But I can tell you the following things about the game:
***
Those who followed my performance in "Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix" against rapper Soulja Boy know that I'm far from the world's best "Street Fighter" fighter.
So even in this brave new world in which we publish "kinda, sorta reviews" here at MTV Multiplayer (see this Killzone 2' 'review') I'm not the guy you want trying to review "Street Fighter IV."
Still, I'll try anything.
And now, after fiddling with a review copy of the game this weekend, I can tell you that I've found my limits.
I can tell you that "Street Fighter IV" looks great. Running in high-def on my TV, it's a cartoon come to life and as vivid as I can remember a "Street Fighter" game ever looking. At best (and at worst), this game keeps up with how your mind thinks "Street Fighter" has always looked. You know how you always remember games from the past looking better than they are? (See "Halo 2," all you people who thought "Halo 3" wasn't much of a visual upgrade.) A fellow MTV News reporter walked past my work TV on Friday and saw "SFIV" running. I told him what it was. He told me it looked the same as it always did. That's my point. He wanted to know what was new.
I couldn't tell my colleague what was new, because I barely understand "Street Fighter IV." Yes it's a fighting game. Yes, it looks great. Yes it's satisfying to button-mash through a fight with a fellow reporter of equally inept skill.
I thought I'd have some help for my "review." The game' publisher and developer, Capcom, supplied me with two copies of the game's "training manual," a stapled, magazine-shaped guide for … new players? Certainly not. On page four of this manual, I found an interview with a guy I once had burgers with in Los Angeles, a Capcom employee and "Street Fighter" expert named Seth Killian who is so tied into this game that the person writing the training manual didn't feel it was necessary to say how Seth is tied into this game. (I know he's Capcom's community manager, but still...) I'm sure Seth shared some fries with me back in L.A., so I can't hold it against him that his interview includes such foreign phrases as:
you will notice you cannot cancel into (or out of) the Ultra Combos. We respect the flexibility of cancelling, but wanted the most powerful technique in the game to center more on the idea of a "single strike" rather than devolve into the endless combo string popular in other fighting games."
I think I know what he's getting at, but I'm not certain.
To play this game so I could "review it," I realized I would have to chuck the training manual aside.
Instead, I explored the game's training mode, which I can now report, doesn't train the player. It's just one of those fighting-game arenas in which you can test your movies on an unresponsive opponent. That's where I re-learned how to make Ken throw a fireball.
Yes, I can once again throw a fireball. Look out, Soullja Boy.
The default difficulty of the game's single-player Arcade mode is too hard for me. I took Ken into that mode and lost in my first match, to electrified Blanka. I lost to Chun Li. I beat someone and then lost to Dhalsim.
I didn't dare try to hook my build up for any online matches.
For me, playing "Street Fighter IV" is like playing "Madden." There's too much going on, and I can't keep up, even though I badly want to.
That was Saturday. On Sunday I discovered the game's Challenge Mode and a mode within that called Trial Mode. Finally I can tell everyone something useful: Challenge Mode's Trial Mode is the mode that teaches you how to play the game. I don't know why the game doesn't tell you that.
The problem for me is that even Challenge Mode is too hard. I tried to learn Ryu's moves and was succeeding. Then I was asked to do an airborne Tatsumaki Senpukyaku and I managed on probably my 50th try. Later, I had to do a fierce kick that flowed into an "EX" two-button punch. Fifty tries did not suffice. Well, at least "Bangai-O Spirits" is no longer the only game that has a tutorial I can't complete.
I switched to Chun Li and failed even more quickly. I had to do a move that involved flicking my control stick up, then down, then pressing a button (or was it down then up?). I couldn't do it right. Though, now, as I'm writing this with the Training Manual at my side, I see that I was, perhaps, supposed to hold down the control stick, not flick it. Or was this a different move?
How in the world do people learn complex games? How do they grasp complicated controls?
I can play this game as a button-masher. It's quite pretty and fun to look at. But here's a game that me, a non-"Street Fighter" regular, can't be competitive at in the medium difficulty level; a game whose tutorial is stumping me.
Can I learn? More importantly, how can I learn?
Buyer beware, I guess, that "Street Fighter IV" ought not be your first "Street Fighter" -- nor your newest "Street Fighter" if you, like me, couldn't remember how to throw a fireball a couple of months ago.
This is a demerit on my gaming skills. So much for being a well-rounded gamer. I can do all the moves in "Smash Brothers." I can beat the final boss in "Jet Force Gemini." I can score well in "Desktop Tower Defense," and I've beaten "Killzone 2." I can now throw a fireball again.
But I cannot review "Street Fighter IV." I can't even tell you if 20-second load times between stages (and restarts) is good or bad.
So I'll leave it to experts. Maybe someday I'll be good enough. Not today.
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