Streetfighter X Tekken (PS3/XB360): Frustratingly Satisfying.

There was a bowling alley called Vine Lanes that used to be by my house when I was real little. My dad and I would go bowl and have a good time, but in between turns I would run up to the arcade machines to watch people play what would be my introduction to the Fighting Game genre in a game called Street Fighter 2. I just fell in love with the game. I thought the characters were great and it had a green monster who got covered in lightning, why wouldnt I love it? The game was awesome, and it would be a long time till I got an SNES to actually play it myself at home. Flash forward to high school and I come into the lunch room to see that they set up a Tekken 3 machine. I have dabbled with the Tekken franchise a little bit, but a group of 5 of us would fiercely do battle on that machine. Forced me to run out and buy the game and start practicing up. Between these two games I often wondered what a game would be like if these franchises squared off.  For more than 15 years that never seemed to happen, the Street Fighter franchise only ever wanted to tango with other 2d fighters. But on fateful comic-con teased a tag battle with Ryu and Chun-Li vs. Kazyua and Nina. I checked every day to reserve my copy and finally after this long wait, I get to sit down with.....

STREET FIGHTER X TEKKEN:(PS3)

A meteorite made big headlines in the news as it became one of the first interstellar debris to hit the planet earth within last 400 years. It was estimated to burn up in the atmosphere in the planet fall and to do no damage to the environment. But when it struck in Antarctica, all the government found was a peculiar looking box in its place. They couldn't figure out how to open it or what its purpose was, all they knew is that it reacted to conflict around it, releasing a liquid of some type that caused a massive increase of power. Because this box seemed to cause conflict and fighting among the scientists there, they named the box Pandora. The two major entities, Shadowloo and the Mishima Zaibatsu, both realized the potential for such power and both decide that they want Pandora for themselves. In addition to these two groups, both universes characters all have individual motivations for acquiring Pandora for themselves as well.

Right, because Kazuya needed to be more of a bad ass.

Street Fighter x Tekken is the merged brain child of the Capcom's and Namco's major franchises. While the game has a strong resemblance to Street Fighter 4 most notably in its design, SFxT does a wonderful job meshing aspects of the two games together into one.  The rules in its actual game play rule structure is closer to Tekken Tag Tournament: each player makes a team of two characters and the first player to lose one of them loses the round. There are buttons and combos to allow you to tag out mid combo or at a cold stance, and the character who is currently resting will recover a portion of their health back, much like how it works in the Marvel Vs. Capcom series. Matches like most fighting games can be best of 1, 3 or 5 rounds. It also features a scramble mode where all 4 players are on the screen at the same time for just sheer mayhem.  SFxT controls will definietly feel more at home to the avid Street Fighter player, as it uses the same three strength punch and kick system they are used to.

Heavy Punch: Because sometimes a bitch doesn't get the message with a Light one.

Because of this the controls definitely have a more Street Fighter feel to it and team SF moves are generally unchanged and familiar (except you can't mash Chun-li's lightning kick anymore), team Tekken's move sets have been pretty overhauled. Some of the motions still feel familiar but there definitely has been a SF transition to them. I was alright at Tekken but jumping into this game with characters I was very familiar with like Lili, Julia, and Xiaoyu I would find myself getting whipped around until I actually studied the move sets. Many of the Tekken characters incorporate some kind of sidestep/dash move that allows them to pass through fireballs, but I still end up getting whacked when I try to use them. The game also borrows some of Tekken's recoveries when you hit the ground, giving you a chance for temporary invulnerability to get up quick or roll out of a corner after you hit the ground. There are some new mechanics too, like using the Pandora. Basically what this does is if your partner's life drops to less than 25% you can activate Pandora and bring out a pretty bitch'n looking evil version of your partner. You get a full super gauge and a massive boost to power, but you only have a small amount of time to finish off your opponent because if you don't your character loses. It looks cool as hell but it's never saved me from a fight. There is also a gem system that you can customize for each character. Adding gems will allow power, speed, defense or gauge boosts that trigger under certain conditions to help win fights. I haven't played with them much myself because I'm more concerned with learning the moves.

There are a few things about this game that piss me off though. Again to make things more comfortable for Tekken players, you are able to wall and ground bounce your opponents to string together your combos. This infuriates me to death, because if you ever have to play one of "Those Guys" like Ive talked about before, you are going to get combo'd up and then your character will never hit the ground. Its happened to me dozens of times already and it makes me so fucking mad I have to walk away from the game before I'd smash my tv. This of course brings me to my other problem. Combo's have incredibly tight window, and the average gamer like myself will probably find themselves able to get through about half of the combo trials. Often I've found myself losing my shit because I can't chain together a LP + LP + Roll forward MP combo because it doesn't think I've timed my LPs right. And there is no option to see the combo performed so I can't even figure the timing out. Perhaps this is done to discourage the button masher, but I do feel it makes the game very difficult for those who don't play a lot of fighters. I've played a lot of Tekken and Street Fighter 4 and my very first play through the game on medium, My team of Lili and Asuka was getting relentlessly destroyed by the computer in the last 4 match ups of arcade mode. It wasn't till I started spamming a sweep combo Asuka has that I was able to muscle my way to the finish. On a side note: When playing the computer? Balrog is the worst match-up ever. He will fucking predict any move you make. It automatically goes to hardest difficulty.

I am really happy with the character selection for the most part. Both sides took a group of the games most popular and notable faces. The Tekken side specifically has a very good mix of very different styled characters and a lot of my favorites made the cut (Lili, Xiaoyu, Kazuya, Julia, Hworwang) and the Street Fighter side thankfully didn't over load on the shotoken fighters. I was kinda bummed to not see Sakura in the game or the return of Karin, but I suppose that's a small price to pay to not have to deal with prick's who like spam kick with Eddy Gordo or Christie. Or any of the doofus characters like Dan (Dan is the fucking worst, get over it). The SF side is basically filled with the mainstays you know and love, with some new and returning faces such as Poison or Rolento. There may be some minor balance issues (everyone online plays Rolento and Ken)  but otherwise I'm pretty happy with how the characters turned out.

Poison has a very interesting background. Definitely a great addition to the franchise.

I do have some issues with the characters through. First off? Why the fuck does Cole McGrath not get a storyline? You guys went and got the voice actor who played him in the game, why the hell not give him a story line so he's not just grunting? I felt cheated. But not as cheated as I felt when eagerly took the game home to find out that Fat Dopey Mega Man / Pac-Man were locked out? Why the hell were they locked out? You guys promoted that they would be in the game and even caused a bit of controversy because of it. why did I have to arbitrarily wait two weeks for the stupid unlock code? They were already "exclusives" that were free for me. I cant think of any reason for it. And lastly, the DLC controversy.. I don't want to get too in deep with this rant because I've already done it before, but the fact that Capcom got caught with their pants down with fully playable DLC on the disc and cut a bullshit excuse about it saving space and not being an obvious cash grab is just infuriating. They refuse to show loyalty to their rabid fan base, and that's pretty insulting. Everyone knows the characters are in there and their gonna have the nerve to charge more for them. It would have been a nice act of goodwill to just own up to it and say, "OK,  you got us. Were sorry about that. Here, we are giving out the unlock codes for free." Pffft. Fat chance.

Seriously, Why didn't Cole get a storyline? You suck, Crapcom.

Through all my complaining though, this game is everything that I wanted it to be. Just a wonderful mix of two cast of characters that I've been fantasizing a cross over for well over 15 years at this point. They actually implemented a story so its fun to play single player and the multiplayer is everything that it should be. The controls seem to be very natural to the average player but also seems right at home for the hardcore "that guy" gamers as well.  It makes me very excited to see how the upcoming Tekken X Street Fighter will play out with the SF characters on a 3D plane and possible the removal of their projectile attacks. If you are fan of the 2D fighters I see absolutely no reason why this game shouldn't part of your collection.