Street Fighter IV Review

Xbox 360 is fixed and I've been playing Street Fighter IV. As promised I thought I'd have a little chat about the game and tell you what I think. First of all the game looks great and the characters are all fairly well balanced. No characters feel feel overpowered or anything so there's a real oportunity picking who suits you best. Despite the couple of complaints I'm about to make it is still an excellent fighting game.

My first complaint is a minor one, the dialogue. Street Fighter IV isn't going to win any awards for its brilliant story or anything like that but that doesn't mean the dialogue has to be this bad. The commentator actually says "the weak lose and the strong win" fairly regularly, which constantly reminds me of how bad the dialogue is. Voice acting isn't particularly strong either, Chun-Li sounds inappropriately like one of the kids from Rugrats, Zangeif has a rather patchy Russian accent and Ryu doesn't sound Japanese enough. Now onto a slightly bigger problem. Street Fighter IV is quite challenging, even on the easiest difficulty setting. This mostly comes down to the fact that the games final boss Seth is the cheapest motherfucker I can recall. He teleports behind you and grabs you before you can even turn around. He has stretchy punches that extend for the majority of the screen. He even has a move that sucks you helplessly towards him so that he can pick you up and grind you between the solid ground and his buttcheeks. Cunt. Seth. Is. A Cunt. I haven't been this frustrated by cheap enemies since Mario Kart Wii (fucking blue shells, fuck fuck fuck).

One other issue is that the Xbox 360 controller isn't ideal for fighting games. Luckily Madcatz have released some Fightpads and Arcade Sticks that are awesome for Street Fighter IV. Unfortunately they aren't out in Australia yet and they are sold out globally. Don't even think about looking on ebay unless you want to pay triple the RRP. Here's a picture of the standard edition fighting stick.

I am personally probably going to either get one of these or a fightpad. There is another better Fighstick called the Tounament Edition which uses all the Sanwa parts found in the arcade machines but they're a little pricey for me. I'm very much looking forward to getting one or two of these bad boys though.

This Post Was Supposed to be About Street Fighter IV

Which I got supremely juiced up for. I popped the disc in my Xbox 360 and was totally blown away by the awesomeness of the opening screens (which is highly unusual for me). I selected my character and I watched their intro cutscene. I started fighting. It felt good. It was smooth and sexy but before I knew it the bitch wasn't "in the mood" anymore. After seriously no more than 10 seconds of play time my Xbox 360 was experiencing hardware issues (one blinking red light told me this, non-gamers might not get me on this bit). Fucking Microsoft. I've already had the damn thing fixed before with the highly popular "Red Rind of Death" issue and now I was experiencing some other problem. I called up customer services and they ascertained that because my warrenty had expired I would have to pay $140 to have my Xbox fixed. That pissed me off a whole bunch. They know damn well it's their own fault and they should've done a better job fixing the console tha last time I sent it to them. I still have a working Super Nintendo from the 90's and here I have a console that's broken twice in about 14 months through no fault of my own. This picture pretty much sums up my feelings on the matter (note: not my hand, not my xbox and not my picture).


I was extremely happy a few days later when my girlfriend, who had sympathised completely throughout my bitching, saw the console and asked "so what's wrong with it." I turned it on to show her and something beautiful happened. It was STILL a hardware failure, but it was a good one that Microsoft has had such issues with that they saw fit to extend the warrenty for this particular issue for up to 3 years. My console now had the red ring of death. I must've been the happiest person ever to have their console fuck up. I called up customer care and sure enough they're repairing the console free of charge. I don't know what the deal was, I guess a broken Xbox 360 is kinda shit at self-diagnosis (makes sense really). Kinda seems sketchy especially when warrenty is a major player in the game. So anyway I'm expecting it back soon so expect to hear about Street Fighter IV soon (in this regard you probably wanted my console to stay broken).

Mr.B's High Hopes For 2009 in Gaming

Ok I know I haven't really returned to form after my little break but I thought I'd indulge myself just once more before finally getting around to reviewing Martin Morning. Anyway, just for the sake of it, although nobody will take note or care, I've put together a little list of games I'm looking forward to this year. Whether or not they'll be good is yet to be seen. Fuck the explanations and excuses, I give to you "Mr.B's High Hopes For 2009 in Gaming."

The Sims 3 (PC)
When I first got my hands on the Sims 2 I was completely hooked for weeks. I'm not normally one for PC gaming, don't bother asking me why, and I seriously cannot think of any other time I've been so glued to my computer. I forgot to eat and sleep...well not entirely but I certainly ate and slept begrudgingly. Designing a human being and guiding it through life as either a nerd, romantic, money launderer or family raiser was certainly entertaining and rewarding. By the end of it my family practically populated the whole town. Anyway the 3rd installment in the Sims saga will feature even more customisation options and many new features that are sure to liven up the series.

Cursed Mountain (Wii)
I love a good survival horror game and what Cursed Mountain proposes is a very original idea for one indeed. The premise is that you are searching for you're brother who became lost after failing to adhere to Buddhist superstition before climbing a Himalayan mountain. The storyline is heavily influence by Buddhism and Tibetan folklore. This game is quite literally taking the genre to strange new places, as does the next game...


Sadness (Wii)
Once again survival horror, once again on the Wii and once again an original premise. Visually the game will have a black and white, gothic Victorian England sort of look (sorry if that's a bit of an eyefull). The game will deal with themes of narcolepsy, nyctophobia and paranoid schizophrenia. Psychological aspects to the survival horror genre have proven effective before in games like Silent Hill and Eternal Darkness and are hopefully going to work here aswell. The game's story will take place in pre-World War I Russia. All these excellent ideas for the survival horror genre are making me so excited I need to lay down a little bit before moving on in the list.


Resident Evil 5 (Xbox 360 and Playstation 3)
When compared to the last 2 titles Resident Evil 5 will be quite familiar. The hint is right there in the 5. If you count RE Zero (which I do) RE5 is the sixth installment in the main series of this very popular survival horror genre. But this one I recommend based on the strength of Resident Evil 4, which actually was original and reinvented the series. Of course the new direction RE4 took the series in was arguably not survival horror and more "over the shoulder action horror." But whatever, RE5 will basically be a high def RE4 set in Africa and starring Chris instead of Leon; and when RE4 was just soooo daaaaarrrrn gooooooood it's hard to not be excited.

Street Fighter IV (Xbox 360, Playstation 3, PC and Arcade)
This one's really a no-brainer. It's a new Street Fighter game with a fancy new stylised art direction.


The Conduit (Wii)
Another interesting Wii exclusive. This is a First Person Shooter that uses a lot of clever tricks to ensure it looks as good as the shooters on the 360 and PS3. That and it's control scheme is modelled heavily off Metroid Prime 3, which I hold as the greatest use of Wii controls in any game.

Madworld (Wii)
I pretty much talked this one up a few months ago and don't feel the need to do so again.

Muramasa: The Demon Blade (Wii)
Before I launch into my final preview I'd just like to acknowledge how nice it is to see so many original, non-gimmicky third-party titles on the board for 2009. After 2008 it's very encouraging to see. Anyway Muramasa is an action RPG game with 2D graphics that look hand drawn (think along the lines of games like Okami and Braid). It looks stunning. The game has a feudal Japan theme as features katanas, ninjas, kunoichis and emperors. Very cool stuff indeed. There are two different playable characters which may or may not warrent multiple playthroughs (depending on how good the game is and how different their story modes are I guess). The game is said to be 60 percent complete as of October 2008 so hopefully we'll be seeing this one soon.