« 3rd Strike Online Feedback Series: Mr Jared »

At ComicCon 2010, Capcom announced Street Fighter III: 3rd Strike Online Edition with no specific details. What was mentioned, however, is that should the fans have any suggestions on what should be included in this rerelease, they should inform Capcom. To aid this process, iPlayWinner will be publishing articles from notable members of the community on what they would like to see from this new edition of 3rd Strike. Please share your thoughts in the comments section, both in direct response to our ideas and to include your own as well. And be sure to return to iPlayWinner each week and let us know how your opinions have shifted, if at all, during the course of this series!

I liked 3rd Strike before it was cool.

No, really. There was a point where no one actually played this game. And not in the, "Only 12 people showed up to a 64 man tourney thus no one plays it" way that we joke about now. When Street Fighter III: 3rd Strike originally debuted, people took one look at Chun-li, called it broken and moved on. As someone who loved the mid-tier game within 3rd Strike, however, it was a revelation.

Suddenly, Necro and Elena weren't completely awful and new faces like Q and Hugo got me excited about the SF3 series all over again. Of course, this same love is why I never actually came close to winning any tournaments (Yes, that's the excuse we're going with), but for years it was a regular part of my arcade rotation at Sunnyvale and Milpitas' Golfland and beyond.

Unfortunately, the unbelievable success of Street Fighter IV has come at a cost and our dear friend 3rd Strike is one of its many victims. While I love SFIV, I also miss seeing good ol' fashioned 2D sprites at my local sessions. With the announcement of Street Fighter III: 3rd Strike Online Edition, not only does Capcom get to continue its public adoration for superfluous naming conventions, but we, the fans, may get a chance to rewrite history. Yes, I am in favor of blasphemy: I want to alter Street Fighter III: 3rd Strike.

Before I go any further, I'd like to make a few things clear. I don't want an "HD Remix" of 3rd Strike. I think the visuals are absolutely perfect as is. And I definitely don't want to give it the "Sirlin treatment" where characters receive new or altered sets of moves. If Japanese legend Kuroda has taught us anything, it's that anything is possible if you're good enough, or at least a god of 2D fighting. The truth is, I like 3rd Strike just the way it is ... on the surface, anyway. Now if we want to dig around in those one's and zeroes and change a couple of character attributes, that's another thing entirely.

Hey kids, who wants to get trapped in the world of Street Fighter III? Anyone?

What I propose are some simple tweaks to character attributes (offensive power, defense, super legnth, ect) not to shake-up the tier lists, but simply to compress them a bit. The way 3rd Strike stands today, you have the obvious low-tier (Twelve, Q, Sean), an absolutely dominating top-tier (Chun, Yun, Ken) and the rest of the cast making up the exciting mid-tier game. I don't want to change this at all.

But I would like to see Yun's Super Art 3 (Genei-Jin) change from 1 short bar to max length, with a little damage scaling sprinkled on for good measure. Again, with Chun-li's SA2 I'd rather it be one max length bar with damage scaling, because let's face it, no one enjoys losing 45% of their life or more from a single crouching medium kick. Even with these changes, Yun and Chun are still the most dominant characters in the game, only now it's not quite as free.

Other examples I can think of would be giving Ibuki a small boost in health so that she's not as fragile as a wet tissue, though at the same time, I don't think Akuma needs a boost like that at all. Stun properties could also go back under the microscope because while I love Makoto, free dizzies (or 100% combos if you're fragile) off a successful SA2 are awful. When looking at the game like this, I can even think of a few characters that don't need to be touched at all. Hugo comes to mind since what keeps him down is simply being such a massive target.

Look on the bright side, Capcom. I already created a new intro for you!

Keep Urien's unblockable setups, Q's insane taunt boost ... it's the nonsense that gives Third Strike it's charm and after HD Remix, I don't want to see another game ruined like Super Turbo. But I do believe it's possible to adjust the game in the name of broader appeal without destroying it in the process.

The unfortunate reality is that 3rd Strike is a complicated game and the players that made Super Street Fighter IV such a massive success aren't going to want to learn a game where only three characters stand a even a remote chance of winning a US tournament. I want nothing more than to see Street Fighter III: 3rd Strike make a comeback to the point where holding a tourney for it doesn't sound completely absurd and to do this it has to reach out to more than just its hardcore fans. A straight rerelease won't do that because while it sold (and continues to sell) like gangbusters, Marvel vs Capcom 2 proved already that a port is simply not enough to reestablish a community.