Overview
Street Fighter is a 2D fighting game developed and released by Capcom for arcades in 1987. The first in a long-spanning fighting game series of the same name, it follows either martial artists Ryu or Ken as they participate in a worldwide martial arts tournament.
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 (including a six-button control scheme and special command-based techniques). Along with Ryu and Ken, the game introduced a variety of opponents that would return to the series as playable fighters (including Sagat, Gen, Adon, Birdie, and Eagle).
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.
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 all eight opponents, two from each nation, in order to reach the two boss characters from Thailand.
Special Moves
Street Fighter is the first fighting game to provide a secret move list with special command-based abilities. The game debuts three now-iconic special moves:
- Hadouken (known in international versions 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 international versions 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 international versions 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")
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. This is the only Street Fighter game in the series to do this.
Opponents
Japan
U.S.A.
England
China
Thailand
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