THE pinnacle of fighting games. I only played like a few, but when I do play a new one, they're always super fun to play because of being able to unleash cool combos and requires genuinely hard and quick strategizing and lots of skill in order to be able to beat your opponent, especially if they're another competitive player. Well, Third Strike pretty much perfects everything I love about the genre to an absolute T to give us a fighting game like no other.

There's a huge sense of style to be found in this game, like in the music for example. Every single one of the tracks in this game feels so unique compared to what you would normally hear in other fighting games and helps to give each match you do a more unique and special vibe to it, from the really funky sounding "You Blow My Mind" to the more peaceful and calming vibes of "Twilight". Every track in this game feels fresh and none of them feel the same as each other, and that's honestly why this is one of my favorite soundtracks in all of games.

The artwork is another part of this game's insane sense of style. The backgrounds look so beautiful and perfectly represent the places that each of the characters are from and who they are. The spritework is also gorgeous as well, with insanely smooth and cool animations that legit feel like eye candy to watch.

The roster is really cool and are all really fun to play with and against. Honestly glad the only returning characters are Ryu, Ken, Akuma, and Chun-Li because it allows for more unique and awesome characters like the Hong Kong twins and Makoto to truly shine in the spotlight. Every character in this game feels so unique and different to play with compared to each other and it's always super fun to experiment with each and every one of them to see which ones work best for you. Super balanced too (even the worst characters like Sean and Twelve are still pretty decent to use).

The actual fighting aspect is where the game truly shines however and it's the very best you can find in any fighting game. You got your usually different movesets for each characters that allow for different types of combos, blocking, etc, which already gives this game a good sense of strategizing and skill you need in order to win, but what this game has that other fighting games don't is choosing your specials and parries. Each character has 3 specials you can choose to make them have for a single match that you can use in it and every single one of those 3 has their own advantages and disadvantages to them, and parries are a great way to block an incoming attack without taking chip damage and also being able to immediately unleash a huge combo after doing one so your opponent will be caught off-guard and can't really do anything about it. Carefully choosing which of the 3 specials to have before a match and deciding when to parry and trying to do it both add an extra layer of strategy and skill you need to beat your opponents and even more options for how to approach things in a fight (the best example of this being the famous EVO moment 37 where J Wong tried to finish off Daigo's Ken with his Chun-Li's Houyoku Sen, with that unfortunately backfiring on him because Daigo parried every single one of his kicks and than unleashed a deadly super combo on him to finish him off).

So yeah, this is honestly my favorite fighting game of all the ones I played so far. The game feels stylish in a way that no other fighting games can even get close to being and the actual fighting is the very best you can find in a fighting game in my opinion, with smooth gameplay and new mechanics that give you a shit ton of options for how you want to beat your opponent. Honestly peak fighting game and I can't wait to see it at this year's EVO.

fighting games are most often something people come to for their tight gameplay, interesting characters, and unique mechanics. street fighter is as basic of a fighting game you can get, and as such i dont find myself all that interested in most of the games. that being said, i find myself coming back to third strike more often than any other fighting game, and i think that has a lot to do with all the style this game has packed into it. street fighter iii has a completely different vibe from any other street fighter, instead of trying to ride the coattails of street fighter II and just reusing all the characters from that, (who i honestly find quite boring) third strike is doing its own thing to the beat of its own drum. so many weirdos are exclusive to this game, and theyre honestly some of my favorite characters in all of street fighter, such as Q, Twelve, Necro, and Remy. you've also got a bunch of really cool characters like Gill, Makoto, Dudley, Urien, and Oro, who did eventually come back in later games thankfully. i think this game's soundtrack also contributes a lot to its identity, its very hip hop informed and has some of the best songs in any fighting game. not to mention the beautiful sprite work and the amazing parry mechanic, which leads to some insanely hype matches. this is THE fighting game to play, i absolutely recommend.

When I was a kid, I was never all that good at playing arcade fighters.

Today, thanks to 3rd Strike, I can confidently say I'm still no good at playing arcade fighters.

It's a great game, though.