This week I have found myself playing an awful lot of a game I never thought I'd have a great interest in,
Street Fighter IV. Growing up in the nineties as a keen gamer I was very aware of the huge fanbase for
Street Fighter II though I never really jumped on the bandwagon. I dabbled with
Hyper Fighting in the arcades, as everyone did, but even simple Hadoukens were beyond me.
In the late nineties, with the coming of the original PlayStation, my perspective on fighting games shifted dramatically when I played and loved the first
Tekken. Since then I have strived to play more and more titles in this increasingly niche genre, even going back to play beat-em-ups from the 16bit days. For some reason though, I still never sunk any time into any of the huge number of Street Fighter games.
It was strange then that I felt so compelled to pick up
Street Fighter IV for the Xbox 360. Honestly, I think I just wanted to be a part of a true gaming phenomenon and that's exactly what Capcom's franchise has become. Of course, the price of my interest was spending an entire weekend trying to learn one of the most mechanically complex games ever made.
After several days of playing I still haven't finished the arcade mode on medium difficulty and I'm almost completely useless with every character, except for Ken and Sakura, but despite all of this I have been having a huge amount of fun.
I would definitely reccommend
Street Fighter IV to everyone out there, no matter how frightened you may be by the massive barrier to entry that greets first time players. Learning the mechanics of the game from scratch has been a lot of fun, despite my inital intimidation, and I've even managed to win a good few games on Xbox Live now.
Perhaps the most amazing part of the game though is seeing just how mind-bendingly good some people are at the game. I have lost several Xbox Live ranked matches purely because I was sitting in front of the TV, mouth hanging open, completely blown away by the moves my opponent was combining.
It has been an absolute pleasure to come in at the bottom end of the skill tree and learn so many new things. If you're on the fence about whether or not to buy this game, I throughly reccommend it. Its one of the most pure and entertaining experiences that videogames have to offer. Sure its insanely hard, but that just makes winning all the more satisfying! Hadouken!
