There are hordes of old school gamers who are loving the news about the new Street Fighter 2 release coming out for the Nintendo Switch. Then you have the purists who are already complaining that the game is basically HDR 2.0 and all of the mistakes made by David Sirlin are going to be carried over. On top of that, you have the Nintendo haters who are constantly looking for an excuse to bash Nintendo because of their kiddy graphics and awkward controls.
Super Turbo is getting another chance at the spotlight
Even the most hardcore purists for Super Street Fighter II Turbo is going to give Ultra Street Fighter II the Final Challengers a try. Even if curiosity is the only factor, at the end of the day, the game is going to attract an even larger number of new fans to the Street Fighter II universe. This is something that all of us in the ST (super street fighter 2 turbo arcade) community appreciate greatly because we are doing all we can to keep the game alive.
SSF2T never dies, but it has certainly lost all mainstream power. When HDR came out, the game was given a good boost that brought the love for the game back and it also helped introduce new players that ditched HDR for ST when it started to lose popularity on PSN and XBL. Many of those players are now using Fightcade to play the game online, but the numbers are still too small to be considered viable for the industry.
Ultra Street Fighter 2 the final challengers is a great way to boost those numbers forward even more. It’s way too early to say if the game is going to become a hit at EVO or if it will be received with enthusiasm by the old school community. It will only take a few days after the game is released for the hardcore players to start picking the game apart and calling out the flaws that could immediately send the game into the lowest pits of obscurity, but the title could be a hit if it provides a balanced experience.
Was HDR really that bad?
If you ask a hardcore gamer from the old days of Super Turbo, the most common answer is that HDR is total crap. Some old school players even bash the new look saying that the characters look dumb and the animations are not smooth enough. Then you have other people who embraced this change and became active HDR players, but the game was unable to compete with the SF4 phenomenon and too many critics contributed to getting it wiped out of the mainstream.
This is one of the reasons why so many critics are skeptical about Ultra Street Fighter 2. They think that the game is just another weak attempt at milking one of the oldest cows Capcom has in their barn. Well, guess what? That is what the gaming industry is all about.
They are not looking to please the hardcore fans with frame counts and input lag perfection, they are looking to make money and sometimes they manage to create something that transcends and become legendary, which was certainly the case with Super Street Fighter 2 Turbo.
The gaming community is always going to go where the money is too. If a game is popular, they will play it competitively even if it features broken mechanics and unfair and unbalanced gameplay. All we can do is hope that Ultra Street Fighter 2: The final challenger’s gets enough media attention o become a tournament favorite for a while. It would also be ideal for this game to be ported to other consoles and even to PC, but Nintendo has always been known for doing all they can to keep their titles exclusive to only time will tell.
Conclusion
Anything that helps shine a light at Super Street Fighter 2 Turbo is definitely going to be a plus for Street Fighter 2 fans. Seeing yet another release for this old school game is a testament to how influential and powerful it continues to be. No other game offers the same level of intensity that this game has provided since Super Street Fighter 2 Turbo came out and even if Ultra flops, it will promote the game just like HDR did.