This should be considered the definitive version of SF2.
Street Fighter is the de facto king of 2D fighting games. There have been many challengers to Street Fighter’s crown in recent years, such as The King of Fighters, Guilty Gear, Arcana Heart and Melty Blood. But the one thing that ties all these games together is the simple fact that they all would not be here without the advent of Street Fighter. The Street Fighter II series has seen many revisions throughout the years including Championship Edition, Turbo, Super SF2, Super Turbo, Hyper Fighting Edition, Anniversary Edition and many more ports to other consoles. But now there is one version to rule them all. Super Street Fighter II Turbo: HD Remix or STHD for short.The new major appeal of STHD is its revamped graphics. Udon Comics was put in charge of drawing all of the major sprites and backgrounds. It looks gorgeous, especially in 1080p. The new art follows the Street Fighter classic feeling but adds a bit of attitude to the series. Many of ST’s classic little nuances remain such as Ryu’s Red Fireball (If it connects it will still leave its victim burning), and Blanka’s electricity will still leave opponents with a rather shocking discovery. The biggest enhancement added to the game in the graphics department is the advent of a new widescreen mode, which allows the game to be scaled to fit widescreen TVs. In addition to the screen fill, it causes the camera to zoom in and out of certain portions of the fight. The new zooming feature is very well implemented, as it feels completely natural and it has absolutely no impact on the game play. For widescreen users who do not like the feel, a 4:3 aspect ratio setting is there to change the screen to its classic look. The last graphical addition comes in the form of the costume colors. In STHD you get a total of nine outfits in the remixed game.
Original Street Fighter II graphics.
The remixed HD graphics.
Another new but underappreciated change in STHD is the new revamped soundtrack. Recently, Larry “Liontamer” Oji (from OCRemix.org) dropped by to let us know that Capcom decided to reach out to the community and pull various people from OCRemix to do the soundtrack. The new music for the game is INCREDIBLE! It rocks. Literally. As soon as you start up the game you are treated a beast of an intro. Every character’s theme still feels like their original themes but better. My new favorite has to be Dhalsim’s theme. It’s groovy.
In addition to the newly revamped tracks, Capcom also did some work with popular hip hop artists such as Red Man and DJ Qbert to come up with some awesome tracks that are free to download on the PSN or Xbox Live. In addition to the whole score being revamped, Capcom finally decided to get rid of that annoying high pitched announcer. Instead players will be treated to a newer gruffer-sounding announcer. It took time to get used to but it is definitely an improvement. Each character’s voice has been sharpened up as well. Guile’s Sonic Boom sounds manly now, unlike his previous wussy version. The only sound issue I had was when I was playing online it seemed that the timing of the announcer at the end of the round would sometimes cut into the start of the match. For example, I was in a scoreboard match when after the match the announcer said, “You win!” then he said “Perfe… Round 2 Fight” Maybe it was due to the lag, but no fear, I am sure that can be patched later.
When you think of Street Fighter the idea of new graphics and a new score sound nice, but everyone really is concerned with the game play.
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