Street Fighter is one of the most successful fighting game series ever. The range of characters, moves and a hidden depth of gameplay have made it popular among gamers for years. There have been many variants of Street Fighter over the years but the most popular has been Street Fighter II.
Street Fighter 4 aims to bring back the popularity of the series most popular game and it does so very well, it feels natural to play and is great fun. There are plenty of characters, a good selection of regular characters and a few new ones to boot, however you have to unlock many of them by playing through the story mode of the game using certain characters. There are also plenty of other items such as videos, artwork, costumes colours to unlock by completing the game with various fighters.
The game is easy to get into for both beginners and experienced Street Fighter players, although some of the combos can be a little tricky to work out, however once you work them out they are relatively easy to pull off. Some of the moves look amazing, especially the Ultra and Super Combos, these consist of 7 to 15+ hit combinations which damage your opponent quite considerably.
When you start a game with a character you see a short anime to set up the characters story for the game, and when you complete the game you see another anime to conclude that characters storyline. All the characters stories intertwine somehow along the way which encourages you to play as all of them. One downside of the game is difficulty of the characters varies; some characters are not as well balanced as others and are constantly harder to beat while others are very easy regardless of where you encounter them in the game.
Visually the game looks amazing, the characters are rendered in 3D despite the 2D game play, the visual style is very artistic and differs greatly from what we have we seen before from a fighting game. Fans of the Street Fighter series will love the game as it is a return to form, gamers who have not played any of the Street Fighter series should give it a go, just for the experience, the most fun of this game come in the two player mode. Single player is fun but once you have unlocked the majority of the characters the computer opponents just don't provide as much fun as playing the multiplayer mode.
If you are looking for a fun, challenging and visually impressive fighting game then I certainly recommend this over other fighting games, it is easier to get into than others but just as difficult to master, so this makes it an ideal choice for beginners and veterans alike.
