Street Fighter Alpha Anthology

"Good if you got rid of your Saturn"

Finally. It took Capcom lord knows how long, but we got Alpha Anthology. It contains all three Alphas, Alpha 2 Gold, and Pocket Fighter (Super Gem Fighter). I already own all of these games on Sega Saturn (which I did compare to the actual arcade games. Almost no difference...) but I gave this collection a try anyway. All I have to say is: No. Its still not arcade perfect. In fact, the game seems like the same rush job they did with Capcom Classics Collection. (At least they didn't just stick in the Playstation versions like they did with CCC.)

Graphics: Yes. Its true. The graphics aren't arcade perfect. Its not Capcom's fault. The PS2 simply is not able to display the resolution that most CPS2 games used. To the casual eye, they look like the arcade but a close look reveals artifacts and different lines. The animation is smooth with very few frames taken out.

Sound: Its all here. The music seems a little less rich sounding, but its close enough. All the announcers and sound effects are here.

Gameplay- This is what's arcade perfect. Everything pulls off just like in the arcade with no delays. And its still a blast to play, especially with other people. One nice addition is the ability to have dramatic battles in all of the Alphas (Sorry, not in Pocket Fighter, though.)

Replay- If you play it single player, there's not much replay value except to view everyone's cut scenes and endings. Now if its 2 player, you can play a friend in any Alpha game and not be bored. Dramatic battle is a lot of fun, especially in Alpha 2 against Shin Akuma.

Extras- Now you must be thinking, "If this game is dedicated to SF fans, then its got to have tons of cool extras like all the galleries from the Saturn Alphas, right?" Wrong. Instead, you don't get much. You get to play Alpha 3 with a couple of extra isms. The coolness of this wears off pretty quick when you realize its nothing new. You can play with dip switches, which really is the equivilant of using a Pro Action Replay to get weird effects. And once you beat each game, you get to use any version of a character against each other in versus mode. (No single player mode. That might require actual effort on Capcom's part and we all know from Capcom Fighting Evolution how much "effort" Capcom puts into Street Fighter now.) The only problem is is that Alpha 3 is the only different game out of the pack. In SF Anthology, every version of every character was different from each other. In this one, the only real difference between Alpha 1 and 2 characters was the presence of custom combos. (Alpha 3 was different in that it let you exploit character resets like in Third Strike.)

Overall- "So are you saying this game is crap?" Hell no. If you don't already own these games on Saturn, then this is the closest way to get home based Alpha goodness. Instead, I wish Capcom put more work into making this than simply dumping the games onto one DVD. I want extras like galleries, Puzzle Fighter, remixed music, etc... If you have $30 lying around, go out and pick this game up. (By the way, I am being hard on this game because if a company says something is arcade perfect, then it damn better be arcade perfect.)

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 07/06/06