I am taking this quick moment between work-related trips to post something. I actually tried posting yesterday to ask for recommendations on where to eat in Bellevue, but my iPhone apparently doesn’t like the cookies this blog uses and so it was an abject failure. Alas.
I was holding onto this Street Fighter III: 3rd Strike article until Friday, because that was supposed to be when everyone could go live with news of Street Fighter IV’s existence. Of course, the news leaked early. This was destined to happen — in fact, we took bets at work on how quickly it would happen — because Capcom’s press event this week is in Europe, and the European press is either incapable of or unwilling to abide by the tenuous thread of (legally-binding) gentlemen’s agreements through which the gaming media functions. Technically it was an American outlet that blabbed, but it’s an American outlet with a British parent company, so I assume this means their ambition is to import European gaming press ethics to the States. Excellent!
But who cares about my complaining, right? Read the stinking article, a hagiography of 3rd Strike by way of a love letter to Makoto.
Hey, that was lucky! Write about a video game and a couple of days before it’s sequel, 8 years in the making, is announced. Nothing fishy there, no siree. No NDA’s or nothin’.
*Innocuous whistling*
Man, I don’t know. My computer/Firefox/something does not like this blog’s comment preview. So I guess I’ll retype my comment and post it without previewing!
I haven’t played any Street Fighter since Super Street Fighter II, but this was an interesting read. I found the discussion of animation as it relates to the game mechanics particularly interesting. I’m a sucker for sprite art, so the accompanying pictures were great.
I also liked the mention of Melty Blood. I play that fairly regularly.
Come on now, Street Fighter IV is all well and good, but am I the only one that’s far more excited by Bionic Commando (in spite of tired post-apocalyptic angle a “trying too hard to be like Solid Snake” VA)?
I would have thought Elena, with her kick only style would have made a good example as well.
Beautiful article. Just brilliant.
When is someone going to write about Thousand Arms? This game is begging to be a gamespite article since Toasty Frog appears in it. You can even date her… him… erm, it… Whatever.
Someone really ought to look into that.
That’s beautiful. I always admired Makoto’s animation but seeing stills of it now makes me fully appreciate how brilliant it is and gives me confidence to say there are details in 2D animation that 3D could never aspire to.
My initial reaction to Makoto was the same as every other person ever: “another karate suit?” But no, she turned out to be the most awesome thing about 3S. Her or Hugo. BACK BWEAKER.
Makoto, Hugo and Delicious Third Strike Thunder Thighs represent some astronomical high bar of 2D fighting game animation that Street Fighter 4 will be obliged to equal.
A new Bionic Commando is definetly a much better thing than yet another 2D fighter (which are awesome, but c’mon, it’s not like we’ve been waiting like 20 years for 2D fighters to be released).
Also, 3rd strike is now fully “perfectly” emulated (100% playable). I’m playing it right now and it works like a charm. You need a CHD and a special bios file though. Happy hunting!
There’s another factor in Makoto’s balance – incredibly high priority on most of her moves.
There are some Supers (Dragonpunch, etc.) that trump her, but most everything else fails the dice roll.
I always thought I was weird for expecting Makoto to beat Yun with a giant hammer or punt him into the air. Now I know I’m not the only one who sees her as a reincarnated Akane, right down to the fashion sense.
Quit screwing with my head comments section! Or maybe I’m just incompetent.
Anyway, what I said in the original post was I wouldn’t have made the connection myself (I’ve only watched two episodes of Ranma) if I hadn’t had to revert a bunch of “MAKOTO IS DIRECTLY BASED ON AKANE YOU HAVE TO BELIEVE ME!” edits to Wikipedia. The resemblance is definitely there (link 1), depending on how her hair’s did (link 2), but it’s not like tom-boy karate girl’s a wholly original idea.
I wouldn’t have made the connection myself (I’ve only watched two episodes of Ranma) if I hadn’t had to revert a bunch of “MAKOTO IS DIRECTLY BASED ON AKANE YOU HAVE TO BELIEVE ME!” edits to Wikipedia. The resemblance is definitely there (http://www.akanetendo.com/pic.php?start=220&id=0), depending on how her hair’s did (http://www.akanetendo.com/pic.php?start=029&id=0), but it’s not like tom-boy karate girl’s a wholly original idea.
(Do the comments automatically write over your last post? I post a attendum to my first incomplete post and it instead replaces it.)
And all of the sudden, there’s two posts, now three. I should just quit while I’m ahead.