Street Fighter 6 (Steelbook) (PlayStation 4)

Street Fighter 6 is the first title in the long-running fighting game series to take place after the events of Street Fighter III: 3rd Strike. Peace has largely been restored to Metro City but street fights are still a common occurence among the population to the point of becoming a pastime, and the player can enter the storyline either with a custom character seeking to rise in the ranks of street fighters, or play the usual “arcade” mode and follow the stories related to the canon characters (18 at launch, 6 of which entirely new to the series).

The game has three main modes:

• World Tour – the player’s custom character roams a hub world, receives lessons in various techniques by “legendary masters” (the default characters) to mix and match into their personal style, level up, complete quests and even battle common people who differ in fighting skill levels
• Battle Hub – the player’s custom character engages in multiplayer fighting (including a clan system) or playing emulated classic Capcom fighting games
• Fighting Ground – the classic gameplay of choosing default characters in arcade mode, individual singleplayer or multiplayer fights, practicing (with the ability to measure frames like in more recent 3D Street Fighter titles), and playing with custom rulesets in the Extreme Battle mode

A key addition to Street Fighter 6 are the different control sets: Modern, Classic and Dynamic. Modern is designed to be streamlined and easier to learn for newcomers and Dynamic is designed to perform auto-attacks relative to the player’s position towards the opponent, while Classic retains the complexity and depth of controls from prior games in the series. Players can change the control sets at any time and fight against each other offline – with online only permitting Modern and Classic – but the trade-off is that only the Classic controls deal full damage on every hit. The used control set is shown next to the player’s name during a match. Multiple common combinations which require pressing multiple keys at once (e.g. Light Punch + Light Kick, all three Punches…) can be mapped to a single separate key as well.

The new Drive Gauge, shown beneath the vitality meter, allows execution of moves that rush towards the opponent, parry attacks, counter/absorb incoming hits or overdrive special attacks. It has 6 slots which replenish over time and when normal attacks are performed successfully. Super Arts come in 3 levels, with increasing power and cinematic duration.

Additional characters (as they are released post-launch), gear, cosmetics for custom characters and more can be bought from the in-game store or via DLC packages, while the in-game currency can also be earned by playing. Cross-play between platforms can be toggled on and off.