Street Fighter x Tekken
Well, besides the nonsensical name, this game doesn't seem to be so good. Unfortunately it appears to be made by the Street Fighter IV team, so it looks awful, at the very least. The Tekken characters have human proportions, for the most part, making the Street Fighter IV characters' freakish proportions stick out all the more.
The backgrounds are downright bizaare. In one, you are apparently on a ship launching into space, while a robot Zangief hangs onto the outside, trying to smash his way through a window. As you leave the atmosphere, he floats away. On another you appear to be on the back of a hovercraft speeding through the arctic as a mammoth with Tron-like neon highlights chases after you. In yet another, the cast of Final Fight puts on a kabuki show for you. Just plain strange. The bad art shows here in a bad way as the background elements overreact (inconsistantly) to people getting knocked down: in one stage any knockdown, no matter how undramatic, leads to the trucks in the background -- and we're talking semis with trailers here -- bounce completely off the ground. However, the people in the background don't seem to notice at all. On the other hand, the people still stagger around like drunken marionettes, so I can't really excuse them either.
The character selection is good, though with a peculiar focus on Final Fight characters, with Hugo, Poison, and Rolento available now, and Guy and Cody to show up later. (More on that later!) I just tonight realized that all my best characters are in here: Ryu, Vega/Balrog, Zangief, Guy, Hugo, and Ibuki. That's never happened before, so I guess I can't argue with that! It also has all my favorite Tekken characters -- oh wait, I don't like any Tekken characters. Tekken has my vote for the worst cast out of all the fighting game franchises. Their best characters are uninspired. Among their worst is a velociraptor who fights with boxing gloves, a stupid-looking animated wooden practice dummy, and a guy with a mask and sword he mostly uses to simulate masturbation and bounce on like a pogo stick -- not to mention a move where he impales himself on his own sword. Lilli has nice legs, for what it's worth. That's the nicest thing I can say about the Tekken cast. A version of Mega Man based on his horrendous American box art is on there too, but I suspect the funniness of this will last until about five minutes before the character was announced.
There are gems, which I don't understand the function of properly. I do understand that they give you power ups of some sort during the match and are VERY unloved by serious players. Worse, there are downloadable gems that are better than the ones you start with. Worst still, there are gems you could get from pre-ordering the game at one of the vile video game store chains. That's right: you can pay Capcom to make yourself more powerful. Awesome. Not the best way to create a tournament scene there, Capcom.
There are a BUNCH of downloadable characters that you don't have access to yet. They're not done, so... But wait! What's this!? They are done and on the disk, you just will have to pay to use them later on when they're released. So incredibly shadey. The entire game is liable to cost you a ton of money. (I'm not sure how much, but if the prices are anything like the unlockables in Marvel vs. Capcom 3, we could be talking about over $200 here.) This is crazy and just plain unsavory. Unfortunately the video game buyers are a bunch of spoiled marks who will let Capcom rip them off if it means getting to play their favorite characters, even if they do so openly. Once again, we are getting ripped off, and people are not only accepting it and expecting it, but they are APOLOGIZING for it! We're doomed. I've heard that video game sales were way down this last year. This is the kind of stuff that's the reason why.
In short, this game looks barfy.
The backgrounds are downright bizaare. In one, you are apparently on a ship launching into space, while a robot Zangief hangs onto the outside, trying to smash his way through a window. As you leave the atmosphere, he floats away. On another you appear to be on the back of a hovercraft speeding through the arctic as a mammoth with Tron-like neon highlights chases after you. In yet another, the cast of Final Fight puts on a kabuki show for you. Just plain strange. The bad art shows here in a bad way as the background elements overreact (inconsistantly) to people getting knocked down: in one stage any knockdown, no matter how undramatic, leads to the trucks in the background -- and we're talking semis with trailers here -- bounce completely off the ground. However, the people in the background don't seem to notice at all. On the other hand, the people still stagger around like drunken marionettes, so I can't really excuse them either.
The character selection is good, though with a peculiar focus on Final Fight characters, with Hugo, Poison, and Rolento available now, and Guy and Cody to show up later. (More on that later!) I just tonight realized that all my best characters are in here: Ryu, Vega/Balrog, Zangief, Guy, Hugo, and Ibuki. That's never happened before, so I guess I can't argue with that! It also has all my favorite Tekken characters -- oh wait, I don't like any Tekken characters. Tekken has my vote for the worst cast out of all the fighting game franchises. Their best characters are uninspired. Among their worst is a velociraptor who fights with boxing gloves, a stupid-looking animated wooden practice dummy, and a guy with a mask and sword he mostly uses to simulate masturbation and bounce on like a pogo stick -- not to mention a move where he impales himself on his own sword. Lilli has nice legs, for what it's worth. That's the nicest thing I can say about the Tekken cast. A version of Mega Man based on his horrendous American box art is on there too, but I suspect the funniness of this will last until about five minutes before the character was announced.
There are gems, which I don't understand the function of properly. I do understand that they give you power ups of some sort during the match and are VERY unloved by serious players. Worse, there are downloadable gems that are better than the ones you start with. Worst still, there are gems you could get from pre-ordering the game at one of the vile video game store chains. That's right: you can pay Capcom to make yourself more powerful. Awesome. Not the best way to create a tournament scene there, Capcom.
There are a BUNCH of downloadable characters that you don't have access to yet. They're not done, so... But wait! What's this!? They are done and on the disk, you just will have to pay to use them later on when they're released. So incredibly shadey. The entire game is liable to cost you a ton of money. (I'm not sure how much, but if the prices are anything like the unlockables in Marvel vs. Capcom 3, we could be talking about over $200 here.) This is crazy and just plain unsavory. Unfortunately the video game buyers are a bunch of spoiled marks who will let Capcom rip them off if it means getting to play their favorite characters, even if they do so openly. Once again, we are getting ripped off, and people are not only accepting it and expecting it, but they are APOLOGIZING for it! We're doomed. I've heard that video game sales were way down this last year. This is the kind of stuff that's the reason why.
In short, this game looks barfy.