X-Men vs. Street Fighter

"There are some things a PS1 was never meant for..."

This review begins with a story. I was going to a movie some time around 1997, and there it was. X-Men vs. Street Fighter. I, being a person with an over-active imagination, thought to myself, ''What a wonderful concept!'' And Rogue was in the game! My favorite X-Female! And there was Gambit, too! Wow! Capcom finally put them both in a fighting game! So when I saw it was available for the Playstation, it's what made me want the system.

Upon my receiving of the game, and after some research, I should have asked for Mega Man 8 instead.

Folks, the Playstation is a decent system with some great games out there. This isn't one of them. Now, I know, there's a school of thought that says you shouldn't compare it to the arcade version, but I loved the arcade version so much how can I possibly not? I'm very sorry to all you Capcom-philes out there, but this doesn't cut the mustard at all.

Here's what's happening: Apocalypse has taken X-Men members, Street Fighters, and even Dr. Strange villain Shuma Gorath hostage (he is in the background). Now, a select few of the X-Men: Cyclops, Storm, Wolverine, Gambit and Rogue, as well as X-Villains Magneto, Sabretooth and Juggernaut, are teaming up with Capcom's Street Fighters: Ryu, Ken, Chun Li, Cammy, Charlie/Nash, Dhalsim, Zangief and M. Bison (Vega in Japan). Akuma/Gokui is also hidden: just go to the top of the character select screen, and there he is. These teams of two are going on their own paths and are coming into conflict with each other on the path to Apocalypse. He's a fighting game first: he must stand 5 stories or something! Once he's beaten, your lead character takes on the back-up, and it's then over.

Now, in the Arcade game, you could switch from one character to the other. Not so here. While there is a game mode that lets you do tag mode with your opponent being the exact opposite team, you cannot do it in plain old 1P mode. Instead, you're relegated to the double team supers and the back-up assists for when you're on the defensive. That's it. Major-league bummer. The game controls just fine, but the missing options make this seem more like just another Street Fighter game rather than the first entry into the Vs. series.

To be generous, I'll say that they did get one thing right completely, and that's the music. Every song sounds just like the arcade version, and there's some keepers here, too. The sound effects are decent enough, too. But after that, this game gets harder and harder to recommend.

I'd excuse the not-tagging if slow-down weren't such a problem. Yet it happens rather often, especially during the double-team supers. The PS1 is not a very good 2D machine, but when one compares this to the translation of Marvel Super Heroes vs. Street Fighter, it's amazing that Capcom didn't just go back to the source code and try to clean things up.

Now, I haven't talked much about graphics, and there's good reason for it. Animation is pretty bad, especially on larger characters. Zangief and Sabretooth are ridiculously choppy. Juggernaut barely even animates!! And the missing animations... from single win poses for some characters, to Rogue not dusting herself off after she lands in her intro, there's enough missing here to frustrate anyone who really loved the arcade game. Again, you can chalk it up to the limitations of the PS1, but also again, compared to later efforts on the same platform, it just doesn't hold up.

Avoid at all costs, folks, unless you're a Capcom completist. Go for the import Saturn version if you can find it (and a Saturn) instead.

Reviewer's Score: 4/10, Originally Posted: 09/22/02, Updated 09/22/02