Yes, this Fighting Game blog, long in the running, is finally here and ready to be posted! After a bit of contemplation, I've decided to save my Mortal Kombat and SNK related discussion for another time, so that I may more easily compare and contrast the new (awesome) Mortal Kombat reboot with it's overindulgent, overblown 3D predecessor: Mortal Kombat Armageddon as well as espouse the virtues of KOF XI and Capcom vs SNK 2. Thus, this leaves me with:
Street Fighter Alpha Anthology
I've decided that I am a fan of Street Fighter, but since I've only really played Street Fighter IV and HD Remix, I decided to broaden my horizons a little. Since Third Strike is coming to actual modern systems by download at some point and I am occasionally reminded that I own a Playstation 2, I got this little all-in-one. Obviously, this calls for each game to get its own little section as a result.
Alpha 1
Off the bat, there are three things that can be said to differentiate the Alpha Series mechanically from the rest of Street Fighter as a whole. They are: 1. Air Blocking 2. Alpha Counters and 3. Multi-level super bars with multiple supers and multiple levels of supers. Still no dashing though. That, and a more anime-ish art style featuring younger versions of some SFII characters. The fighting in Alpha is pretty good, not good enough to make Alpha 2 totally supersede it in every aspect, but good enough for the first game of a franchise (see: my rule that no fighting game series can really be judged on its first installment). I should also mention the presence of chain combos. While I'm all for target combos, it's a little weird to see them in a Street Fighter game as the main delivery mechanism for massive damage.
I might as well get my ranting about the cast out of the way here. While Dan is obviously the most amazing character in all of Street Fighterdom, and it's kind of cool that this incarnation of Bison has a projectile instead of the psycho crusher, not all of the characters are winners in this regard. And by that, I mean Sodom and Birdie. Rose was obviously popular enough to make it into the first wave of Alpha characters for SFIV, Adon is dumb and I still like Guy despite the fact that I'm not very good as him. Meanwhile, these two clowns are grapplers since Zangeif wouldn't appear until Alpha 2. Birdie is not only sort of lame design wise, he's also lame gameplay wise! He has two grabs and a forward rush move. Oh, and Sodom has the exact same thing. It's hard to qualify exactly why they aren't very fun to play as, but when people talk about their favorite Street Fighter characters, these guys don't show up very high on the list.
Alpha 2 (and subsequently, Alpha 2 Gold)
Alpha 2 is probably the highlight of this collection for me (more on SFA3 later). As I said previously, it represents the logical progression from Street Fighter Alpha 2, adding more dudes, getting rid of chain combos and adding the always popular “Only people who play this game at a high level will be able to use these properly” Custom Combos, which have appeared in plenty of other fighting games since then. Alpha 2 Gold doesn't deserve a separate section, basically only being a balance tweak that also added Cammy and making Evil Ryu and Shin Akuma easier to select.
In this case, the new characters are Sakura, who I am ambivalent about (You know, I find it more than a little ironic that while Dan is clearly a parody of characters who rip off the shoto fighting style, Sakura is clearly a ripoff of Art of Fighting's own Yuri Sakazaki with that dashing uppercut of hers, as well as the general archetype of being a female character who uses a modified version of the main character's fighting style. Of course, it doesn't help that Yuri constantly borrows moves from other Capcom characters as an SNK rebuttal to Dan), Rolento, who is actually pretty cool with his wall dives and heavy use of explosives and of course Gen, who is the guy that only crazy people learn how to play correctly. Also, Zangeif (yay! A grappler that doesn't totally suck!) and Dhalsim (ehhh... sure.) return.
Alpha 3
You may have read me talking about it on my status, but I find Alpha 3 to be a really weird game. It's not just the new characters (whom I find to be more than a little B team. R. Mika? What? The reintroduction of the entire cast of Street Fighter II doesn't help either), nor the way the fighting styles are presented (Once again, while I appreciate the potential that V-ism brings, I have no use for it as someone unwilling to master this game. X-ism seems like a deliberate handicap at some point). No, it's also the presentation. The way all the character themes sound weirdly similar, the obnoxious overexcited announcer, heck I find the entire art style for the character portraits and even the interface itself to be more than a little off. The fighting seems alright, but there are instances where you can juggle someone where you wouldn't be able to in a different game, or the way moves string together. Maybe it's just me? Alpha 3 fans, I'd like to hear why you like this game. I'm not so much down on it as I am confused by it.
Super Gem Fighter Mini Mix (also known as Pocket Fighter)
I think this video speaks for itself.
As an additional note, there's also a hidden Hyper Street Fighter Alpha, which in the grand tradition of Hyper Street Fighter II, lets you make different versions of the same character fight each other with fairly confusing and nonsensical results that only really matter to people who have played these games inside and out. But this may be even weirder since Alpha 3 is fairly different from the first two, whereas the most major difference (not counting balance tweaks and whatonot) between any two versions of a character in HSFII is the addition of a super meter.
El conclusion
So thus, despite my bewilderment surrounding Alpha 3, I've decided that I like the Street Fighter Alpha series. They aren't my favorite fighting games in the world, but they're clearly well made titles with a good amount of personality and some solid (if odd) underlying mechanics to go along with it. Alpha 2 is clearly the star of the show, being the most solidest and probably having the best soundtrack. Gem Fighter is pretty good as well, although I can't see myself seriously playing it.
Now if we want to talk about fighting games that may be my favorite.... well, you'll just have to wait until next time. Yo, that KOF XI is pretty radical. As is that Mortal Kombat and that Capcom vs SNK 2. Catch it!
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