Back home, and I have a rant - VGF

Tad Venture · 06-18-2006, 05:39 PM

Prepare yourselves for:

THE TOP 5 WORST STREET FIGHTER CHARACTERS

On this vacation, I packed a couple games. Wario Ware Touched, Mario Kart DS, Golden Sun, New Super Mario Bros, and Street Fighter Alpha 3. I have 3 stars in everything in MKDS, I have Wario Ware Touched down to the highest high scores I can possibly achieve. I beat New Super Mario Bros. with 3 stars really early in the trip, then beat Golden Sun halfway through the trip and forgot the sequel at home.

So, that leaves me with Street Fighter Alpha 3, a game that I've rarely played, and therefore have stuff to unlock. I set out in playing it.

I realize how much I love Street Fighter, and I also realize how terrible some of the Street Fighter characters are. I narrowed the list down to 5, and some honorable mentions.

These are based on the character's
A. Story
B. Playability
C. Coolness, or lack thereof (Less important than the former 2)

Here we go.

Disclaimer: I've never played Street Fighter 3. This list is of the characters in the Alpha Series, and the regular series up to 2.

5. Rainbow Mika
"Hey guys, we need another girl in the game. We have Zangief...he's like a wrestler in the USSR. Let's have an American Pro Wrestler to counter that, and we'll make her look pretty stupid."
"She'll have insanely large breasts, right?"
"This is a video game. Of course she will."

Thus was the board room meeting behind the creation of R. Mika. The reason she landed at 5 was because of the fact that they realize what a bad idea she was and they really ham it up with her, and she's actually playable. I'm still not a fan of the butt charge, though (which comes in 2 different forms!).

[Honorable mention for No. 5--Dee Jay. Very lame story, but I really enjoy playing as Dee Jay, he's got some fun moves, like his shaky uppercut deal.]

4. Dan Hibiki
Now, I know that if PenguinMan were still here, he'd disagree with me...But Dan Hibiki is on this list mostly for the same reasons that R. Mika was--He's a joke. Having a good joke every now and then is a good thing, but if that joke has a projectile of one inch distance, his strongest move being easily dodged by ducking, and is an all-around bad copy of Ryu, it's not a good joke. Plus he wears pink. I don't have a problem with pink, but what self-respecting martial artist has a pink uniform?

I realize Dan was supposed to get killed by Sagat or whatever. That would have been just fine with me, actually.

3. Thunder Hawk
Though I do like T. Hawk's story (2 of the puppet dolls for Shadaloo were captured from his tribe, so he sets out to destroy M. Bison and the rest of Shadaloo), that's really his only redeeming quality. Full-circle moves are tough to pull off on a control pad, so that takes out his strong moves. The diving thing is really not useful--When you're going up for Anti-Air, it's at a pretty awkward angle, and is pretty easily recovered from, and if you're going down from the air, the charge-up time for it is too long, so the computer or your opponent can easily block or roll out of the way or something. So, let's see...that's his whole moveset. In other words, not very good. Impossible to fight well with.

And to make matters worse, the computer will whip you whenever you play against T. Hawk. How do they do it? I dunno, they're the computer, they can do anything.

2. Edmond Honda
The reasons for this go without saying, but I will anyway. Unless your really into Sumo Wrestling, E. Honda's rather lame. I mean, come on, his best move involves hitting you with his oversized hindquarters [Sidenote: I edited this to fit the demographic of the current VGFer, which is under 8 years old. Or at least their maturity level being under that of a pre-8-year old.]. "Look! Up in the sky! It's a bird! It's a plane! No, it's E. Honda's Enormous butt coming down to crush you!" Death by obesity...Someone else's obesity, no less, is not a pleasant thing. Nor honorable.

And didn't Capcom make enough characters with "Tap the button repeatedly" moves? A five year old could be a formidle opponent with E. Honda by tapping the B button over and over again. I think Chun Li's kick thing, Blanka's Electricity thing, and Gen's pokey thing were enough, but no, Capcom had to give E Honda the "HUNDRED HAND SLAP! SUMO! RRAAAAAARRRR"

1. Birdie
Those of you reading this probably thought "Why isn't Birdie on this list yet?" Well, I think this is a very fitting place for him at #1.

A street thug trying to make a name for himself by joining an agency that is out for the destruction of earth. Yeah, fun stuff. Much like the board room meeting for R. Mika, the meeting was titled "We need another minority--let's think of one." What happened is that they ended up taking a white guy from SF1 and making him black. Real subtle, Capcom.

That's too bad, they could have had a way cooler minority. A secret service agent on the Shadaloo case would have been fun. Fighting in a suit would be enjoyable. But no, we had to have Hole-in-the-mowhawk, Chain-licking, used-to-be-white-guy, "Oh! I was pale before because I was sick!" Birdie.

Moveset:

Another guy with a full-circle move. Zangief had enough full-circle moves for the whole game, why make yet another person with that in his moveset?
A totally predictable flying-across-the-stage move. At least E. Honda's and Blanka's are somewhat surprising--Birdie makes a little twirl saying "Hey! Block this!"
And once again, that's his whole moveset. Plus, he's not cool. Anybody who licks the chains they have on their hands is not that cool in my book. Birdie gets the "FAIL" award. Well done, Birdie.

Fin.

Swordmaster Link · 06-18-2006, 05:49 PM

*nods* I have no gripes with this list.

***Ace Mercury*** · 06-19-2006, 12:04 AM

I always thought that adding more and more characters is a stupid way of making a fighter game. Eventually you run out of archetypes and good ideas, ending up with lame, incongruous characters. Like, when I heard about Sakura, I was all, like, dude why'd they put a school girl, like, into Street Fighter?

GRENTLEMEN · 06-19-2006, 01:10 AM

I've never been a fan of the Street Fighter series. I love me some World Heroes, and that's about as close as I get. Killer Instinct really needs another sequel, but I doubt Rare is fit to do the job, considering the shape they're in. Most people don't know how to make things just out-right cool, anymore. Heh, in the original Killer Instinct, T.J. Combo was obviously the lamest character. I don't know about KI2, though.. I mean.. Meh, they messed with some stuff they shouldn't have. Like Tusk(sp?) the barbarian... The way he says "DAAAHHHHHH" after just about everything is sooo damn annoying.

***Heroine of the Dragon*** · 06-19-2006, 03:15 AM

Welcome back, ML!!!! *gives ya marshmallows* It's great to see you return... did you send a postcard?

Koga · 06-19-2006, 04:20 AM

I've only briefly played Street Fighter Alpha 2, but I was a big fan of SFII and all its beefed up versions.

I can definitely agree with your assesments although it has to be sad that E. Honda's hundred-hand-slap is the best tapping move, because he can actually move while doing it. That made him one of the cheapest characters, although he could easily be countered by projectiles.

I really miss Balrog (= the black boxer) on your list, though. He was the most lame character. Even if the computer controlled him you could still easily get perfect.

I definitely prefer Killer Instinct to Street Fighter too.

Tad Venture · 06-19-2006, 06:25 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Koga

I've only briefly played Street Fighter Alpha 2, but I was a big fan of SFII and all its beefed up versions.

I can definitely agree with your assesments although it has to be sad that E. Honda's hundred-hand-slap is the best tapping move, because he can actually move while doing it. That made him one of the cheapest characters, although he could easily be countered by projectiles.

I really miss Balrog (= the black boxer) on your list, though. He was the most lame character. Even if the computer controlled him you could still easily get perfect.

I definitely prefer Killer Instinct to Street Fighter too.

The cheapness of characters really wears them down in my mind. Balrog was close to being on my list, but I have something against saying the Shadaloo Bosses aren't cool.

Bandit · 06-19-2006, 07:24 AM

.......I would wear a pink karate uniform. >_<;

Codiekitty · 06-19-2006, 09:12 AM

Note about Dan Hibiki:

It's believed he's actually a mockery of a King of Fighters character, I'm not sure which one since I'm not into King of Fighters. See, the KoF character was a ripoff of Ryu, so Capcom retaliated with Dan Hibiki.

And Sakura is just a female Ryu.

As for my opinion on Street Fighter, I'm not much of a fan of the series. I could barely play the version on Capcom Classics Collection, and my favorite character to play in Marvel vs. Capcom is actually Strider Hiryu. I guess my lack of love for Street Fighter was the reason I was able to walk away from the live-action movie without being completely offended by it (though I didn't think it was a good movie at all. I just didn't think it was written, directed, and edited by Satan like most people make it out to be).

Where are these lemmings going? The Super Nintendo Super Shire! Hop in line and follow them there!

Koga · 06-19-2006, 05:33 PM

The animated movie kicked ass.

Tad Venture · 06-19-2006, 09:36 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by CodieKitty

Note about Dan Hibiki:

It's believed he's actually a mockery of a King of Fighters character, I'm not sure which one since I'm not into King of Fighters. See, the KoF character was a ripoff of Ryu, so Capcom retaliated with Dan Hibiki.

And Sakura is just a female Ryu.

Yeah, I'm aware. Like I said, he's a joke, but in my opinion, not even very well done, since I've played King of Fighters before. One of Dan's winning quotes is "I'm not much in to the Art of Fighting, but I've always wanted to be the King of Fighters!"

I really like Sakura's story though (At least from the Comic Book). She was a Japanese girl who idolized E. Honda, and she finally got Tickets to see E. Honda fight some guy named Ryu. Ryu kicked Honda's ass and her new idol was Ryu. She followed Ryu to his training spot in Japan out of admiration, and Ryu actually trained her a little bit--hence the Ryu-like moves.

By your logic, Ken and Akuma would be dumb characters because their moves are like Ryu's, when they have cool stories behind the reason that their moves are similar, too.

Codiekitty · 06-19-2006, 10:12 PM

I don't know much about the Street Fighter stories, so this is purely from a gameplay/physical character design/basic role in the game/why Capcom created them viewpoint.

Sakura design meeting: "Hey, instead of trying to put some REAL effort into character design, let's just put boobs on Ryu!"

Ken was an alternative, not a boring knockoff.

I don't get Akuma. What was so wrong with M. Bison that they had to create an evil Ryu to take his place as main villian of the Street Fighter universe?

Where are these lemmings going? The Super Nintendo Super Shire! Hop in line and follow them there!

Tad Venture · 06-19-2006, 10:45 PM

I'll admit that the Sakura design is a little lazy, but what can you do. I like it when Capcom makes characters and gives them actual stories, unlike R. Mika. Sakura's story explains why her moves, and it's a fun story, too. That's just fine with me--she has a fitting story. She's not sucky.

Akuma's story is also awesome. Akuma killed the master that Ryu and Ken trained under, Master Gouki. Akuma is trying to make Ryu realize his true potential by unlocking the evil force within him and let it take control. The evil force is actually what gave Sagat the scar. There's more to Akuma's story, too, if you want to hear.

Bottom line: I don't mind it when Capcom makes new characters, or brings back old ones. Just give them a story that fits in and isn't an excuse to bring someone back. Birdie doesn't even really have a story. I'm really not sure why he's in the game.

06-19-2006, 10:12 PM	#12
Codiekitty Just Another Face in Red Jumpsuit Join Date: May 2001 Location: Lemmingland Gender: Posts: 19,143 Thanks: 121 Thanked 173 Times in 119 Posts Points: 43,546.72 Bank: 3,021,450.74 Total Points: 3,064,997.46 Donate	I don't know much about the Street Fighter stories, so this is purely from a gameplay/physical character design/basic role in the game/why Capcom created them viewpoint. Sakura design meeting: "Hey, instead of trying to put some REAL effort into character design, let's just put boobs on Ryu!" Ken was an alternative, not a boring knockoff. I don't get Akuma. What was so wrong with M. Bison that they had to create an evil Ryu to take his place as main villian of the Street Fighter universe? Where are these lemmings going? The Super Nintendo Super Shire! Hop in line and follow them there! Last edited by CodieKitty; 06-19-2006 at 10:22 PM.

06-18-2006, 05:39 PM	#1
Tad Venture Moderator of Awesome Join Date: Aug 2001 Location: Location, Location. Gender: Posts: 23,502 Thanks: 484 Thanked 628 Times in 369 Posts Points: 80,512.52 Bank: 94,554.82 Total Points: 175,067.34 Donate	Back home, and I have a rant Prepare yourselves for: THE TOP 5 WORST STREET FIGHTER CHARACTERS On this vacation, I packed a couple games. Wario Ware Touched, Mario Kart DS, Golden Sun, New Super Mario Bros, and Street Fighter Alpha 3. I have 3 stars in everything in MKDS, I have Wario Ware Touched down to the highest high scores I can possibly achieve. I beat New Super Mario Bros. with 3 stars really early in the trip, then beat Golden Sun halfway through the trip and forgot the sequel at home. So, that leaves me with Street Fighter Alpha 3, a game that I've rarely played, and therefore have stuff to unlock. I set out in playing it. I realize how much I love Street Fighter, and I also realize how terrible some of the Street Fighter characters are. I narrowed the list down to 5, and some honorable mentions. These are based on the character's A. Story B. Playability C. Coolness, or lack thereof (Less important than the former 2) Here we go. Disclaimer: I've never played Street Fighter 3. This list is of the characters in the Alpha Series, and the regular series up to 2. 5. Rainbow Mika "Hey guys, we need another girl in the game. We have Zangief...he's like a wrestler in the USSR. Let's have an American Pro Wrestler to counter that, and we'll make her look pretty stupid." "She'll have insanely large breasts, right?" "This is a video game. Of course she will." Thus was the board room meeting behind the creation of R. Mika. The reason she landed at 5 was because of the fact that they realize what a bad idea she was and they really ham it up with her, and she's actually playable. I'm still not a fan of the butt charge, though (which comes in 2 different forms!). [Honorable mention for No. 5--Dee Jay. Very lame story, but I really enjoy playing as Dee Jay, he's got some fun moves, like his shaky uppercut deal.] 4. Dan Hibiki Now, I know that if PenguinMan were still here, he'd disagree with me...But Dan Hibiki is on this list mostly for the same reasons that R. Mika was--He's a joke. Having a good joke every now and then is a good thing, but if that joke has a projectile of one inch distance, his strongest move being easily dodged by ducking, and is an all-around bad copy of Ryu, it's not a good joke. Plus he wears pink. I don't have a problem with pink, but what self-respecting martial artist has a pink uniform? I realize Dan was supposed to get killed by Sagat or whatever. That would have been just fine with me, actually. 3. Thunder Hawk Though I do like T. Hawk's story (2 of the puppet dolls for Shadaloo were captured from his tribe, so he sets out to destroy M. Bison and the rest of Shadaloo), that's really his only redeeming quality. Full-circle moves are tough to pull off on a control pad, so that takes out his strong moves. The diving thing is really not useful--When you're going up for Anti-Air, it's at a pretty awkward angle, and is pretty easily recovered from, and if you're going down from the air, the charge-up time for it is too long, so the computer or your opponent can easily block or roll out of the way or something. So, let's see...that's his whole moveset. In other words, not very good. Impossible to fight well with. And to make matters worse, the computer will whip you whenever you play against T. Hawk. How do they do it? I dunno, they're the computer, they can do anything. 2. Edmond Honda The reasons for this go without saying, but I will anyway. Unless your really into Sumo Wrestling, E. Honda's rather lame. I mean, come on, his best move involves hitting you with his oversized hindquarters [Sidenote: I edited this to fit the demographic of the current VGFer, which is under 8 years old. Or at least their maturity level being under that of a pre-8-year old.]. "Look! Up in the sky! It's a bird! It's a plane! No, it's E. Honda's Enormous butt coming down to crush you!" Death by obesity...Someone else's obesity, no less, is not a pleasant thing. Nor honorable. And didn't Capcom make enough characters with "Tap the button repeatedly" moves? A five year old could be a formidle opponent with E. Honda by tapping the B button over and over again. I think Chun Li's kick thing, Blanka's Electricity thing, and Gen's pokey thing were enough, but no, Capcom had to give E Honda the "HUNDRED HAND SLAP! SUMO! RRAAAAAARRRR" 1. Birdie Those of you reading this probably thought "Why isn't Birdie on this list yet?" Well, I think this is a very fitting place for him at #1. A street thug trying to make a name for himself by joining an agency that is out for the destruction of earth. Yeah, fun stuff. Much like the board room meeting for R. Mika, the meeting was titled "We need another minority--let's think of one." What happened is that they ended up taking a white guy from SF1 and making him black. Real subtle, Capcom. That's too bad, they could have had a way cooler minority. A secret service agent on the Shadaloo case would have been fun. Fighting in a suit would be enjoyable. But no, we had to have Hole-in-the-mowhawk, Chain-licking, used-to-be-white-guy, "Oh! I was pale before because I was sick!" Birdie. Moveset: Another guy with a full-circle move. Zangief had enough full-circle moves for the whole game, why make yet another person with that in his moveset? A totally predictable flying-across-the-stage move. At least E. Honda's and Blanka's are somewhat surprising--Birdie makes a little twirl saying "Hey! Block this!" And once again, that's his whole moveset. Plus, he's not cool. Anybody who licks the chains they have on their hands is not that cool in my book. Birdie gets the "FAIL" award. Well done, Birdie. Fin.

06-18-2006, 05:49 PM	#2
Swordmaster Link Super Bodyguard & King of the Arcade Join Date: Apr 2000 Location: Wherever you want me to be Gender: Posts: 29,999 Thanks: 215 Thanked 538 Times in 376 Posts Points: 1,168.85 Bank: 1,205,748.12 Total Points: 1,206,916.97 Donate	nods I have no gripes with this list.

06-19-2006, 12:04 AM	#3
*Ace Mercury* Marshmallow Knight ☆ Supermod Join Date: Jun 2000 Location: Southern Ontario Gender: Posts: 18,945 Thanks: 360 Thanked 1,496 Times in 783 Posts Blog Entries: 1 Points: 98,044.56 Bank: 12,202,050.71 Total Points: 12,300,095.27 Donate	I always thought that adding more and more characters is a stupid way of making a fighter game. Eventually you run out of archetypes and good ideas, ending up with lame, incongruous characters. Like, when I heard about Sakura, I was all, like, dude why'd they put a school girl, like, into Street Fighter?

06-19-2006, 01:10 AM	#4
GRENTLEMEN Retro Nintendo Supermod Art & Literature Mod Metroid Mod Join Date: Aug 2002 Location: I rub my tilde all over your asterisk Gender: Posts: 15,886 Thanks: 456 Thanked 1,151 Times in 628 Posts Points: 6,533.33 Bank: 1,830,360.28 Total Points: 1,836,893.61 Donate	I've never been a fan of the Street Fighter series. I love me some World Heroes, and that's about as close as I get. Killer Instinct really needs another sequel, but I doubt Rare is fit to do the job, considering the shape they're in. Most people don't know how to make things just out-right cool, anymore. Heh, in the original Killer Instinct, T.J. Combo was obviously the lamest character. I don't know about KI2, though.. I mean.. Meh, they messed with some stuff they shouldn't have. Like Tusk(sp?) the barbarian... The way he says "DAAAHHHHHH" after just about everything is sooo damn annoying.

06-19-2006, 03:15 AM	#5
*Heroine of the Dragon* The Grinnie Fool! ♥ VGFCodes Staff Join Date: Jul 2000 Location: In a pretty place surrounded by sparkly faerie dust!! Gender: Posts: 27,544 Thanks: 241 Thanked 258 Times in 190 Posts Blog Entries: 1 Points: 17,197.90 Bank: 1,906,558.86 Total Points: 1,923,756.76 Donate	Welcome back, ML!!!! gives ya marshmallows It's great to see you return... did you send a postcard?

06-19-2006, 04:20 AM	#6
Koga Veteran Member Join Date: Sep 2000 Location: The Netherlands Gender: Posts: 17,093 Thanks: 104 Thanked 176 Times in 118 Posts Points: 104,323.41 Bank: 17,752.41 Total Points: 122,075.82 Donate	I've only briefly played Street Fighter Alpha 2, but I was a big fan of SFII and all its beefed up versions. I can definitely agree with your assesments although it has to be sad that E. Honda's hundred-hand-slap is the best tapping move, because he can actually move while doing it. That made him one of the cheapest characters, although he could easily be countered by projectiles. I really miss Balrog (= the black boxer) on your list, though. He was the most lame character. Even if the computer controlled him you could still easily get perfect. I definitely prefer Killer Instinct to Street Fighter too.

06-19-2006, 07:24 AM	#8
Bandit Senior Member Join Date: Apr 2001 Location: Your Pants Gender: Posts: 3,685 Thanks: 184 Thanked 165 Times in 91 Posts Points: 25,078.14 Bank: 1.38 Total Points: 25,079.52 Donate	.......I would wear a pink karate uniform. >_<;

06-19-2006, 09:12 AM	#9
Codiekitty Just Another Face in Red Jumpsuit Join Date: May 2001 Location: Lemmingland Gender: Posts: 19,143 Thanks: 121 Thanked 173 Times in 119 Posts Points: 43,546.72 Bank: 3,021,450.74 Total Points: 3,064,997.46 Donate	Note about Dan Hibiki: It's believed he's actually a mockery of a King of Fighters character, I'm not sure which one since I'm not into King of Fighters. See, the KoF character was a ripoff of Ryu, so Capcom retaliated with Dan Hibiki. And Sakura is just a female Ryu. As for my opinion on Street Fighter, I'm not much of a fan of the series. I could barely play the version on Capcom Classics Collection, and my favorite character to play in Marvel vs. Capcom is actually Strider Hiryu. I guess my lack of love for Street Fighter was the reason I was able to walk away from the live-action movie without being completely offended by it (though I didn't think it was a good movie at all. I just didn't think it was written, directed, and edited by Satan like most people make it out to be). Where are these lemmings going? The Super Nintendo Super Shire! Hop in line and follow them there!

06-19-2006, 05:33 PM	#10
Koga Veteran Member Join Date: Sep 2000 Location: The Netherlands Gender: Posts: 17,093 Thanks: 104 Thanked 176 Times in 118 Posts Points: 104,323.41 Bank: 17,752.41 Total Points: 122,075.82 Donate	The animated movie kicked ass.

06-19-2006, 10:45 PM	#13
Tad Venture Moderator of Awesome Join Date: Aug 2001 Location: Location, Location. Gender: Posts: 23,502 Thanks: 484 Thanked 628 Times in 369 Posts Points: 80,512.52 Bank: 94,554.82 Total Points: 175,067.34 Donate	I'll admit that the Sakura design is a little lazy, but what can you do. I like it when Capcom makes characters and gives them actual stories, unlike R. Mika. Sakura's story explains why her moves, and it's a fun story, too. That's just fine with me--she has a fitting story. She's not sucky. Akuma's story is also awesome. Akuma killed the master that Ryu and Ken trained under, Master Gouki. Akuma is trying to make Ryu realize his true potential by unlocking the evil force within him and let it take control. The evil force is actually what gave Sagat the scar. There's more to Akuma's story, too, if you want to hear. Bottom line: I don't mind it when Capcom makes new characters, or brings back old ones. Just give them a story that fits in and isn't an excuse to bring someone back. Birdie doesn't even really have a story. I'm really not sure why he's in the game.