Review: Super Street Fighter IV
Well, this is a game that really doesn't need an introduction, Capcom's flagship fighting game pretty much created the genre with Street Fighter 2 In arcades and home consoles in the early nineties and was spoilt in GREAT SUCCESS. So much they made a horrible
live action movie. Oh dear.
More to the point, Last year the fighting game scene was revitalised, not only with Street fighter IV. But various other games Such as Arc System Works' Blazblue (creators of guilty gear), King of Fighters XII and Tekken 6.
Now, a year on. Street Fighter IV pretty much reigned Champion above all of these fighters, so naturally. Capcom announced their new iteration of this game with various new characters and tweaks to gameplay/new gameplay modes.
I will not scrutinize Capcom for doing it this early because well, all fighters seem to have some new iteration of sorts a while after about a year or so. So its a tradition.
In my case, I only got a PS3 with the launch of the Slim in September, so I have missed quite a truckload of games, including SFIV.
So the release of SSFIV was the perfect opportunity to get to grips with this game properly.
Street fighter is what you call a 2-D fighting game as there is only a X and Y axis to move across, therefore mostly 2D graphics have been used in previous titles like Third strike and the Alpha series, but SFIV decided to switch it up a bit by having 3-D models fighting on a 2d landscape. And I have to say that it fits the game perfectly. It retains that street fighter aura that you get when playing some of the older games, although they are not as great as say, FFXIII. It does the job.
However some of the newer 2-D fighters like KOF and Blazblue look absolutely GLORIOUS in HD, because all of the sprites are very fluid and in VERY high resolutions. But who the hell plays fighters for the graphics?! onto the actual gameplay...
Street Fighter is a game accessible to both newcomers, and seasoned greats such as Alex Valle and Umehara Daigo, which is what makes it so great!
SSFIV has the typical 2-D fighting buttons with things such as Light, medium and heavy Punches and kicks. And taking that to a further level is that you can tie the direction your character is going in and a respective Light/med/Heavy Punch or kick to do a technique.
Taking this to a further level are "focus" Attacks, wherein you leave yourself open, but can take the hit and counter. This can be increased in complexity by doing Focus cancels, which are where you can preform an attack, cancel the frames in between by focusing, and chaining that into another attack. There is a LOT more depth to the system then is visually apparent in the actual game.
Of course the classic characters are all in there from the start, unlike Vanilla SFIV where you have to unlock all of the characters.
In my opinion it worked extremely well compared to say, Tekken 6 where All the characters were unlocked from the start and I really had no drive to "do" anything with the game. Whereas SSFIV Brings things such as the "trials" where you test your skills to do combos against a dummy. The Bonus stages make a comeback in this version of SFIV. where you break barrels and smash cars, it's a nice retro touch that they added that I think will be greatly appreciated by hardcore fans of the series.
Akuma Fighting a car, Pure badassery.
The beauty of Playing with other people/online is that there is always going to be that one guy that will be better then you, and you train the insides and outs of the game, and you get your own little group of friends who play and there is a little sense of community that builds within. I can't say that I have ever experienced the fighting games in arcades, but it sure has "spread" with this new online aspect in the home consoles.
Websites like Shoryuken and FADC exist for these fighting games, and I have to say. It's possibly the greatest gaming community I have ever been in "touch" with. It's the drive to get better and beat your friends is something great that cant be found in modern Day shooters like Call of Duty or Halo.Fighting games are tests of pure skill, wit and how to outwit your opponent and keeping your head cool. This separates the genre from all others, this is pure competitive gameplay. Which anyone can get into, anyone can take on the greats with this console online aspect. And I have to say, in about Six hours with this game yesterday, I went from being a completely shit Scrub to a mediocre Scrub. Hah.
It's the taste of glory when you get your first win, it's something that you just DON'T get with other games.
This is why Super Street Fighter IV is possibly the BEST fighting game to have ever come out. Ever. In terms of advancements in gameplay and fundamentally changing things, I'm not sure if balance is an Issue in SSFIV yet. It's too early to Call. But this and Guilty Gear Accent core Plus are possibly the best fighting games on the market right now.
And ontop of that. It's being sold brand new at a Budget price, there is really no excuse for picking up this fantastic fighter.
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