The wants and needs of competitive fighting game players have warrented increasingly meaningful consideration from developers in the past few years, but Ultra Street Fighter 4 is a clear example of how a fighting game can address those needs without alienating more casual players.

Same great fighting; Fun new characters; Smart balance changes; W-Ultra; Edition select

Street Fighter IV inarguably revived a dying genre when it hit arcades in 2008. Fighters had begun to stagnate and wane in popularity, and Capcom stepped up to the plate and knocked it out of the park with a game no one thought to bet on.

Let's get it out of the way, unless you already enjoy Super Street Fighter IV, there's nothing in Arcade Edition that's likely to change your mind. Unless you've got a fetish for Dragonball Z and X-treme skating twins in Kung-Fu shirts. Then you're in business.

Yun and Yang are fun to play; Upgrades for weaker characters; Fairly priced

Strange balance changes; No new Trials; Still unfriendly to new players

The beat-em-up genre has seen many contenders come and go but all were pretenders to the crown and never really took Street Fighters title.  Will Street Fighter 4 deliver on our rose tinted memories or is it a Hadoken to the face that should be quickly forgotten?

Street Fighter X Tekken X Street Fighter. It's only natural to feel conflicted about Ultra Street Fighter IV . On one hand, this third major update to the series that began in Japanese arcades in 2008 is by and large a value buy.

A budget price and a comprehensive list of updates probably won't impress casual gamers, but Super Street Fighter IV: Arcade Edition still has plenty of additions that hardcore fans will want to snatch up.

Lots of "under the hood" updates that should please hardcore players; four new characters; good roster balancing. Even without purchasing Arcade Edition, the free Update Kit helps bridge both versions for "vanilla" Street Fighter players who still want to interact with the AE crowd online

A fighting game fan's dream come true. Following the release of Street Fighter II, my […]

+ Rock solid gameplay; + Gorgeous visuals; + Incredibly fun online multiplayer; + Simple enough for newcomers; + Deep enough for pros

Cutscenes are lackluster; Final boss difficulty may turn off some

With the mainstream resurgence of fighting games led by Capcom's Street Fighter IV , the whole community has been revitalized. Sure, they still drive up to big cities to do local tournaments that cover both new and old games, but now there's a secondary community, one that plays online.

Ce Street Fighter IV devrait séduire les amateurs de la série. Capcom a trouvé le juste équilibre entre la mise en place des points qui ont fait le succès de la série, et quelques nouveautés qui permettent de faire évoluer son jeu.

Equilibre entre nouveautés et "anciennetés; Prise en main rapide; Mêmes coups; mêmes techniques; Contre-attaque; Graphismes

Manette 360 pas forcément adaptée

It's obvious that each iteration of the long-running Street Fighter series has been carefully tuned and tweaked to the finest degree, and nowhere is this more apparent than in Street Fighter IV.

Gorgeous character models; animations; and background art; Comprehensive multiplayer modes; Accessible but nuanced gameplay; Plenty of replay value for completionists

No tournament mode; Online play suffers if either fighter's connection is slow