Knowledge of game beforehand: I had never played a Street Fighter game. I had never seen someone play a Street Fighter game. My interest in the game started when the staff of Giantbomb began talking at length about it in all facets of their website. Many of us listened and watched as Giantbomb’s opinions on the game changed from shock and bewilderment at the first teaser trailer in 2007 as to what the game would look like, to an uneasy feeling about the combat and the hit boxes upon their initial playing of the game at E3, to the unflinching love thereafter from playing the game in arcades at TGS. In the recent past I had trusted Giantbomb, and ended up loving another fighting game series I was new to, Mortal Kombat, so I decided to try and give Street Fighter IV the same love it had received thus far from this website.
Opinions afterward: I now love Street Fighter games.
Knowledge about fighting system beforehand: I had seen gameplay videos and been intimidated by the seemingly simplistic, fast-paced, side scrolling fighting of the series. I didn’t know how to block. I didn’t know how to dash. I was scared.
Opinions afterward: I love the fighting system in Street Fighter IV. If you’ve never played a Street Fighter game the best way to go about learning the fundamentals of the game is the Trial Modes “Challenge Mode” which has you pulling a characters main attacks, and shows you some of the combos possible with them. The only complaints I can lobby against the game’s Challenge Mode is that it doesn’t teach you some of the tips you’d want for each character, such as what to do against projectiles or what tactics are best against what characters; something that the Giant Bombcast touched on in one of their episodes. The other complaint is that sometimes the timing requirements for the combos in Challenge Mode ask too much out of the Xbox 360’s controller. The later challenges are possible, but the timing can be crushingly specific (Something that MK v. DC’s Kombo Challenges are now notorious for as well). Luckily when playing online the people you’re fighting have the same handicap as you do, so outside of Arcade Mode or Challenge Mode the timing never hinders your ability to win a match.
Knowledge about graphics/audio beforehand: I loved the art style of the game, mainly being put off by Chun-Li’s legs which appeared to be twice the width of her torso. The burly look of the fighters also seemed a little bit past over the top.
From what I’d heard the audio was good, with the sounds of attacks appropriate, and the voice acting fine for the most part. The only thing that I’d heard that made me cringe was the American voice for Blanka.
Opinions afterward: The over-muscular character models didn’t seem nearly as strange and cartoonish after seeing how fluidly they animated. The colorful, slightly blurry, washed down visuals of the game are reminiscent of a Japanese water painting, with the edges of the environment and the character models boldly outlined. The audio was fantastic, and it turned out Blanka never talks outside of his cut-scenes for Arcade Mode; only grunts and snarls in fights.
Knowledge about multiplayer beforehand: I knew it had it. I actually just assumed it had it; I wasn’t sure. You may actually not yet know either. Find out if it had multiplayer in the next paragraph.
Opinions afterward: It has multiplayer. It actually has good, functional multiplayer. The game has the basic Versus modes for local play. It also has Xbox Live Matches which are split into Ranked Matches and Player Matches. Finding a game can be problematic at times, since the Quick Match option doesn’t match you up with the first game it finds, it only finds three matches for you to try and join. mode has an option however to create a perpetual match lobby while you fight the CPU in , so you’ll always be finding opponents to fight.
The frame rates online are consistent, only dipping into total unplayability about 1/15 of the time you’ll be online. There are Titles and Icons to earn, though very few are actually related to multiplayer, and they offer customization for your account online. In the month since the game’s release the online community has progressively diversified its use of the game’s full roster. Early on there were mostly only people playing as Ken, Akuma, or Ryu, but since then people have grown out of this and the online experience has become much more varied.
Something else worth noting is the exclusion of double-blind character select. Although all the fighters are balanced it still leads to the Old Western stand-off of one player waiting for the other to pick their character.
Buy or Not: I trusted Giantbomb, but still prepared myself for a drive back to Gamestop, receipt in hand, after my purchase of Street Fighter IV. It has been a little over a month since February 17th, the day I purchased the game, and since then it has been the only game to grace my disc drive. Buy!