With any long-running series, there’s a delicate balance between retaining the things that people love and refreshing the decor. With Street Fighter V [official site], Capcom have come close to hitting a reset button marked ‘1991’ when it comes to fighting systems and yet this is the most forward-looking game in the series, with one eye fixed on the world of esports. It’s a streamlined entry in the mighty fightin’ series, for better and for worse, and we sent fisticuffs expert Andi Hamilton into the fray to see how it all works. He returned with these words of judgement.>

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A month or so ago there was a Capcom weekend on Steam, where some of the publisher’s finest cuts were free to play for a few days. Out of curiosity as to whether my old 360 arcade stick would work with it I downloaded Ultra Street Fighter IV [official site]. I have a long history with Street Fighter IV and thought I knew what to expect but the World Warriors blew me away again, and that once-dusty stick is now part of the furniture. Here’s why.

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There was a period in the mid-nineties when Rise of the Robots and One Must Fall: 2097 were the only beat ‘em ups available on PC. Believing robotic participants to be the future of combat sports, Colin Computer, CEO of PC Incorporated, banned all fighting games containing living combatants. When it became clear that people might accidentally play Rise of the Robots in a two-game market, Colin was chased out of town.

Times have changed. Now you can play the latest Dead or Alive< ! and Mortal Kombat games and a whole lot more. And this weekend, starting right now, you can play Ultra Street Fighter IV for free through Steam.

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SSFIVAE is breaking free from GFWL! What does that mean? It means that Super Street Fighter IV Arcade Edition is snapping the shackles of Games For Windows Live and switching to Steamworks this coming Friday.

This is good news, because Games For Windows Live may soon vanish (though given this is Microsoft, it’s not quite that simple) and it’s not yet clear which games will make the transition to other multiplayer-enabling services. Unfortunately there’s also some bad news for people who bought SSFIVAE DLC through GFWL.

It’s a good day for people who love acronyms. Or GDFPWLA, as we like to call it.

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In another life, I didn’t spend the entire Easter weekend managing virtual football teams, but instead spent it practicing fighting game combos. I like to think that this dimensional doppelg nger has enough good taste to make Street Fighter his puncher of choice. I’ve never been good at it, but I’ve read enough to know that it’s good. And the trailer below for Ultra Street Fighter IV, due out early June August, makes me wish I could trade places with my other self for a while. Check out the stage with the dinosaurs in the background.

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I’ve button-mashed many a fighting game character just to watch them die, but recently I’ve been trying roll my fighting game knowledge-train a little further down the line. As reported by Wired, the Street Fighter IV Combo Trainer looks like a good way of doing that. It’s a fan-created mod that helps you practice the timing of combo attacks. (more…)

I think I know what hell will be like. It will be someone demanding you put all the Street Fighter games in order on a shelf. The latest entry to the entirely garbled series will be Ultra Street Fighter IV, come August next year. It evolves to the next level!

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Protest as we might, PC versions of big-name console games arriving later than their disc-bound cousins increasingly seems to be a fact of gaming life. We’ve heard all manner of excuses in the past, from polish to piracy, but Capcom have just offered their own reasoning for why we see the likes of Resi and Street Fighter amble onto PC weeks later than their console kin. (more…)

My choice of feckless, work-dodging pursuit while a student (due to being too poor to afford a PC at the time) was PlayStation man-thumper Tekken, specifically 2 and 3 in the series. While I haven’t explored its strange lands of fighting bears and suicidal undead samaurai for many years, a certain nostalgia tickles at my childlike soul upon news that Namco’s longstanding brawler is to make its first foray onto PC.

In a manner of speaking, at least – the upcoming console licence mash-up Street Fighter x Tekken had its Windows version confirmed by Capcom over the weekend. No details yet, simply that the PC edition “just began development.” Rather surprising, to be honest, but it’s always heartening to see the platform tyrannies of the past slowly dissipate. It rather suggests the PC versions of Street Fighter IV’s assorted flavours did quite well, too.

Are we still sore about Capcom not bringing Super Street Fighter IV to the PC? y/n? Well, in case you can’t decipher those aconyms in the headline, today Capcom announced that they’re working on PC releases of both the enhanced Arcade Edition of Super Street Fighter IV, boasting four new playable characters (Yun, Yang, Oni and Evil Ryu), some balance changes and an impressive new suite of replay features (including the ability to “follow” the replays posted by any players or friends of your choosing), and> Street Fighter X Tekken, due out in 2012. Trailers after the jump.
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