Why are you so reliably irrational? I never said Capcom and Marvel hated each other. But there are all kinds of reasons they might do this that don’t say ANYTHING about their emotional status. Including, I don’t know, that it was a business decision and not a middle school cafeteria discussion? It could well be that the marketing of retro games was included in the latest licensing agreement when they teamed up for MvCi and that no decision was required by either Capcom or Marvel - the decision was made ages ago. All I’m telling you is to not make wild and inexplicable leaps of logic based on pretty minor things. Doesn’t sound too unreasonable to me.
SFV is still being updated and marketed to try to make money. They have just announced Arcade Edition and they are selling it for only slightly discounted full retail prices. It introduces a lot of new gameplay into the game and is going to shake up the tournament scene quite a bit. You don’t undercut that clear business plan by announcing the next game will launch writhing the year. There’s 0 chance SF6 launching this year and I would say nearly 0 chance of an announcement. I wouldn’t expect SF 6 until 2022.
As far as MvC - they cancelled development of MvCi midway through. Lots of additional characters and content were planned (hence “infinite”) and they scrapped it because the game was a failure. No one, and I mean no one, who is making business decisions for Marvel is going to say “well that was a failure. Let’s do another one!” MvC is dead as a franchise. Anyone holding their breath for a new MvC announcement is a victim of magical thinking.
You get a like just for this quote. I’m not sure why you and @Iago407 are so vehemently agreeing about the direction of the next SF game, but I tend to agree “dark and gritty” (or “grim dark” as they tongue in cheek call it in Warhammer) is overplayed. I find the Dark Knight movies pretty mediocre and certainly not worthy of the high regard they are held in by a lot of fans. I actually enjoyed Man of Steel a lot - especially the first 2/3 of the movie which explored what it would be like to grow up as an alien with a secret rather than just imagine an idyllic farmboy existence as a backdrop. But to each his own.
Eh. I wouldn’t expect an MvC announcement anytime soon, but calling the franchise absolutely dead is a pretty big leap I think. Lots of franchises and properties that were critical and commercial failures do indeed rise back up - heck, Marvel itself went bankrupt back in 1996, and the MCU was initially financed with Marvel’s rights to several of their own characters. Marvel properties have value, and the company will probably eventually want to make additional use of that value in the gaming space. While it’s pretty possible they just shoot for their own FG instead, the MvC franchise is a franchise, and that means irrespective of Infinite’s failure there is a base (within a relatively niche market) for capitalization. All of the MvC and Capcom-produced fighters before Infinite were critical successes and much beloved by fans; there’s definitely a “there” there for partnering with Capcom yet again. It might not be soon, but I definitely figure it happens again eventually.
I suppose that’s fair. While it’s true that occasionally things rise from the ashes, I’m still waiting for someone to show me a fighting game that flopped and then was remade a couple of years later. Probably the closest thing is Samurai Shodown, which bounces back from its woeful 3D incarnation. But that was more than a two year hiatus.
I think you can go much closer to home to be honest. Street Fighter III was released in 1997 to pretty massive failure, with the much-lauded 3rd Strike releasing in 1999 to warmer, but still pretty dismal sales. SF3 basically killed the franchise, and ushered in the so-called “dark ages” of 2D fighters. That didn’t stop the franchise from wildly reinvigorating itself in 2009 with SF4.
For sure you can caveat that resurgence with things like SF characters appearing in cross-over titles like CVS2 or Alpha the like, but I think the same is pretty true for Marvel characters, no? Even if MvC sits for a while, fans and potential fans are guaranteed to continue to see those characters and have excitement for them, so there will still be that hunger to see them come back for another try at a beloved series.
That’s fair. So in 2027 I think people can expect a new MvC game.
I admit, I’m being a bit of a jerk about this. I’m a bit hung up on how over the top negative MvC fans were over what I think are ultimately minor flaws in a very decent iteration of the series - to the point where they worked to kill it. And then turn around and expect to see a new, better one released right away. I honestly don’t see it happening.
Was I being that vehement? I didn’t mean to be. I think I was more surprised at Leaguer’s disdain for The Dark Knight, but everyone’s entitled to their opinion, of course. The whole grim dark thing seems like a bit of a strange criticism to me, as plenty of comics have gone in that direction at various times, though I’ll certainly concede that it can be overdone to the point of parody.
To be clear though, as far as Street Fighter 6 is concerned, I was definitely not advocating that SF should go in that direction. I was thinking more along the lines of just looking a bit more realistic and less bright / anime. I know that’s not necessarily Street Fighter’s MO, so some might think I’m trying to change it, but I do think that for a new game, they could go with a slightly different style without going full on in to Mortal Kombat levels of darkness and grittiness or whatever.
I know those terms have become rather cliche form overuse (as is the case with cliches), but I think it’d be cool if SF went for a bit more of a realistic approach in terms of character design, with faces, bodies, stages, etc that weren’t quite so garish and exaggerated. That’s really all I was getting at. Yes, maybe add a touch of darkness and “seriousness” to it, but I wouldn’t go any further than Killer Instinct on the grim dark-o-meter.
Does that make sense? Maybe I’m not conjuring the right image in people’s minds. I hope no one’s getting Street Fighter: The Movie: The Game vibes here, because that’s not what I’m talking about at all, where most of the dudes are so scrawny they look like cosplayers. Either way, I didn’t mean to come off like I was advocating for Shadow the Hedgehog shopping at Hot Topic in Seattle lol. I like that too. That made me laugh. But yeah, nothing quite so extreme. I just think they can improve upon the muscle milk anime style and I’d like to see that.
Still the greatest name for a title in the history of videogames
As to the more general question of SF6 aesthetics, while I’m down for a stylistic change, I’d be against a general turn towards “realistic”. Street Fighter is cartoony - that’s one of its defining traits. There are myriad variations and stylistic choices to be made within “cartoony” though, and I’d be all for a style with sleeker and less steroid-infused characters.
And tone doesn’t have to be “dark” to be different. Third Strike’s jazz-synth mashup and urban character feels distinctly different from much of what came before and after in the series, even though it’s still very much a cartoony affair. Moreso than the other titles in fact, due to how expertly stretch and squash were applied to so many different interactions.
I just want them to make a movie based on Street Fighter: The Movie: The Game. Is that too much to ask?
Thank you for putting in to words what I was trying (and utterly failing) to express above. This is exactly what I was looking for; less steroid-infused characters. Less muscle milk characters. A slightly, and I mean slightly darker tone would be nice. Again, not asking for grim dark.
Honestly, this would be awesome. Love the way this idea is conveyed.
I just feel like Street Fighter has had relatively the same art style since SF4 came out well over 10 years ago and it’d be nice if for the actual next numbered game if they’d find some new inspiration and maybe go more in this direction. Middle ground between ArcSys and KI. Give characters bodies some real texture to them. Slightly darker, but not “dark” and certainly not “grim dark.”
Whew! There. Thank you both for saying what I was having such a hard time articulating. Much appreciated.
I can certainly agree with this. Regardless of the quality of the work done in SFV’s graphics and animation (which I think are pretty good) the graphics have not really been a selling point for the game.
The ARC System Works graphics are pretty amazing to look at and certainly would bring a bit of “wow” to SF. I’m not sure the art style is going to translate though. The “source material” for SF characters is not typically anime. But I would be happy for them to try.
I generally feel that they need to do something different. SFIV and V look pretty similar to most observers as far as style and it needs something to generate a little interest.
The big difference is that SFIV had the cell shaded japanese calligraphy angle with its graphics, where as SFV chose to go with the “clayfighter” aesthetic.
Also, fun fact, I played USFIV on my Xbox One and the uprising combined with my big HD Roku TV caused the textures in the game to be blown up so big they became pixelated. Not the game models or anything else. Literally just the textures. Top shelf programming there Capcom.
Yes, they are different. But not noticeably different. SFV replaces the black ink effect (added rather last minute to the game based on how much everyone loved the cgi trailer) with the color swirl effect. I would not describe the SFIV aesthetic as cell shaded but I don’t want to argue the semantics. They are different. But not wildly different.
The central challenge of fighting games seems to be releasing something new and different that everyone will hate immediately (SFIII, MVCi) or safely releasing the same game over and over again and hoping you don’t lose fans to boredom (Tekken). I would love to see more bold choices being made. It’s one of the things I most admire about KI. While I didn’t like every choice they made, they always went for it. Given the chance, they took risks with the characters, design and gameplay. I really admire that and wish we saw more of it. As an aside, I give NRS credit in this area too. Their games are different each time. But it seems most gamers Just want to play mostly the same game, forever, with in time with incremental improvements in graphics.
