Street Fighter x Tekken in War of the Gems

Looking
forward to a lot of character reveals for Street
Fighter x Tekken at the New York Comic-Con this year? Well, you are going
to be pretty disappointed.

 

No, the
focus of the game’s showcase at the con was clearly on the new (and very controversial) Gem System. This is
a new system being introduced in this game, whose effects will activate when
certain conditions occur in battle. The abilities your character will receive depend
on the type of Gems a character has equipped. Don’t take my title to mean
they’re bringing back Marvel Super
Heroes‘ Gems. Nope, not the ones from the SNES action/platformer either.

 

A Gem’s
effects will also depend on the color of the Gem equipped, so your opponent
will know what kind of Gem you have. Red Gems will increase attack power,
Yellow Gems will increase defense, and Green Gems will provide a speed boost.
But some Gem types don’t fall into the previous categories; for instance, some
will activate if you land a hit on your opponent. Others activate if you take a
hit, or if you hit your opponent with a special attack. You can have up to five
Gems equipped in battle. Sound complicated? That’s because it is, at least on
the surface.

 

Needless to
say, it’s not getting a favorable reaction from fans thus far — it was
actually greeted with a hail of boos during the conference. Some are
considering banning it in tournaments because it could potentially disrupt the
balance of the game. Despite the virulent reaction (which is mostly of the
“They Changed It, Now It Sucks” variety, as you’d expect from the internet),
it’s way too early to say whether they’ll cause any imbalance, will be
completely useless, or add to the game’s playability factor. It definitely sounds like a bizarre idea, but it
remains to be seen as to whether it will be a bunch of silliness or not.

 

What is a bunch of silliness, though, is that
some Gems will be preorder exclusives. You’ll receive a pack of different ones
via a code depending on which retailer you decide to preorder the game at. If
you want to avoid all of that stupidity, you’ll have to purchase the Special
Edition, which also includes its own exclusive pack. It also comes with a
build-it-yourself arcade cabinet, and a prequel comic drawn by the artists at
Udon Entertainment. Unfortunately, the price has not been announced; and Capcom
USA doesn’t make the most enticing special editions, so hopefully it won’t be
too expensive.

 

They also
announced a definitive release date for the game: March 6th, 2012 for America
and March 9th, 2012 for Europe. You’ll have to choose between this and Mass Effect 3 now!

 

But wait! There
was one character unveiled during the
press conference: Rufus. We already knew he was in due to the cinematic trailer from
Tokyo Game Show a month ago, but Capcom officially announced his inclusion
in case anyone still doubted his appearance. This was the only new character
announcement, but Capcom provided a bunch of teasers for Tekken characters that
will be appearing in the game. They provided one for the Street Fighter
characters last week, in case you wanted to check that out too. I’m personally
not interested in playing this guessing game (rumor is that some of them might
be red herrings), so you’ll see a post here when the characters are revealed.

 

You can
check out all
of the videos from the NYCC at Capcom Unity.