GDC: Getting my ass kicked at "Street Fighter IV"

Even back in the day when I haunted arcades, I wasn't much of a "Street Fighter" fan. I wasn't smart enough or coordinated enough to memorize and implement all the crazy combo's, which resulted in me getting my ass kicked repeatedly.

Visiting Capom's suite at GDC was a nice flashback to those days. Not only did I not really know what I was doing as I sat down to play "Street Fighter IV," but I was visiting the suite at the same time as some folks from Destructoid. Really nice guys but, as anyone who has visited the site knows, it's for hard core gamers. Which means it's by hard core gamers. Which means I got a nice flashback to the '80s as my ass was handed to me repeatedly, in the form of E. Honda or Guile falling on his ass.

(There's a photo on the left of two people playing against each other.)

I should have known I would be in trouble when I admitted to the guy sitting next to me I wasn't sure of all the controls (there were some on the machine, but they were in Japanese) and his response was "Guile controls the same." My seemingly logical response was "The same as what?" And the exasperated enthusiast game journalist replied "as in 'Street Fighter 2.'" As in "Duh." As in "How could anyone come to the Capcom booth and not remember how the controls worked in "Street Figher 2?!"

The game comes out this summer at arcades in Japan. It hasn't yet been announced on consoles but, you know... it'll probably hit 360 and PS3 by the holidays or sometime in 2009. Possibly in conjunction with the new "Street Fighter" movie.

So what was "Street Fighter IV" actually like? Pretty much the same as the "Street Fighter" I remember as a kid, except awesome hi-def graphics and more stuff going on in the background. To be honest, I'm probably not the best person to critique the game, as you may have picked up, so since I've picked on them a bit, I'll refer you to Destructoid for a more in-depth analysis.

Also on display was the new "Bionic Commando" game. Actually the two new "Bionic Commando" games -- the XBLA and PSN game "Bionic Commando Rearmed," which is essentially a tweaked version of the classic, and the new 3-D version for next-gen consoles.

I only got hands on "Rearmed," which certainly looks good and will be a fun throwback for those who loved the old version. I didn't get to play the 3-D game, but it looked in many ways like your standard abandoned city / jungle shooter. But with the big addition of an extendable bionic arm, of course. I was definitely impressed at how much work the developers put into making it work. There's a great mix of auto-aim, to make sure players don't miss the thing they're trying to latch onto, with manual adjustment to get an object right where you want it. Physics make objects, or the hero, move faster or slower based on the weight of the object he's holding onto. And there are some great fighting combos based on latching onto an enemy and pulling yourself towards him, or him towards you.

In other words, it's the standard game industry thing -- the same old shooter we're used to but with one big new feature. However, it looks like that feature might work extraordinarily well, which is certainly more than you can say for a lot of other action games.

(I should note that my "Bionic Commando" demo was, perhaps inevitably, repeatedly interrupted by screams and yells from the Destructoid guys' "SF IV" matches.)