Finding the Right World Warrior for You

11:00 AM November 21, 2014

Ultra Street Fighter 4 is by far one of the most complex Street Fighter games ever made. Gone are the days of rock, scissor, paper fighting where one style simply beats another while loses against another. With the recent tournament wins of Rose at Evo 2014 and El Fuerte at Canada Cup 2014, Ultra Street Fighter 4 shows that any character on the roster can win at any time. While it is simple to pick a character just because he or she is popular on the pro tier list, many new players to the game are left wondering: Who is the best world warrior for me?

This can be a daunting choice considering that the roster currently stands at 44 characters, light years from the original eight. Now we could go into very heavy detail on the technical side of things, taking into consideration frame rates, hit stun deterioration and the sort, but let’s keep it simple and say that you pick the character that you feel that you have the strongest connection to.

Now, that may sound stupid or silly at first, but it happens a lot more often than you think. Many pros have stuck with particular characters for years just because that character was their first choice when they started playing Street Fighter. Justin Wong has gone on record saying that he picked Rufus because he was the first “fat” world warrior and that he’ll win for the out of shape players out there, while Ryan “Filipino Champ” Ramirez once said that he picked Dhalsim because he thought Dhalsim looked cool with his human skull necklace.

So how do you build a connection with a particular character? One of the easiest ways is to get into the character’s back story. By now, all the fighters that have ever been in a Street Fighter game have a unique back story developed over the years. Some of these stories have been so integrated into our culture that even if you ask a random person on the street, they would know that Ryu’s story is that he’s a wandering Street Fighter.

The fighting style of each combatant is also something that a player should take into consideration. Some characters are considered to be more aggressive, wanting to push the tempo of the fight with close quarter combat, while other characters like to be defensive, playing on the other side of the screen waiting for their opponent to make a mistake and then punishing them. Then there are others who are a combination of the two, switching back and forth as needed.

With all this taken into consideration, the status quo first choice of characters would be Ryu. Why? Because Ryu has a deep yet memorable back story, easy to learn moves and combos, and a versatile attack style that lets him play offensively or defensively.

This does not mean however that every new player should choose Ryu. I, for example, picked Cody as my primary character when I first started playing Ultra Street Fighter because I had liked the character from his first game — Final Fight — and his story was very well developed during the Street Fighter Alpha Series. When I started playing Cody, I found that his more aggressive play style fits me perfectly.

It may take many attempts to find the right world warrior for you to play, practice and master, but once the bond between player and character is made, it becomes difficult to break. Just don’t give up and remember the day Bison came into your game like it was the most important day of your life, but for Bison it was a Tuesday!