Street Fighter IV

"The most horrible, aggravating fun I've had in a long time."

There is something about this game. I don't really know what it is, but while I sit here in the coffee shop on campus all I can think about is kicking Cammy in the face. I should be studying, but instead I'm formulating strategies for fighting Seth and thinking of ways to improve my timing. Its some kind of addicting, but in a way crystal meth has yet to accomplish.

I think part of it is the fantastic art style. The use of black, brush stroked ink to emphasize the focus attacks is just brilliant. I love when the characters give their final victory poses and all the outlines thicken. Its the little details like that that burn vivid, violent images into my brain. I love that the characters' eyes widen and their jaws drop when I trigger Akuma's raging demon attack. It makes it that much more fun to do it over and over again.

And that's another thing. When I first tore this game from its packaging and set it loose in my 360, I expected a decently simple little fighting game. And for about 3 hours, it was. You see, all of the characters only have about 12(ish) special moves. Compared to games like Soul Calibur or Dead or Alive this seems, I don't know, elementary. But then my enemies began stringing them together. Ryu would sock my guy, launch a fireball, spiral kick me into the air and finish me off with a gravity defying uppercut. And it was soon after several crushing defeats and dipping my controller into the trial mode that I realized how deep this game really was. Its actually a little intimidating, but not enough to stop.

I believe that addiction forms when one is actually taking the abuse. Crystal meth makes you wanna rip your skin off, and Street Fighter IV makes you wanna throw your controller through the television. I mean that the game is ridiculously frustrating at times. The harder-set computers mock your feeble attempts at victory by effortlessly interrupting all of your carefully planned advances. Making it through the challenge mode really is a feat of supreme nerdiness, or luck. Either way, its still enraging. Some characters in particular seem to irritate more than others. This list will surely vary from player to player and fighter to fighter, and despite the holes in my drywall, I think this is a good thing. It means that the game is deep enough that you need to be able to change your approach for every individual player/fighter combination that you encounter. Not radically new for the genre, but again its just scratching the surface of this thing.

There are a few things that I do not like about this game. First of all, the music. At the risk of sounding mildly racist, the theme song is the typical cheesy, Japanese depiction of popular American music. At first I hated it, but it seems to have planted its hokey claws into my brain with the intention of using me as a host. Its diabolical scheme is yet unknown. The fight music is fine I guess. Nothing remarkable. But the fact that you can't turn it down all the way is just silly.

Secondly, I think that a couple of the new characters are just stupid. Not because of the way they fight or anything like that, they're just stupid. I mean Rufus and El Fuerte, specifically. Why is Rufus fat? Why does El Fuerte cook? Sound like a match made in heaven I know, but I get the feeling that they could've dropped the cooking thing for El Fuerte and had an awesome luchador to fight with/against. And as for Rufus, well they probably should have gone a different direction altogether with him. The fat jiggle is kinda funny, though. And disturbingly hypnotic... I know that Japanese quirkiness is part of the package, but a little discretion would've been great. They've already got Dan, why do they need a fat American with a topknot and a chef-wrestler from Mexico?

Lastly, I hate lag. I mean online. The online aspect is absolutely wonderful, until it lags. Then its tedious and tumultuous. And it can be fairly difficult at times to find games with descent connections. When that's the case, your better off hitting the challenge mode or the power button.

However, those concerns are all extremely minor. Really, this is some of the best fun I've had on a console in a long time. Its fast and vicious and it will tear you down to a lesser level of human being. But once the dust settles and you've broken the back off of the lay-Z-boy, you will feel satisfied and inexplicably drawn back to the action. And if you can keep your cool, even better. Street Fighter IV is not just a game for fighting fans, but a game for game fans.

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 02/26/09

Game Release: Street Fighter IV (US, 02/17/09)