I still remember the sequence that led me to see Street Fighter II for the very first time in July 1991, in Canada.
I’m 11. I’m entering this arcade. Those back then were super rare in France so I’m happy just looking around and listening to all those digital sounds. First I see a Canadian foosball table which makes sense, then I see Final Fight which I already knew and then I see two guys going at it.
It’s Guile’s stage. Guile VS Ken. I lose my shit over the design, the sounds, the moves. Everything is dope as I can’t barely process it. I realize how accurate that F-16 in the background is
(they have blue clothes in the arcade version right? That’s probably a SNES pic who gives a fuck anyway)
And then I see and hear the SONIC BOOM and Ken’s HADOKEN and TATSUMAKI moves and I’m like what is going on?? At that time, Dragon Ball is on TV in France, Dragon Ball Z is about to start and I can’ help but be like WHAT IS UP WITH JAPANESE PEOPLE AND FIREBALLS THIS IS SO COOL
That was traumatic in a very good way. The best part of meeting SFII had yet to come though.
Fast forward, it’s 1992 and we’re all trying to get some parents to pay for an imported SNES game and soon all my friends have SFII and two pads. Before SFII, all fighting games were played this way: go through characters, find the strongest and beat the game. And then have stupid matches against your friends.
Not with SFII. I realize as my friends start trying to master Ken/Ryu that all characters are capable. Capable of beating the fuck out of any other character. I choose Dhalsim to run some experiment and although it’s very hard, matches end up incredibly close despite the notion that this character is the worst possible. I sometimes even win flawlessly.
Something clicks in my mind: it’s intentional. Having characters perfectly balanced or as much as possible was the team’s goal. I understand all of sudden the concept and importance of balance in game design, which would bring hilarious matches and unexpected ends. Depth, longevity and having fun.
Also, audio. Back in 1991 a game with digitalized voices was more than the 4K/60fps of today. It was groundbreaking, we still were mostly playing with bleeps and bloops on 8bit systems. Those impact, punch and kick sounds were perfectly balanced too, between fantasy and realism. You didn’t need to look at the health bar, those pitched down smack sounds were letting you know that your opponent was hurting.
Kids today want the full story and everything in between. I grew up on SFII filling up the blanks of each fighter’s story, daydreaming about it. It made it mythical. That was cool.
SFII, the only one.