2 collection: Street Fighter Alpha Anthology.

In a sense, you could almost include Street Fighter Alpha and its progeny as an anime adaptation, given how it was based on the success of Street Fighter II: The Animated Movie. Its concept was born of curiosity for the background story of its characters, especially the one's focused on in the movie - because you just knew a 100 minute feature couldn't balance a cast of 16 characters. This isn't to give any kind of importance to the story of a fighting game (it's not), or to acknowledge that the movie's story was any good (it isn't); but the fact that it was fun was good enough, so why not transfer that into the game's.

That idea gave birth to the first Street Fighter Alpha, which featured a downsized-though-reanimated 13 characters (ten initially with three hidden). You may or may not have liked the changed art style depending on your preferences - with Alpha shifting more towards anime rather than the faux-realism style of Street Fighter II - but it made plenty of sense upon seeing what it was based off of. From observing that, you could surmise that Alpha was definitely for dedicated fans that had stuck with the series and absorbed its plethora of merchandising with open arms. On the other hand, you could also blame it for relegating the franchise to one that now only appealed to a specific niche.

But what about the game? Well, Street Fighter Alpha somewhat refined the classic Street Fighter formula with a gameplay style that was a little more with the times for the mid-90s. The controls were tighter than II's, and the game was much more forgiving with its combo inputs. This game also allowed chain combos similar to what was introduced in X-Men: Children of the Atom, which involved stringing a succession of hits together to form a pretty big and damaging combo pretty easily.

It's hard to put into words, but it feels as if there's something missing from the first Alpha title. It feels like the team at Capcom took a bunch of ideas and slapped them into the game without any concern for how to implement them. The result feels like a haphazard beta released at full price to test fan reaction to everything introduced. It's acceptable, and better than your average fighting game (i.e. it still manages to distinguish itself from the Street Fighter-alike games that were prevalent at that time. Why hello there Fighter's History and World Heroes!) , but it feels like the prelude to something better. Of course, this feeling is especially prevalent after you've played the second game, which released not even a year later. In other words, it feels like what a lot of people think King of Fighters XII is.

Though the game gets a special place in my heart for introducing the single best character in the history of the franchise: Dan Hibiki.

It isn't until you play the two of them back to back that you realize how big of a leap Street Fighter Alpha 2 is. It may not look that way at first glance, but when you play both of them, you'll realize the frightening realization: Capcom actually fooled us out of our money or quarters with the first game, and the second game is the real product. That's because Alpha does everything better than the first game. Lack of stages? Well now everyone has their own stage. Too slow? Now it's much faster? Lack of "oomph" in the music? This time, it has more of a beat. Not enough characters? Capcom added five more here (six if you're including the Gold edition) Not enough fan service? Well, this one has much more.

Boy does it ever have more fan service. SFA2's new character is Sakura, a character so obviously made to cater to anyone who liked Ryu and had a schoolgirl fetish. It's definitely pandering, but Capcom knew that they were doing, and knew they had a goldmine of a character at their disposal. Despite being an apprentice story wise, she's a pretty capable fighter, which has unsurprisingly made her very popular.

What made SFA2 important for fighting game fans was that it was tournament viable. The first Alpha game just felt too blasé for its own good for anyone to really take interest in it, but SFA2 is one of the most balanced games Capcom put out at the time. Dan was a little better, but Akuma, thankfully, was quite nerfed from his way-overpowered Alpha 1 counterpart. Despite that, though, the tournament scene was later dominated by nothing but Ryu, Ken, Chun-Li, and Rose players, since they were pretty sizable advantages over the rest of the cast. Nice try, though.

But that didn't stop SFA2 from being a superlative product, though. The game has an energetic-yet-subtle approach to how it deals with its gameplay, and all of this is mainly why it's the most highly regarded of the three Alpha games.

Street Fighter Alpha 3 is an entirely different beast than its two predecessors, mainly because of everything it includes. Capcom clearly took the gloves off for this one and made the gameplay quite disparate from the first two games. More juggles are possible, many characters have new moves and animations for more combo possibilities, and the character roster was almost doubled. These are enhancements you would expect for a game releasing around two and a half years after the second game, and they're definitely for the better...and worse.

SFA2 took an energetic-yet-subtle approach to its gameplay, but SFA3 removes any sense of subtlety the games previously had. It's way over-the-top with some crazy juggles, characters jumping all around the place with and after landing attacks, and a massive cast that will ensure a lot of experimentation; even though that last point can be bad for the sheer amount of match-ups you'll have to learn for a single character, and that's not even including the fact that some characters have different forms. It can be pretty overwhelming going from the second game to this initially, but it's perfectly easy to adjust to after familiarizing yourself with all of the new mechanics.

In terms of fanservice, though SFA2 increased the amount of it over the first game, this game is loaded with it. It has extensive back stories and endings for every character, which is necessary given how this is the last Alpha game. The story will be required to link this to Street Fighter II, especially since every character from II is included here (if you're including the home version and renewed arcade version). It's a pretty big achievement for a game with a cast of 31 characters, still the most ever in a Street Fighter game (especially in the PSP version, which has four more characters).

The changed feel of the game is also reflected in the music, which drifts away from the new age soundtrack of the previous games and embraces techno. This also means the familiar character themes that had been prevalent since Street Fighter II are all completely gone. It's kind of the antithesis of Street Fighter III: 3rd Strike's soundtrack, which had some heavy rap influences.

Though it's different and a bit unbalanced because of how over-the-top it is, SFA3 is still a lot of fun to play. The sheer amount of experimentation in the game is what makes it so addictive that you're guaranteed to come back over and over to experience it. And that's regardless of the, uh, six systems the game is available for.

So yeah, the Street Fighter Alpha franchise (sub-franchise?) is really great, though it didn't start out that way. I didn't really hammer the point in how good the second and third games were in my original feature, but thankfully a blog like this presents second chances. The last two games in the series are still playable today, though it would be best if you did so on the official Anthology released for the PS2, thanks to them being perfect ports of the arcade games.

If you accept that X-Men: Children of the Atom was Capcom's next step in a new sub-genre of fighting games, then X-Men vs. Street Fighter was the prefect follow-up. But that's definitely not what people initially took notice of upon seeing the game for the first time. No, what made it stand out was the pure craziness of a crossover between those two franchises. A Marvel and Capcom crossover is pretty commonplace these days, but this game marked the first time something like this ever happened. It was the kind of concept that you could tell your friends about, but they wouldn't believe it until they were able to see it in person, which actually gave us geeks a lot of grief - this was a time before the luxury of DSL/Cable internet, you see.


But it was very real, and the results were superb for the time. X-Men vs. Street Fighter utilizes the gameplay found in both X-Men: CotA and Marvel Super Heroes and expands on it by adding a tag-team function. It sounds like a clever gimmick on paper, but in actuality it does a lot towards spicing the gameplay up and making it even more intense. It's like the perfect addition to its formula, in that while tagging in your partner takes a little practice - mainly, tagging them in when the time is right - it doesn't make the game harder to play at all.

As its title implies, X-Men vs. Street Fighter includes most (probably not all, I'm sure someone's favorites are missing) of your favorite characters from both teams. On the Street Fighter side, expected additions like Ryu, Ken, Chun-Li, Bison, Zangief, Dhalsim, and Akuma make it in, along with some you probably didn't expect to see like Charlie and Cammy. All of the Street Fighter characters have their Alpha sprites, including Akuma this time, thankfully; though that excludes Cammy, who prior to this game didn't have any (she didn't appear in the Alpha series until Street Fighter Alpha 2 Gold). For the X-Men, only Wolverine, Cyclops, Storm, Juggernaut, and Magneto make it in from COTA, but this game adds Gambit, Rogue, and Sabretooth to make up for them. Apocalypse also makes an appearance as the unplayable final boss.

Inserting the Street Fighter characters into an X-Men world doesn't sound like an easy task, but both games play similarly enough that it's perfectly fitting. Though it's only "fitting" for your tastes if you're willing to accept that this game doesn't have the same amount of depth or complexity as a Street Fighter game. Like CotA before it, it eschews that for a higher sense of fun for people who aren't already attuned to games like that. The result was a game that was a little finicky at times (especially with people who exploit the unbalances in the game), but still remained fun and flashy enough that it attracted casual and hardcore gamers alike.

Character techniques were done in the same way they were in CotA, with only a few characters having anything that required two quarter-circle-forward motions. The only aspect that took getting the hang of was having a partner and knowing when to switch them in. The idea behind having a tag team mechanic was so you could switch in another character after one has taken too much damage, since some of their health can recover while they're away. Switching them at the wrong time could be even more costly, since your character performs a signature taunt after kicking their way in. If your opponent gets hit by the kick, that's fantastic, because it'll send them through the air and leave them vulnerable for a second. But if it's blocked, it can be punished with a devastating combo. It's not exactly an ingenious layer of depth, but one that's welcome, because having players switch without any kind of penalty would be quite horrible.

So yeah, you can tell that the game was successful as an experiment given that it had plenty of sequels. Its gameplay was already incredibly addictive (which is pretty bad when your hard-earned quarters are on the line), but that's when you can tell that a company has a successful product on their hands. But not every successful experiment stays in arcades; it also released on a couple of home consoles.


Unfortunately, no home consoles at the time could perfectly handle the game as they were. For it to run efficiently, it entailed that four characters had to basically be on the same screen simultaneously in order for them to be switched in and out quickly. The game did receive a perfect home console port for the Sega Saturn, which included a 4MB Ram cartridge to help the system handle the game (for reference: a bunch of other games, including Marvel Super Heroes vs. Street Fighter, Darkstalkers: Vampire Savior, and The King of Fighters '97 would also only work with the cart plugged in). It was the only perfect home port, which tragically wasn't released outside of Japan. We did get the Playstation version though. Note: place much emphasis on version.


It's a shame that Sony didn't want any added ram on their console, which resulted in a much less-than-adequate port of the game. Gone was the innovative tag team gameplay that made the arcade game so special, and in its place was a...one-on-one fighter - though you could play the game in tag-team mode if two human players wanted to play the same characters, but still. Not only that, but it was also laden with plenty of slowdown and serious framerate issues. The sad part is that, before the time of emulators, this was our only option for a home console version unless you were willing to import (which a lot of people did).

X-Men vs. Street Fighter isn't an X-Men game per se - thus only half-qualifying for this feature - but its significance is important to X-Men in gaming because of how much the game meant to arcades back in the mid-90s and the rest of the crossover games. These days, it's still pretty great to play, so feel free.

When Street Fighter IV was announced and shown to be using a 3D graphics system, fans balked at the approach it was taking. While Capcom claimed that their intention was to capture fans sense of nostalgia, their memories were of the game being a 2D experience, hence the hassle. But Capcom's ambitions went further than that: they also wanted to bring back the audience that left after Street Fighter II Turbo. Fortunately, the results were good, but the initial fan reaction was understandable given the existence of Street Fighter EX.

Street Fighter EX was the franchise's first foray into 3D. Assumingly, Capcom didn't want to continue developing all of the sub-series in 2D, and decided to enlist the help of Arika to develop a new game using the Playstation's polygon pushing power. A pity about the actual game, though, which is pretty mediocre thanks to the game's loose controls, which make performing techniques and combos more difficult than they should be. Also, I don't think anyone wanted to see their favorite characters make the transition into blocky polygons. Thankfully, it looks better in motion, but that isn't enough to assuage the clunky feel of the game.

EX was also a host to a bunch of new characters, the majority of which were some of the most bizarre the series ever produced. Some of them were pretty normal, like Hokuto and Pullum (both of which I'd personally like to see in other games), but some were downright eye raising, like a dominatrix named Blair Dame, an entertainer in a skeleton suit named Skullomania (who's also memorable in his own right), and a man with a long wire and spikes embedded on his wrists named Doctrine Dark. The characters were mostly pretty interesting, much better than the game they were in.

The first EX title also had some bizarre endings. These were supposedly designed to give Tekken a run for its money with full CG endings only accompanied by music. They all either ranged from boring to embarrassingly awkward. Some of which are so awkward and comical that they qualify as nothing other than cheesy humor today, mainly because they're so out of character for Street Fighter.

To continue with the legacy, Street Fighter EX 2 released for the PSOne a few years after the first game. The good thing is that the graphics were smoothed over for this one, giving the character models a smoother feel. The gameplay? Oh, well it's still as clunky as the first game's. There are also a bunch of new characters, like Blair's sister Sharon, but none of them are as memorable as anyone introduced in the first game. Except for maybe Area, a nerdy-looking girl wearing roller skates and a mechanical arm. Yeah, bizarre. EX 2 is probably the best in the series, though that isn't saying much if the core game is still lacking.

Then came Street Fighter EX 3, which was...well, not really a sequel. This was a launch title for the Playstation 2 back in 2000, so naturally the game looked better than a PSOne game. It also featured a tag mode similar to Tekken Tag Tournament's. Again, the core game was the same, and there were no new characters added. EX 3 instead reuses characters from the previous installments, with a few omissions - one of which is fan-favorite Akuma, interestingly enough.

Street Fighter's first foray into 3D didn't go so well. On the other hand, it's probably good that these games were released, because Capcom could use it was a reference point for Street Fighter IV for what not to do with 3D space. Needless to say, they did it very well. So while Street Fighter EX is a viable historical reference point, it's still an unfortunate blight on Capcom, Arika, and the Street Fighter franchise.

Street Fighter II: The Animated Movie had released in Japan in 1994 to great popularity. For fans, it was a treat to see a feature delve into the stories surrounding our favorite characters in beauteous detail. And it still left the fans the franchise still had wanting more, and Capcom decided to respond with Street Fighter Alpha, a game that let us play in the world the movie only gave us a glimpse of in flashbacks.

Though it's the ostensible successor to Street Fighter II from a gameplay perspective, Street Fighter Alpha actually takes place before that series, but after the original Street Fighter. Alpha also had a different aesthetic to it, eschewing the gritty look of II and going for an anime-style design. It was also one of the first time the announcement of a brand new Street Fighter series didn't set the arcades on fire; Alpha's announcement drew very little buzz and not enough excitement to bring everyone who had left the series because they thought it couldn't count to three.

Fans themselves, however, were delighted at the new look. Street Fighter had almost faded into a niche franchise, though its then-current audience was a niche that usually watched anime. The game had some noticeably younger characters from Street Fighter II, some returning characters from the original Street Fighter. There were only two new characters in the first game: Rose, a woman created by the good that the series' mainstay villain M. Bison excised from himself, and Dan, who was created as a parody of both Ryo Sakazaki and Robert Garcia from SNK's Art of Fighting franchise.

Overall, though, the first Street Fighter Alpha game was pretty underwhelming. Its cast of characters was colorful figuratively and literally, but they were a far cry from the epic cast included in Super Street Fighter II Turbo. But it was the gameplay that made it not quite up-to-par with the best of the Street Fighter II titles. Executing charge techniques as part of a combo was a little difficult, and mystifyingly the game overall moves much slower. It was an OK start to a promising concept, but not good enough to draw away criticisms from the game.

Alpha saw a console release on the Playstation and Saturn in February 1996. With new technology, the game was probably the first great arcade-to-home console transition for a Street Fighter game, the Saturn version being the better one (with a better controller to boot). Unlike Street Fighter II did for the SNES, Street Fighter Alpha didn't have the potential and buzz to sell a console. Still, for current Saturn and Playstation owners, this was the only Street Fighter game to tide them over for a while. No, Street Fighter: The Movie - The Game of the Movie doesn't count.

At least until Street Fighter Alpha 2 released later in the year. Basically, Street Fighter Alpha 2 is what the first game should have been. Sure, it may not look like that big of a leap from the first game, but Alpha 2 actually refines the formula established in the first game very well. It avoids the mundane and sluggish feeling of the first game with the addition of a more upbeat soundtrack and faster gameplay speed. The game also adds one new character named Sakura, who's obviously designed to appeal to anyone with a Japanese schoolgirl fetish. Also, Akuma was finally nerfed down to the level of any other characters.

Alpha 2 also succeeded more in bringing the respective plots of II and Alpha together. Considering the lack of story in the first game's endings, the second game has conclusions that almost get the job done. Alpha 2 also didn't have as much of a presence in US arcades, another sad sign of Street Fighter's lack of draw power. It also saw a quick arcade-to-home release, releasing only six months after its arcade release (faster than Street Fighter IV) for Playstation, Saturn, and Super Nintendo in fall of 1996. You could've predicted the PSX and Saturn release, but the SNES release (published by Nintendo in the US) surprised us because of its existence and because it was a respectable port to boot.

Though Alpha 1 and 2 released close to each other, Street Fighter Alpha 3 didn't release until 1999. Alpha 3, as far as storyline was concerned, was Capcom's way of saying that Alpha 2 was not the definitive game to bring Alpha and II together, but Alpha 3 was. And it did, because the game has the most expansive storyline of any Street Fighter game around until Street Fighter IV. Alpha 3 decided to give more refinements to the formula, giving the gameplay a new sense of intensity. Heck, it was probably a little too intense. While Alpha 2 reveled in its own sense of subtlety, Alpha 3's presentation was way over the top with new juggling moves, a louder soundtrack, and a semi-witty announcer.

Alpha 3 has probably had the most single ports of any game in the franchise, with versions existing on the Playstation, Saturn, Dreamcast, Game Boy Advance, PSP, and Playstation 2 (through the Street Fighter Alpha Anthology). It's no surprise either, since the game is loaded with a plethora of fan service. Including the home versions, every character from Street Fighter II was included, and the game also has ISMs that allow characters to play in either Alpha style or Super Turbo style. It's still the pinnacle of a Street Fighter game in terms of characters, the PSP version having the most for a total of 36.

The Street Fighter Alpha franchise had a nice life, though it never achieved the popularity that Street Fighter II would. But the series established a number of great characters and elaborated on the back story the majority of dedicated fans had been speculating about for a while (only the dedicated fans cared about story in a game like this). But us fans also appreciated the gameplay that was refined and enhanced from Street Fighter II, along with the novelty of actually getting somewhat of a sequel after II was released five times. It was popular enough for the franchise to go on.

Over the next ten days, this blog with have at least one entry a day related to Street Fighter, leading up to the release of Street Fighter IV in all territories. The entries will be mostly about the history of the franchise, but won't be limited to just them. To spice things up, there will also be impressions and reviews, while the history entries will talk about the franchise's trials and tribulations (and oh my are there many). It's not that SFIV needs the hype, but we believe that a franchise that has carried on this long deserves the coverage; it's admirable quest to bring back it's erstwhile fans while embracing nostalgia deserves a lot of respect.

Not to say that there won't be posts on other subjects. On the contrary, we'll also blog about the usual stuff as well. You know, not at all related to Street Fighter.

Look forward to it! Or not.

The point of this post is to highlight some of the best outfits being offered, the ones that will almost force you to order them if you like them enough. Even if they're being offered in packs, and not singularly. Warning: some of this info is regurgitated from the last post. I thought I'd say that before some ostensibly clever person posts "OMG you already talked about this LOL" in the comments. Yeah.


Sakura's outfit is...interesting. It combines the top of Ryu's karate gi with a Japanese schoolgirl gym clothes. It's cute, even though it doesn't help assuage the feelings of people who think she should be older and out of the school outfits by SFIV's timeline. I'll admit that I think Ryu's gi adds a nice touch to it.


Chun Li's alternate outfit is...quite revealing. I don't think I could possibly describe it in detail without my thoughts having the implication that I'm a deranged pervert. So, you know...look!


And now to the "borrowed" outfits, first starting with Zangief, whose alternate is basically Haggar's outfit from Final Fight. While it's fitting, since Zangief and Haggar have very similar fighting styles (down to the pile driver and spinning lariat), it's comforting to see that Capcom still remembers Final Fight. It's another sign that this game is definitely a by fans, for fans affair; people who are not only familiar with Street Fighter, but the plethora of Capcom's history.


Balrog's is very similar to Apollo Creed's outfit from the Rocky movies. This one's a bit more obscure compared to Zangief's, since it's not derived from a video game character. Still, it's a character that a lot of gamers playing Street Fighter are familar with, and it's nice to see a nod to something that's kind of embedded in nerd culture in a fighting game like this.


And here we have Fei Long's, which is a neat little homage to an outfit Bruce Lee wore in Enter the Dragon. This one is even more obscure than the last one, given the uproarious internet reaction to the outfit being a bizaare load of crap. And that only begs a bigger question: there are people playing fighting games that have clearly never seen Enter the Dragon. I think some of them should be going out to rent or buy this movie instead of wildly anticipating this game and begging Gamestop to get their arcade sticks in. Guys, it would help pass the time, at least!

Don't worry, I still hate that Capcom is going with the paid downloadable content route for this, but there's no denying that some of these are really nice. There are a few more that I think are neat, but this post is already too long for a topic that was awfully frivolous -- so frivolous that I'm questioning whether it should exist at all! The bad thing is that by paying for and downloading these, we're actually encouraging developers to continue the process. Damn it, Capcom.

I still think you're great, though.

In theory, downloadable content sounds like a good idea. The concept that developers can create extra adventures and/or expansion packs and sell them digitally after most people have already finished the game sounds great. It's better when it's used in the form of stuff like the Elder Scrolls IV expansions and Mass Effect: Bring Down the Sky, in that the developers are in no way making an attempt to price gouge. Unless it's DLC that's only available on one system, and that particular word isn't given to consumers efficiently enough (see Fallout 3, Tomb Raider Underworld, Grand Theft Auto IV, etc.); then it's a total screw job.

A pity that price gouging is what most developers are using the system for. Probably the most dastardly form of "downloadable content" are unlock keys, meaning you have to pay for content that's already on the disc. Most, if not all, of this is stuff that would probably be already available in the game with no price attached if this was last gen. The newest culprit: Street Fighter IV. It turns out the extra costumes, that will undoubtedly be on the disc already, will cost you to unlock. You know if this was last gen, this would be unlockable via a method in the game itself. It's pretty despicable.

But man do they look good! Personally, I think it's a heinous practice, but this is the first time I actually feel inclined to pay for this. Especially for the female costumes, for some very strange reason. Though I also like how some of the outfits are interesting nods to other fictional and non-fictional characters. Zangief's alternate is basically Haggar's outfit from Final Fight, Balrog dons Apollo Creed's outfit from the Rocky movies, and Fei Long's is definitely an homage to Bruce Lee's outfit from Enter the Dragon.

So yeah, this is pretty bad, even though it's not on the same level as something Namco Bandai would pull - i.e. an extra character that should have been there in the first place. You don't need these in order to be able to play the efficiently, and they're definitely a probably-not-even-tertiary concern. But still, damn it Capcom! I'm probably just going to wait until April to download them all cheaply, though if this was last gen...oh, never mind.

Hey look, speaking of the Hollywoodification of nerdish materials, look what showed up on Game Watch earlier today: new shots of Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li. I'm sure Chun-Li fans are shedding a tear at its continued existence though. That's a shame.

If you're a Street Fighter fan, you may want to retcon the original Street Fighter movie from existence like it retconned the game's canon and maligned it into it's own maelstrom of disaster, depending on your perspective of it. I certainly don't want to forget; while it was definitely terrible, it was definitely a hilarious one that I can't get enough of every time I see just to listen to some of my favorite one-liners from it. And yes, it's much worse than Batman Forever, which I stated in my last entry was also hilariously bad.

In an ostensible effort to prove that there isn't a god, some studio execs who thought they were clever decided it would be a good idea to make another Street Fighter movie. This time, the tale would be based around Chun-Li, Street Fighter's leading lady who's totally NOT a news reporter. If you like Street Fighter, you're preconceptions of the project are likely the same as your opinions of the Street Fighter movie. It will either be so terrible as to be intolerable, or bad enough that it's guaranteed to be a front runner for the best comedy of 2009. But wait! Apparently there are a few who are holding out hope for the movie, crossing their fingers that actress Kristin Kreuk couldn't possibly be attached to a movie too bad.

So allow the latest screen captures from the movie to completely dash your hopes of it being any good in any which way. Disregard the fact that Kreuk isn't completely Chinese, or that she doesn't have Chun-Li's thunder thighs. Just look at and try to figure out what the heck is going on in that shot above. I heartily apologize to anyone who was expecting this to be any good; you now have your guarantee that it will be bad...and totally hilarious. Please keep in mind that popcorn will be prerequisite upon entering the theater this movie is playing in.

If you're the kind of person who loves to riff bad movies, definitely look forward to Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li when it hits theaters on February 27th. Now the only question is whether Capcom will make a video game tie-in a la Street Fighter: The Movie: The Game.

So there was this game called Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix released on Xbox Live Arcade and Playstation Network this past week. Personally, I'm a Street Fighter fan from way back in mid-1992. I was a little know-nothing tyke when I first laid eyes upon Street Fighter II: The World Warrior (the first in a series of five, for those of you counting) in a deli when my dad took me with him to get lunch on his break from work. The appeal of the game then came from its sheer ingenuity. I had never seen a game like it. Really, none of us hadn't.

Like the series or not, you have to respect Street Fighter for one thing: it single-handedly made the fighting game genre viable. You know a game did something right when it spawned a number of look-alikes that would release one after another for years and years, one of which even caused Capcom to sue (Fighter's History -- which was very much a rip-off despite Capcom losing the case). Heck, that legacy carried on for as long as SNK made 2D fighters into the era where even most hardcore gamers had stunned them for how stagnant the genre had become.

While the series was known for its very responsive and fluid controls, it was also very complicated. Street Fighter II is known as one of the games that moved arcades from the place for everyone to strictly a hardcore gamer's den. A game with eight degrees of motion and six buttons for combat wasn't something a person could pick up and fool around with to get the hang of; and that's not even getting into the complex motions required for super techniques. But really, the number of us that were totally planted into the hardcore gaming square ate it up as much as the machine's ate our quarters.

If you're the kind of person who remembers Street Fighter II from the second iteration of the halcyon era of arcade gaming, you'll definitely want to pick this one up if you own a 360 or PS3. It really means a lot to us to relive the nostalgic experience with a very nicely retooled, and well-balanced, version for a mere $15 asking price. Though I'll warn you: it's seriously a "by fans, for fans" title. If you're not really that well versed in the Street Fighter universe and you're looking to get into it, you may want to hold off  until Street Fighter IV makes it's way out on February 17th.

One of the strangest things that gamers love to discuss among themselves on message boards and blogs consist of analyzing the story of a fighting game. They spend some time trying to examine everything to see how it fits into the series' cannon. The reason why it's strange is that, in all honesty, a storyline really doesn't matter in a fighting game. These games are all about tests of skill in a competition to find who's the winner in a specific match, with a player siding with a character whom they resonate with the most. I find it pretty silly, really, like a lot of things on the internet.

But even I get a little puzzled about a few decisions in fighting games in terms of canon. Sakura was revealed to be a selectable character in the home edition of Street Fighter IV, which releases in February 2009 for PS3 and 360. In terms of canon, the fourth game in the franchise takes place a little after Street Fighter II, and well after Street Fighter Alpha. Sakura originally appeared in the Alpha series as a sixteen-year-old schoolgirl. Now she's appearing in this game...as a schoolgirl.

Given that IV takes place at least four years after Alpha, shouldn't she have, you know, ditched the schoolgirl outfit by now? I couldn't care less about the all important "storyline," but I figured that since the series' director Yoshinori Ono intends to keep it canon, he would have had her look modified to look like some that dresses like she's at least 20. It's ostensibly mystifying, but not really surprising. Sakura was seriously introduced in Alpha to pander to fans who had a little schoolgirl fetish. In order to keep those fans happy, they introduced her here as still being a schoolgirl. Yeah, it's sick and demented, but it should have been expected.

Though I'd just love to hear the developer's excuse as to why she's still a schoolgirl. He won't freely admit that they're pandering to the sick and perverted individuals of the fanbase out there, but what would he say when asked that question?  My money is on that she ended up getting so enveloped in street fighting that she flunked around four years of school, and as a result, she's still in high school.

Of course, we always have those alternate outfits...

It's grade school for me, in the late 1990s. Street Fighter III: New Generation has just graced arcades, and blown me and my friends minds with its mind-blowing animation. OK, not really; it actually only blew my mind, seeing as how my friends had already moved to alternate pastures after the Street Fighter franchise had moved into the hardest-of-the-hardcore realm with III's difficult-to-grasp gameplay. I opened up a new issue of EGM, and saw that a new time-release character had been revealed: Sheng Long. 


The character created in Ryu's line from the arcade version of Street Fighter II ("You must defeat Sheng Long to stand a chance") had finally been revealed as a playable character. Similar to the only one being excited about SFIII, I was also the only one I knew who cared about Sheng Long's inclusion. It was a great time...and a gullible one.

The gullibility factor came in from actually believing it at all. Though I didn't realize it at the time, and constantly went to arcades to look for the character to grace the selection screen soon, it was actually an April Fool's joke. This was a time before the internet came into stride; we didn't have any "online announcements" or the like to officially confirm this. We got all of our news from magazines, and I knew that EGM was the most trustworthy source for video game news. Amidst the disappointment, I thought it was OK to be fooled by one of the most elaborate April Fool's features in video game magazine history.


The joke was so elaborate that Capcom decided to make him an actual character in Street Fighter IV. As revealed in Famitsu last week, Sheng Long, known as "Gouken" in Japan, is now available in the arcade version of the game as a CPU character (not playable. Not yet, at least). You know a joke is good if it still gets the attention of a company like Capcom over a decade later.

And it's no surprise to see that the guy looks like a beast to fight against, too. Definitely more so than Akuma, especially in terms of his move set (he has all of Ryu's best moves), but probably not on the same level as the final boss, Seth (who rivals SFIII's Gill in terms of cheapness). His story in the game is currently unknown; according to SF's canon, he was killed years ago by Akuma's Raging Demon attack.

So, there you have it. All of the hints that SFIV's producer Yoshinori Ono had been dropping for months have finally come to fruition. And much earlier than expected too, as we'd speculated that he was going to be a console-exclusive character to be revealed at the Tokyo Game Show late next week. This only further solidifies the fact that SFIV is definitely being made primarily for the fans.

Capcom announced that they had a special surprise for Playstation 3 Street Fighter fans on Friday, and proceeded to announce Monday that the surprise they were alluding to was...Street Fighter Alpha 1. It's being added to the Playstation Network's PSOne library tomorrow. Go ahead, act surprised, even though the ESRB leaked its existence months ago.

Keep in mind that this is the PSOne version of the game, which has the added bouses of a lower animation framerate and slowdown. But hey! You are getting some remixed music. How about that? No added necessities like online play or anything like that. It's inferior to its arcade counterpart, which was already available on the Street Fighter Alpha Anthology released for Playstation 2 in June 2006. That collection also includes the vastly superior Street Fighter Alpha 2 and 3. P.S. Use your money to get that instead.

Hopefully you weren't expecting something special from this announcement. And at least there are PSOne games coming to the US Playstation Network!