Category: Fighting Games

Street Fighter V still has a few days left until its official release, but one lucky NeoGAF user was able to get some time in with the final build during a tournament at their local GAME location. While they didn’t provide gameplay details, they were able to try out the early story mode that will be available at launch.

Story is never the most important part of a fighting game, but Street Fighter V’s features a number of cameos from important characters in the universe. In the shots they provided, a younger Sean Matsuda can be seen having a tender moment with his sister Laura, Nash speaks with the mysterious woman (who is apparently named Helen) from the cinematic trailer, and Guile reunites with Chun-Li and Cammy in a more casual version of his military uniform.

Click to view slideshow.

We can glean a few things from these images, as random as they may be. For one, Sean seems significantly different than he did in Street Fighter III, with red hair and lighter skin. Also, we may be looking at an early version of Guile’s design before he becomes playable later this year.

This art was created by famed Capcom illustrator Bengus, and will act as the initial, character-focused story mode before the full cinematic narrative drops this June.

Street Fighter V is scheduled to launch for PlayStation 4 and PC on February 16. For more specific details on what happens in these various story scenes, be sure to check out this additional post.

Source: NeoGAF

Joe “LI Joe” Ciaramelli is set to get the era of Street Fighter V started right with an exclusive invitational later this month. Sixteen of New York’s strongest fighting game players will be competing for $500 with just a few days worth of practice, which should make for an exciting event.

The full list of competitors includes Team PIE’s Smug, Evil Geniuses’ K-Brad, Bifuteki’s Spab Rog, Tinshi, Javits, Flipside Tactics’ Alucard, Moons, Marvisto, Kreymore, Empire Arcadia’s Hiro, Flux, Kick-Punch-Block’s Manny Fuerte, DaFeetLee, Zeus, OG’s Shine, and Always Godlike’s Native Impact.

LI Joe’s invitational is scheduled for February 20. A live stream will be provided on Twitch.

Source: LI Joe

Editor’s note: Reports differ on the exact day Street Fighter II was actually released, but we’re in that timeframe now so the sentiment still stands.

Due to the nature of our community, our relationships with fighting games are varied. You may be a godlike Guilty Gear player or a newcomer mashing out the magic series for the first time in Marvel, but one title, more than any other, can be looked upon as a sort of binding factor for the disparate portions of the scene.

Twenty-five years ago today, Street Fighter II launched in arcades. It was a different time. While the genre had already seen its foundation laid by other titles, Capcom’s sophomore effort in the world of Ryu and Ken proved to be the true beginning of traditional fighting game competition. If you were lucky, you stumbled upon the cabinet with a friend who already knew the ropes; many, however, were forced to experiment, slowly discovering a world of fireballs and uppercuts hidden beneath the surface.

It probably wouldn’t be a stretch to say every player has a history with Street Fighter II, whether it was when the game first released in 1991 or during the subsequent decade of updates, ports, and remixes. Seeing as I was barely two years old when the game initially popped up in arcades, my introduction would come some time later, first as a passing fancy on home consoles and then as a serious addiction later on. I can’t say I ever truly competed in Street Fighter II, but it still holds a special place in my heart, a sentiment that’s likely shared throughout the community.

And now, twenty-five years later, we look back on that time fondly. It was where we learned fundamentals, debated the legitimacy of throws, and pondered the physics of Dhalsim’s stretching limbs. A good player can earn what were once unimaginable levels of money this day and age, but there’s something special about the era of Street Fighter II that will never be replicated.

I’ve rambled enough. For more on Street Fighter II’s impact, be sure to revisit Polygon’s excellent retrospective from a few years back and head on over to Gamasutra to read up on their collection of thoughts on the game’s legacy from various members of the fighting game community.

Were you the best in your local arcade? Were you one of the fervent adherents that kept Super Turbo alive at Evo well into the 2000s? Or are you merely a casual admirer, happy to bask in the nostalgia of your older counterparts? Feel free to jump into the comments and let us know your history with Street Fighter II; if it’s special to you, we want to hear about it.

Have a good weekend.

In honor of the recent Lunar New Year, Steam has discounted on a number of titles available through their service. As usual, there’s a good amount of fighting games here, with sales on BlazBlue, Guilty Gear, Skullgirls, and more.

Of particular note is the discount on the King of Fighters Triple Pack. The bundle, which includes King of Fighters ’98 Ultimate Match Final Edition, King of Fighters 20002 Unlimited Match, and King of Fighters XIII, is currently only $6.99, a far fry from its regular $34.99 price point.

We’ve collected all of the markdowns in the table below. Let us know what you plan on picking up!

These deals will be available until February 12 at 10 AM PST.

Source: Steam via Eternal0Star, Dream Cancel

Although they only just completed their Fall 2015 at Genesis 3, The Melee Games’ are ready to pick back up in the spring for another season of Super Smash Bros. Melee competition.

The Melee Games, an series of intercollegiate crew battles, first began back in 2014. “I wanted to keep the new players coming, I wanted to introduce them to each other, and I wanted to bring some camaraderie and school pride into it,” organizer Matthew “MattDotZeb” Zaborowski explained to SSBM Tutorials. “I figured crew battles were the best way to do that. From there, we just kept adding things on.”

Like anything Smash related, the community immediately latched on, and Fall 2015 saw 179 schools from 25 states participate. After deciding the best teams of each region, division, and then conference, the Genesis 3 finals crowned their champion: the University of California Irvine, who defeated Georgia Tech in a nailbiter.

For their fifth outing, The Melee Games will be returning to state-level play, forgoing a national championship ahead of the dual Fall 2016-Spring 2017 season. But that doesn’t mean the competition will be any less intense!

If you’re interested in participating, be sure to visit Smash.gg to look up your college’s team or, if there isn’t one already, establish a squad of your own. Registration ends on February 14.

Sources: SSBM Tutorials, ShowdownGG, Smash.gg