At this moment in time, this is my favorite fighting game. I'm an extremely casual beginner who is slowly building up their skill, and despite its weird little mechanics, this is my favorite game to practice on. The presentation is great, the gameplay is smooth, and the roster size is worth dying for.
Gameplay:
I don't have anything insightful to say here as I'm not a pro and the gameplay is pretty standard. It plays like Street Fighter. You press the buttons. You punch the guy. You move the joystick around a fireball comes out. Alpha 3 does have a few interesting things going on though. Firstly, the giant roster of 28 characters is awesome. All the characters seemed pretty balanced too, or at least I haven't run into any unfair matchups. I could be wrong about that though. Second, the guard meter is something I wish more games had. It doesn't become a factor often, but when it does, I'm glad it's there. It prevents an overreliance on blocking for both you and your opponent by causing them to be stunned once a threshold is reached. The threshold is quite generous and therefore not too annoying or exploitable so it's a welcome little mechanic. Thirdly, the "-isms", probably the game's weirdest mechanic and the biggest sore spot for balancing. You can pick between three "-isms" when selecting a character. A-ism is the standard option where you do normal damage and have three super bars.
X-ism is supposed to sort of mimic SF2, I think, with only one super bar, but it does boost your damage to try to balance it out. V-ism turns your super meter into a custom combo meter and I don't even know what that means in my little fighting game pea brain. I guess the "ism" system is kind of neat, but it probably didn't really need to be there.
Though I love this game, I do have one massive qualm with it, that being the fight M.Bison at the end of the arcade ladder. You get one shot at it. If you lose to Bison, it's game over. You're sent right to the results screen. I just think that's so frustrating and unnecessary. It wouldn't be so bad if Bison didn't have ridiculously BS moves that covered the whole screen and ate 50% of your health. I know arcade games are meant to be unfair to eat your quarters but JEEZ. I did play this game on the SF 30th Anniversary Collection which does have save states, but it would be nice to not have to be required to use them. It just puts a big damper on the singleplayer content considering the fun of arcade modes is to see the endings.
Sound and visuals:
There isn't too much to note about the music and sound design. It's all pretty solid. However, I do absolutely love the announcer. The announcer puts all other fighting game announcers to shame.
The visuals are stellar. The whole Alpha series' art style is just so good. The characters are animated well, the stages look super nice, and the UI feels appropriately energetic. It's a seriously good looking game, though I will say that some of the character portraits can look pretty weird.
Conclusion:
Street Fighter Alpha 3 is a great fighting game. It's got some downsides, but overall, it's a lot of fun. It's simply just so fluid and high-energy, and there's a lot to explore with the mechanics and roster. It'll be hard to top this game for me, and I definitely recommend it (and the whole SF Alpha series in general) to any fighting game fan who hasn't tried it yet.
Gameplay:
I don't have anything insightful to say here as I'm not a pro and the gameplay is pretty standard. It plays like Street Fighter. You press the buttons. You punch the guy. You move the joystick around a fireball comes out. Alpha 3 does have a few interesting things going on though. Firstly, the giant roster of 28 characters is awesome. All the characters seemed pretty balanced too, or at least I haven't run into any unfair matchups. I could be wrong about that though. Second, the guard meter is something I wish more games had. It doesn't become a factor often, but when it does, I'm glad it's there. It prevents an overreliance on blocking for both you and your opponent by causing them to be stunned once a threshold is reached. The threshold is quite generous and therefore not too annoying or exploitable so it's a welcome little mechanic. Thirdly, the "-isms", probably the game's weirdest mechanic and the biggest sore spot for balancing. You can pick between three "-isms" when selecting a character. A-ism is the standard option where you do normal damage and have three super bars.
X-ism is supposed to sort of mimic SF2, I think, with only one super bar, but it does boost your damage to try to balance it out. V-ism turns your super meter into a custom combo meter and I don't even know what that means in my little fighting game pea brain. I guess the "ism" system is kind of neat, but it probably didn't really need to be there.
Though I love this game, I do have one massive qualm with it, that being the fight M.Bison at the end of the arcade ladder. You get one shot at it. If you lose to Bison, it's game over. You're sent right to the results screen. I just think that's so frustrating and unnecessary. It wouldn't be so bad if Bison didn't have ridiculously BS moves that covered the whole screen and ate 50% of your health. I know arcade games are meant to be unfair to eat your quarters but JEEZ. I did play this game on the SF 30th Anniversary Collection which does have save states, but it would be nice to not have to be required to use them. It just puts a big damper on the singleplayer content considering the fun of arcade modes is to see the endings.
Sound and visuals:
There isn't too much to note about the music and sound design. It's all pretty solid. However, I do absolutely love the announcer. The announcer puts all other fighting game announcers to shame.
The visuals are stellar. The whole Alpha series' art style is just so good. The characters are animated well, the stages look super nice, and the UI feels appropriately energetic. It's a seriously good looking game, though I will say that some of the character portraits can look pretty weird.
Conclusion:
Street Fighter Alpha 3 is a great fighting game. It's got some downsides, but overall, it's a lot of fun. It's simply just so fluid and high-energy, and there's a lot to explore with the mechanics and roster. It'll be hard to top this game for me, and I definitely recommend it (and the whole SF Alpha series in general) to any fighting game fan who hasn't tried it yet.