Final Fight: Streetwise

"Capcom wasn't too wise about this."

Final Fight was a classic beat 'em up that rocked arcades everywhere. It had a couple sequals later on, which were also pretty good. Then, after the 3rd installment, the Final Fight series ended and became nothing more than a classic. And now, a decade later, Capcom releases Final Fight: Streetwise, a poor attempt at mixing the old with the new.

Story-3

Story: You are Kyle, a pit fighter who uses his martial arts skills to rake in cash. After winning a pit fight, Kyle's brother Cody, yes, THE Cody from the Original, tells him to meet up for a drink. All seems well, until Kyle finds that Cody has gone missing. He also finds that there's a new drug known as "GLO" hitting the streets. This drug turns a mere human into a stronger, green-eyed freak with enhanced strength. Now, Kyle must find his brother and put a stop to the production of GLO by beating up gang members and playing stupid mini-games.

It started out cool, but ended up going from the action genre to the Sci-Fi genre, which is just stupid. For example, I was fighting punks for about half of the game and out of nowhere, I was drawn into a boss fight with a...Mutant? Wtf? Since when can a drug turn a man into a monster? I swear, this guy was a big, brown, and spikey freak. In a beat 'em up game? It's a big mistake to switch genres in the middle of a game. It went from street fighting to Resident freaking Evil!

Gamplay-4

Simple. You run around the streets freely and beat the living hell out of local street gangs to get information, cash, and weapons. You meet up with certain people who give you missions in exchange for more info on Cody's disappearence as well as underground info on that GLO drug. You will sometimes be forced to do Mini-games, such as Roach Stomping and the dreaded "Memory" game. And yes, you HAVE to do these stupid mini games in order to progress. And these games aren't exactly that easy, especially that stupid Memory tarot card game.

Now, you can freely roam the streets of Metro City and continue on with the game when you're ready. You can use your "Hard Earned" money and purchase new fighting techniques and stat upgrades from Gyms, weaponry, and healing items. What's new to this Final Fight game is the use of guns, which come in handy since some enemies use handguns. You can also recruit the help of a coulple familiar faces as well to fight along side you.

So why the low score you ask? Simple: The Minigames! This is a beat 'em game for cryin' out loud! Why should you have to kill bugs and play cards in order to stop a drug deal and find a missing person? And besides that, the card game is a total pain in the ass!

Control-7

The controls are pretty basic. You get your basic attack buttons, a block button, and a "special" button, which allows you to gain extra strength and crush your enemies while activated. These controls are fine. Nothing bad. Nothing Special.

Audio-1

Now, for the stinker. Capcom was known for their Elite work in producing Awesome sound tracks for their games. In the game's case, however, Capcom screwed it all up! Instead of making there own Video Game music, they just throw in some rap music. (I cannot stand Rap music, by the way) That is just not acceptable, especially for the highly acclaimed VG music makers at Capcom.

The voice acting was ok, except for Kyle. He sounds like a wannabe tough guy. He gets really annoying whenever he picks up money. He'll say some stupid line everytime. Overall, the Audio in this game just sucks.

Streetwise had a lot of potential being a sequal to the classic series, but it all went to waste because Capcom tried to fix what wan't broken. It seems that they want all of their games to be modernized and have mutants in them. You can't put this kind of thing into an arcade classic.

Reviewer's Score: 4/10, Originally Posted: 07/31/06