Super Street Fighter 2: The New Challengers
Reviewed by Hadoken
There have been many fighting games made over the years, but none
were real successes, except for Capcom's legendary Street Fighter series!
In 1987, one of the first ever one-on-one fighters was released for
arcades: Street Fighter. Of course, this game had many flaws, including
the very cumbersome button system, which was two "analog" buttons,
where the strength of the attack depended upon how hard the button was
pressed. This meant trouble for arcades, because many of the models were
broken. Another thing about the game was, the graphics sucked! Of course,
this was the 80's, so graphics weren't cared about much, so forget I said
that. Well, another thing: only two playable characters?! Ryu and Ken,
who were IDENTICAL, were the only playable fighters in the whole game.
Well, with this horrible nightmare of a game, why is the series such a
success? Well, ever hear of Street Fighter II? Possibly the most
revolutionary fighting game ever, this monster title, released in 1991
for arcades, and in 1992 for the Super NES, Street Fighter II: The World
Warrior was a total blast to play for loyal fans of the original. There
were lines out the arcade doors of people waiting to play this. Not only
was it very graphically enhanced, but there were four times as many
playable fighters as in the first game. With Ryu and Ken, still identical,
came six new, playable fighters: Blanka, Edmond Honda, Guile, Chun-Li,
Zangief, and Dhalsim. However, four players remained unplayable, as the
four Grand Masters: Balrog, Vega, Sagat (the only other returning fighter
from the original), and Mike Bison. Just about everybody loved this game.
It wasn't just some silly fad, either. The legacy still lives on today. There
were still several problems with this title, though. The players were
unbalanced; masters of fighters such as Dhalsim and Honda could rule
the arcade machine for hours, just because they're actually BETTER
than most of the other fighters. Also, the computer fighters in this
game are total cheeseballs. They don't have to charge their moves, and
Balrog can just keep using his Dash Straight on you until your energy
runs out, even if you block.
The next year, another Street Fighter game was released for the Sega
Genesis only: Street Fighter II: Special Champion Edition. In this game,
all twelve fighters were fully playable, right out of the box. So, players
could now have the chance to master Balrog, Vega, Sagat, or the infamous
M. Bison. One great addition to this was the introduction of several new
attacks. Chun-Li got a Fireball, Ryu and Ken actually became a little more
different from one another, and Dhalsim got a Yoga Teleport move. There
are much more new attacks, also. There was also another addition
introduced in this the Hyper option! In this mode, players could speed
up the game, so it would no longer be as slow as a fly on glue. However,
you can still play in the Normal mode.
The Super Nintendo soon followed up with a virtually identical game,
Street Fighter II Turbo: Hyper Fighting. This is the same as the Champion
Edition, except that in the Normal mode, the moves are the same as in
World Warrior. There's still a Hyper setting, duh. Other than all this, the
game is identical to the Champion Edition.
With all this hype, people soon grew tired of Street Fighter... NOT! It was
still a killer in the arcades, and a sellout in stores. Capcom, in 1994,
released a totally new game for the arcades: Super Street Fighter II Turbo.
This monster was revolutionary in a number of ways. First, the stellar
soundtrack rocked. Second, a new Super Combo technique was introduced,
in which players had a Super Bar they had to fill up. By doing this, it was at
last possible to have a combo of over ten hits! Super Combos did an insane
amount of damage, but were hard to perform. And do you remember how
unbalanced the fighters were in the old SF titles? Not here. Every fighter
is equally balanced now, so no more cheeseballing buttheads ruling the
arcades for hours. Oh yeah. I almost forgot to mention that FOUR NEW
CHARACTERS were introduced! Thunder Hawk, a bulky North American
wrestler from Mexico, Fei-Long, a hyper-active carbon copy of Bruce Lee
from Hong Kong, Dee Jay, a wacky Jamaican kick-boxer, and the Brit babe
Cammy, a sort of "competition" for Chun-Li. All of these four new fighters
were totally unique, by means of moves, origins, and styles.
Okay, I think that's enough of the Street Fighter background for now. So,
finally, in 1994, Capcom released a revised version of this arcade smash
for the Super NES and Genesis, called Super Street Fighter II: The New
Challengers. It is great in many aspects, except the fact that the Super
Combo tech was dumped! Also, the mysterious hidden character known as
Akuma was MIA in this game. Still, though, it's a smash to play, and you
can bet your old SF titles will collect a few tons of dust while you're
playing this. So, without further ado, here's the review.
The graphics, although dated and somewhat cheesy, are still state-of-the-art.
The framerate is good, the fireball animations look amazing (as does the
opening FMV of Ryu!), and the endings are all new and polished to a brilliant
glow. The portraits of the fighters' faces look wonderful, as well. If there
is any drawback at all to the visuals in this game, it's that most of them
were recycled from the old SF games.
Oh, gee, what can I say about the sound, except that it's downright CD-quality
amazing!!! I was just in tears when I found that there was no sound test mode.
The tunes in this game are just SOOOO rockin', you'll find yourself putting
the time on infinite and letting the fighters sit there on Ken's stage in
Versus mode. Hey, I do. Well, I suppose that just makes it all right for
anyone, doesn't it. Anyway, you will love this game's killer soundtrack.
Uh... the SFX... it's good, but the voices sound kind of canned and tinny.
However, the good thing about the voices is that every fighter has their
own voice! No more hearing "OOH-UH, OOH-UH, OOH-UH..." whenever anyone
gets knocked out. I especially like Guile's cry: "OOMP-AWW...." Anyway, this
sound is nothing to be ashamed of if you're a Capcom employee.
Oh, man. The replay value! Geez laweez! With four play modes, 16 playable
fighters, and eight levels of difficulty, you'll never put your controller down.
Just glue it to your hands! It's also to your advantage to play often, because
the game is very good with rewards! If you finish the Super Battle on level 3
or higher, you're treated with your character's ending. If you beat it on level 6
and do continue, the ending after your fighter's ending will show eight
one-on-one battles between all 16 characters, with the SFX muted and a
super-stellar song playing!
The value of the game is sky-high. Heck, I paid like ten bucks or so for it
six months ago, and if I had to buy it again, I'd easily pay up to thirty dollars
for it. This game is priceless, and I wouldn't sell it for a hundred dollars,
unless of course, I could buy another (duh). It's not even rare, for a reason
unbeknownst to me. Just go to your local Defuncto Land store and pick this
one up. It's a great choice with which to start your fighting experience!
Don't miss it!
In closing, I'll just say that this is one of the most revolutionary games
ever made. Period. I'd gladly put this up against any other fighting game
in a popularity tournament. Super Street Fighter II is possibly the best
16-bit game ever, and definitely the best arcade game ever. It may not
have super-bright or super-real 3-d graphics, but it does have super-everything
else! I'd give it an 11 out of 10, but that's stupid. Why not a 100 out of 10?
Anyway, I know I'll never get tired of this game. You won't either. I guarantee it!
Overall: 10 out of 10