  Zangief doesn't look quite as intimidating with that big ugly head. |
I've always been addicted to fighting games. I was always the kid in the arcade that would work out all of his aggression on the nearest video game cabinet, smashing the buttons until my fingers developed blisters. And, of course, one of the most famous fighting titles I wasted my youth on was Street Fighter.
So I was intrigued to discover that Capcom has come out with Street Fighter Alpha Anthology. At first, I thought this might be a new title, like a Street Fighter: The Next Generation, better than all the Ferengis and bald, car-selling Joey Jeremiahs combined. But alas no, it's simply a re-release of older titles. Containing Street Fighter Alpha, Street Fighter Alpha 2, Street Fighter Alpha 2 Gold, Street Fighter Alpha 3 and Super Gem Fighter MiniMix, this package brings attention to how far even this genre has developed over the years.
To be fair, the Street Fighter Alpha titles were the first redevelopment of the series that started in 1987. Coming out in the mid-to-late nineties, these games offered better graphics, more characters and environments. By then, Street Fighter was already in competition with Mortal Kombat and more advanced fighting titles, such as Tekken and Soul Edge, had started to grab gamers' attentions. Even then, 2-D fighters had started to lose interest.
So here they are again, now for the PlayStation 2 and we can see just how behind the times they are.
With the exception of Super Gem Fighter MiniMix, there's very little difference between the games. The graphics are improved from game to game. The later ones also offer additional character choices. While Ken, Ryu and Chun-Li, for example, are available in all of them, Blanka is only accessible in Street Fighter Alpha 3. But save for that and varying difficulty levels, the games are essentially the same and they become quite boring very quickly.
It would have been nice to have more variety. I realize there are probably licensing issues, but it would have been nice to have X-Men vs. Street Fighter, which is arguably the best one of this series, due to the number of characters and the tag team setup. Or at the very least, they could have included Street Fighter: The Movie game, so you could play as Jean-Claude Van Damme, Kylie Minogue or the late great Raul Julia.
But even if these titles were included, it wouldn't change the biggest problem here, that these game controls do not translate well to the PS2. On the arcade cabinets, two rows of three buttons sat next to the joystick. The top set were punches, and the bottom ones were kicks. So the PS2's four buttons, which sit in a diamond formation on the front of the controller, makes it difficult to keep track of which kicks and punches are which. And since there's still two more buttons to deal with, by default, the heavy punch and kick are the R1 and R2 buttons, respectively.
Hitting these both together at certain times allows your character to activate a super fighting mode, but the button layout makes almost every other fighting combo harder to use. And in Street Fighter Alpha 3, with its high difficulty level, the lack of special moves makes it almost impossible to advance.
For this reason, Street Fighter Alpha 2 and Street Fighter Alpha Gold 2 (almost identical games) are the best of the Alpha titles as there are a decent number of characters and it's not incredibly difficult to progress through the stages.
On the other hand, Super Gem Fighter MiniMix stands out above the rest. Originally known as Pocket Fighter, the game takes many of the more popular characters and shrinks them down into stumpy little figures you might find in a bad Japanese cartoon for young kids. Although, the game isn't that easy to play, the controls translate slightly better to the PS2, and the animation is entertainingly confusing. They all do weird Anime-like fight moves that made me laugh. Akuma, for instance, will perform a strange punching combo and then take a dip in a magically appearing pool of water. (He probably just drank a Nestea.) During the battles, you also collect gems to perform super moves. It's by far the most fun of all the games, even if doesn't make very much sense.
All of the games include a versus mode when you fight other people and a training mode in order to practise moves. Also, the Alpha titles offer a dramatic battle setting which pits two against one and a survival mode, where a character fights battle after battle until he or she dies. Fun times.
Street Fighter Alpha Anthology is a “blast from the past," as the saying goes, but it would have been much better if it just stayed there.
WHAM! Rating (Overall): |
5.2 out of 10 |
ESRB Rating: |
T (Teen) |
Official Web Site: |
|
|
WHAM! Rating: |
4 out of 10 |
ESRB Rating: |
T (Teen) |
Official Web Site: |
|
|
WHAM! Rating: |
5.5 out of 10 |
ESRB Rating: |
T (Teen) |
Official Web Site: |
|
|
WHAM! Rating: |
5.5 out of 10 |
ESRB Rating: |
T (Teen) |
Official Web Site: |
'Street Fighter Alpha 2 Gold' |
|
WHAM! Rating: |
5 out of 10 |
ESRB Rating: |
T (Teen) |
Official Web Site: |
|
|
WHAM! Rating: |
6 out of 10 |
ESRB Rating: |
T (Teen) |
Official Web Site: |
'Super Gem Fighter MiniMix' |
|
