As someone who's only experience with fighting games is the Smash Bros series, (and a little bit of Mortal Kombat (2011) back when that first came out), I've always felt like I've been missing a big gap in my gaming knowledge base. So I figured, what better game to start filling that gap with than Street Fighter II! Which is why I started with Street Fighter 1. And Street Fighter 1 is just... very bad.
But Street Fighter II is great! Playing through the arcade mode, I felt like I was getting a microcosm of fighting game experiences. I'd get super excited whenever my opponent would bust out some insane special move I'd never seen before, like Chun-Li's spinning kick. Fighting Guile made me face what it's like to fight someone who just sits in the corner and spams projectiles. Fighting E. Honda made me face the reality that sometimes *I* was the guy sitting in the corner spamming projectiles. When facing off against Ken, I felt the thrill of planning what my next move should be and then successfully executing on it all within a split second. And then going up against M. Bison I realized that sometimes pure button mashing might be the only chance at victory.
But what's a fighting game if you're only playing by yourself? I knew I had to try my skills against real life, honest-to-goodness gamers. So I got four of my friends and we had our own tiny tournament. Now only one of them had any real experience with the game prior to this, so I was expecting the whole thing to be a bit of a mess. But it turned out to be insane. At our skill level, this had no business being as exciting as it was. There were constant close calls, several upsets, nearly every match went into game three. A grand finals that, with a bracket reset, lasted for ten whole games. It was glorious. Shoutouts to @SewerGoblin for nearly knocking me out in round one, @BaddaBoomie for causing a serious upset, LavaViper for nearly going all the way, and @Donjitsu for winning the whole thing.
This game is a ton of fun, and I'm excited to keep exploring the genre!
But Street Fighter II is great! Playing through the arcade mode, I felt like I was getting a microcosm of fighting game experiences. I'd get super excited whenever my opponent would bust out some insane special move I'd never seen before, like Chun-Li's spinning kick. Fighting Guile made me face what it's like to fight someone who just sits in the corner and spams projectiles. Fighting E. Honda made me face the reality that sometimes *I* was the guy sitting in the corner spamming projectiles. When facing off against Ken, I felt the thrill of planning what my next move should be and then successfully executing on it all within a split second. And then going up against M. Bison I realized that sometimes pure button mashing might be the only chance at victory.
But what's a fighting game if you're only playing by yourself? I knew I had to try my skills against real life, honest-to-goodness gamers. So I got four of my friends and we had our own tiny tournament. Now only one of them had any real experience with the game prior to this, so I was expecting the whole thing to be a bit of a mess. But it turned out to be insane. At our skill level, this had no business being as exciting as it was. There were constant close calls, several upsets, nearly every match went into game three. A grand finals that, with a bracket reset, lasted for ten whole games. It was glorious. Shoutouts to @SewerGoblin for nearly knocking me out in round one, @BaddaBoomie for causing a serious upset, LavaViper for nearly going all the way, and @Donjitsu for winning the whole thing.
This game is a ton of fun, and I'm excited to keep exploring the genre!