Update of our test carried out on 20/06/2014 at 17:25
With the end justifying the means, Capcom didn't think long before reverting to its old demons, despite loud words and promises kept in media interviews. Anyway, he would have been fooled to believe that Capcom was going to limit itself to one or two updates of its Street Fighter IV, whose more than positive sales allowed Yoshinori Ono to concoct more or less indispensable sequels. . So here we are with the fourth version of Street Fighter 4, after a 3-year break during which the Japanese publisher focused on other equally prestigious licenses, namely Marvel vs Capcom 3 and Street Fighter X Tekken. . Initially offered as a DLC to be collected on PlayStation Network and Xbox LIVE for €14,99, Ultra Street Fighter 4 will be available in physical version from August 8 for a higher price (€29,99) , history that collectors or other players who jump on the bandwagon can also enjoy this final episode. The great novelty of the latter lies in the presence of 5 "new" fighters. The presence of quotation marks is also not insignificant since apart from Decapre, the other protagonists are defectors from Street Fighter X Tekken released in 2012. Suffice to say that Capcom has once again made economies of scale but also of imagination to ensure the union minimum. Fans will blame Capcom for this characteristic laziness, while the general public will see nothing but fire.
Here come another not so new challenger !
This is all the more true since these newcomers, Hugo, Poison, Elena and Rolento, offer enough gameplay variety to keep players going for long games. Those who like brute force and characters that take up the whole screen, for example, will choose without hesitation good old Hugo, while players who prefer to surprise their opponents with twisted movements on unusual axes will set their sights on Rolento. The average player, on the other hand, will have more affinity with Elena, a capoeira adept who has a pretty good reach with her long legs and her attacks that cover both the ground and the air. As for Poison, despite looking like a brainless pin-up, offers a fairly complete range of blows and can be formidable with his riding crop. In fact, the real surprise comes from Decapre, a physical clone of Camille, who has a command list that is likely to please pro-gamers eager for lively and dynamic characters, which is played on quarter circles as well as charged attacks. . In short, with these new faces, the Ultra Street Fighter 4 roster displays a nice figure of 44 fighters, ensuring a colossal lifespan for those who would like to master them all.
As for the sets, they are unfortunately not as numerous, despite the addition of 6 new courses also from Street Fighter X Tekken, not to mention that they do not transpire originality either. We could moan for a few more lines, but what does it matter in the end, what counts above all with Ultra Street Fighter IV, are the adjustments made to the fight system, demanded loudly by the community and the latter has been heard. To deal with the unstoppable blows linked to the releve and some questionable hitboxes spotted in Super Street Fighter 4: Arcade Edition, Capcom has decided to rectify the situation so as not to have to suffer the wrath of hardcore gamers who could no longer bear it. lose on risky attacks. It's this famous rebalancing that Capcom was talking about throughout the Ultra Street Fighter 4 promotional campaign, carried out hand in hand with the game's fans who left their informed opinions on the Capcom-Unity forums. Result of the races, the possibility for the player to have access to a late relief of a few frames, leaving the attacker in doubt as to when the fighter on the ground will recover on his two legs. It only takes a trifle to destroy all the timing of a carefully prepared combo in the head of someone who is angry with the stick, and why not turn the tide.
Stay focus !
Another notable change is the introduction of Red Focus. This is the evolution of the famous Focus Attack, which allows you to absorb a blow before counter-attacking wildly and generally placing a 6 hit-combo in the face of your opponent. With the Red Focus, it is not one but several attacks that it is possible to collect, provided you have 2 gauges of Super in stock. A rather clever way for the weakest characters in defense to have an advantage in certain circumstances. As for the last gameplay element that shakes things up a bit, there is the Double Ultra, which, as its name suggests, allows the player to have access to his 2 Ultras that he can swing like a pig in the middle of a game. . There is necessarily a counterpart to this notable advantage: a reduction in the damage sent into the mouth of the opponent. It is these readjustments that allow Capcom to redistribute the cards and revive interest in its game. That said, with the possibility of playing with any version of its favorite fighter (SF IV, SSF IV, AE or Ultra), Capcom finds itself in a certain contradiction. The famous god-tier Saga which was very bad in 2009 for example can again do heavy damage and regardless of the readjustments of 2014. Fortunately, these options are only valid offline, just to prevent the community from doing a new outcry when it comes to increasing his stats without any cheats. Logical in fact.
