Street Fighter IV — An indestructible revolution in the fighting game genre
Of all the games that have released recently that have attempted to cash in on the recent nostalgia craze, Street Fighter IV is the one that has done it the best. Through its inherent familiarity with the numerous characters and catch phrases that accompany special techniques, the game appeals to original fans of Street Fighter II who left for a series that didn’t seem like it was dragging its feet a little too much in terms of innovation. Yet simultaneously the game embraces the technology and gameplay mechanics welcome in today’s games, blending them seamlessly for a superlative package; the likes of which we’ve never seen before.
Of course, there’s nothing quite like witnessing this firsthand. I had the pleasure of going to Best Buy do to some window shopping, and I wasn’t surprised at all to see the game in their caged display with Street Fighter IV replacing Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe. As much as I like to talk about how the game appeals to the senses of erstwhile fans, there’s nothing like seeing people gravitate to the game with a sense of familiarity. These were older people who were easily picking up the controller and letting the cacophony of Sonic Booms and Tiger Uppercuts commence.
Familiar faces doing familiar techniques. All is right here.Not to say the game is completely accessible initially; it actually has quite the learning curve, even for the veteran fighting gamer. With the transition to a 2.5D space, the timing that comes with landing some combos is going to be different than, say, Street Fighter II. But it will only take mere minutes to get a good grasp of the controls themselves, as just about all of your favorite moves from your favorite characters are here. Through the controls, the game figuratively tells you that one of its primary goals is accessibility.
Part of that also has to do with the replacement of Street Fighter III‘s neat-but-complicated parry’s with focus attacks. These allow you to absorb a possible hit, taking temporary damage that will replenish as long as you’re not hit again. It’s important to remember that you can only absorb one hit (unless you’re playing new character El Fuerte), and if you’re hit immediately afterwards, it would be as if you never absorbed it. However, a successful focus attack will also temporarily stun your opponent, ideally leaving them open for an attack or combo large enough that you’ll have replenished your health by the time they recover.
Console-exclusive characters like Cammy and Fei-Long are also great to see in action. And they also play wonderfully.Due congratulations should also be given to the graphics, which are an intriguing mesh of polygons and enough cel-shading to draw in the casual gamer who finds appeal solely in graphics, and the gamer who has a taste for nice in-game artistry. It also animates beautifully, but don’t be surprised to see a little clipping at times. I don’t think fighting games will ever be rid of that problem, but it’s nothing that breaks the game at all.
With the graphics being so good, it’s a pity to see they aren’t used in the cut scenes. Each character has an anime prologue and epilogue for their story; not that using anime is a real problem. Though there is the issue of the overall story being unbelievably terrible. Sure, some of them are humorous, but don’t be surprised if you find yourself frantically pressing the start button to skip the inanity; unless you have a high tolerance for horrible dialogue and some of the illogical actions of the characters (like Chun-Li spilling the precise details of her supposedly undercover investigation to Abel, who she just met seconds ago).
But it’s not like fighting games need a story at all. It’s there to provide extra entertainment for the Arcade mode, even if it could’ve been much better than what we received. So suspend your disbelief when you realize that at least three of the characters should be dead if the game’s established canon should be believed, and laugh at how ridiculous the details are on their “revival.” Though it’s always good to have more characters in a fighting game.
And here, M. Bison (Vega in Japan) faces the guy who “killed” him. Heckuva job, Akuma!Speaking of the story, it establishes Seth as the new leader of Shadaloo after M. Bison’s “passing.” Predictably, he’s the final boss of the game you have to topple in the Arcade Mode. Somewhat predictably, he’s one of the cheapest final bosses you’ll ever come across. Say what you will of Street Fighter III’s Gill, but at least he didn’t have a dangerous anti-air and the ability to teleport. His techniques can be easily predicted by having a lot of matches after continuing over and over again.
Probably the worst thing about the AI overall is that fighting it does nothing to prepare you for human competition. Unlike a human, the AI can’t learn from its mistakes, meaning it’ll constantly fall for the same trap you set up any time. A human Zangief player, for instance, will realize they need to stop doing the glowing palm technique if he can be thrown immediately afterward. But no, the AI will keep doing it, while you keep capitalizing on it. Something human players would learn from. Well, most of them, at least.
Focus attacks can make and/or break you depending on how wisely they’re used.Like any fighting game, Street Fighter IV specializes in multiplayer. Specifically online play since these days not everyone is bound to have friends that play Street Fighter or fighting games in general. The online features are…well, they’re OK. But merely OK online features are kind of disappointing for the most heavily anticipated fighting game in years, especially when considering that Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix actually handled online better.
At the time of this writing, forget trying to find quick matches, because it’s not happening. In trying to find one, you’ll either (1) come across numerous online connections that are so ostensibly tenuous that you probably shouldn’t bother, (2) run into people that can’t fight you because the list hasn’t been updated in time and someone else has taken that request, or (3) get a message that says your request can’t be granted. There are also no tournament options like those in HD Remix, and rooms can only have two people in them. It’s pretty amazing to see that a $15 downloadable title actually did things better than a full $60 retail game.
Pretty much the only ways that you can get a stable match going are by either creating your own rooms or playing though the Arcade mode with fight requests on. While those are nice – the latter of w
hich being a genius idea, actually — wouldn’t it be better if all the options available to us actually worked?
The hilarious and expressive facial animations are also part of what makes the graphics so good. On the whole, online matches handle quite well, with the network strength icon being a rather accurate barometer for how the match will handle. Unfortunately, you’ll sometimes be pinged for a match with a person whose connection is less than satisfactory, resulting in either terrible visual or input lag. Some of those matches will be determined not by skill, but by how much better the other person is at handling the lag, which can be awfully frustrating.
Also frustrating are the number of people who quit matches when they’re losing so they won’t lose Battle Points (BP) acquired by winning Ranked online matches. Unfortunately, players aren’t penalized for dropping out, so if the incentive for it is there, the more spoiled sports of the online community will take advantage of it. Hopefully with an upcoming patch, Capcom can implement a feature to penalize players who run from a battle. It will be disastrous if it continues.
In the grand scheme of things, all of the flaws listed above are minimal compared to how superlative the game is. The fact that the game has been received so well serves as a bold proclamation from the entire fighting game genre, saying it’s not a genre destined to phase out. It’s here to stay, and hopefully more games will realize what it takes for a fighting game to be recognized in the eye of the public: by finding something that resonates with them and exploiting that. For Street Fighter IV, that’s nostalgia, and I’d like to see how other fighting games approach it.
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Geoff
News Editor | Geoff is some nerd who writes for a blog and thinks he's knowledgeable. He write a lot about video games, but is capable of writing about other subjects, too. Twitter
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I’ve been playing fighters for some time now and I must say, Street Fighter 4 is one of the most disappointing fighting games I’ve ever played. I’m not sure whether people don’t value a game that takes some effort and decency, however, Street Fighter 4 is obviously a painful game that was made to please anyone that hasn’t played any real fighting games. What do I mean? Basically, they just made a crappy game knowing that everyone would enjoy it as long as their favorite characters were there. Let’s start off with the basics than, shall we?
Graphics – The graphics are probably some of the crappiest polygons I have ever seen, especially considering the generation of console. The only reason people seem to believe they’re better is because Capcom made a transition from 2D graphics to 3D, and that’s about it. People are ignorant when it comes to details such as this (We are all ignorant in our own way so, nobody should take that into offense. I’m ignorant when it comes to mathematics.) It was possibly one of the easiest things for Capcom to do because A) They know that most gamers don’t realize 3D graphics takes less money and time to make. B) Capcom also realizes that gamers believe 2D graphics are inferior to 3D graphics. Now, I’m not saying 2D graphics are better, however, if you’re actually going to make 3D graphics, I wish Capcom put effort into it. The only reason I can let it go is because they had to make an arcade release first, however, it’s still no excuse for doing such horrid work. Most of the backrounds aren’t memorable and are probably a disgrace to the Street Fighter series as a whole. Anyhow, the only interesting thing is how you can affect the backrounds somewhat, even then they did that in 3 and it didn’t look like crap.
Sound – The music is probably one of the worst that I’ve heard in a fighting game, especially Street Fighter. They truly weren’t thinking when they did the music and honestly, I could have done a better job with my bass guitar alone. I will say this, the remixes were alright, however, nowhere near as good as Street Fighter 2’s soundtrack. One huge problem I found is that the only time those song plays is during a Rival Battle. They honestly should have given you an option to choose what songs you would like to play and what you wouldn’t want to play because more than half of the soundtrack would have been turned off. They were really lazy with the music and that introduction song has some of the most generic lyrics I’ve heard. Everything else that plays in the game (other than the rival songs) really does not fit in with the environment. I’m told over and over again to turn the volume off if I don’t like the music, however, when I turn it all the way down, the music is still barely audible. That’s not all, to make it worse, the voice acting is probably worse than House Of The Dead 2. I honestly did not think that was ever possible, however, it’s true. If you do intend to watch the stories, I highly recommend setting it to Japanese voice dubbing because if there was any effort put into the voice acting, Capcom got if they even gave those actors a penny.
Storyline – The storyline is probably one of the worst things about the game both surprisingly and unsurprisingly. The reason I say surprisingly is because everything else was so bad, how was that even possible? The reason I say unsurprisingly is because the Street Fighter series was never popular for having a good story. Street Fighter 2’s stories weren’t the most unique, but they were pretty decent for their time, not to mention it had alot of charming qualities about it. Street Fighter 4 lost all those charming qualities and decided to just make the storyline the worst thing possible in the history of any video game. Almost every single storyline is generic, humiliating, or just disgusting. It doesn’t help much to have the poor voice acting, but the horrible story to top it off? One huge example is El Feurte’s who thinks that by fighting the greatest fighters, he can create one of the greatest meals. This brings the question of “Was Capcom even trying?” Of course not! Most people are satisfied to know their favorite characters are back. I know some of you may be thinking “Who cares about the storyline?” Well, I assure you there are people who DO care, and even so, doesn’t having a good storyline just make a game BETTER?
Characters – They brought alot of the old characters back while downgrading some of their personalities. One example being Dan, who’s no longer as funny as he use to be and is now just annoying. Ryu isn’t as much of a badass as he used to be. Moving on, the personalities of the new characters are nothing too interesting. Abel is kind of odd and his personality is inconsistent. Rufus replaced Dan is the funny character and he’s still not all that funny. El Feurte is annoying. C. Viper is kind of interesting I guess, however, she’s not all that cool either. Most of the characters have the same moves they had before with some additions, however, the properties of most moves have been changed immensely. Now, I know that it seems like that’s not a big deal, however, in a fighting game, if you change properties of moves, it can change a character almost completely. Example: Blanka is a hold character and has been one, however, in Street Fighter 4, his hold moves have so much priority that using him any other way would be unheard of. In Street Fighter 2, his holds weren’t as useful, however, he could be used somewhat as a rush down character. Anyhow, the characters have alot of the same moves otherwise, however, the way the moves are used have been changed quite a bit. In my opinion, Rufus has the best fighting design out of all the new characters that were added.
Gameplay – After seeing all the crap Street Fighter 4 had to offer, I was hoping the gameplay would make up for it all. Had it met my expectations? Not even close… I’m guessing that around 95% of the people who play Street Fighter 4 had very, very, very low expectations. One of the problems I find to be a huge issue in Street Fighter 4 is that I honestly don’t believe it’s all that balanced. People will say “This is probably the most balanced fighter ever.” however, it’s been proven that Guilty Gear XX Accent Core, King of Fighters 98 Ultimate Match, and other games are more balanced than this game. Characters such as Gen, Dan, and Fei Long suck in the game (This is without bias either. I wanted to main Gen and Fei Long. Sadly enough, I’m good with Dan, that or everyone online sucks, which doesn’t surprise me.) They honestly did not think through the EX feature of the game, the reason I state this being that a character like Balrog can zoom through projectiles, get hit during his rush in, do heavy damage on you, and combo afterwards without any punishable frames due to the fact that he was built to combo after his charge moves. Ryu and Ken’s shoryukens have been given virtually no frames of start up and reach farther than ever before. Akuma can spam fireballs all day and when you reach him, just teleports across the screen. Guile is considered a crappy character in Street Fighter 4, however, he’s suppose to be one of the more balanced characters, meaning that anyone that’s labeled worse is probably really crappy. The grabbing system, like in almost every single Street Fighter, really sucks and has caused too many problems due to how far it reaches and how some have better grabs than others. Zangief has been made a slow character which doesn’t even matter due to the fact that he can zoom across the screen with his glowing hand that does a lot of damage and stops projectiles.
I still ask, why do people like this game? Is it because everyone’s favorite characters are overpowered? Perhaps it’s due to the advertisement of Capcom and that most of these so called “gamers” have played so few fighting games that this is their conception of a “perfect” fighting game. Maybe they just have low standards, who knows?
Online play – This is probably one of the biggest humiliations to the Street Fighter 4 series. I say this because most of the people online A) Suck really badly. B) Spam the same stuff over and over again. C) Use alot of the same characters (Ryu, Ken, Akuma, Sagat, Balrog, and maybe sometimes Zangief). D) Try to exploit the cheapest tactics they can find and try to pass it off as skill.
I will say this though about the online play, it runs pretty well and doesn’t usually lag too often for me, however, it’s rare to find someone that might have a green bar. Either way, all you’ll be facing are scrubs or people who exploit something about an overpowered character, but, that’s why I switch to Dan if some guy playing Ryu or Ken shows up, to show them how much they suck and humiliate them. I don’t play the game that often because of how big a disappointment it is, however, I beat a Sagat that had around 4,000 to 5,000 points and was shocked that this was a “High place” Sagat player, especially since all he did was spam his Tiger Knee.
Final Words: If you’re a gamer that has played plenty of fighting games and knows the difference between a fighting game that took time and effort to make and this, I highly recommend you don’t get it. If you’re just a casual gamer that’s looking to have fun with your friends online, I recommend you give it a chance. Personally, I think this was one of the biggest let downs I’ve ever had in the history of ever playing fighting games and I have never been so disappointed with Capcom. Have fun.
Reviewer’s Score: 6/10, Originally Posted: 07/09/09
Game Release: Street Fighter IV (US, 02/17/09)