I'm going to talk a little bit about the 3D Street Fighter game that almost was. I'm also going to talk about the problems associated with adapting 2D fighters to 3D brawlers. I'll bring in some other Capcom titles as well as those from perennial rival, Namco. In 2006 Backbone Entertainment pitched a 3D Street Fighter game set between the events of SF II and III. This game was pitched before SF IV had come out but had an eerily similar name. Titled Street Fighter IV Flashback, the game was more of an adventure brawler than a fighting game, akin to Final Fight.

Would it have been a hit or a miss? Would a Western developer be able to create a satisfying brawler? What are the lessons that Capcom has learned since creating the groundbreaking Final Fight some 20 years ago? We'll explore these and other questions in this blog.

Capcom didn't invent the brawling genre. Most gamers would agree that 1987 Double Dragon by Taito was the first real brawler hit. The side-scroller adventure introduced us to the basic mechanics; a player would fight wave after wave of villains using an assortment of attacks and throws before taking on a boss character at the end of each stage. Double Dragon II inspired Capcom to create their own version of the brawler. Street Fighter 89 was supposed to be the sequel to the original Street Fighter. Vendors didn't like that a brawling adventure game had replaced the fighting format. Capcom renamed the game Final Fight and set about making a true successor to SF. Variations of the format have appeared over the past 20+ years. True sequels to Final Fight as well as knock-offs like Streets of Rage by Sega. Modern action titles like Devil May Cry, God of War and Bayonetta still hold some of the influences from Final Fight. Namely wave after wave of opponents, boss battles and the strategy required to hold out despite the odds.

True 3D brawlers are few and far between. The format seems cumbersome and is one of the genres that hasn't made the transition to 3D very well. Control is one of the major problems with 3D brawlers. Moving characters through stages in 3D space and combat are much more difficult to do in a 3D brawler than a 2D title. The camera part of the issue but more than that it is the ability to set up opponents, to find proper ranges and be able to attack enemies coming from multiple angles. In two-dimensions the player had to focus their attention left or right, making it much easier to exploit a solid strategy. Newer titles made it possible for opponents to sidestep attacks or for players to misjudge distances because of awkward angles, increasing the difficulty of the title and making the experience less enjoyable.

All of those issues didn't Capcom and a host of other developers from trying to keep the genre alive. Unfortunately everything they tried seemed to fall short in the eyes of players and critics. Capcom experiemented with putting the genre in a Japanese science fiction setting, using cel-shading and even alternate-costume nods to SF characters in the title Crimson Tears. Unfortunately the game didn't seem to register very well with Western audiences. Their following titles did even less to impress gamers. There were some parallels behind the titles that Capcom created, their success (or lack thereof) and their attempt to capture the Western market. The two biggest missteps from the company being Beat Down: Fists of Vengeance and Final Fight Streetwise.

These titles attempted to capture the look and feel of urban culture, similar to what EA was trying to accomplish in their Def Jam series of fighting games. Unfortunately for Capcom there was, and remains, a divide between what Western audiences are looking for and what the Capcom designers think will be a hit in the west. This is in regards to character and level design but more important to the storytelling devices in the games. The stylized characters and universe of Beat Down seemed cheezy and unrealistic, while Final Fight Streetwise tried to make the formerly bright and heavily anime-influenced universe dark and gritty, to the point of becoming obscene. Even before Streetwise had come out Capcom was moving the direction of the series into a brooding mess. Final Fight Seven Sons by Capcom Studio 8, had little of the charm of the original Final Fight and looked somewhere between Streetwise and Crimson Tears before the project was scrapped. The angry plots, the sub-par control and ugly worlds were hardly the experiences that made Capcom great. Would Street Fighter IV Flashback have been better than Capcom's 3D brawlers or would have been more of the same?

There is a distinction between 2D brawlers to 3D brawlers and 2D fighting games to 3D brawlers. The moves of a fighting game character are usually more robust than the typical brawler. They can make the transition to 3D more easily. Some fighting games, like Tekken and Soul Caliber by Capcom rival Namco, were created in 3D. Developers find it easier to create adventure experiences using the 3D assets from Namco that by trying to start from scratch. The animations, models and collision information were ready made. The developers could add these characters to levels set within the universe, each with stunning visuals, objectives, boss battles, etc. The hard part seemed to be ways in which to challenge the player in the traditional brawler format, wave after wave of generic thugs and fighters to challenge the player. An early fighting brawler experiment from Namco was Urban Reign. It used a modified version of the Tekken engine and applied many combo and control elements from the Tekken right into the game.

Soul Caliber Legends was one of the other experimental titles using the fighter-to-3D brawler experience. Namco created fantastic worlds in which to set the medieval / fantasy sword fighter. This game was moderately successful, but memorable because it showed that fighting game characters could make the transition to adventure brawlers. Those that were familiar with the control mechanics and combos from the fighter would make the transition to roaming levels smoothly. Others that had grown up on adventure platformers like Devil May Cry or God of War lamented the controls.

Namco was one of the early pioneers of 3D fighting game engines while Capcom was focused on 2D sprite-based technology. It stands to reason that they are able to do more with several generations of 3D technology than Capcom has been able to do with the SF IV engine... so far.

For example, Tekken 6 expands upon the lessons that Namco learned from Urban Reign and Soul Caliber Legends. The game offers a solid fighting experience with tons of customization for the main characters, as well as a large library of fighter to choose from. Some of the adventure portions feature wave after wave of minor character combat rather than 1-on-1 battles. Many of these enemies were throwaway designs, others were concept fighters that didn't make the cut and still others flesh out the universe as agents and soldiers from the warring Mishima factions. Do these elements make the fighting game better? Do they compliment the overall purpose of a fighting game or has Namco created a new genre of fighting game, one which makes the distinction between fighter and free roaming brawler, yet are part of the same title? Are these things that Capcom should consider implementing in future versions of Street Fighter, so long as the series stays in 3D?

I am very defensive when it comes to the SF series. I am defensive about the character design, the control and the balance of the game. I am skeptical of the direction the series has taken, the use of gimmicky costumes for DLC or that the title would even work as a 3D brawler . Capcom does not have a great track record when it comes to making 3D brawlers, if you don't believe me then try playing Beat Down and Final Fight Streetwise. I am even more skeptical of third-party developers, like Backbone Entertainment, trying to make a version of Street Fighter in an entirely different genre.

A lot of the original intent and spirit of the game could be lost in another genre, or if designed by people that did not understand all of the nuances that went into the universe. Creating a game that has characters with the same names, moves and abilities as the SF cast does not make it a SF game. Those that are doubters should really try playing the game based on the SF Movie. Many of the designers and artists working abroad undoubtedly have a soft spot for the franchise. They want to do the game right and make it memorable for gamers that did not grow up with SF. Take the case of the artists and writers at Udon are such people but even they view the universe with a skewed perspective. Udon and the animators of the horrid USA cartoon series, had one thing in common. They tried to invent plots and relationships which kept the cast tied together. Not unlike the GI Joe cast, all of the main characters had to return again and again no matter how absurd the story.

The version of the universe that westerners got was colored by the mistranslations of the game. The lack of a connection between the martial arts and Eastern philosophies and religions also prevented the characters from taking on deeper cultural significance with those writers and artists. Of course many western gamers also don't have a "big picture" take on the SF universe. To many gamers the SF cast were simply cool characters with cool moves. That cultural POV shaped the way western gamers perceived the canon and character relationships. It is possible that despite the best intentions, the universe and mechanics of SF were beyond the grasp of Backbone entertainment. Making a 3D adventure game that featured the cast, with familiar special moves and attacks like the Namco brawlers, would have been a strained fanservice experience.

Remakes of classic Capcom titles by western developers tend to miss the spark that made the original title so memorable. It was something I talked about on the importance of getting the Bionic Commando right blog. Many of the same rules apply for Street Fighter. It is up to the developers to meet the characters at their level, not to try to change them to meet a different vision and betray the intent of the game. It is absurd to imagine a scenario where we follow Ryu along a path fighting wave after wave of random goons. Okay, so maybe a scenario like that would appear in an Udon comic, but I digress. There was a reason why Capcom created Final Fight, so that somebody other than Ryu could explore the world with an entirely different play mechanic. So that a wrestler, a ninja and a brawler could beat the snot out of wave after wave of different characters. Developers that fail to make that distinction are destined to hurt the franchise in the future.

Are there characters SF characters that could work in a brawler or adventure title? Certainly! Are there ways to make an adventure story out of Ken and Ryu that do not betray the spirit of Street Fighter? Absolutely! Am I going to spell these things out? Not today my friends.

Have a great weekend.

The character profiles are good, if all in Japanese, including tidbits of info such as first appearances and even birthdays. Did you know that Robert Garcia was born on Christmas Day, or that Mai Shiranui was a New Years baby? Of course the book also served to remind fighting game fans that Tae Kwon Do characters have been around before Juri was ever announced, in fact, the KOF series is saturated with TKD fighters that I'd rather see than Juri.

But I digress... The book is a little thin but very thorough. Don't expect to see multiple character profiles aside from the most recent version of the art for each character. This is not an art book but it does have some concept pieces dating back to the first KOF title in 1994. This art helps demonstrate my frustrations with fighting game character design. The SNK school of design seems to be based on the numbers game. Each generation of the KOF series mixes fighters from previous SNK titles (not always the fighting games) along with new characters. Since the game is a 3-on-3 tag based system then teams of three have to be created each generation. The "easy" characters to implement were three from the Art of Fighting and three from Fatal Fury, those being SNK's earliest fighting games. The concept designs for the other nation's fighters weren't as iconic. Some were very laughable in fact. Let's take a look at the Hip Hop theme placed on the concept characters for Team USA.

Although the game was released in the mid-90's the fashion of the characters did not accurately reflect the times. The spandex underneath jackets was decidedly late 80's USA pop fashion. These were looks that the USA did not idealize in fighters, yet SNK thought they would be strong candidates to represent the nation. Unfortunately these videos defined the USA to Japanese developers. Either SNK was ignorant of the cultures they were representing or they simply didn't care what "Americans" thought was cool at the time. The final designs for Team USA included a basketball player, a football player and a boxer, none of which were very well liked or even remembered by the majority of gamers.

The poor designs kept on coming through the years. Characters that would have been scrapped by other developers (like Capcom) or refined until they were solid were pitched at a high volume because each team needed three members. If SNK wanted to impress fans by introducing a new team made up of well-dressed gentlemen then surely they could have them stomping on the Fatal Fury poster boy Terry Bogard! This type of sketch was insulting to fans of FF and KOF by insinuating that a suit could have as much fighting prowess as, arguably, the most popular character in the universe.

Latter KOF designs began incorporating more Japanese pop culture trends and began ignoring the fads from the rest of the world. Characters inspired by anime and Harajuku fashion like the Gothic Lolita, were favored more and more than actual fighters. One page of the KOF Encyclopedia summed up this change of direction. The character K9999 is presented as a black silhouette and in no other part of the book is his likeness reproduced. SNK lost the rights of the character to Korean co-developer Eolith.

The homage / tribute to the character Tetsuo from the manga and film Akira probably rubbed a number of anime fans the wrong way as well.

After getting this book I realized that the future of KOF and Street Fighter designs are very intermingled.