Characters Going Forward

Current Fighting Games Fighting Game Discussion
1

Hey,

Obviously there has been some rumours floating around about a potential Street Fighter 5 title. While there is little to nothing concrete on this yet, it did get me to thinking about character choices going forward. Its fairly safe to say that the ‘classic’ 12 characters will automatically be in Street Fighter 5, but thats not to say that all of the 40 odd current cast members will carry on to the next game once it does come out (or have its cast announced at least)

As a person who is currently maining Juri this could potentially pose a problem for me. SF4 and its updates are the first fighting games I’ve properly gotten into, beyond just special mashing casually for fun with some mates. While I’m by no means any good yet, I’m certainly working on improving and aim to carry this on to Street Fighter 5 when it comes out. But some people will be more experienced than I, and will have gone from old games to new in the past.

If you main Ryu or Chun-Li one would assume you have a bit of an advantage going into a new game, they’re going to be in it and barring new mechanics and metas you’ll have a solid foundation for carrying on that character? Or do you find that things change completely? As a Juri player I’d not be horribly surprised if Street Fighter 5 doesn’t have Juri at launch, certainly if they do something similar to Vanilla SF4 with a smaller starting line up (though I’d hope she would make it into say Super Street Fightr 5 - or whatever its expansion versions are called). So I’d have to change mains.

Is that a fairly standard thing? Do people use the switch to a new Street Fighter series as a ‘safe’ way to change mains, or do they tend to stick to the safer characters they have always played (if they’re a classic cast main player). Are the mechanics likely to change drastically enough that it will be a level playing field regardless of who you’ve played in the past (ie combo timings completely change etc - one would assume special/super inputs would stay roughly the same).

I just thought it could make for an interesting discussion…

2

I’ve never mained the same character across major Street Fighter releases (2 > Alpha > 3 > 4) or even across other fighting games, for that matter. People do that sort of thing, albeit maybe not to the extent I do, all the time. It’s pretty common.

3

No offense, but “going forward” is one of the most vague, vapid phrases I’ve ever heard. It even TASTES wrong when used outside of situations where you’re giving directions.

Anyway, yes, if it’s Capcom, maining a character from the last 3 or so games means you have an advantage over somebody discovering a new character because Capcom either keeps their characters nearly the same over a series’ various upgrades, or even sends them a step back in some cases, discarding moves or tools they had in previous games. Namco’s Tekken is similar: the characters stay mostly the same…but they get more tools every time instead of simple frame tweaks, and sometimes some inputs are changed. Other companies’ fighters…well, you just don’t know what to expect. The guy who had a cool projectile in the last game may become an up-close fighter in the next. Juri is a pretty popular character from what I can tell, so you should be okay sticking with her. Of the new characters, she’s the least…freak-showy/goofy/joke character-esque. She’ll probably become a trademark character, being sf’s first real female villain.

4

there’s a big advantage to be had being the dude who is pioneering a new character too, it just takes more creativity. if a returning character is in a new game but is played mostly the same as before (like ryu and chun li), beating that character is probably going to be familiar to most people too.