Street Fighter IV

Sublime is a word that shouldn't be thrown around that much, as it applies to so few things. It's rare that's something is actually worthy of the word, but it's wonderful when something that good is discovered. Street Fighter IV is a sublime fighting game. It's flawless in its execution and presentation and a worth successor in the Street Fighter franchise.

Street Fighter IV preserves the 2-D fighting format of its previous editions, but renders everything in 3-D. This is nothing new, as New Super Mario Brothers did something similar in their last 2-D platform outing on the DS. 3-D fighting games are much more common these days, and the fact that Street Fighter IV chooses to eschew that 3rd dimension is admirable. They're sticking to what they know, and it works. The action continues to refine what's been done in the Alpha series and in Street Fighter III. The game plays very smoothly, and anyone who's been playing a Street Fighter game for the last decade will be able to hop in and play.

What really takes the game above and beyond is the online play. When you fire up Arcade mode for the first time, you might be surprised when you're all of a sudden challenged by an online opponent. By default on the 360 version, online matchmaking is enabled in Arcade mode. This means that you can be challenged by online opponents at any time while you're in Arcade mode. You can also specify criteria for said challenges (connection speed, player ranking, location), or turn them off entirely if you're feeling antisocial. You can also set up a room to play random opponents or your friends, or you can become that random opponent that challenges people in Arcade mode. Playing people in Arcade mode is definitely where it's at, as it reminds me of the days in the mall when you'd slap a quarter on the machine and challenge the guy on it. You play, and then maybe you play a rematch, but then you're done w/ that person and you move on. You get your win, or take your loss and then take on the next opponent. It's a great way to play a lot of different people of varying skill and truly test your mettle or just mess around as Dan and try to get that super taunt off.

Speaking of Dan, the characters making an appearance are both awesome and odd. The old standbys are here, some new characters throw their hats into the ring, but some other interesting choices are there. Dan is back for some reason, as is Rose, Gen, Cammy, and Fei Long. The Super Street Fighter II love continues with rumors that Dee-Jay and T. Hawk are fully rendered in the game engine and ready to be released as new characters. I'd love to see Karin and Adon make it into the game as downloadable content.

That leads me to my only complaint about the game. The DLC so far has consisted of costume packs that are $4 for an alternate costume for 5 characters. This isn't a very good deal, and the only really good costume set is the one for the girls. Fortunately, we're told that if extra characters do become available in the future, they'll be free.

If you love fighting games, this is a must buy. Obviously Street Fighter fans are going to pick up this game, but it really is simply a fantastic all-around game. 10/10, with the awesomely bad boy-band theme song and dumb DLC balanced out with the potentially awesome free downloadable characters.