STREET FIGHTER 4!!!!

[Adam12]

Originally Posted by Alexzandra

It really depends what kind of gameplay you prefer. Anniversary edition is probably the safest bet as it has both SF3: Third Strike (3S) and Hyper SF2 (a miss-mash of all the SF2 games). I have a really fond place in my heart for Alpha 2, so the Alpha collection is awesome imo (plus drunken pocket fighter is win).

I play more CVS2 than anything, but I warn you, it is not very noob friendly. Most will tell you that 3S is much more noob friendly. I personally don't care much for 3S, but it has a big scene still.

All that being said, I can't recommend the complete awesomeness with sex on top that is GGPO. Alpha 2, MvC1, and now Vampire Savior (darkstalkers 3) on the best online connection for fighting games made so far. Check out GGPO.net .

Yes, I actually meant Alpha 2. Alpha 2 is great, but I prefer 3rd Strike above all others.

[Del]

Links to the 1up Street Fighter 4 Show Special

WMV: http://zdmedia.vo.llnwd.net/o1/1UP/1...iv_640x360.zip
QTHigh: http://zdmedia.vo.llnwd.net/o1/1UP/1...sfiv_quick.zip
iPod: http://zdmedia.vo.llnwd.net/o1/Podcasts/122807.m4v

[Alexzandra]

A lot of people feel that way. Personally, I think that parrying makes it play very "unstreet fighter," but different strokes for different folks.

Bang for the buck wise, he's better off getting the AE for 3S and SF2, then downloading GGPO and the SFA2 rom and using that for his alpha fix.

Alpha 2 on GGPO is sex.

[Adam12]

I agree. It's hard to really pick one when you have/played the shit out of all of them. I think I've just had more epic shit happen on 3rd strike multiplayer, which is why I prefer it.

[Ronne]

Just download Mugen and melt faces with Shin Gouki like I do ^^

[The Dauntless One]

Anyone know where I can download an ISO for Street fighter anniversary edition or Capcom VS SNK 2?

I tried looking on craigslist and other forums but the only ones I find are people who wants 100+ dollars for them.

I recently bought KOF XI and getting back into 2D fighters. Even that game was hard to find. The EBgames I went to only had 1 copy and it had a french manual >__> I might go mod my system for these 2D fighters.

[Kheldin]

Originally Posted by Alexzandra

It really depends what kind of gameplay you prefer. Anniversary edition is probably the safest bet as it has both SF3: Third Strike (3S) and Hyper SF2 (a miss-mash of all the SF2 games). I have a really fond place in my heart for Alpha 2, so the Alpha collection is awesome imo (plus drunken pocket fighter is win).

I play more CVS2 than anything, but I warn you, it is not very noob friendly. Most will tell you that 3S is much more noob friendly. I personally don't care much for 3S, but it has a big scene still.

All that being said, I can't recommend the complete awesomeness with sex on top that is GGPO. Alpha 2, MvC1, and now Vampire Savior (darkstalkers 3) on the best online connection for fighting games made so far. Check out GGPO.net .

define not noob-friendly. I play tekken at a fairly high level, and used to play some street fighters back in the day, but it's been since SF Alpha 1 that I took a break from them for awhile.

Basically what i'm looking for is:
a.) Tight gameplay where skill is king over cheese bullshit
b.) Visually impressive graphics
c.) Combos that make sense (in the Marvel vs. Capcom games you'd have like 30 hit combos that did like 10% damage, when a few fierce punches would do the same deal...it was combos for the sake of combos, and that was stupid)

That said, does that skew your recommendations at all?

[Alexzandra]

Originally Posted by Kheldin

define not noob-friendly. I play tekken at a fairly high level, and used to play some street fighters back in the day, but it's been since SF Alpha 1 that I took a break from them for awhile.

Basically what i'm looking for is:
a.) Tight gameplay where skill is king over cheese bullshit
b.) Visually impressive graphics
c.) Combos that make sense (in the Marvel vs. Capcom games you'd have like 30 hit combos that did like 10% damage, when a few fierce punches would do the same deal...it was combos for the sake of combos, and that was stupid)

That said, does that skew your recommendations at all?

You'll find tight gameplay in all of these titles. Cheese is subjective of course. I'll try to be as objective as I can with my breakdown below, but note that my bias favors CVS2 and Alpha 2 as my favorite fighters (with super turbo up there somewhere).

Alpha Anthology

- Alpha 1's day is gone. It is kind of fun, to noodle with, but probably wasn't really for release when it came out. Alpha 2 is really the first complete game in the series. Guy and Ken rule the world.

- I really enjoy playing Alpha 2, but many dislike the high damage custom combos, which are easier to do than in other fighters with customs (in most cases). It is decently well balanced, with most of the mid tier being fairly competitive against the top tier (Chun, Ken, Rose, Ryu) in any level of play you will likely be engaging in any time soon.

The art direction in A2 is considered by some to be the pinnacle of old-school art direction. Most of the backgrounds kick ass. Plus the music is mostly renditions of original music from SF2.

- Alpha 3 is the most controversial game in the Alpha series. It was the first street fighter to have the player select character modes or "isms," which determines the type of super gauge the character has. In high level play, Vism dominates for most characters; there are some tricks you can do with Vism that literally breaks the game engine and allows a few characters to do infinites. I avoid A3 because of this, but it does have some cool things going for it.

In terms of competition for the above games, Alpha 1 and 3 are pretty much dead stateside. You'll see occasional Alpha 3 side games in local tourneys, with it being more common as a side game in larger ones. However, with the addition of Alpha 2 to GGPO, A2 has had a bit of a revival.

If you're really interested in playing an Alpha game, my honest recommendation would be to play Alpha 2 on GGPO, especially if you have access to an arcade stick you can use on PC.

Anniversary Edition

- Hyper SF2: Just wait for SF2:HD to come out of Xbox live or PS3. This is fun and all, but often not considered a tournament worthy game due to some champion edition characters breaking balance totally. (Hi Bison!)

- Third Strike: One of the most popular tournament games still (The big three 2D fighters--aside from Guilty Gear--are 3S, Marvel, and CvS2, with an honorable mention for Super Turbo). It has a lot of depth on some levels, but the parry system destroys the importance of projectiles and makes controlling space and zoning more random, or so some would say. I've seen a lot of things happen in high level play that just leaves people scratching their heads. A lot of old schoolers dislike it for the slow, slow pace and the parry system. Plus in high level play it pretty much turns into ken vs chun vs yun with the occasionally makoto.

The super art system is interesting in theory, but in practice every character has one, maybe two super arts you'll see in high level play.

It is the most visually striking of all the games mentioned here definitely. It still holds up pretty well today. I also enjoy the electronic/hip-hop influenced music, but some may disagree.

It is pretty noob friendly as there are a lot of high damage combos that are pretty easy--relatively speaking--to pick up, with higher damage and harder ones to learn that give an edge, but aren't necessarily required for entry level competition. Parrying isn't really that hard to pick up, but you won't be pulling a Diago and parrying all of Chun's SA2 tomorrow. It also has a limited cast compared to CVS2 (though still 20 characters), and two of the top tier are reasonably easy to pick up and go with (Ken, Chun).

CVS2

- CVS2 arguably has the most depth of all the games mentioned here, so much so it is pretty daunting and intimidating to the new player. It has over 50 characters, of which you pick a team of three to play as with a ratio system (you chose to play as 1 ratio 4, 2 ratio 2s, a ratio 1 and 3, or 2 ratio 1s and a ratio 2, but unless you use the last option you're gimping yourself).

The "ism" system from Alpha 3 is used in this, except they're called grooves and there are six of them. Yes, six. Only three of them see heavy use in high level play these days (C, A, and K, with some N). Many of the characters are more optimally used in one groove over another, and teams should be selected to have some synergy. Figuring all of this out, not to mention becoming competent with three characters is a bit more of a time/skill investment than the above games.

Of the the strongest grooves, A, is based around a custom combo system that is rather hard to execute, for most at least. C is very competitive, however, if you don't want to start with A (many consider C a counter to A anyway).

Where things get even more tricky is a tournament legal glitch called roll canceling. Three grooves (C, A, N) have a command move roll executed by hitting lp and lk at the same time. Where the glitch comes in is that you can perform a special move about 1/6 of a second after doing the roll, which will cancel the roll and transfer invincible frames found in every roll to the special move, whether it was intended to have invincible frames or not. Roll canceling is one of the most technically difficult things in any fighting game to do consistently. You will not be doing this day one.

On top of that, the game system is rather complex compared to most other fighters. There is a huge FAQ about it on gamefaqs that is required reading if you want to take the game seriously.

Graphically, the game looks fairly dated, especially on PS2 (it runs in slightly higher res than arcade/dc, so the characters are a bit more pixelated).

So while CVS2 might have the most depth of the above games, it might be to the game's detriment.

---
I hope that helps somewhat. If you have more specific questions, by all means, let em rip.

[Kobalt]

Originally Posted by Alexzandra

- Third Strike: Plus in high level play it pretty much turns into ken vs chun vs yun with the occasionally makoto.

The super art system is interesting in theory, but in practice every character has one, maybe two super arts you'll see in high level play.

This is bullshit, 3rd strike has one of the biggest variety of characters used in high lvl play. I see tons of uriens, dudleys, hugos, necros etc. Hell even Q who is low tier gets alot of play.

CVS2 and MVC2 are the real jokes in this regard, gl finding someone using anything besides some slight variation of the high tier teams.

And considering theres only 3 supers, I don't think its bad that 2 are used. What fighter do you know where everyone uses every super? The characters that have 2 good supers shows why it's a good system, and the ones that don't, its just no different from any other game really.

[Alexzandra]

Originally Posted by Kobalt

This is bullshit, 3rd strike has one of the biggest variety of characters used in high lvl play. I see tons of uriens, dudleys, hugos, necros etc. Hell even Q who is low tier gets alot of play.

o rly?

Originally Posted by evo '07 tourney results

Street Fighter III: Third Strike

1st: Nuki (Chun-Li, never lost)
2nd: Tokido (Chun-Li, Urien, loses to Nuki and Nuki)
3rd: Alex Valle (Ken, Ryu, lost to Nuki and Tokido)
4th: Mike Wakefield (Makoto, lost to Valle and Tokido)
5th: Fubarduck (Chun-Li, loses to Tokido and Tokido)
5th: AznHitler (Necro, Ken, loses to Mike Wakefield and Mike Wakefield)
7th: Ricky Ortiz (Chun-Li, Ken, loses to Nuki and Fubarduck)
7th: Ed Ma (Ken, loses to Amir and AznHitler)

And considering theres only 3 supers, I don't think its bad that 2 are used. What fighter do you know where everyone uses every super? The characters that have 2 good supers shows why it's a good system, and the ones that don't, its just no different from any other game really.

I personally prefer a system that gives you access to all the supers. In alpha 2, for instance, there are viable reasons to use both of Ryu's supers. So yeah, it is different than other games.

edit: I should add, in top level play, if you're using chun in anything besides SA2 you're wrong, Ken in anything besides SA3 you're wrong, or Yun in anything other than SA3, you're wrong. That's a total of six supers that are defacto useless in the top tier alone.

[Algol Devilstar]

Get MvC if you can find it, it's the best by far =P

[Jedah]

Originally Posted by Algol Devilstar

Get MvC if you can find it, it's the best by far =P

When you're comparing all the most recent iterations of Capcom fighting games, it's really a case of apples v. oranges v. bananas v. watermelons.

[Kobalt]

Originally Posted by Alexzandra

I personally prefer a system that gives you access to all the supers. In alpha 2, for instance, there are viable reasons to use both of Ryu's supers. So yeah, it is different than other games.

edit: I should add, in top level play, if you're using chun in anything besides SA2 you're wrong, Ken in anything besides SA3 you're wrong, or Yun in anything other than SA3, you're wrong. That's a total of six supers that are defacto useless in the top tier alone.

Would there ever be a reason to use anything besides yun's SA3 even if he could use his other 2 at any time? If it didn't suck so much in cfj it would be all anyone ever used also.

[wild_whiskey]

If you're avoiding cheese gameplay, then stay the fuck away from MvC2. It takes skill to own, but every game I see between good players is "who can get the other person trapped in an infinite combo first." Everyone plays the same team (with miniscule changes).

3rd strike is imo without a doubt the best capcom fighter to date.

Since you're a Tekken player, I'll put this in Tekken terms. Playing MvC2 is like playing Steve vs. Steve in Tekken 5.0... over, and over, and over again.

[Blank]

on the other hand, it's really fun to suck at MvC2 and play other people that suck at it :] You can actually use characters aside from Storm/Magneto/Sentinel/Psylocke and no one knows how to infinite or shit.