Darth Vader and Yoda in Soul Calibur 4
While most fighting games fans are getting hopped up about Street Fighter IV, there’s another fighting game franchise that’s about to hit its fourth incarnation. And it’s bringing some crazy Jedi and Sith powers to the table.
In Soul Calibur III, there were three console-specific characters: Link (from the Legend of Zelda), Heihachi (from the Tekken series), and Spawn (from Spawn). These characters were not originally from the Soul Calibur franchise, so it was a welcome change of pace. Link fit in especially well, since he’s a sword-wielding warrior anyways. For Soul Calibur IV, they’ve welcomed the world of Star Wars.
Check out the video clip above for some crazy Soul Calibur IV action involving Jedi master Yoda and the dark lord known as Darth Vader. At a little past the halfway point in the video, you can see Darth Vader using the Force Pull. That seems a little unfair considering that no other Soul Calibur character has a ranged attack. Then again, he is Darth freakin’ Vader, so that’s okay.
Street Fighter IV Gameplay Videos: El Fuerte and Crimson Viper
As we get closer to the official launch date of Street Fighter IV, more information about the highly anticipated fighting game is starting to avail itself. We’ve already heard about the introduction of newcomer El Fuerte, a lucha libre combatant with rather incredible wrestling-style moves. Now we can see the world warrior in action. In the clip below, El Fuerte challenges Zangief, ultimately finishing off the Russian with his super special.
One of the other new characters, besides Abel, is Crimson Viper. She kind of reminds me of Vice from King of Fighters ‘96. Anyways, you can see her do battle with M. Bison and with Sagat below.
Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li
Right near the end of 2007, we caught wind that they were making a live action Street Fighter movie that would focus on the story of Chun-Li. Appropriately named Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li, the movie would star Kristen Kreuk (of Smallville fame) in the title role. In the meantime, we’ve heard that people like Michael Clarke Duncan (as Balrog) will be included in the action.
There aren’t any official shots on the set just yet, but the official movie site is now up and running (though it’s hidden behind a password), and they’ve decided to take the route of a blog. One of the inaugural posts, according to the Cut Scene, is that of a storyboard. In it, we see Chun-Li getting shot at with a bunch of bullets and then running away.
It doesn’t reveal much, but it’s nice to see that the project is underway. I doubt any of Street Fighter IV newbies like El Fuerte and Abel will be included in the mix, so we’ll probably get a similar character list as the Jean-Claude Van Damme Street Fighter movie from several years ago.
Anyways, on with the storyboard:
UPDATE: I just got an email from Aaron Horwitz, the guy behind the Street Fighter movie website. The site is now up and running again, no longer hidden behind a password.
He writes:
Just wanted to say thanks for posting the story the other day, and even though we’ve run into some legal issues, the site is now up again, password free, and under heavy construction, so excuse the design please. Thanks, and enjoy the site.
Looking forward to your future updates, Aaron!
Virtua Fighter Mobile Announced
Glu Mobile is porting the ever-popular polygonal fighter over to our mobile phones, reports Pocket Gamer. This news isn’t exactly coming out of left field, seeing how Glu Mobile already has an agreement in place with Sega to bring a series of Sega classic games over to our cellular phones. Yes, Sega does more than Sonic.
There’s very little indication as to which chapter in the Virtua Fighter franchise will be sent to mobile phones, but I imagine that they’re not jumping into the realm of Virtua Fighter 5 just yet. The video above is from the original VF1 and it probably serves as the most likely candidate. I just hope that they don’t reduce the number of characters, forcing us to play as Jacky or something. I prefer Akira myself.
Naruto Does Battle on the Nintendo DS
Naruto is easily one of the most popular anime series today, taking on similarly epic proportions as Dragon Ball from a few (many?) years back. We like following the exploits of Konoha’s future Hokage, along with all his friends from the Hidden Leaf Village. From Kakashi Sensei to the pink hair of Sakura, we can’t get enough of these crazy shinobi.
Naruto Shippuden: Shinobi Retsuden II certainly isn’t the first Naruto game to appear on the Nintendo DS, but it’s shaping up to be a pretty solid fighting game, featuring a full slate of characters from the popular anime series. Shinobi Retsuden II won’t have the technicality of Virtua Fighter 5 or the quirky items of Super Smash Bros Brawl, but the action looks pretty hectic!
It looks like it’s going to be a Japan-only release, so you’ll want to look to the importers to get your hands on this fighting game.
A Look Back at Super Smash Bros Series
It started with Super Smash Bros. on the N64. It got better with Super Smash Bros. Melee on the GameCube. And now it has culminated in the epic Super Smash Bros. Brawl for the Nintendo Wii. This fighting game franchise has had quite the storied history, so it’s nice to see just how far the game has grown and matured over the years. Check out the six-minute featurette below for a side-by-side-by-side comparison. All I have to say is holy polygons, Batman!
Street Fighter IV Move List: Abel
Everyone already knows that Street Fighter IV is going to be pretty awesome, giving us access to the original eight from Street Fighter II, as well as the original four boss characters. But we’ve got to pay attention to the new characters as well.
I’m personally more excited about El Fuerte, but this guy Abel could prove to be kind of interesting too, especially if you like wrestling-geared characters similar to Zangief. In the video above, you can check out the full Street Fighter IV move list for Abel. It doesn’t look like he has any projectile moves and his specials are very wrestling-oriented, just like his Russian cousin.
You’ve got to feel a little sorry for Guile though, don’t you? The more American soldier is getting his ass handed to him in the most royal of fashions, over and over again.
Knowing me, I’ll just end up using Ken and Ryu over and over again. I wonder if either of them are going to get any new moves or is it just going to be the cheap hadouken-hadouken-shoryuken game all over again?
Super Street Fighter II: HD Remix (Three Videos)
New Mortal Kombat Game Coming This Year
Fighting games fans are getting pretty excited about Street Fighter IV and understandably so, but there was another fighting game from the 1990s that really revolutionized the genre. Get over here! Flawless victory! Fatality!
That’s right. Mortal Kombat is coming back and according to some guys at Midway, an all-new bloodbath is scheduled for release some time later this year. A new Mortal Kombat in 2008?!?! How did this news fly under the radar? Granted, I stopped being a fan of the series after they went to the third dimension, but if this new Mortal Kombat game keeps to the traditional 2D and doesn’t opt for some cheesy side-scrolling adventure (Sub-Zero Mythologies was pretty bad).
I wonder if Hillary Clinton is going to be a selectable character…
Source: Kotaku
El Fuerte Joins Street Fighter IV (New Character)
Should we be thanking Nacho Libre for this? Virtua Fighter 5 introduced us to El Blaze and now the newest world warrior to join the cast of Street Fighter IV is some guy named El Fuerte. My Spanish is a little rusty, but I believe that roughly translates to The Fuerte Hot One. Okay, I’m probably totally off on that one.
Shown here is a scan from Japanese magazine Famitsu, more specifically from an issue that has not yet hit newstands. We basically known nothing about El Fuerte other than the fact that he will be joining the ranks of Abel and Crimson Viper as the new characters to the game. They will be fighting alongside returning world warriors like Sagat and Balrog. El Fuerte appears to be inspired by Lucha Libre, so my guess is that he will be somewhat similar to VF5’s El Blaze. Who knows, though. Maybe he has like fireballs and sonic booms too.
Stay tuned for more as it develops.
Source: Kotaku
