You Win...Perfect!
I've been posting about SSFIITHDR all year and the good pilgrims at Capcom have delivered a digital feast for the Thanksgiving holiday! Once the download was complete I jumped right in, SSFIITHDR is a must have for fans of the Street Fighter franchise and it's as good as this 14 year title has ever looked or played. The intro screen boasts a powerful remixed score by the guys at overclocked and showcases Ryu and Gouki (Akuma) artwork from UDON. Press the start button and your brought to the main menu, there you can choose Singleplayer, Multiplayer, Scoreboard, Help & Options. Choosing Single Player will bring you to a new window where you can choose Arcade Mode or Training Mode. Choosing Arcade Mode will bring you to a new window where your given the choice of HD Remix or Classic Arcade, Choose a mode and then the character select screen will come up, choose your fighter and get to kicking ass offline. Training Mode is a great place for Street Fighter Vets and N00bs to familiarize themselves with how the remixed World Warriors handle. Like Arcade Mode, Training Mode gives the player the choice of HD Remix or Classic, after choosing the fighter you want to train with, your sparing partner and stage to train on this mode goes the extra mile by giving a list of additional features like the character's Move List, Training Options; Opponent's Behavior: Stand/Crouch/Jump/CPU controlled/ Human controlled Opponent Blocking: Auto/Always/Never Super Meter: Normal/Infinite Display Hitboxes, which will overlay red hit boxes for attack moves and blue for defensives areas during moves. The other features are Help and Options, About the Game which explains some terms and techniques of Street Fighter, Controls which is where you can customize the controller buttons to your preference and Settings where you can adjust the audio and/or display (WS or Standard) of the game.OK stop playing with yourself....There's Plenty of Other Fighters Like You All Over the World!Lets test your skills against all the other World Warriors all over the World!Multiplayer mode is where your gonna trully test your might! Choosing multiplayer will bring up a new screen with four options Local Match, Scoreboard Match, Friendly Match and Tournament Match.Local MatchTest your skills with friends and family on your console, that's ok but playing the same people over and over gets dull after awhile...trust me I know! Friendly Match"The true warrior enters the *online* arena with all his powers at the ready"You may be able to beat the game with over five stars difficulty and disgrace your buddies with but lets see if you got the heart kid! For some this may come as a rude awakening that all these years you thought you were l33t at Street Fighter only to find your like Apollo Creed against Ivan Drago...Friendly Match mode will not record your records so it's an ideal location to sharpen your skills for when it matters in a scoreboard match!When you choose Friendly Match you'll have three options; Search for Match where you can specify certain filters like game speed/ number of players in a room/ voice chat. You'll then get a list of rooms that fall within your parameters, or leave the filters as any to widen your search, pick a room with an opening and wait your turn to challenge the current leader of the room. Rooms can range from two players to six and private slots can be set aside for friends.Scoreboard Match
When sparring matches in your safe 1v1 friendly match games is over and your ready, enter the Scoreboard Match and test your skills, this is virually the same as a friendly match, double blind character select, 2 rounds to win a match. The only difference is the these matches record your wins, losses and according to Capcom there will be a stat tracking website launnched that will keep track of not only your wins and losses but how many special moves you've performed such as kikokens, hadokens, shoryukens, and spinning bird kicks, how many times you've won by perfect, how many times you've won by using a super move etc.
For me, Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix is a tremendous value, for only $14.99 you get a 100% arcade quality port of the original SSFIIT as well as the HD remix which could be considered a completely new version. SSFIITHDR is a testament to the longevity and quality of the Street Fighter franchise, the fact that this project almost got scraped yet the teams behind it pushed on to produce such an amazing game shows how devoted Capcom USA, Udon and Backbone were to this project and the hard is seen in every frame of the game and every sound bite!
I have waited since the late 90's to be able to play Street Fighter on line on my home console, I would've been pleased with a straight port of any version but for Capcom to practically rebuild SSFIIT from the ground up with the depth and attention to detail like a swiss watch maker was more than most fans of the franchise could've hoped for!
I recomend this game with no reservations for veterans and newcomers alike, the game offers enough variations for newcomers to learn the basics and work on mastering the more technical aspects of the game. And the remixed version is trully a joy to play, not only is it a visual masterpiece but the gameplay and remixed tweeks to the characters adds tremendously to the competitve nature of hardcore players. Below is a list of links to the Capcom Unity Blogs chronicaling the retooling of the World Warriors. With a game that is so dependant upon timing, lag could ruin the experience of playing this game online but with over 200 matches fought I can say that, for the most part, very minor issues with lag (I use Verizon DSL) and that the network is for the most part, very stable. Although I did find myself in a scoreboard match with someone who found a way to make the entire screen black except for my character and the health bars...obviously this person was very inexperienced to say it politely to loose to me even with a glitch that rendered me blind so to speak.
9/10
Ryu http://blog.capcom.com/archives/558
T.Hawk http://blog.capcom.com/archives/598
Ken http://blog.capcom.com/archives/627
Blanka http://blog.capcom.com/archives/872
Cammy http://blog.capcom.com/archives/960
Balrog http://blog.capcom.com/archives/987
Sagat http://blog.capcom.com/archives/1041
Fei Long http://blog.capcom.com/archives/1105
T Hawk (revisited) http://blog.capcom.com/archives/1143
Guile http://blog.capcom.com/archives/1183
Dhalsim http://www.capcomdigital.com/blog/20...art_13_dhalsim
M. Bison http://www.capcom-unity.com/s-kill/b...art_14_m_bison
Zangief http://www.capcom-unity.com/s-kill/b...art_16_zangief
Dee Jay http://www.capcom-unity.com/s-kill/b...art_17_dee_jay
The season of Street Fighter continues, Our first look at the up coming movie, Street Fighter: Legend of Chun Li is out albeit in Japanese...but do you really need this trailer localized? 
Wow the resemblance is UNCANNY!
