On Dec. 5, the debut trailer for Street Fighter 5 leaked online. And even with only just more than a minute of footage to go on, there are already some conclusions that can be drawn.
The first big news? The the game would be exclusive—as a console title—to the Playstation 4. Of course, it will also arrive on the PC, but that news was a big blow to fighting game fans who already own an Xbox One, especially those who might have chosen Microsoft’s console in reaction it Killer Instinct’s Xbox exclusivity.
The action in the trailer will surely look familiar to anyone who knows Street Fighter. Ryu and Chun-Li show off some of their signature moves. But a closer look reveals a number of changes coming to the series.
The first is based around the player’s ability to continue combos in different positions. In the video, Chun-Li works a combo while Ryu is both thrown up into the air and lying on the ground. These two types of combos, air juggling and OTG (off-the-ground), would surely present a variety of new possibilities and could signal a break from Street Fighter 4’s emphasis on singular pokes and tight link combos, which must be strung together within the space of as few as a single frame.
Chun-Li also manages to launch Ryu through a breakable wall. This could be a new feature allowing players to transition mid-round to different areas. How this would affect the gameplay is unknown, as the sequence shown in the trailer ends as soon as Ryu breaks through the wall.
Other games, such as Dead or Alive, increase damage when an opponent is knocked through breakable areas. One possible advantage however, is that the feature could also reset their positioning. So while the player taking damage might take a bit more for having been pushed through a wall, they may in exchange be given relief from the corner pressure.
Both Ryu and Chun-Li also activate some kind of special, powered-up mode in the clip, adding some visual effects to the characters and their attacks.
It’s not clear how this would affect the game. It could provide additional damage, greater attack speed, or allow moves to be strung together that otherwise couldn’t be. And, of course, we also don’t know how it’s activated—maybe it’s an ability each player starts with that can be used once per round or match, or maybe it’s a comeback mechanic that activates after a player has absorbed a certain amount of damage. Or—and this is highly unlikely given how prominent ability features in the trailer—it could also just be some flashy visual flair.
What everyone wants to know going forward, of course, is which of the series’s recurring characters will appear. Series stalwarts such as Ken, Guile and Sagat would seem a safe bet, but there may be further clues in the trailer as to who else we might see.
A post on the official PlayStation blog makes reference to Ryu using the Denjin Hadouken. This is notable. The only previous game in the series in which Ryu has used this particular move is Street Fighter 3, which canonically takes place later in the series timeline than any other game.
If Street Fighter 5 happens around the same time or after Street Fighter 3, it may mean that the entire cast of characters in the series would be available for use should Capcom wish to include them.
We’ll find out soon. The game will be playable at this weekend’s Capcom Cup in San Francisco. The tournament is the culmination of the company’s Pro Tour that has played out over the course of the year.
Fans are already excited to see what else might come, especially after series producer Yoshinori Ono said in a recent interview that several long-sought after features will be added.
