In terms of fighting games, my preferred brawler has always been Street Fighter. For me, nothing has ever come close to the style it exudes. Maybe it’s because it was my first ever real fighter, but I’ve never connected with others such as Tekken, Virtua Fighter or Mortal Kombat (the first two were great but then it just seemed to blend in to one big mess of the same thing but slightly tweaked).
The only problem I have with Street Fighter is that I’m not that good at it. Although I started playing it on PC at a young age during the early 90’s, that was the last I had played it… until recently.
After watching the anime series and movies numerous times over the last two decades, I decided it was finally time to put fist to face.
This is where the embarrassment begins.
Earlier this year I played Super Street Fighter IV. I heard it calling me from the other end of the video shop, enchanting me with its sweet siren song. As soon as I got home, it was in the Xbox and I was keen to start a path to glory. However, the path was a dead end.
It seems Ryu, the Wandering Warrior, cannot wander too far at the hands of a n00b. His journey often ended after 30 seconds and numerous “WTF?!?” moments. My record ‘arse on a platter’ knockout was nine seconds. That’s right – nine seconds. I was gutted and had to go for a long walk and think about what I’d done.
I dabbled with other players and seemed to have a little more luck with Sagat, but Dhalsim, Blanka, Zangief and Vega all offered poor results.
The game sat there, mocking me from a distance, until I returned it the next day with my head hanging in shame. It was one of those moments where you could tell strangers somehow knew what you’d done and were quietly laughing about it with their friends.
Thankfully Dutch came to the party and told me he had similar woes, with his win/loss ratio differing significantly between the Super and standard versions. Further searching confirmed this is a common result and I started to build my confidence. Maybe I could win more than one fight against a weak player…
Now that I can finally look Ryu in the eye, I bought SFIV for both the iPhone and 360 with much better results. Much like the UFC games, it’s not about mashing, but more about learning your character and knowing how to use them in battle. Ryu’s path is now looking a little longer and a little more respectable.
What are your greatest n00b moments?
