Street Fighter

Overview

Street Fighter is a 2D arcade fighting game developed and released by Capcom in 1987. While it did not achieve the same popularity as its sequels (particularly Street Fighter II), it introduced many elements to the then-bare fighting game genre. The game introduced memorable characters Ryu, Ken, and Sagat, as well as characters who would return in the Street Fighter Alpha series among other fighting games ( Gen, Birdie, Adon, and Eagle). Some of its innovations include a six-button attack system and special command based techniques. The game follows Ryu or Ken as they participate in a worldwide martial arts tournament.
 
Two arcade cabinets were sold for this game: regular and deluxe. The regular version (which was sold as a tabletop cabinet in Japan and an upright cabinet overseas) featured the same six-button configuration (three for punches and three for kicks) used in most of Capcom's later fighting games. The deluxe version featured two pressure-sensitive pads (one for punches and one for kicks), determining the strength and speed of the player's attacks based on how hard the pads were pressed. This is the only fighting game to utilize pressure-sensitive pads for attacks.
 
In the international versions of the game, the voices of Ryu and Ken were dubbed so that they yelled the names of their moves in English instead of Japanese ("Ball of Fire" replaces Hadouken, "Dragon Punch" replaces Shoryuken, and "Hurricane Kick" replaces Tastumaki Senpuukyaku). This is the only Street Fighter game to do this.
 
The port for the TurboGrafx CD (known as Fighting Street) was the first game released on that system, utilizing an arranged soundtrack. Because the console did not have any six-button configurations, the strength and speed of the attacks were determined by how long each of the action buttons were pressed. The game was also ported to the Commodore 64, ZX Spectrum, Amstrad CPC, MS-DOS, Amiga, and Atari ST. There were actually two ports to the Commodore 64, one by Capcom USA and one by Tiertex in the UK (who went on to develop the unofficial sequel, Human Killing Machine). The original arcade version was included in Capcom Arcade Hits Volume 1 for the PC, Capcom Classics Collection Remixed for the PlayStation Portable, and Capcom Classics Collection Volume 2 for the Xbox and PlayStation 2.

Gameplay

Single player mode can be played as Ryu (when playing as the left player) or as Ken (when playing as the right player). A second player could join at any time and challenge the first player. Depending on the arcade configuration, the player can choose between either two or four nations to start off with (Japan, U.S.A., England, or China). The player must battle through eight opponents, two from each nation, in order to reach the two boss characters from Thailand.
 
Street Fighter is the first fighting game to provide a move list with special command-based moves. The game debuts three now-iconic special moves:

• Hadouken (known in versions outside of Japan as "Ball of Fire") - The original fighting game fireball technique, done by holding down on the joystick, then moving forward in the direction of the opponent, then pressing a punch button. (Known as quarter-circle forward punch (QCF P), or the "fireball motion")
  
• Shoryuken (known in versions outside of Japan as "Dragon Punch") - Jumping uppercut attack, done by moving the joystick towards the opponent, then down, then down and towards the opponent, then pressing a punch button. (Known as the Z-motion, or "dragon punch motion" (DP P))
  
• Tatsumaki Senpuukyaku (known in versions outside of Japan as "Hurricane Kick") - A horizontally moving kick attack, done by holding down on the joystick, then moving away in the opposite direction of the opponent, then pressing a kick button. (Known as quarter-circle back kick (QCB K), or the "hurricane kick motion")
  

 

Characters

Playable Characters

• Ryu (player one)
• Ken (player two)

 

Cpu Opponents

• Retsu (first Japan opponent)
  
• Geki (second Japan opponent)
  
• Joe (first U.S.A. opponent)
  
• Mike (second U.S.A. opponent)
  
• Birdie (first England opponent)
  
• Eagle (second England opponent)
  
• Lee (first China opponent)
  
• Gen (second China opponent)
  
• Adon (first Thailand opponent)
  
• Sagat (second Thailand opponent)