The next evolution of the Street Fighter series is finally here with Street Fighter 6. The direction of the series has forever changed with this new release as it modernizes everything about the series, but keeps a lot of the core intact. The previous game in the series, Street Fighter V, released over seven years ago and was barebones upon release. I can say that immediately out of the gate, those worries can be squashed. With some time consuming and varied modes, Street Fighter 6 offers a lot for players out of the box that doesn't even include the fighting mechanics themselves.

Even at its most base level, the fighter chosen for the cover was Luke, who won't be recognizable to people who may have left Street Fighter V early on and certainly not fans of the older titles. The game offers eighteen characters at launch with all offering a different fighting style. Ryu, Ken, Chun-Li, Guile, Zangief, E. Honda, Blanka and Dhalsim are the original World Warriors in the title while Cammy, Juri, Dee Jay and Luke are more recent characters from previous titles. Six new characters join the foray with some taking influence from other previous characters and others offering a brand new slate of fighting styles. If there's a certain style you're looking for, there's about 3-4 fighters that can be grouped to accomplish that. A combination of speed, counters, projectile, power and aerial assaults are balanced well in Street Fighter 6.

The classic characters have been modernized and given an older look while the new ones tend to be younger (outside of JP). Lily's heritage ties come from the same tribe as T. Hawk, although she plays much quicker. Manon is a French model/ballerina that has a long reach and tends to favor a defensive stance for her moves. Jamie tends to be more aerial and relies on "potions" to increase stats. Marisa is a large and devastatingly-powerful character that has reach. Kimberly has a very different move set that relies on speed and continuation of moves after landing. Finally, JP is all projectile with what seems to be psychic powers pulled from Bison. Every new character has their own usage with some that have a deeper option to master. Being able to offer something different with some of these characters while including the gameplay balance is fantastic.

Some of the move sets on the World Warriors and the legacy characters have been simplified. Almost all the moves in the game revolve around the half and full clockwise rotation. Of course, there's a move list and training to help learn the characters moves, specifically, and to see what gels best. The legacy characters also may have one or two moves added, so players won't necessarily be able to jump right in and take full advantage of their favorite legacy character. The updated character designs are also fantastic for the ones that got updated. Cammy, Dee Jay and Ken stand out the most. Dhalsim is much older, otherwise Zangief, E. Honda and Blanka still remain the same.

Capcom has also instilled the Drive mechanics, which can swing matches one way or another. There are two to use, one which allows for parrying and the other for aggression. The Drive Parry is a full on defensive action that when timed right can open things up for an offensive barrage. The Drive Impact shows off brilliant artistic graphics when used and it can break apart offensive moves. This can also be executed by both parties that creates a slow cutscene that adds suspense to the moment. Players in Street Fighter 6 only get dizzy or stunned if they're knocked against the wall, so there's less of this overall. These two mechanics add just enough to modernize the fighting mechanics and are a great implementation without being over complicated. There's a separate meter that gets built up that allows for use of this, and successful parries will also fill this meter. You won't be able to spam this, but the gameplay does lure you in to come out aggressive. There are also advanced moves of each character's special move that does more damage and that is completed by using both medium and high attacks at the same time. Of course, there are Super Moves in the game and each character has three varying levels with the best one being the top tier.

Another way Capcom has modernized Street Fighter 6 is with a new control scheme. The classic control scheme is still available, and for those familiar with it will probably still be better suited to use. Of course, controls can be customized for the button layout of choice. Throws are locked to both square and X simultaneously and the Drive Parry is triangle and O (on PlayStation, of course). The new control types are known as Modern and Dynamic. These are for players that are new to the franchise. Every aspect of this game feels geared towards mostly new and younger players, and the Modern and Dynamic Controls will assist with that. Kicks and punches are combined into light, medium and heavy attacks, with the option to pull off a special move that's mapped to a button. There's also an option for an assisted combo option, and it's possible that veterans online will take advantage of this. Dynamic is aimed at purely pulling off flashy moves with ease. On top of the Drive Mechanics, these new controls are a good starting point and hopefully they don't end up over the top.

Where Street Fighter V launched with basically just an arcade and versus mode, Capcom has rectified this and destroyed all fears. This is on top of the eighteen fighters to choose from, but the additional modes are out there. Fighting Ground is the traditional area where players can do Arcade Mode and play through the story of each character. The choice of doing five or twelve matches is available with increasing difficulty, but the game doesn't seem to have one main boss. The Arcade Mode features hand-drawn scenes to tell the narrative of each and it closes with a main rival for that specific fighter. Players are rewarded with tons and tons of beautiful artwork from different artists over the years. Players can also turn on on-going online invites for casual and ranked matches. This is where the the local versus is included and it's basically the traditional option for the Street Fighter series. Along with a team mode, Capcom has added the Extreme Battle Mode that throws in different rules and gimmicks for a change of pace. Bonus Stages also return during the Arcade Mode as you aim to score points.

The other big mode is geared towards specifically single player action. While fighting games have adopted more of a story mode, no one has really gone the route of an RPG. In World Tour, players will create an avatar that will progressively learn moves and unlock higher tiers of fighting stats as the story progresses. World Tour isn't some short tack on, either, but instead rather time consuming and can even come off grindy at the beginning. It takes place in Metro City, and there are a ton of nods and cameos with Final Fight characters. You start off training with Luke with another character named Bosch and there's an underlying issue with the chemistry between your avatar and Bosch. Bosch eventually bolts and does his own thing but you ultimately aim to protect him. The streets are full of gang members from different factions and much like an RPG, encounters will happen with varying levels of opponents. The goal is to get your avatar to follow under the teachings of the fighters in the game. This means utilizing a skill tree to improve attributes and ultimately groom the perfect fighter which can be taken to the Battle Hub. You can focus on special moves from specific fighting styles and offer any setup. This also includes focusing on speed, power, aerial attacks or projectiles.

World Tour can feel like Monster Hunter at times when it comes to the dialogue. New areas unlock and while tickets are needed to travel to eventual world locations, the main area to explore is Metro City. While trying to build up your avatar, it starts off slow. It begins to get tedious when gang members will run you down and they are lower levels, which won't help in the long run. Most anyone is willing to fight in Metro City, even the vendors. Players will need to watch their energy meter as it doesn't regenerate automatically, so they'll need food and other consumption items to bring this back up. Apparel can be purchased that has higher levels in different fields and can also include stat bonuses. In terms of an RPG, World Tour is solid across the board and gives players something else to play with that's actually engrossing with a pay off in the end. Besides just a few nagging design issues, it's orchestrated well. The avatar customization is also deep.

Lastly, the Battle Hub is where you will go to get beat down by online opponents. This is different than the matchmaking in Fighting Ground, as the Battle Hub is a dedicated online fighting area with some extras.  I feel those that get this and want to be the best online will stick directly to this mode. This is where the avatars can also do battle or you can choose from one of the eighteen fighters in the game. The problem with this is that you won't be selecting fighters for each match. You'll need to dig through the menus to select a default character to stick with, as they'll gain experience. The control type also defaults to Modern and this will need to be adjusted as well. There could have been a better design decision behind this. Your avatar navigates the arena and tucked away in the back is an actual arcade with Capcom Classics that will change up every so often. It feels much like an MMORPG hub as it has a live text chat where people can ask questions or gear up for a battle. Players can also spectate matches if they please. Capcom could have went with just either Fighting Grounds or the Battle Hub, but I'm glad they included both options. This will help build community and the access to classic games to play with others is awesome.

The actual online matches went mostly smooth. This is prior to the launch, but Capcom has had betas to try this. Every so often in the Battle Hub, I experienced lag during matches. Control input was quick and responsive, however, and matching up and loading into matches was consistently quick. There were more issues with spectating, but I believe the fast forwarding effect I got was to catch up to the live moment. While trying to find a ranked match through matchmaking in Fighting Grounds took a bit of time, this should be alleviated at launch. There's no lobby system on that side, as the Battle Hub serves as basically a lobby.

The soundtrack is actually a mixed bad and somewhat of a letdown for a Street Fighter game. Some of the music is big fight hip hop that goes well with the modernization, but some of the bangers you expect from Capcom-composed music just aren't there. It still fits the electronic mold that dates back to Street Fighter 4, but nothing comes across as catchy. To add to the big fight atmosphere, players have the option to select fight commentators for the matches each with different language versions. Thea Trinidad (Zelina Vega WWE), James "jchensor" Chen, Jeremy "Vicious" Lopez and Steve "TastySteve" Scott serve as English-language commentators. Kosuke Hiraiwa, Aru, Hikaru Takahashi and H.E. Demon Kakka serve as Japanese-language commentators. Players can pick who they would like, but strangely this is only done in the Fighting Ground versus menu yet carries over to other modes.

The voice recordings for each commentator are well done and while they weren't conversating with each other when recorded, there's chemistry that worked out between each. The dialogue will tend to get stale after a while and it's worth trying out. If you're into the tournament atmosphere and like to hear commentary, then this is right up your alley and coincides with the modernization of the franchise. The actual voiceovers in English for the fighters are also solid. It's what you would expect from a Capcom title, even with the World Tour voiceovers. It truly does feel like a JRPG especially when the voiceovers come into play from NPCs.

Street Fighter 6 is the first game in the series to run on the RE Engine. Obviously, this has been seen in Resident Evil and eventually Devil May Cry, but adapting this to Street Fighter felt a bit questionable. Simply put, the player models are beautiful. It blends the design of realism with art so well and the amount of detail for player faces and bodies is uncanny. This can be seen on the matchup screen with being able to choose different emotions while the fight loads (quick rather). The game offers both a performance mode and graphical mode with little difference between the two. Performance basically helps with frame rate issues in World Tour, but most importantly the fights run at a perfect 60 FPS.

The art from the Super Moves, the animations and the Drive Mechanics are pretty. For the most part, the hair even looks stellar on characters like Blanka. The only thing that really struggles is any edge stubble on a character's face. The only real knock to the visuals is that in World Tour, characters at a distance will render at a slow frame rate. Backgrounds are lively on fight stages and those background characters don't struggle with this. The overall visuals in World Tour and Battle Mode tend to take a hit in quality compared to the actual fights.

Closing Comments:

Street Fighter 6 modernizes the series and feels like a true evolution that hits the likes of Hyper Fighting, Third Strike and SF4. This is possibly the biggest swing the series has seen and it worked out. With three time-consuming modes that will keep players engaged while offering a variety of balanced fighting across the board with solid online options, this is as complete as Street Fighter could be in 2023. Beautiful player models combined with updated and new fighting mechanics and controls make the game not only accessible, but also include the ability to master these characters. Outside of a handful of questionable design decisions and a soundtrack that lacks any memorable songs, Street Fighter 6 offers a complete experience for fans of the series while welcoming new fans to fighting games.

[embed width=696 height=392]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nkDDIiNtZBc

Street Fighter 6

Reviewed on PlayStation 5

Franchise
Street Fighter
Platform(s)
PS5 , PS4 , PC , Xbox Series X , Xbox Series S
Released
June 2, 2023
Developer(s)
Capcom
Publisher(s)
Capcom
Genre(s)
Fighting
Multiplayer
Online Multiplayer , Local Multiplayer