Hiya!

Street Fighter 6 is officially a year old now! The latest entry to Capcom‘s long running fighting game franchise garnered a lot of praise from gaming news sites and fans alike. Even the PlayStation 4 version of the game played remarkably well. Not as good as it does on higher end consoles but it was still playable, which was kind of surprising to me. Capcom even decided to announce the 1st Year Anniversary by holding a month-long celebration and to get us all revved up for a whole new year of Street Fighter 6 content.

While the game launched with a lot of great fanfare, that’s not enough in today’s gaming universe. Gamers today expect companies like Capcom to support something like a fighting game by sprinkling new content throughout the year. I do find it weird no one really reviews this. So, I decided to do something about that! Here’s my review of the entire 1st year of Street Fighter 6!

A few guidelines to detail here before I go into the review itself. I will, as much as possible, not factor in how much I love Street Fighter 6 when it was first released. After all, this is a review of what happened after launch. This is me looking at how Capcom handled what happened afterwards and the content they’ve added throughout the year since launch. This includes all the DLC characters, the little added games and content, the patches (or lack thereof), the tournaments and the like. We’ve got a lot to talk about so let’s not waste any more time!

The most notable additions Capcom made were, of course, the Year 1 DLC characters. It’s become a running practice for any fighting game to add a few new roster members and Street Fighter 6 was no different. I will say Capcom put a lot of work into Rashid, AKI, Ed and Akuma as they all had their own strengths and weaknesses, making them all competitive in their own way. The only “weak” DLC character, in my opinion, was AKI as she was the only one without an invincible Overdrive reversal. Still, in the right hands, she can do a lot of damage. So, no one was outright “bad” in the typical sense.

Not only that, each of them could also be your Master in World Tour mode. I do think it’s rather disappointing they weren’t woven into the story mode all that well. I understand it would be difficult to make them integral to the main plot of JP taking over Nayshall post launch. However, it does seem like a waste as well since Rashid, AKI and Ed have strong connections to Shadaloo and, in turn, JP himself. They do mention the criminal organization when you to reach a high enough relationship level in World Tour mode. It still feels like it could have been integrated better.

I do have to give a thumbs down on the character DLC release schedule as Capcom didn’t pin down a regular timeframe between each release. Rashid was released around a month or so after Street Fighter 6’s release. 2 months after that, AKI was made available. So, you would expect a timeframe of around 2 to 3 months based on that pattern, right? Well, apparently not as Ed was released February, a whopping 5 whole months since AKI! That’s insane to think there was a 5 month span of time when there was no new character!

To be fair, Capcom did try to fill the time with a lot of Avatar costumes, emotes and other extra stuff, which I can appreciate but I know a lot of the hardcore Street Fighter audience couldn’t. I understand where they’re coming from as the World Tour is more of a fun little addition rather than an integral part of the Street Fighter 6 package. To them, the main game is having the roster duke it out so all the Avatar stuff, despite some of them being pretty cool, was a big letdown. I do hope Capcom does make the release schedule of the DLC characters a bit more regular so all of the Avatar stuff could be a little more palatable for the hardcore crowd.

It also does boggle the mind how Capcom made deals with the likes of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Spy X Family only for these collaborations to work with just the Avatars. This feels like a gigantic missed opportunity to make a whole lot more money. Instead of just giving us the option of buying putting on a Leonardo skin on your Avatar or putting on Yor’s iconic assassin gown on your created character, imagine how much more money would Capcom make if it was Ryu donning the half-shell or Chun-Li walking around stylish in Yor’s outfit. I know even the hardcore audience would’ve loved this!

Speaking of outfits, I was also disappointed with the rather lack of alternate costumes Street Fighter 6’s main roster got. Most of the secondary and tertiary costumes are really well made. I mean, Marisa‘s wedding dress, Manon‘s regal costume and Juri‘s sleepwear are costumes I purchased and I don’t even play Marisa, Manon or Juri! Too bad some are rather uninspired, like E. Honda‘s vacation outfit and did they really just put Blanka in the Blanka-Chan costume again? Still, the majority were good so I guess Capcom really wanted to focus on making them as good as possible. Quality over quantity and all that jazz.

I do love how the secondary outfit can be unlocked by raising your relationship with each character in World Tour mode. It gives people the incentive to play that “extra” mode and, hopefully, see how fun it can be. The pricing for the 3rd outfit did leave a lot to be desired as they’re really expensive and, for some reason, Capcom didn’t allow us to get a bundle of all the costumes! While I don’t have any regrets paying for the aforementioned Marisa, Manon and Juri outfits, this did mean I will be refraining from getting the E. Honda and Blanka costumes. If it was in one neat little package at a slightly discounted price, I might’ve gotten it.

The biggest issue I have is with the number of balance updates Street Fighter 6 has gotten throughout its 1st year. Capcom only made 1-1/2 balance updates. I say 1/2 because the first one they did was this really teeny tiny one which tweaked a few things here and there, like JP’s crouching heavy punch not being a super good anti-air or making Luke’s crouching medium punch much more easy to whiff punish. They only released the gigantic balance patch alongside Akuma’s release. I do think one gigantic balance patch is better than nothing but, I’ve already talked with myself about this and I say 2 or 3 would be a better frequency. Capcom already said they’re going to do more balance updates throughout Year 2 and I say that’s going to be a vast improvement from Year 1.

While I may seem like I’m being super negative of the entire year Street Fighter 6 had, but they did do some things right, like the Akuma Giant Attack event, which was incredibly fun. The thing is Capcom should do more fun and crazy events. They’ve been talking about doing an Extreme Battle tournament but how about things like Avatar tournaments or having some tournaments on the Arcade machines featuring Street Fighter II Turbo?

The thing is, while the entire year was kind of ho-hum, the base Street Fighter 6 experience more than makes up for it. I have been playing Street Fighter 6 almost daily since its release so the game is fun. I just wish Capcom made it more fun by sprinkling really good content consistently throughout the year.

Byee!

What did you think of Street Fighter 6’s first year? Let me know in the comments section below!