1UP.COM: YOSHINORI ONO ON STREET FIGHTER 4.1

1up posted an article today from TGS where Capcom officially confirmed the console release (I thought they already did this) of the game in Q1 of 2009.

Yoshinori Ono, the games producer, mentions that there will be some additions like new characters and training mode, but no major gameplay or balance changes from the arcade.

SHO-SHO-SHO-SHO! SAKURA REVEALED FOR STREET FIGHTER IV CONSOLE RELEASE

SAKURA IN SFIVExcellent find by "The Shift" on SRK. This a Famitsu scan showing Sakura in SFIV. After looking at the can you will see, much like all the other characters in SFIV, most of her staple moves are there: Fireball, Hurricane Kick, Standing Roundhouse, etc.

It also appears she has her own stage. At first it kind of looked like an old Rivals School stage but I think its actually under or near a bridge. One complaint I have with SFIV is the stages, most of them look very uninspired, but it's not really a big deal.

So it begins. As TGS 2008 cranks up I'm sure we'll see a lot more of SFIV's new cast including Fei-Long, Cammy and Dan! Sakura is a real suprise though. I did not think there would be any additonal characters outside of the ones I mentioned for the console release.

Update on Wednesday, October 8, 2008 at 8:26AM by haunts

Theory Fighter - Sakura Meter Burning Combo: c.lk, c.lk, s.lk, Uppercut, FADC, Hurricane Kick, FADC first hit, Ultra!

JUSTIN WONG CGS INTERVIEW: STREET FIGHTER 4, USA ARCADE SCENE, RIVALS AND OF COURSE... THE DAIGO PARRY.

As Street Fighter 4 creeps closer and closer to a console release, we continue to see more coverage from sites and other outlets that may have not given a thought to the fighting game genre even year or two ago.

This bring us to an interview with Justin Wong  conducted by CGS. CGS (Championship Gaming Series) as far as I know is a gaming organization that throws tournaments for more mainstream games like FPS's and I assume rhythm/music games (I see a Guitar Hero guitar front and center). They bring up some interesting questions if you're not really into the competitive scene, and Justin sheds a lot of light on the scene for people who aren't involved.

Lastly, they ask for the one fighting game to be included in CGS next year and he mentions SFIV so we'll see if the game shows up in more main stream competitions next year.

Watch live video from All Games Radio on Justin.tv

Watch live video from All Games Radio on Justin.tv

Watch live video from All Games Radio on Justin.tv

TEKKEN 6: BLOODLINE REBELLION COMING TO PS3

I always figured this was the case but it was confirmed earlier this week by Namco. According to SDTEKKEN.COM it will have more content than the arcade version. 

A couple things that are on my mind: was this always the case? How long has the PS3 version been in development? How will they plan the release date with so many fighting games coming out next year?

It seemed like holiday 2008 would be a great time to drop Tekken 6 but this may mean we have to wait till late 2009 for this game.

JIMMY REY: FINAL LIST OF CHANGES FOR SUPER TURBO: HD REMIX

If you were wondering about the official changes to each character and the so-called rebalancing of the game, check out Jimmy Rey's blog on what the final changes are.

Update on Tuesday, October 7, 2008 at 11:10AM by haunts

I knew this looked familiar. Sirlin posted these same details months and months ago, so this isnt exactly breaking news. I guess they wanted to clarify all the final changes to the game.

KIKIZO INTERVIEW: SEGA AM2 MAKOTO OSAKI, VF5:R'S "DESTRUCTIVE DIRECTION"

This is a great interview from Kikizo with Makoto Osaki, SEGA AM2 development boss. One of the more interesting aspects is that it appears the high damage combos in VF5:R were intentionally put into the game by the SEGA AM2 team.  This is the "destructive direction" they are taking the game:

Kikizo: How do you go about deciding how to re-balance the abilities of the characters each time you make a revision to the game?

Osaki: Every time we do a revision to the game, our motion director and ace player, Katagiri-san, works to adjust the game balance. Every time, we have a certain "scene" for the version. Up until this point, we've tried to equalize the balance amongst all the characters with a more "mild" game balance. But for VF5R, we've gone in more of a... how would you say it... "destructive" direction. By that I mean that all the characters have some powerful, hard-hitting attacks and potential to inflict a lot of damage on each other given the right opportunity. Both characters in a match have strong moves available to them. This means that a single round can end very fast when compared to the original game. However, we have gleamed that this is the sort of thing that our users want.

Kikizo: So more high-damage combos like in VF2 and VF3.

Osaki: It's more in line with the initial version of VF4. Virtua Fighter 2... man, that game was HARSH. You'd eat Akira's Tetsuzankou and you could pretty much kiss that round goodbye. You had matches ending in three seconds back then!

Read the rest of the interview here.

Update on Monday, October 6, 2008 at 10:18PM by haunts

This video seems appropriate for some reason:

KOTAKU: FIGHTING TO PLAY

Kotaku has an article on the EVO Championship Series and how it came to be. Not the most flattering picture of John Choi but an interesting read nonetheless.

In 1995 a group of top arcade fighters, sick of arguing over a newsnet who the player was, decided to gather at an arcade on Broadway in New York City to finally decide it.

"We all came from the street fighter arcades," said Seth Killian, director of EVO and community manager at Capcom. "Everyone coming to that thing was like the kingpin of their local arcades."

INTERVIEW WITH KING OF FIGHTERS XII PRODUCER

I saw this on Mad Mans Cafe a little earlier today. I always wondered why they scrapped the location test earlier in this year and they have an answer for me:

You scheduled a location test in April, but it was canceled, and you stop communicating on the subject for a long time. Could you talk to us about this incident?

Y: We were looking at our rivals’games, as some of us wondered if we should release the game with even fewer characters. But we couldn’t make a KOF with less than 20 characters, so we decided to stop there and add some more. It was far too early to make a location test: the systems were rough, and we still had a lot of work to do. We couldn’t make a location test with such an early product, so we decided to just show our game so far at the AM show.

Our biggest concern was to add as many characters as possible.

C.VIPER: STREET FIGHTER IV'S IBUKI?

So I was checking out the new GameChariot videos on HardEdgeOfficial's youtube channel and there were a bunch of a C.Viper matches. After watching a couple and reading some threads, it occurred to me that she is somewhat similar to Ibuki in Third Strike. She has the tools to get the job done, but doesn't do a ton of a damage, has low vitality, but she can stun the opponent relatively quickly with a couple openings. Also, as I understand it more of her high damage combos and set ups are highly situational.  Over all she has to work a lot harder for a win compared to some other characters like Bison, 'Gief and Sagat.

To get an idea of what I'm talking about check the video below. In round 3 she stuns Bison after 1 throw and two short combos. The follow up corner combo is really nice too: Level 3 Focus Attack, c.mp (?), EX Seimso Hammer, Super jump cancel, Burning Kick, HP Thunder Knuckle.

KING OF FIGHTERS XII TGS 2008 UPDATE

So after searching around a bit today looks like there is a lot of new information on KOFXII. First off, three characters confirmed to be playable at TGS: Andy, Iori and Raiden! Iori received a total makeover, not sure what I think about it. Anyway, more importantly, on cyberfantix.com they have some new information on the gameplay system:

CLASH/OFFSET SYSTEM (SOUSAI)
- Occurs when strong attacks, special attacks and DMs clash (replaces counter hits, I assume)
- If you don't input anything after the offset, both opponents do a backstep automatically
- If you do input something, the backstep is cancelled and you can continue to attack.
- You can cancel projectiles in this manner as well.
- You can cancel the clash into a dash or a jump by holding the lever in the appropriate direction
- When you cause a clash, you take some damage (a fraction of the damage of the attack that the opponent was doing, so it scales up as you clash more powerful attacks - at least that's the impression I'm getting).
- If you clash while in midair, you can follow up with just about anything that your character can do in mid-air

GUARD ATTACK (command = b+ CD)
- To be used when trying to turn the momentum of the battle in your favour, or when you've predicted that a defensive opponent will attempt to counter attack.
- You can do it even when the opponent isn't attacking you (unlike the guard cancel CD of old)
- It catches all types of attacks - high/low/mid/overhead
- You're vulnerable to throws during the attack

HOKUTO NO KEN FIGHTING GAME FOR PSP ANNOUNCED - TEN NO HAOH

Thanks to Akutabi Gamma for posting this on SRK. The Fist of the North Star game that dropped for PS2 has been said to be a pretty fun game although not completely balanced. I never played it myself, but now they are announcing a similar game for the PSP. I don't have anymore details besides a link to the Japanese site.

http://www.interchannel.co.jp/psp/haoh/

Update on Friday, October 3, 2008 at 10:47AM by haunts

The game appears to be tied to the new series that is coming out. Confirmed characters are: Raoh, Jagi, Souther, Reina and Uighur.

Update on Friday, October 3, 2008 at 1:36PM by haunts

Here are some bigger screens: http://www.psphyper.com/psp/new-fist-of-the-north-star-fighter-first-screens/

STREET FIGHTER IV DAIGO VIDEOS

A good find by nohoho on SRK, a couple new Daigo videos. Since Third Strike is pretty much dead now he looks happy to finally be able to play Ryu full time again! No one should ever have to settle with Ken! Err.. anyway.. nothing too new gameplay wise so no need for a video analysis but check them out anyway! A lot of solid play all around.

TIGER KNEE IS HOW MANY FRAMES?

No, not a pop quiz, just a heads up that there is a good discussion on Street Fighter IV frames going on the SRK forums right now. Info and data is being pulled from the SFIV Master Guide. Right now Reno is doing all the translating but hopefully we will have a copy here within the next week.

Study up!

STREET FIGHTER IV MASTER GUIDE & TRIUMVIR GEAR NOW AVAILABLE

Well, sort of. The SFIV Master Guide is definitely on sale at play-asia, but the Triumvir gear is pretty much already sold out. I think the caps are still available but the fresh black  Shadowloo shirt is sold out! I have been waiting a while to pick up the black shirt but looks like I was too slow on the draw this time. Oh well, off to E-bay!

HARASS SEGA FOR VF5:R ON CONSOLE!

SEGASo I live literally 2 blocks from SEGA's San Francisco office and decided to go down there and ask them what's the deal with VF5:R on console. They didn't have any information for me on VF5:R but gave me some juicy details on Sonic Whack-A-Mole for the Wii! We'll get into that later, but for now, check out VirtuaFighter.com where they have instructions on how to fill out a form on SEGA's japanese website to request VF5:R on console.

Update on Thursday, October 2, 2008 at 2:05PM by haunts

Just to clarify I didn't actually go down there outside of walking by it on my way to get coffee at Starbucks. I just had to squeeze a Sonic joke in there somewhere!

With that being said I had my girlfriend ask one of the game testers she knows who works there if he knew anything and it was essentially the same response! Guess we will have to wait till TGS to hear anything.

GAMESPOT SF4 & HD REMIX TOURNAMENT IN SAN FRANCISCO

Updated on Wednesday, October 1, 2008 at 6:05PM by haunts

HD REMIX STATIONSSo yesterday at the CBS Interactive Center in San Francisco, Gamespot along side Capcom hosted a tournament for Street Fighter 4 and SF2 HD Remix. I wasn't too sure if I was going to check it out or not but I'm glad I did. No entry fee and a chance to win $2500, so might as well right?

Click to read more ...

PRE-ORDER STREET FIGHTER IV MASTER GUIDE

ARCADIASo in the post below, there was mention of an Arcadia magazine Street Fighter IV guide with strategies and frame data . Well, this guide is already up for pre-order on play-asia! It will most likely be all in Japanese but I'm sure you can figure things out by looking at the numbers and notation.

Street Fighter IV Master Guide

FAMITSU GOUKEN SCREENSHOTS, UNPLAYABLE CHARACTER?

So this Famitsu link has been floating around for a couple days. It contains clean screenshots for almost all of Gouken's moves.

You may have to copy and paste the address into your browser window in order to load up the page:

http://www.famitsu.com/game/news/1218440_1124.html

Also, another interesting bit of information related to Gouken from Reno on SRK:

Enterbrain/Arcadia magazine will be releasing a mook for Street Fighter 4 on October 2.

http://www.arcadiamagazine.com/cgi-b...iew.cgi?id=183

Looks like it'll be about 168 pages in A4 format, and sell for about 1500 yen. I'll be picking one up when it goes on sale.

Interesting note in the summary text is that it says it introduces the moves and strats for the 17 characters, and the 2 non-playable characters, Seth and Gouken. Hm, perhaps those two are not playable after all?

Most importantly... there will be frame data in the mook! Rejoice suckas!

CLOSER LOOK AT GOUKEN

Alright, so this is me just playing some Theory Fighter, but after watching a couple videos of Gouken I have had some ideas on how he may play if he ever becomes selectable like Akuma.

Really the main thing I have been looking at is how he will utilize his Focus Attack Dash Cancel into his Ultra.

A couple thoughts:

• After the rush punch in the corner, FADC into ShinShoRyuken. Since the opponent flies through the air I don't believe you will be able to do this mid screen.
• First hit of his hurricane kick. I am not sure if the first hit launches, but if it does you should be able to FADC and then juggle into ultra.
• After the anti-air fireball. This probably depends on the recovery of the move and also the angle in which the opponent is hit.
• Air-Counter -> Air hurricane kick -> FADC -> land -> Ultra. Serious Theory fighter here in that I'm not sure what you can follow up with after the air counter or if you can FADC the air hurricane kick.

GAMASUTRA: SFIV YOSHI ONO INTERVIEW

YOSHINORI ONO SFIV PRODUCER  

This is a real indepth interview from Gamasutra with Yoshinori Ono on Street Fighter IV.

One thing that seems to always come up in these interviews is Street Fighter III and how "complicated" the game play system is. The thing is, after spending a month or two with SFIV myself, I actually think the Focus Attack system is far more complicated than the parry system in SF3.

If you watch some of the newer videos coming out, a lot of top players are making good use of it but the actual inputs for a focus attack dash cancel among other things are much more complicated than just tapping forward or down for a parry. I think a lot of casuals and journalists do not realize this yet and the game is still being presented as a "simpler street fighter, a rewind to Street Fighter II".

I think once the game is out on console and people start playing others online who have had time with the game they will see this. 

Of course you can play the game SFII style, but to do real damage in this game you must utilize the focus attack dash cancel system. We'll see how it plays out.