Will there ever be a Street Fighter 4?

[The Snat]

I think most people thought that Street Fighter 3 would never be released, but where now for the series, is it over or will Capcom make another?

[Leon Retro]

If Capcom can get some enthusiastic people with total respect for the Street Fighter name to produce a true next gen 2D sequel then it will work.

The game needs to have 2D visuals beyond anything ever seen. The characters need to be hi-res with amazing animation. If everything can be created with a lot of polish and dedication- then with the right marketing approach the game could be a global success.

Capcom have lost respect for the SF name. They are half-hearted with a pessimistic view of what the public would enjoy. They seem more interested in making Resident Evil and Devil May Cry than commiting themselves to creating a true next gen Street Fighter.

The reason SF3 wasn't very popular is simply because it wasn't fresh enough. The visuals weren't massively more advanced in most people eyes- and everything just seemed so half-baked!

I like SF3 and SFA games- but for the series to continue it needs to appeal to the mass-market. The only way this is gonna happen is for any new Street Fighter to be something truely ambitious and exciting!

[Pirotic]

I think the problem with 2D beat-em-ups is most companys are unwilling to put a big budget behind them - instead they'd rather quickly churn out another generic fighter reusing sprites from 10 year old games and making a quick buck.

i'd love to see SF4 but only if they put some money and time behind it rather than trying to cash in on the name.

[nightstalker100]

All id want was what sf3 should of been: get rid of these newer characters who have as much charm as a used condom and looked like they were thought up in a matter of minutes (twelve anyone) and bring back the oldies but redrawn and with the sumptous animation of sf3. I reckon theyd still be able to reach into the mainstream by stickin to original cast - most of my non-street fighting friends can still practically name all the original 12!

[Pirotic]

i liked the new characters. Hugo was ace

[Balou]

Capcom missed the chance to make SF3 more popular in europe by not including it in the PS2 Anniversary package.

[moonwhistle]

There's nothing half baked about 3rd strike as far as I'm concerned, everytime I play it I'm more and more impressed by the animation, the visual effects and the fighting engine, it's all so fresh and visceral. It took a while to sink in but I feel that it is more than a worthy sequel to all the other Street Fighters and also the best by a long shot. Initially I didn't like the new characters but I've grown to love them all, with the exception of Twelve who is a total ass and maybe Remy. It was a brave move on Capcom's part to lose so many of the classic characters, and I don't think they should be criticized, nobody complained about Garou which only kept Terry and Rock and is an inferior game. I believe in you Capcom, roll on SF4

[Fuddle]

the street fighter 3 characters are loads better than the crappy stereotypes of street fighter 2. people only love them so much because they grew up with them...biggest case of rose tinted specs ever.

if there ever was a street fighter 4, there should be no returning characters at all.

[Tig]

The game needs to have 2D visuals beyond anything ever seen. The characters need to be hi-res with amazing animation. If everything can be created with a lot of polish and dedication- then with the right marketing approach the game could be a global success.

Yeah, I've been waiting to see someone come up with a next generation 2D engine. Chunky pixel-art looks old these days. And what with the amount of power in X360 and PS3, surely something amazing could be done in 2D?

Maybe the sprites could be vector-drawn, to give them an infinintely smooth look on HDTV? Hell, even super-high-resolution sprites with a bajillion frames would be impressive. I dunno. Capcom ought to come up with something new.

A next-gen Street Fighter 4, driven by a new, striking 2D engine - and with the full roster of classic characters - would sell bucketloads, particularly if they marketed it correctly as The Second Coming. As nightstalker100 said, Street Fighter is still a massive presence in the casual gamer's mind. Everyone remembers playing SFII at some point. It's a sleeping giant imo. Capcom just need to give the franchise a kick up the arse, like they did with Resi.

[nightstalker100]

There's nothing half baked about 3rd strike as far as I'm concerned, everytime I play it I'm more and more impressed by the animation, the visual effects and the fighting engine, it's all so fresh and visceral. It took a while to sink in but I feel that it is more than a worthy sequel to all the other Street Fighters and also the best by a long shot. Initially I didn't like the new characters but I've grown to love them all, with the exception of Twelve who is a total ass and maybe Remy. It was a brave move on Capcom's part to lose so many of the classic characters, and I don't think they should be criticized, nobody complained about Garou which only kept Terry and Rock and is an inferior game. I believe in you Capcom, roll on SF4

Yes no one crticized snk with teh new garou cast but thats because the majority of the additions were revisions of earler characters. The two kaphwan brothers are variations on kim and knushwood butt or whatever you want to call him was similar to ryo/mr. karate. And i think the characters in garou have more continuity with one another - in SF3 at times it could pass for a crossover game with jokers such as necro and twelve fighting against ken for example. Although Hugo is a fantastic character, nothing revolutionary in fighting style but boy did capcom perfectly encapsulate all the mannersims and movement of andre "the giant" roussinoff even going so far as paying homage to the juggernaut that was wrestlemania 3 with hogan and andre fronting up to one another centre ring.

[Kotatsu Neko]

Imagine an XB360 Street Fighter 4 with 30fps animation and sprites drawn for 720P resolution. The backgrounds would be painted and in full 32bit colour and use as many layers of parallax as the artists wanted.

I'd buy it.

[Balou]

Hmm... they should also have bigger sprites, plus a "damage-model", like in Art of Fighting 1.
I know that would make super jumps difficult, or require a lot of zooming, but I still think huge sprites would be a nice addition.

[Tig]

It would be cool if they could somehow cel-shade a detailed 3D model, so it was all but indistinguishable from a hi-res, hand-drawn sprite. Then switch seamlessly between hand-drawn frames and 3D models during animations, so you get the most impressive visual aspects of both

Look at what Capcom have done with Okami... they can do this...

[Casual_Gamer]

The mainstream public don't really care about 2D fighters as much as they used to back in the SF2 heyday. Hence SF4 will never be as popular as we all would like. Most of my friends who used to *love* SF2 back in the day will now laugh at me when I pick up a game like Capcom Fighting Jam, with familiar characters, nevermind what happens when I fire up a NeoGeo port. As far as they are concerned, the SF2 phenomenon was born and died with SF2 (possibly the VS series as well). It's something to look back on and occasionally fire up with the emulators just to see if they can still pull off Guile's glitch moves.

If Capcom do make SF4, it will not do well, no matter how polished it looks. That's because everyone else will be playing Tekken 7/Soul Calibur 5/DOAuperduper-extreme-mega-uber edition/etc.

I'd love to see SF4 as much as the next guy, but in reality, I doubt it will happen, and if it does, we will all be disappointed anyway.

[Psyduck]

I could be wrong, but I've always assumed that as the resolution rises, it takes far longer to do 2d graphics. With 3d games you just make a model once then animate it, with 2d you've got to do each frame separately - if you're having many times as many pixels then that'll take loads longer, so I doubt we'll see anything nearing 720p...
I wonder if MS would allow a game to run with say 640x480 res sprites scaled up or if they'd insist on something drawn at 720p?

And with regards to characters, obviously it'd be nice to have sf2 with great new graphics, but surely we want a little more from sf4? Definitely needs some new ones IMO.