Fighting games have always been a staple within gaming, whether it be through casual matches with friends or high stakes esports tournaments. While it wasn’t the first fighting game to come out, the “Street Fighter” franchise has become one of the few series in the genre to still be around after almost 40 years.
With a franchise this iconic, you might think it was always a massive hit, but the first game didn’t make “Street Fighter” a household name. Credited with fighting themed names, director ‘Piston’ Takashi Nishiyama and planner ‘Finish’ Hiroshi Matsumoto helped the rest of the team to release the first entry to arcades in 1987.
In “Street Fighter,” you play as either Ryu if you were player one, or Ken Masters if you were player two, traveling across five countries trying to become the World Fighting Tournament champion.
Initially popular within the United Kingdom and Japan, the rest of the world was not enamored with the fighting game at first. This was due to a lack of variety in gameplay, as Ken and Ryu had the same movesets and executing the limited combos was notoriously difficult. The cabinets were also hard to maintain.
The game was still brought to home consoles despite the limited success it saw, but it would not be limited for very long. Four years later in 1991, Capcom developers Akira Nishitani and Akira Yasuda debuted the sequel, “Street Fighter II: The World Warriors.”
Marked as an improvement on almost all fronts over its predecessor. It had 14 new characters across the multiple versions, more buttons to make controls easier and expanded movesets with hidden special attacks. The expansion made the game much more popular, it was in such high demand that Japanese markets had pirated versions for the Nintendo Entertainment System and Famicom floating around for a while.
The second entry in the series has made about $10 billion in inflation-adjusted revenue, a huge achievement that showed fighting game enthusiasts that the series would stick around and inspire later franchises like Tekken.
My experience playing the series lies within the most recent entry, “Street Fighter 6,” and I think it stands out pretty well in comparison to other fighting games I’ve played. While the movesets and rosters have expanded again since the ‘90s, it is still small in comparison to other games like “Super Smash Bros. Ultimate,” which features a roster of 89 playable fighters.
There’s enough variety in the game while still forcing you to be intentional with every move you perform, making rematches and new fights just as entertaining. It’s also pretty accessible to newcomers, having a much easier modern control style compared to the input-heavy classic mode.
Even though the focus is on fighting, the Street Fighter series does have an evolving lore that contains criminal syndicates and the Illuminati. While I’m not entirely familiar with its intricacies, how well does the core identity of Street Fighter translate to the big screen?
Hayley cutting in here- I went into this movie with little knowledge of the game other than it being your classic “button smashing” fighter style game that went on to inspire future battle royale themed games. However, this film took me by surprise in a good way. I feel the casting was perfect, both Andrew Koji as Ryu and Noah Centenio as Ken Masters did excellent jobs with their roles. Despite the film being heavily comedic and action packed, Koji and Centenio managed to pull at my heart strings with their portrayal of brotherly friendship.
I also really enjoyed director Kitao Sakurai’s choice to not only open the film with an anime style sequence, but to then proceed to splice in the sequences as a way to flashback to the characters’ pasts. This version of storytelling is something I have not seen done, and it brought a fun element to this film that had it gone without, would not set this action movie apart. Sakurai made this choice to include these hand drawn 2D animation scenes to pay tribute to the ‘90’s anime style. Pulling major influences from that time and really cranking up the nostalgia for anyone who grew up playing the game in the ‘90s. I also appreciated that he worked with the studio Titmouse, and had artists drawing these flashbacks instead of using AI, or CGI.
Brody here. My only hope coming into the movie was that it would match the game’s fantastical and lighthearted tone while telling a good story. For the most part, the movie is able to strike that balance very well, having great comedic moments and line readings from both Centenio and Koji as Ken and Ryu. Eric Andre was also a welcome addition to the comedy of the film, acting as a nice break as the film cuts between the tournament and the story.
I also thought the animated sequences worked well at filling in the gaps in Ken, Ryu and Chun-Li’s stories without interrupting the flow of the movie. My only gripe with the story is that it feels a little simple in some spots. While David Dastmalchian is excellent as M. Bison, his motivation and group of sidekicks feel a little underdeveloped.
The main hallmark of the movie was the fights, which delivered pretty impressively. The choreography and camera work added a lot of life to the fights, almost feeling like you were controlling one of the fighters on screen. There was a good balance of iconic special attacks on top of regular moves, and each fight brought something different.
I liked this adaptation a lot more than “Mortal Kombat” from a few years ago, mainly because “Street Fighter” knows what kind of movie it wants to be. It doesn’t take itself too seriously and has more to offer than its fights, but what it has in charm and heart, it’s missing in the depth of the story.
Hayley jumping back in, I agree with Brody in that director Sakurai knew exactly what he wanted to create with this film, and it certainly delivered. The experience was unique and refreshing, especially after having watched so many heavier psychological films as of late. I also agree this cast was surprisingly stacked, featuring actors like Callina Liang as Chun-Li, 50 Cent as Balrog, Jason Momoa as Blanco AKA Jimmy and Orville Peck as Vega.
I also really enjoyed the comedic influence and timing of André, despite the fact that some audience members may have felt his take on the role was a little too surreal and unhinged. I think Sakurai, being the director of the “Eric André Show” knew exactly what he was doing when casting André into his role, and without his comedic moments the film would be lacking a balance.
Where I disagree with Brody is on the plot, I didn’t mind the simplicity of some of the moments and side characters of the film. I was thoroughly impressed with Sakurai’s ability to craft a storyline from a game that while it gave a wonderful framework for the characters, did not provide much of a storyline. I felt the slower moments, cheesy humor and predictable character tropes helped create the fictional world that felt directly yanked out of the early ‘90s. Especially, with this particular universe being set in 1993.
All in all, “Street Fighter” is going to make it on my personal rewatch list. A perfect flick to toss on when in need of some lighthearted action-packed-comedy. Or, if you have some gamers in your life, might I recommend a gaming and watch party? Get a few rounds going and then end the night with the film to see all the characters spring into action from the game to the movie screen.