STREET FIGHTER III W IMPACT

—by Kenneth Lee

Years ago, during the end of the ‘STREET FIGHTER arcade craze,' fans (and non-fans) jokingly wondered if Capcom knew how to count to three—which was in direct reference to Capcom's ridiculous amount of sequels to its STREET FIGHTER II series, none of which ever managed to actually be a true sequel: a STREET FIGHTER III game. Well, finally after years and years of waiting, Capcom finally released STREET FIGHTER III into the arcades. But by then, the STREET FIGHTER craze had already died down, most fans moved on and what was supposed to be an epic gaming event, turned out to be a rather blasé moment for the industry.
Released on Capcom's new CPSIII arcade board, STREET FIGHTER III really seemed to be a worthy successor: A completely new cast of fighters (except Ken, Ryu and Gouki), three to four times the amount of frames of animation per move when compared to its predecessor, and an overall complete makeover (new gorgeous backgrounds, fluidity, increased color palette, etc.) All this added up to the most beautiful 2D fighting game ever created. In the end, after poor sales in the arcades, Capcom released a (‘surprise!') sequel to the game, called STREET FIGHTER III 2nd IMPACT, which featured 2 new characters, and new backgrounds. That was over a year ago.
At that time, no home system had enough 2D power to faithfully replicate these games. Finally, with the advent of the Dreamcast, Capcom has seen fit to release both games, STREET FIGHTER III and STREET FIGHTER III 2nd IMPACT onto the Dreamcast, in one complete package, called appropriately enough, STREET FIGHTER III W IMPACT ("double impact"). What this package contains is 100% perfect ports of both games, and in the end, what you get is a solid, tournament-style 2D fighting game, gorgeously animated, but ultimately lacking that certain appeal to make it great.
Without a doubt, Capcom has gone the extra mile in the graphics department. With the extra RAM available in the Dreamcast, Capcom has been able to create huge, well-crafted, and-drawn characters that animate as fluidly as anything seen in anime; seeing Ryu throw his Hadoken (fireball) is proof enough. You can actually see his arms pull back and then forward to ‘throw' the Hadoken, and when he releases it, his karate gi flaps in the wind generated by the ‘chi power' he used to create it! The backgrounds also are impeccably created, and they all look like wonderful paintings that fit into the game.
Beyond that, the game begins to fall short, starting with its all-new cast of characters. The irony here is not without humor: Perhaps the largest complaint by many fans of the series was that every sequel featured the same cast of characters and that they wanted Capcom to move on and give them totally new characters. It is sad that when Capcom finally did give the fans what they wanted, it was the sequel's greatest downfall.
Despite being well animated and far superior to any previous SF game, the character designs and concepts are just boring. You have Dudley, a British boxer who's about as much fun to play as his personality is appealing. A 1920's style fisticuffs ‘boxer' complete with suspenders and a starched white dress shirte, Dudley's prudish and stiff; Yun and Yang, two young Chinese skateboarding punks who fight like a cross between Gen and Fei Long; Oro, a thousand year-old withered, one-armed freak who throws fireballs by picking his nose! (no joke.) Then there's Ibuki, the requisite ‘kawaii bishoujo' (read ‘cute teenage girl') fighter, who's a ninja, but transforms into cute, hip street-clothed win poses at the end of matches (yawn); or Necro, a ‘90's Dhalsim,' complete with stretching limbs and the like, but nowhere near as cool. The list goes on, and the best one is the final boss, Gill, a muscle-bound freak, who's painted half-red, half-blue and fights practically naked with the exception of a pair of Speedos that he's wearing. Ultimately, all the characters just seem uninspired, or just too weird to relate to—who wants to play a nose-picking, 1000-year old mummy in a fighting game? They just don't have that personality that the classic STREET FIGHTER II characters had.
The gameplay is usually the most interesting aspect of the game but, like the character concepts, it falls short. Essentially, it's still the same six button layout: with light, medium and heavy punch and kick buttons. You hold back to block. Moves are still of the ‘move the joystick a quarter-circle forward/backward' variety. And they even added the ability to Super Cancel your moves: In other words, if you do a special move, like a Hadoken fireball, you can immediately interrupt that move, and ‘cancel' into a Shinkuu Hadoken super move, adding to the combo possibilities. This is without a doubt a great addition, and a good change from previous SF games. They even balanced gameplay out so that newbies wont get wiped out by a veteran 'combo master.' You do more damage pulling off a super move by itself than if you did it in a super cancel combo. So combo-crazy people can still show off and do the advanced combos but won't dole out outrageous amounts of damage. Gamers, who are less combo-inclined, can still do good damage executing the super move by itself at the right time.
But there are problems in two key areas: One, because of extra frames of animation, the game slows down considerably from previous incarnations. A roundhouse kick from Ryu now takes almost 2-3 times as long as it did in previous games, and while it's wonderfully animated, it does make the game slower. Now the slower gameplay itself isn't that bad—sure it's not as zippy or fast as before—but it can still be played. But the problem is that most veteran SF players are already accustomed to a much faster turbo speed. By slowing the tempo of the game down, moves are almost ‘telegraphed—when someone executes a move and because the action is animated so well but slowed down, you can see it coming a mile away, and react accordingly, punishing the attacker. And so, it turns into a much more defensive-driven game. Since you can see many moves a lot ‘clearer' now, both players have to be even more careful when to stick out a move, or jump in to attack, meaning, there is a lot more waiting and ‘sizing up' the opponent.
Yet what makes the game even worse is the second addition that Capcom made to the gameplay, the Parry. Basically, just when an opponent is about to hit you, tap toward your opponent (or tap down if it's a low attack), and you will ‘parry' the move: an offensive block. At that moment, you can immediately stick out some move of your own and punish the attacker. A very cool idea, but since you can parry almost anything in the game, this becomes a huge problem. With the slower gameplay, and with parrying now in, at the higher levels of playing, both people end up waiting for each other to stick out a move, so that they can either counter-attack immediately, or parry it and counter-attack. It becomes a very defensive game later on, and as a result, it becomes a lot more boring.
In the end, STREET FIGHTER III W IMPACT is a solid, beautifully-animated 2D fighting game, probably the most beautiful 2D game ever created. But what it falls short on is the lack of spirit in the game—it's just not fun. The boring cast of characters, slower and more strategic gameplay all add up to a game that falls short. It is even more interesting that SNK's previous release of THE KING OF FIGHTERS '99, which featured much more poorly animated characters, is a much more entertaining game; Nearly all of its cast of 38(!) characters are just exuding with personality and attitude, and the gameplay which not as refined, is faster, and just more enjoyable. SFIII is a good game, but nothing worthy of being the true sequel to STREET FIGHTER II.

Rating: 8.0 / 10.0

Dreamcast (1 GDRom)
Fighting
1-2 players
T-1211M
¥6800
Available now in Japan
Where to buy