Some even say that it saved the fighting game genre. It didn’t; saying that implies that other developers in the genre didn’t do anything while Capcom sat on their hands for the better part of a decade. Excellent fighting games were developed during that time: Soul Calibur, Guilty Gear, Dead or Alive, Capcom vs. SNK, Virtua Fighter… all of those games exist. Street Fighter IV didn’t save the genre. But it did revive it from near irrelevance and resurrected one of the most important franchises in the history of the medium in the process.

"The PS4 re-release marks what is likely the game’s last hurrah before Street Fighter V next year, and the end of an era for the fighting game genre. As a package, Ultra adds the most content to Street Fighter IV since Super Street Fighter IV in 2010, but the question remains: is the re-release of an update to a game from 2009 worth your time?

Ultra Street Fighter IV marks the third and final (come on, AE 2012 doesn’t count) major revision to the Street Fighter IV formula, the definitive stamp on one of the best fighting games ever made, that period at the end of a sentence seven years in the making. The PS4 re-release marks what is likely the game’s last hurrah before Street Fighter V next year, and the end of an era for the fighting game genre. As a package, Ultra adds the most content to Street Fighter IV since Super Street Fighter IV in 2010, but the question remains: is the re-release of an update to a game from 2009 worth your time? The long answer depends on how much you like Street Fighter, and fighting games in general, and whether or not you already own a copy of Ultra Street Fighter IV. The short answer, however, is yes.

Like previous updates to the game, the biggest addition to Ultra Street Fighter IV is the new characters. Ultra adds five new fighters to Street Fighter IV’s roster, boosting the number of playable characters up to an impressive forty-four, a number almost unheard of in one-on-one fighters. Four of these new characters – Hugo, Poison, Elena, and Rolento – previously appeared in Street Fighter X Tekken, while the fifth, Decapre, is making her first appearance in the series.

None of these characters are new in the truest sense of the term, which is a shame. Even Decapre, who is supposed to be a completely new character, is just an evil version of Cammy that shares many of the latter’s animations. This was no doubt a cost-cutting move on Capcom’s part, but the lack of “new” characters in Street Fighter IV’s last update is still disappointing, if somewhat expected given that Street Fighter IV is more than six years old and a majority of the original team has moved on to other projects.

"In a rather inspired move, Capcom has also provided players with the ability to select which edition of a character they would like to play, which makes for some very interesting matchups.

The new characters may not have that new car smell aesthetically, but each brings a unique bag of tricks to Ultra Street Fighter IV. Rolento, for instance, is a hit and run character that can control large areas of space at once, while Elena is an offensive kicking machine capable of big combos. Hugo, meanwhile, is a grappler with a ton of health (and a huge hitbox), and perpetual partner in crime Poison is more of a cross between Crimson Viper and a traditional Shoto. Decapre rounds things out with a dash and teleport that allows her to attack from multiple angles, keeping opponents on their toes.

Of course, there have been a number of balance changes to the other characters, as well. The changes are pretty extensive, but Capcom has been kind enough to outline them in a handy YouTube playlist. They’re are largely meant to even out the tiers in the hopes of making the game more competitive, and it’ll be hard to see how well Capcom did until the community has spent more time with the game, though initial impressions are positive. I don’t think anyone is mourning the loss of the vortex.

In a rather inspired move, Capcom has also provided players with the ability to select which edition of a character they would like to play, which makes for some very interesting matchups. Wanna pit the incredibly powerful Street Fighter IV version of Sagat against AE 2012’s nasty Yun? Or maybe you want to toss Super Street Fighter IV’s beastly Akuma into the ring with Ultra’s buffed Ken? You can do that, at least offline, and it’s a cool feature that allows players to jump into the game with any version of a character while being able to enjoy all of Ultra’s other additions, which are considerable.

" Capcom has finally gotten around to adding Ultra specific challenges for the entire cast, but they’re not much good for anything other than practicing specific combos and getting a general feel for each character.

There are also six new stages to choose from, one of which features an incredibly cool pair of T-Rexes and gives off serious The Lost World: Jurassic Park vibes, and a number of new gameplay features and modes, as well. The new Red Focus mechanic allows you to burn meter to absorb more punishment than a normal Focus Attack, while Delayed Wake Up provides a way out of the infamous vortex, and makes knockdowns a guessing game for the attacker and the defender, rather than just the latter. The last puzzle piece comes to us in the form of Ultra Combo Double, which lets you access both of your character’s Ultras at once at the price of reduced damage.

Each of these changes seriously impacts the way the game plays, and will keep the most competitive World Warriors busy for a long time. These new gameplay wrinkles are complimented by a number of new modes and quality of life improvements like an online training mode, a series first, as well as Elimination, a 3-on-3 match that operates similarly to a round in King of Fighters. The last big addition is native YouTube uploading, which allows you to save both online and offline matches and upload them to YouTube without ever leaving your console, though said videos are unfortunately capped at 480p.

Unfortunately, all of these additions throw into light all of the things that Ultra Street Fighter IV still lacks. Capcom has finally gotten around to adding Ultra specific challenges for the entire cast, but they’re not much good for anything other than practicing specific combos and getting a general feel for each character. As good as Street Fighter IV is, Capcom’s general lack of interest in the challenges (it took them months to finally release the ones for Ultra) shines a bright light on one of Street Fighter IV’s largest problems: this is a game that has no interest in teaching you how to play.

"Neither one of these things – the lack of teaching tools of any real merit, and the inconsistencies in presentation that mostly crop up around the new characters – is a dealbreaker, but it will be more than a little jarring to new players who are making their first journey into the wonderful world of Street Fighter.

To be fair, this is a problem fighting games have been struggling with since the genre’s inception. It’s a ridiculous problem, really, and any other genre would be crucified for it. Could you imagine if RTS games like StarCraft didn’t feature comprehensive tutorials? What about something like DOTA 2, Braid, or STALKER? It would be awful. People would be infuriated. But somehow, it’s become not only commonplace in fighting games, but acceptable.

This was a problem ten years ago when only Tekken and Soul Calibur had anything resembling passable teaching tools, but now, when Killer Instinct’s tutorial teaches you not just fighting games, but universal concepts like frame data, buffering, and hitboxes? Now, when Blazblue will teach you every mechanic and major combo for every character? Now, when Injustice allows you to view frame data, and when it’s challenges will walk you through a number of complex ideas and mechanics? It’s absolutely unacceptable that Ultra Street Fighter IV’s trials are so barebones, and baffling that Capcom didn’t use what is undoubtedly their last chance at updating Street Fighter IV to add more complete teaching tools.

It’s also rather depressing that Capcom hasn’t given the new characters the nice pre-fight videos that occur when you fight their rival in arcade mode. Neither one of these things – the lack of teaching tools of any real merit, and the inconsistencies in presentation that mostly crop up around the new characters – is a dealbreaker, but it will be more than a little jarring to new players who are making their first journey into the wonderful world of Street Fighter.

"The few problems that the game does have do little to diminish Street Fighter IV’s enduring greatness, especially when you consider the $25 price tag, which includes all of the previously released DLC costumes, and the fact that it supports PS3 fightsticks, provided you have a DualShock 4 connected for each one.

Much has been made of the technical issues that plagued the PS4 version on release, and with good reason. They were considerable, and including input latency, lag in online matches, animation problems, disappearing projectiles, and a number of audio issues. In fact, the problems were so serious that the PS4 version was dropped from Evo, the world’s premier fighting game tournament, in favor of the Xbox 360 version. It was a rough few weeks for Capcom and Sony, especially considering that this version was supposed to be the one that finally brought 1080p resolution and 60 frames per second to a console version of the world’s most popular fighting game. Capcom and Sony have been working hard to set things right, however, and the final result is easily the best version of the game on consoles, just as we were promised.

The few problems that the game does have do little to diminish Street Fighter IV’s enduring greatness, especially when you consider the $25 price tag (for the digital version. There are no physical versions at the time of this writing), which includes all of the previously released DLC costumes, and the fact that it supports PS3 fightsticks, provided you have a DualShock 4 connected for each one. It’s kind of a steal, really; Ultra is easily the best and most accessible console version of the title on the market and will do more than enough to keep you busy until next year’s Street Fighter V.

I don’t envy Capcom, having to follow up on this game; having to outdo 44 characters, Ultras, and Focus Attacks, the endless amount of hype. How do you begin to approach that, that legacy? I don’t know. It won’t be easy, but we’ll always have Street Fighter IV. And in that regard, in securing that legacy, Ultra does more than enough. So, whaddya say? You wanna go another round?

This game was reviewed on the PlayStation 4.

EVO 2015 is almost here- the world’s premier fighting game tournament, and also one of the showcases for eSports, has record participation this year, across a full range of games, covering everything from anime based fighters like Guilty Gear and Persona, western fighters like Mortal Kombat and Killer Instinct, technical and exacting ones like Street Fighter and Marvel vs Capcom, and Nintendo’s Smash Bros., of course.

If you were planning on following this event at all, in any capacity, then you are in luck- EVO has gone ahead and released the full schedule for the tournament for this year, which you can see above by clicking on the image. The last two days appear to be especially exciting, with Smash 4, Melee, Street Figter, and Guilty Gear finals all being held in that period.

Which games are you planning on following at EVO this year? Personally, I’m excited for Persona and the two Smash games. What about you? Let us know in the comments.

It should not come as a surprise to anybody, but the games with the most entrants at the world’s biggest and most prestigious fighting game tournament, EVO, also happen to be the two most popular fighting games on the market. The numbers are in, and it appears that Ultra Street Fighter IV and Super Smash Bros. for Wii U are the two most popular games at EVO this year, in terms of numbers of participants.

The third game is Super Smash Bros. Melee, which, in an incredible feat for a fourteen year old game, saw its total participation rise, while also beating many, much newer, constantly updated games. Collectively, it appears as though Smash Bros. is the biggest attraction at EVO this year (though of course, Street Fighter remains the largest individual one).

The full numbers are:

• Ultra Street Fighter IV – 2,227
• Super Smash Bros. for Wii U – 1,926
• Super Smash Bros. Melee – 1,869
• Mortal Kombat X – 1,162
• Guilty Gear Xrd – 968
• Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3 – 816
• Tekken 7 – 458
• Persona 4 Arena Ultimax – 437
• Killer Instinct – 397

Personally, this is a good lineup, and I am glad to see that all of these games got so much love. And I cannot wait to see some higher level play for the sublime Super Smash Bros. for Wii U.

Stay tuned to GamingBolt for more coverage and information on EVO 2015.

Ultra Street Fighter IV’s PS4 launch was a disaster. Originally billed as the definitive version of the game, that would be arcade perfect and tournament ready, the game launched with a bevy of bugs, a lot of them humorous, but almost all of them serious enough to impede with high level play. The community reacted with vitriol, and Capcom was forced to withdraw the PS4 version of the title from the competitive circuit, reverting, instead, to the Xbox 360 version.

However, the PS4 version still remains broken, and there are people who have nought it who deserve something that at least somewhat resembles the product that they had been promised. And so, a new patch for the PS4 version has been released, an extensive patch that fixes quite a lot of things:

• Reduced Interface lag within menus
• Addressed disappearing projectiles
• Fix Decapre’s teleport animation
• Fixed missing SFX for Red Focus Attack
• Fix Rolento audio glitch during victory screen
• Fixed Akuma’s stomp SFX not playing
• Addressed bottom portion of the ON/OFF text being cutoff under the graphics setting in the Options menu
• Removed extra character that was sometimes displayed in the Leaderboards at the end of a player’s name even if they have not set it to be there
• Fixed issue when seeking an arcade match-up with LAN cabled disconnected, and then starting up training results in a message ID being displayed
• Addressed online IDs not appearing correctly
• Addresses issue when changing the HP bar’s HUD position in Options, the Online ID HUD positions does not move with it, and is displayed at the default position
• Anisotropic Filtering (AF) changes to decrease blur
• Fixed appearance of white box after backing out of a command list menu
• Addressed Fight Request in Arcade Mode (Arcade | Arcade)

A few bugs still remain, such as the infamous sonic boom bug, and most importantly, the input lag, which is the most egregious issue with the port, has still not been fixed. Still, at least they are trying to overhaul the product and bring it up to acceptable standards.

If only they had done that before it had been launched to the market.

The PS4 version of Ultra Street Fighter IV was supposed to be the definitive version of the game, the one that would be played at all tournaments- so much so that Capcom and Sony had already announced that this would be the version that would be played at all tournaments going forward. However, in the wake of the terrible launch for the game, which we reported on yesterday, Capcom has gone ahead and withdrawn the PS4 version from the tournament circuit.

“For those experiencing issues and wondering about a patch, we are aware that you are experiencing problems with the PS4 version of USFIV, which was published and developed by SCEA’s Third Party Production group,” Capcom said in a statement. “SCEA and Capcom are currently looking into the issues that some users may be experiencing and are working to resolve them as quickly as possible. We will continue to provide updates on our progress.

“A lot of our more competitive players have wondered how the USFIV version of PS4 will affect them and the tour. To that we’d like to advise that the integrity of the Capcom Pro Tour is a top priority for us and we will continue to work with tournament organizers worldwide to ensure that the highest quality event will be run. Each region will maintain its current hardware standard for the remainder of the 2015 Capcom Pro Tour until otherwise announced. We will keep you updated as to when the PS4 version of USFIV will be integrated into the Pro Tour.”

What does this mean? Essentially, it means that each tournament will, for now, continue using the version of Ultra Street Fighter IV that it has been using so far. So if a tournament was using the Xbox 360 version, they will continue to use that. Tournaments using the PS3 version will use that one instead. Most tournaments use the Xbox 360 version, so we will probably see that one highlighted for the near future.

The lone standout so far is EVO, which has confirmed that it is assessing the situation, though given its statements yesterday, it is also likely to announce a switch soon- especially since, given Capcom’s wording of its statement, it can be implied that Capcom does not expect this port to be up to scratch until the Tournament circuit is over- which ios well after the end of this year.

We will keep you posted. Stay tuned.

Ultra Street Fighter IV was supposed to be the definitive version of the game- it was coming with all DLC included, it was going to be arcade perfect and tournament ready, it would support all fighting sticks and controllers, and it was going to remove the lag that had pervaded past versions of the title, especially the PS3 version.

The game we got, instead, seems to be absolutely broken, and a nightmarishly glitchy product that is so problematic that its status as the version of choice at future fighting game tournaments is coming under jeopardy. The issues with the game include lag, stuttering and other noticeable glitches affecting the experience. Menus suffer from dramatic slowdown, and graphical glitches are leading to inadvertent buffs for some characters, such as Guile’s Sonic Boom being practically invisible, and thus unavoidable.

There are graphical and sound glitches too (you can see the former in the video embedded above), and, hilariously enough, the title screen of the game still asks you to press Start to proceed, despite the fact that the PS4’s controller has no start button.

This sundry list of issues has led to the shoddy port coming under fire at multiple online fighting game enthusiast communities, including Shoryuken, NeoGAF, and Reddit. The outrage has prompted EVO to officially respond with a statement, and they have said that if the PSS4 version of the game is not patched satisfactorily soon, the tournament will revert to using the Xbox 360 version for its matches; other tournaments have already announced the abandonment of the PS4 version.

Meanwhile, Sony’s Gio Corsi of the Third Party Productions team (which was responsible for this port), has officially released a statement too, indicating that they are looking into the glitches.

Yikes. What a mess. For now, stick with the PS3 or Xbox 360 versions, I guess.

The world’s biggest fighting game tournament is back, and it is being headlined with some good, big games this year- the organizers of EVO have selected a very diverse bunch to be represented this time around, including Capcom’s Ultra Street Fighter IV, the unreleased Mortal Kombat X, and even the arcade version of Tekken 7.

The big news for everyone here is probably going to be that both, Super Smash Bros. Melee and Super Smash Bros. for Wii U will be played at EVO this year; Melee, of course, is the biggest game at the tournament, drawing in more players, viewers, and counts than anything else, and, fourteen years after release, still has a thriving competitive screen. The excellent Smash Bros. for Wii U, on the other hand, is also a competitively viable game that distinguishes its style of play enough from Melee, and is popular and nuanced enough to warrant its inclusion.

The full lineup includes:

• Ultra Street Fighter 4
• Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3
• Super Smash Bros. for Wii U
• Super Smash Bros. Melee
• Guilty Gear Xrd Sign
• Killer Instinct
• Mortal Kombat X
• Persona 4 Arena Ultimax
• Tekken 7

That’s a very nice and varied lineup, though of course, EVO notes that it is subject to change.

Still, I can say I am very happy, and that EVO will be getting a lot of my viewership this year.

EVO 2015 will take place July 17-19 at Bally’s and Paris Las Vegas Casino in Las Vegas, Nevada.

Street Fighter made its debut at the PlayStation Experience but not in the way you’d expect.

Capcom’s Ultra Street Fighter IV was announced at the event along with various new costumes and other content. Yes, Street Fighter IV again. Though this could be an effective troll job by Sony following the leak of Street Fighter 5 recently, it’s still baffling why Ultra Street Fighter IV would be exclusive to the PS4.

Regardless, it’s out in Spring 2015 for those interested.

Ultra Street Fighter IV will likely feature various versions of the same characters for players to experiment with different move sets and whatnot. At the very least, the alternate costumes look snazzy. There’s not much to say at this point since it’s still Street Fighter IV after all these years.

What are your thoughts on the announcement? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below and stay tuned for more information as the PlayStation Experience continues.

Capcom’s financial results for the second quarter of fiscal year 2015 are out and though the company suffered a lower amount of losses than in the same period last year, it’s still not good. Sales for the quarter ending on September 30th were down by 51 percent to ¥16.3 billion or $151.32 million from ¥35.8 billion or $331.3 million. Operating losses were at ¥8.25 billion or $76.7 million which is down from last year.

Capcom stated that, “Ultra Street Fighter IV (for PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, and PC) and Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney Trilogy HD (for Nintendo 3DS) posted steady sales, while Dead Rising 3 (for Xbox One and PC), which sold over a million units in the previous fiscal year, continued to do well.

“However, no major new titles were released in this period, so sales focused on existing products. Meanwhile, the online titles Monster Hunter Frontier G series (for PC, Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, Wii U, and PlayStation Vita) performed solidly. Because small titles and repeat sales made up the majority of sales overall due to the lack of major titles in the lineup during the period under review, sales were not sufficient to offset the aforementioned downturn in Monster Hunter 4 (for Nintendo 3DS) sales, even though the digital download content supported sales growth.”

It’ll be interesting to see how the company proceeds into the new year since it doesn’t have any big-name games until Resident Evil Revelations 2 releases in early 2015. Stay tuned for more information.

Capcom has detailed the mysterious upcoming Omega Mode that it will be adding to Ultra Street Fighter IV, its final-for-real-this-time-guys-we-promise update to Street Fighter, free of charge.

Within Omega Mode, all 44 characters in the game will receive brand new abilities; unfortunately, the mode will not be cross compatible with multiple of the new innovations and mechanics that Ultra Street Fighter IV brought with it to the table, such as ‘Red Focus’ or ‘Combo Double.’

These changes for characters will often entail thorough overhauls, some that series fans may find to be pleasant throwbacks to previous games in the series. For instance, Ryu will be getting a parry move similar to that of Street Fighter III: 3rd Strike. And he won’t be the only character being redone in such a way either, as Ken and Chun Li are also confirmed to get similar new moves.

To play it, you will find it listed under the ‘Editions’ Menu in Ultra Street Fighter IV.