The Inevitable Street Fighter V Story Thread: ARCADE EDITION!

Street Fighter V
23569

I’ve always said Ryu shouldn’t be the HERO of the game.

He’s the conductive thread of the series, the thing that gives them continuity, but his struggle should be limited to himself. Ryu doesn’t have a motivation, to begin with, he’s just the “eternal fighter”, while other characters have specific missions and enemies. He’s a self-centered guy that cares only about his own growth as a martial artist, in my opinion he has nothing to do with the “world-saving” type of missions.

Let’s see:
[list]
[] Ryu was the definite protagonist of Street Fighter Ⅰ
[] Street Fighter Alpha was the sequel and he was given focus as a side-plot with Akuma and the Dark Hadou, but Akuma’s still a representation of Ryu’s inner struggle. The actual story was the battle against Bison, when Shadaloo was at its prime and they had amassed the biggest army ever. The protagonist of this series was Nash, it ended with his sacrifice and I think it was good this way.
[] Street Fighter Ⅱ was Bison again, Ryu should have had his rematch with Sagat and that’s all. The focus was given to **Chun-Li **getting her revenge as well as **Guile **as her right hand, getting his revenge too.
[] Street Fighter Ⅲ clearly had moved on from Bison. It was supposed to make clear Chun-Li had been the protagonist of Street Fighter Ⅱ, that’s why her legendary battle against Bison was referred. The new protagonist was supposed to be Alex and Gill was going to be the villain, while we still saw Ryu continue with his training, so that should have been all.
[/list]

Now, it’s clear Ⅳ and Ⅴ were steps backwards from the story and it was already a problem. The problem’s that they shun off the natural progression and “moving on” thing from the series, and cramming all the protagonists (including Abel having a lot of the focus in Street Fighter Ⅳ) and then switching the canon to take away some character’s protagonisms, doing a disservice to some of them (Chun-Li and Nash were treated like crap) and leaving hanging threads that will probably contradict the “future of the series” (Alex is in the limbo right now).

I liked how the storyline from the original series was constantly moving forward with new storylines, but these new games have been mostly a mess when it comes to the plot.

23570

Tbh it’s not like Ryu has been the absolute hero/Boss defeater of SF saga

SF1- Ryu def Sagat but nobody give shit about SF1
SF2- Canon winner who???
SFA- It’s a fuckton of crazy shit happening, with Nash as the closest to be the "Hero"
SF4- It’s Bison to defeat the real Seth. Zangief defeat a one of the clones and get credited as the SF4 Champ
SFEX- Rosso win everything, get Eliza pregnant and fuck some Capcom’s executive wife+daughter too -> game get banned as retaliation
SF3- Alex defeat Gill
SFV- Ryu defeat Bison

Peoples are influenced by all the anime/manga having Ryu as the Hero/Winner, but in actual games this is the first time he got that role since SF1 (1987 lol)

23571

I would say it was Ryu would made it to the final fight since Bison did awake the SNH within him, but then the fight was interrupted by the gang and Ryu was able to snap out of it. No clear winner though since the tournament set up likely fell apart by this point.

23572

[quote=“Cestus, post:23560, topic:177027”]

Yup crop out 90% of my post and answer only to the part you can counter argue, it’s genius. The scene of Sim helping Ryu is valid, but saying that Ken helped Ryu is kind of a stretch. And saying that one last “Chun needs rescuing” scene makes her look badass is beyond a stretch. Lastly, quit it with the “ew whiny waifu crowd” thing. My favorite character is Rashid. I main him. Other characters I spent a considerable amount of time with include Alex, Urien, and Chun. 3/4 of them are guys. But I don’t want Chun being treated like shit, so I guess I must be a bitchy waifu lover huh? Chun, Guile, Ken all got shafted; don’t see how any of that is up for debate, but w/e.

Side note, I’m hoping the second story focuses a bit more on developing Alex’s character. As it is, I don’t think there’s enough depth or material in him to carry the entire SF3 saga.

23573

Street Fighter Ⅳ is very odd game, I rather consider it a “prelude” to Street Fighter Ⅴ, storywise, than as a full-circle story.

I think in Street Fighter Ⅱ Bison was dispatched by Akuma, so Street Fighter Ⅳ - Ⅴ was the perfect chance to bring Bison back and have Chun-Li getting rid of him for good, a great closure for her storyline and would explain Urien’s quote in Street Fighter Ⅲ. Instead, the brought back Nash, gave Ryu the privilege of the final battle, used Rashid as a new sort of “gateway” protagonist, and even freaking KARIN did more in the assasult of Shadaloo than Chun-Li… they’ve even bringing Alex into the mix!!

At least they should have taken advantage of Nash’s return to get some kind of closure with Guile’s trauma… but they completely dropped the ball, didn’t have any emotional moments with Guile and he was swatted away like a complete wimp!!

Street Fighter Ⅴ had A LOT of potential on itself, and a couple good ideas to improve the continuity and history of the Street Fighter saga… but the writers were so stupid they made an utter mess with some things…

To be fair, ASF isn’t entirely unworthy, there are some really entertaining parts, at least we had a closure with the dolls, Rashid’s story is good and so… but they made mostly a mess with the already established heroes/protagonists of each series.

23574

Nah dude It’s not about Ryu asking help from his friends…
Or your just denying the fact that the final battle had both bad script and bad battle transition?

Who said about Ryu should be asking help? your confusing it or just never got my point here.

and another thing SF is not just HNK alone that should based entirely story telling.

It’s about Guile, Nash and the rest of the cast, it’s not a Ryu issue alone.

**It’s about emotional transition and emotional responses on events. **Even HNK had it’s dramatic sacrifices and deaths that had proper emotion transition, reaction and responses to those events that fits the character plot.

What I am pointing out is those people in the scene should act or feel like friends or even people and not audience or background props/backdrop that are just the worst acting of being a 2D dimensional fictional character other than cheering and screaming without any logical limitation but choose to stayed that way. This make the feels of the battle being staged not being truthful to each character with plot in that event/situation.

**
Not realism dude but good story writing, transition and characterization.
Anime thing?
Here are other shonen jumps…other than HNK**

Goku was helped by Picolo with Raditz,

Goku during the first encounter with Vegeta,

Android 16 sacrifice.

Goku during the encounter with complete Cell

Killin’s death that was caused by Frieza.

Yusuke and Kuwabara against Togoro in the grand finals,

Yusuke’s friends was trapped by Itsuki when Yusuke was fighting Sensui.

Yusuke’s friends rage after Yusuke deaths in the hand of Sensui.

Jotaro Kuju final fights from two chapters especially in Stardust.

Rurouni kenshin had a lot especially every Shishio confrontion

**and let’s go back to Street Fighter 90’s
**
Ryu and Ken with “combined efforts” with the right emotional responses against Bison in both SF2V and SF2AM.

23575

A Shadow Falls should have:
[list]
[] Removed all that Karin’s “command protagonism”. Guile and Chun should have been the ones giving the orders here.
[] Nash could have fought Bison but maybe the gem of his forehead break off, he could have rather a) stayed catatonic and Guile rescue him b) Run away becoming a sort of rogue agent, Guile run after him, to leave Chun-Li do the final battle against Bison (Bison probably a little weakened after Nash’s final attack - which didn’t result on Nash’s destruction)
[] Bison and Shadaloo finally destroyed for good. By Chun-Li. Yeah, Ed could be still around, I have no problem with that.
[] Ryu shouldn’t have been involved at all in Shadaloo’s assault. His final battle should have been against Necalli. Maybe even in a different place. Necalli be temporarily dispelled by Ryu. Oro cameo required, I mean he’s a wise man, probably knows more about Necalli’s nature and help Ryu to get prepared for the next battle against him.
[*] Everything with Rashid, F.A.N.G. and the Dolls was gold. Let it stay. Karin participate in the fight with the dolls or something.
[/list]

23576

[quote=“You, post:23572, topic:177027”]

1- Thank you, you’re welcome. More like the part i bothered reply =)

2- To repeat it simple, many chars has been given crap to eat, many worse than Chun.
Yet the whining is ever about “Chun deserved better”, while ultimately she got better treatment than many if not most chars.
Bigger fanbase louder support and all that shit
That’s pretty much a fact reading this thread, given this i’m not particulary interested on who you play with wich ratio lol

3- I think a bit more character building for him is pretty much given (will be hard do LESS lol), even if actually we have to wait the Tom vs Gill fight before Alex get REALLY involved.
While we’re at it, Tom (and Gill) for SFV pls

23577

I agree with all of this.

One of the things I like about the KOF/FF/AOF series is that the protagonists were never actually OP. Even after their greatest moments, they were still shown to not be too overwhelmingly strong. Terry was able to defeat Geese and Krauser after difficult battles, Ryo was able to handle Mr. Big, Mr. Karate (Holding-Back), and Geese, Kyo was able to (with help) go against Rugal, Goenitz, and Orochi. Same with Iori. This never stopped them from getting their ass kicked in later games. K’ and team were able to beat Igniz and yet were unable to do any damage to Mukai.

Kyo got torn apart by Orochi Iori and had to be saved by Ash of all people. The Fatal Fury team never seemed to make it far in the tournaments. Same with the Art of Fighting team. Kyo and Iori are both really strong, but he’s most likely not beating any of the members of Those from the Past (Mukai Magaki, Saiki) alone.

With Ryu, outside of Oro and Akuma, it seems like he’s nigh unstoppable right now. Back in SF3, Oro was already questioning if Gill was even on Ryu’s level (“I wonder if you’re as strong as the boy in the headband”) before their battle. Oro can sense Chi, so that’s likely how he’d compare Gill to Ryu. I can’t imagine what level Ryu will be on in the next game.

23578

Agreed and with all of Shockdingo and DoctrineDark.

23579

Alex was the designed hero of the SFIII timeline and Alex is the one that should be at the heart of any Illuminati-centered plot in my opinion.
I would do it more or less like this: Alex handles Gill directly, because he’s part of a prophecy or because Gill himself sees something in him, whatever; the trio of Chun, Cammy and Guile instead handle the subplots of investigating and fighting the Illuminati as an organization, stopping their projects, discovering what they’re up to, maybe even help Alex directly (or maybe keep the plotlines separated, it could work either way); Ryu instead should stay out of the Illuminati plotline entirely and have his own separate story centered on him and Akuma finally coming to a definitive fight, probably with Oro having a significant role, so that for once the shoto plotline gets resolved without interfering with stuff it has actually little do with. I’m not sure where to put Ken because in SFV he basically becomes a family man, and he still is a family man in SFIII, which means he’s kinda out of the shoto plotline and and kinda out of the Illuminati plotline too. Somehow he has to fit in though, because he’s Ken and Ken deserves a big spot in the story (even if his personal storyline feels kinda exhausted right now).

As for the power escalation nonsense I always hated that aspect and if it depended on me I’d have post-SFV Ryu being still on the same level as most other fighters (just with more experience and wisdom, which is kinda like what I think Chun-Li is in Third Strike) with the only thing making him really special being his ability to use the Power of Nothingness, allowing him to take on much stronger opponents when the situation demands it, but not in every random situation.

It’s probably going to sound weird or stupid, but I like when story and gameplay manage to flow together somehow, it just makes the game and the series more enjoyable to me if what I’m playing is also something that I feel it may happen in the story. Which is why I like to think that most playable characters are roughly within the same level (with the common sense exception of obvious powerhouses like Akuma and Bison) and that there’s never any way to tell how a battle will play out, that even bottom-of-the-barrel Birdie might be able to beat Ryu on a very lucky day, or junior ninja Ibuki may be able to beat seasoned master ninja and psychopath in charge Vega also on a really good day.
That’s just how I feel about it though.

I’d add Cammy to that list, she too had very personal reasons to go after Bison in II, and quite a background even at that early stage.
In theory T. Hawk too had personal reasons to go after Bison, but I feel he wasn’t quite the most successful design in SFII.

Yes, I’m a hopeless shill for my main.

23580

Look, i never said HNK was the only anime model possible (SF2AM was itself the obvious alternative), but that’s the one they picked and that i’m ok with it.

If you read a page ago i will have made that last fight different, i just happen to appreciate “theyr way” too… actually much much more than some of the alternatives i’m reading lol

If anything at this point i will have prefered them to push it to the max of the 1v1thing

instead they gone

Bison "yo Ryu show me your power"
Ryu "power is too mainstream, my shit is new level shit, you’ve probably never heard of it"
Bison "whatever let’s fight i’m bored"
Ryu "lol Bison suck a dick, i told u my new power is too good!"
Bison "eh whatever, i will resurrect at some point, interessing new power btw, see ya in SF6"
Ryu “see ya”

Lol

You see the idea it’s there, it just lack the epicness it needed

As first step, they should have keept this shit for Bison, not waste it on Nec and get boring hado-ending for Bison

Same for Bison, his ultimate attack felt weak af, they should have make him charge his biggest psychoshit and Ryu pierce through it with dat punch

Personally i don’t blame story script much, more the coreography/direction of the scenes lacking the needed anime epicness for a script like that

23581

Nah dude your really losing the point. Even your examples were not on what I am saying and it’s very far.

I have even given other Anime examples in the earlier post and it’s really you didn’t get the point.

It’s not just the power up or even the power up and the conversation is as is between Ryu and Bison. In fact it wasn’t even about Ryu and Bison battle alone. **It’s more on Guile and Nash ** and the rest of the possible cast then Ryu and Bison as the least part.

23582

Cammy’s evolution throughout the series has been one of my favs.

She started out as a weapon that got so powerful that she needed a Psycho Limiter (Alpha 2 Gold) implanted into her to restrain her power. Right before that happened, she was beginning to question the meaning of her existence. By Alpha 3, Dhalsim encounters her and begins to make her more self-aware, leading Cammy to encounter Vega. There, Vega taunts her and tells her Bison plans to get rid of her, which she’s confused about because she’s his best assassin.

After beating Vega, she seeks out Bison, who immediately questions why she didn’t kill Vega. Cammy’s reluctance alone is apparently enough of a reason for Bison to exterminate her–aside from the fact that he’d rather take Ryu’s body for himself, anyway. Cammy ended up rescuing her sisters, but eventually loses all of her memory. It’s assumed that Vega took her to Delta Red, though I don’t get that impression anymore. SF2 Revival has Bison saying he had Cammy planted there for his own reasons.

Fast forward to a few yrs later where Cammy learns she was created from Bison’s DNA, as she was meant to be his replacement body. Not only was she made by this evil fiend’s DNA, but she also did his bidding–killing countless people and other sorts of things. Cammy also has no fond memories of family since she’s never had one. Cammy has had a tough time living life as a normal human. When she was talking to Chun-Li about never having that experience, you really felt for her.

I’m glad Cammy’s become more well-rounded. She fights to protect others, so she’s the real deal.

If anything, I hope Cammy gets the ability to summon cats to scratch the shit out of the opposition in the next game. Fuck a Nadeshiko. Get scratched.

23583

Agree Cammy had been a serious character and more mature and wise role in SF than others SF younger girls.

Rose, Cammy, Chun li and Viper had very good story direction. Cammy’s role is like more older than her age because of caring of the dolls.

23584

<3

23585

I wanted Necalli to go around actually absorbing people with powerful unique ki energies. Absorbs Rose, gains Soul Power. Absorbs Nash, gains Illuminati power. Absorbs Bison, gains Psycho Power. Each time, his hair changes color and he becomes stronger.

Eventually, he tries to takes SnH from Ryu, but Ryu defeats him as he does in ASF, and this causes him to release everyone he’s absorbed, Majin Buu style.

23586

Final confrontation between Ryu & Bison was boring as shit.

They looked like action figures and by the end of the fight it had all the epic feeling and brutal confrontation qualities of “Tuesday”…

Absolutely lame. Street Fighter’s biggest confrontation basically ends with less intensity than the fucking win-loss screens of SFII.

Think about that.

Way too cartoonish. Way too uninteresting.

23587

[quote=“You, post:23572, topic:177027”]

This. I still can’t believe people think Chun’s role in ASF was good. Do people realize how little she accomplished in the story? Chun literally places a few chess pieces on a board that ends up being totally irrelevant. Then later on the hero’s big plan is literally just to walk into the base and do “something” because Rashid had a plan to stop the moons again. So they walk through the base and encounter no opposition after entering, find Bison, Ryu beats him, and Chun beats up a henchman who 5 seconds later gets up totally unharmed. It’s great that they showed her motherly side and all that shit, but Chun did NOTHING to stop Shadaloo. Absolutely nothing in ASF.

I’ve said it 1000 times, I don’t/didn’t care that she didn’t fight Bison or whatever. But she definitely should have done SOMETHING that hindered Shadaloo in ASF. Rashid did more to stop it than she did, and has been mentioned, that Urien quote about her has essentially been all but retconned. This wasn’t a good look for Capcom’s premiere heroine. And as I’ve also said, Capcom really wants to keep Chun delicate and soft. There’s no other explanation that makes sense as to why they always have her getting her ass kicked and rescued all the damn time. There is just no edge to her anymore. She just doesn’t come across as tough or competent like in past games.

Why Capcom did such a poor job with Chun, Cammy, and Guile is something I’ll never understand. Necalli was shit too but since he’s a new character, it didn’t sting as much. This was supposed to be the storyline that culminated the long journey that Guile Chun and Cammy have had against Shadaloo and Capcom just totally wasted all that potential.

23588

Chun’s role was definitely disappointing.

I’m just glad they at least allowed her to demolish F.A.N.G. at the very least. Granted, F.A.N.G. was almost no better than a typical Shadaloo grunt by that point with the amount of L’s he took. Mentally and physically, he was finished. Chun just took out the trash.