This year, 2017, finally it’s been just 30 years since Street Fighter I was released in Japan, 1987. However, to be honest I didn’t have an opportunity to play it on those days because I had yet to go to an amusement arcade as I was not allowed to do it because our parents tended to think it was mostly occupied by rude teenagers at that time. Therefore, in my case its series I’ve known is from a legendary Street Fighter II released in Japan in March, 1991.
When it was released here in Japan, I had yet to play any arcade games at amusement arcades although many of my former classmates had already started to do it. Because I still thought the image of arcade games were still bad just like my parents’ generations. However, in the same month, after I bought Super Famicom aka Super NES released in Western countires, I also wanted to play the original arcade version of Gradius III because it was really different from original as it was arranged for console players too, so I wanted to know a real arcade version.
As a result of it, I finally started to play arcade games at one of the nearest amusement arcade from here in my home where I already visited two years ago from that time. Fortunately, Gradius III was still put there although it had been one year and four months since it was released. Needless to say I and my closest friend were addicted to playing it for a couple of months and during that time, many players were absorbed in playing Street Fighter II beside us, but I didn’t focus on it as we were only interested in Gradius III.
However, one day, when I visited at a shopping center nearby the amusement, cabinets of Street Fighter II were vacant and I finally played it for the first time. As a result I was immediately crazy about the game and I thought I really wanted to play it over and over again. I mean, it was my first Street Fighter II experience in my life, but that game was already extremely popular across the world, so we always had to wait to play it at least 30 minutes until a previous player finished it. In addition, I was not good at playing any arcade games, that’s why because I had not got used to using an arcade stick and buttons on the control panel yet, and of course most of the arcade games were much more difficult than consoles.
Therefore, I was unable to beat even the second character, so I couldn’t play even the first bonus stage which is crushed by a player. But I’d never given up to play it in spite of that. That was why we were extremely fun while playing it every time, although I had yet to use very well its special control panel assembled by an arcade stick with 3 punches and kicks buttons respectively.
However, I had not beaten even the second or third enemies in the game for a couple of months until even September. So I deeply considered how I would be a good player during that time. But one day, I knew one of the video game magazines exclusively for arcade games called “Gamest” at a bookstore because its publisher released a special issue magazine called “The Best Game” in June, 1991. Therefore, I bought some of its back numbers which introduced the tips of Street Fighter II from the beginning and I referred it.
Then, finally I gradually knew how to beat the enemies and I accomplished to beat Vega, Japanese version, by Ryu at an amusement in Atsugi City, south of my hometown in October. My first and when I cleared it, both of cases I used Ryu, because I tend to use a main hero in any games because most of them tend to be created as an appropriate character for beginners. However, as most of the old players have already known, Ryu and Ken in the game were weakest characters for versus players fighting. That was why all of his special techniques were very hard to be used by players especially Shoryuken. Moreover, normal punches and kicks were also weaker than others because their reaches were very short. So they always have disadvantage due to its reasons especially Guile and Dhalsim who have longer reaches than Ryu and Ken, so it was so hard for them to beat both in the versus fighting.
But I didn’t stop to use both despite that. Because a cancel technique, especially their special movement called the Upper Shoryuken, which combined a strong punch and Shoryuken with cancel technique. It can get a very strong damage to enemies as very fluent and fabulous movement. So it was one of the goals as Ryu players and I practiced it so many times until I did it nearly perfectly. And then, my close friend was also being a good player and we also started to play the versus fighting each other finally as it was much more fun than versus computers. Moreover, around November in Japan, the Dual Cabinets exclusively for versus fighting were installed at many amusement arcades across Japan. So we also had a lot of opportunities to play against other players, but unfortunately we were able to operate only Ryu, Ken and Zangief, as well as E.Honda by my friend, so it was so hard to win other characters.
By the way, many amusement arcade reinstalled the first Street Fighter as many players who had never played it also want to play as well as me. However, there were two different version available at that time. The first one is the special cabinet including two huge buttons with pressure censor, and the second one, a normal lever with 6 buttons as the same as the SFII original control panel. Needless to say most of locations chose the latter because of very compact. However, it was not good for us as it was too hard to use all of special movement due to very severe timing. But fortunately, one of the nearest places which had the original cabinet version, so I was lucky to play it many times but I played it only until Birdie as a first enemy in the UK stage.
When it comes to SFII again, so I played the versus mode in the game only with my closest friend due to the reasons that I described above. But surprisingly, we unexpectedly received a big news from Gamest at the end of December that Capcom announced to develop a new version of it called Street Fighter II Dash which would be released in April, and its detail was introduced in the New Year. Needless to say we were so happy to hear about it, because we expected Ryu, Ken and Zangief, characters we liked and used would be stronger than SFII. So I was so excited to read articles about it in the magazines until it was released.
It was as I’ve expected, all of the characters were stronger than a previous version. But most of others, especially Vega(M. Bison in overseas), Guile and Sagat were much stronger than them in spite of that. Actually, I went on playing it for a couple of months until August, but I was finally tired of playing it anymore around autumn season because my interest was moved to other genres such as shoot’em up and quiz games also released by Capcom. But surprisingly, the third updated version was released again its title called Street Fighter II Dash Turbo in winter in Japan suddenly. Because around October, the pirated version of SFII Dash was released in the whole world. So it was the biggest reason why the latest version was released.
In my case, I had never played the pirated version at any places, so I only heard it from a classmate of mine at that time. So I guess it couldn’t be helped it because actually a pirated is extremely illegal here in Japan. However, to be honest we were fed up with the latest version. That’s why Capcom seemed to earn money from players very easily as it was not a new game completely, just updated version. I knew Capcom released not only updated Street Fighter II version but also many many notable games such as Captain Commando, Tenchi wo Kurau a.k.a Warriors of Fate in overseas and the Adventure Quiz part 2 Capcom World which is my favorite. But Street Fighter II significantly influenced the entire of arcade video game industry on the planet at that time, so many players tended to misunderstand Capcom released only updated version of SFII.
However, even though many players had complaint of Capcom due to that reasons, we still liked playing the latest version. Because it was very speedy and added some of the special techniques only for some characters, such as High Speed Double Lariat for Zangief, and Kiko-ken for Chun Li. And then, finally Ryu was one of the strongest characters in the game according to compatible data by Gamest. During that time, other competitors of Capcom also released especially from SNK, such as the Art of Fighting and Fatal Fury 2 at the end of 1992. So both of games were paid attention in Gamest especially the latter. To be honest it seemed to be very unnatural because Gamest used a lot of pages for the article of Fatal Fury 2 even before it was released. However, it never won SFII Dash Turbo on the ranking chart in the magazine, which means it was never more popular than SFII series by players.
Therefore, SFII Dash Turbo kept on the best income and popular games on the chart in the magazine until World Heroes 2 was released by ADK in June, 1993. Moreover, SNK also announced to release other rival competitors such as Samurai Showdown and Fatal Fury Special. Capcom also developed a completely new programmed version of SFII series called Super Street Fighter II The New Challengers, including four new characters who are T. Hawk, Dee Jay, Fei Long and Cammy. But to be honest they didn’t give us huge impact. As a result, Samurai Showdown received the Best Game Award by Gamest in 1993 and SNK became the most favorite arcade video game company chosen by players at the same year.
The following year, Capcom released Street Fighter II X Grand Master Challenge in March. I played it at the Amusement EXPO’94 held at Makuhari Messe before being released with my closest friend. The game is still played by many players even now and it made a young player become very famous called Mr. Daigo Umehara, who is the first Japanese professional game player. So I realize SFIIX must be an appropriate version as the final. But to be honest I didn’t play it completely as the CPU enemies were strongest in the entire of the series and I was sick and tired of it. As a result, I preferred to play Gokujo Parodius released by Konami in the year.
Then, at the end of 1994, another legendary fighting game called Virtua Fighter 2 was finally released across the world. It means a new era of fighting games began but I was not addicted to playing it. Because shortly before it was released, I suddenly terminated to go to an amusement arcade. One and a half year later, after I bought PlayStation one, I also bought and played any fighting games such as Street Fighter Zero and Tekken series, and a half year later, also Virtua Fighter 2 for Sega Saturn when I bought the console. So sometimes I went to an amusement arcade to play its original versions, but I’d never been absorbed in staying at the place like when I was a high school student, so I can’t describe what happened there on those days anymore from my experiences.
To be honest, I’m scarcely interested in any latest games nowadays, but I still have some of the latest consoles such as PS4 and Xbox360 exclusively for downloading retro games from Internet because I still love them. Surprisingly it’s been thirty years since Street Fighter was released, and twenty-six years since Street Fighter II was released in 1991 and I played. But its memories are still remaining in my mind as unforgettable youthful memories even now.