I’m a big fan of the Street Fighter series. It is no secret for a person. So I was pleasantly surprised when Capcom announced a compilation summarizing my life as a gamer, developed by Digital Eclipse. So I had to put this compilation to the test.
Recap of previous episodes:
Street Fighter 30th Anniversary Collection is a compilation of the following 12 games:
- Street Fighter
- Street Fighter II
- Street Fighter II: Champion Edition
- Street Fighter II: Hyper Fighting
- Super Street Fighter II
- Super Street Fighter II Turbo
- Street Fighter Alpha
- Alpha Street Fighter 2
- Alpha Street Fighter 3
- Street Fighter III
- Street Fighter III: 2nd Impact
- Street Fighter III: 3rd Strike
In addition to the local Arcade and Versus mode for all games, Training Mode is available for the 4 main games that also have online combat mode: Street Fighter II: Hyper Fighting, Super Street Fighter II: Turbo, Street Fighter Alpha 3, and Street Fighter III: 3rd Strike.
The Switch version features a recreation of Super Street Fighter II: The Tournament Battle (previously available in arcade) that allows you to create a tournament between several Nintendo Switches locally on SSF2.
The owners of PS4, Xbox One and PC who had pre-ordered the game, got an additional copy of Ultra Street fighter IV instead.
There is also a Museum mode and gallery mode with lots of information about the Street Fighter saga and it’s really nice to see it all as a fan.
Details for fans
Now that what was obvious has been said, let’s move on to all the details that are not advertised in the trailers or press releases.
The games are present in minimum arcade version, there are no or very few controls on the dipswitches, ie on all the options that arcade managers had access to.
You will be able to adjust the difficulty on most games, the speed on some of them, the level of damage on some of them and that’s about it.
With 12 games, and hundreds of character variations, I was hoping to at least have a list of commands for each of them, to find out what moves are available in a particular game… Well… THAT’S THE WAY IT IS. They really put a list of commands in each of the games, for all the characters. I hadn’t seen this detail anywhere, so I’d rather reassure you.
It is also possible to customize the game controls for player 1 and player 2, and the changes will be applied to all games at once, because they all use the same low fist, Middle Fist, Strong Fist, Low Foot, Middle Foot, Strong Foot scheme.
However, it is not possible to assign the combination of 3 punches or 3 kicks to a single button, as is the case in the vast majority of console versions of Street Fighter.
The Start button on your controller is associated with the Compilation Menu, while the Back button is associated with the Start button on the game’s arcade terminal. It will take you a little while to stop making the mistake and squeeze one instead of the other.
Online mode
For online modes, you have the right to:
- An Online Arcade: Play arcade mode in one of the 4 main games with the option to be interrupted by an online opponent at any time.
- Ranked Match
- Casual Match
- And lobbies of 4 players…. No way to adjust the number of players at all in these lobbies. We just decide whether it is public or private. On the other hand, THE fabulous feature of this mode is the ability to choose which of the 4 main games you want to play before each game. You can start a first game and lose to a Guile in Super Street Fighter 2 Turbo, want your revenge and win in Third Strike, and play the beautiful in Street Fighter Alpha 3. The 2 players decide each time the game they want to play, and it is decided at random between the 2 choices. Just this function changes my appreciation of the compilation. It’s great fun to constantly change games, characters, and see lots of opponents’ techniques. It should be noted, however, that in the lobbies of 4 players, you cannot expel a player out of it. A basic function that is missing.
Another basic missing function, ragequitters are not punished and can disconnect inconsequentially when they are about to lose their match.
Les modes Arcade, Versus, Training
Apart from the online aspect, Arcade versions of the games are present with their qualities and flaws. It depends on the point of view. So Akuma is playable in Super Street Fighter 2 Turbo with the same code as at the time, it is still much better than the rest of the characters and it is playable online, with no option to ban it.
The other hidden characters are also playable with their respective codes.
Bonus courses are also present: barrels, cars to destroy… All the purposes of each of the characters are there too.
You can even save at any time in arcade mode so you don’t lose your progress.
And Street Fighter 1 is still unplayable.
In Versus Local mode you can choose the level you want to compete on in ALL the games, and that’s great. This is a feature that existed in very few console versions of these games.
The Training mode of the 4 main games has PLEIN of options. In addition to being able to choose the level of the game as in Versus, we can set the bars of fury, the living standards, the state of the opposing CPU and above all … we can record a sequence that the CPU will reproduce at will. It’s enough to learn to parse certain techniques and train properly.
The balance sheet
Games require a little time to adapt because of tighter timings than recent Street Fighter productions.
To conclude, the compilation is fun to browse and you can change the game at any time.
A few details mentioned above are missing to be totally unavoidable for passionate players, but casual players are sure to have fun with the titles they know.
It’s strange, developers seem to know what enthusiasts want and give them a lot of content but fail on certain details.
Hopefully this will be patched in the near future.
Compiling is a convenient way to play all these games, on a recent machine.
And thanks to the Switch version, you can now take them anywhere.
Street Fighter 30th Anniversary Collection (Steam, PS4, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch)
Version tested PC Steam.
Price: $50 CAD.
Release date: May 29, 2018
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