REVIEW – Finally! Street Fighter got a numbered, main installment in the series after several years. The fifth numbered episode is only available on the PlayStation 4 on consoles, so because of this, there was a lot of expectation when February 16 came by. Sadly, we were a little disappointed.

In about two and a half days, I was only able to log in five times total. I have to point this out after seeing a ton of beta testing and also server stress tests before the game launched. Capcom had many opportunities to prepare for launch day. That’s not all [You have logged out of the server, error message!] – …

Serve the server!

I thought it would be a good idea to start playing by some practice, so I launched the Survival mode. I managed to log in, which made the start promising. Oh yeah? I got up to stage nine in the mode and all of a sudden, bam, I’m disconnected from the game server. That’d be alright… if I weren’t thrown back to the main menu after all that jazz! This is not just my problem; I saw several other players encounter the same issue.

Sixteen

Street Fighter V‘s initial cast consists of sixteen players. There are several newcomers, including F.A.N.G, whose gameplay is radically different due to his ability to poison enemies. I managed to win several matches by using this as a last resort. Laura is also a new character; she’s mainly throwing her enemies around. That’s Jiu Jitsu for you, folks!

I also have to include Necalli and Rashid. The latter one isn’t unique for being a Middle-East character (we already saw someone in the EX series!), but also because of his combination of parkour and the wind in his gameplay. Necalli, one of the antagonists of the game, also is a mixture of wrestling with feral elements.

UE4

I was very curious about the gameplay, as Capcom doesn’t use a proprietary engine but instead, they licensed Unreal Engine 4 from Epic Games. (This is the same case with Bandai Namco and Tekken 7.) The engine works well.

The gameplay is a joy for both professionals and amateurs. There is a learning curve, but it isn’t steep enough to be an issue. I have to say, I found Street Fighter V a bit addictive no matter which character I took control of. We can use more powerful moves (offensive and defensive – depends on your character of choice) with the V-Trigger. V-Reversal is a nice way to punish your enemy. It’s a little hard to describe but think of the V-Gauge as a special bar, and you can pull extra moves off by burning this bar down.

“Laura is also a new character; she’s mainly throwing her enemies around. That’s Jiu Jitsu for you, folks!”

Graphically, Street Fighter V is decent. It’s a little more realistic after IV, but it’s still having a bit of that caricature style. You can get used to it in a short time. The audio is also nicely done, and I think the theme isn’t as annoying as IV’s was. (Iiiiiiiiiiindeeeeeeeestruuuuuctableeeeeeeee…)

Lacking

The current story mode in the game is very weak. You can get through it quite quickly with all sixteen characters. Sure, Capcom promised an actual story mode… in June. This is where the game’s second biggest issue enters (after the servers): Street Fighter V lacks content.

Survival, Training, Arcade – after a few hours, playing solo going to be boring. Yeah, you can point out that Capcom made SFV mainly for online matches (Capcom Fighters Network, the biggest menu point…), but that needs working servers. Either I can log in and drop out after a while, or I can’t even find another player whatsoever. I cannot believe that this has become the trend: releasing games in an unfinished state with online capabilities being severely hurt due to servers not working.

Weak… in its current state

The game is only saved from a lower rating is that the additional content can be received for free by simply playing the game. You don’t have to pay for the DLC characters if you don’t want to. However, I still say that Capcom should have waited with this game until June. If they would have launched Street Fighter V as a whole in the summer, then the game would be okay… but then the pros wouldn’t be able to play. Capcom tuned SFV mainly for them.

I say that wait with the purchase until March, but if you like playing offline, and you’re a fighting games fan, I can still recommend SFV. In June, my rating would likely be an 8 or even an 8.5… but for now, my rating is for the CURRENT state of Street Fighter V. (I still can’t get over the censorship of Cammy and R.Mika.)

-V-

Publisher: Capcom

Developer: Capcom, Dimps

Genre: Fighting

Release date: February 16, 2016 (PS4, PC)