Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix (PS3)

The SSF2THDR beta is up now

While every Street Fighter fan waits with bated breath for Street Fighter 4, Capcom's HD Remix of Super Street Fighter 2 Turbo has fallen somewhat off the radar. But, now that the Xbox LIVE beta is up (via an 800 MS Point purchase of Wolf of the Battlefield: Commando 3), HD Remix has quarter circle forwarded its way back into the big time. Question is, will it be worth the wait? We dusted off our dragon punches and perfected our Supers with the two playable characters, Ryu and Ken, to bring you the answer.

First off, it's Super Street Fighter 2 Turbo with an HD sheen. It's no more complicated an issue than that. Developer Backbone has tweaked rather than revolutionised the game, which is great, since SSF2T is what many consider to be the best SF2 game ever. The redrawn art, by Udon Entertainment (the guys behind the US comic series), has divided the series' vociferous fans. Inevitably your opinion on the game's 'look' will come down to personal preference. For us, the game looks great in motion, far better than in screen shots, especially if you have an HD television. Fireballs create a heat haze effect on the redrawn backgrounds (only Ryu's Japan stage is available in the beta) and the animations are to our eyes gorgeous. But the most important point is that the redrawn art hasn't impacted on the precision collision detection we know and love from the franchise. The game looks new, but it feels reassuringly old.

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While only staple street fighters Ryu and Ken are playable in the beta (the final game will feature all 17 characters from the original game, including Akuma), full one on one offline and online play, including tournaments, ranked matches and player matches are available. One of the biggest question marks surrounding SSF2THDRemix was how the net code would stand up in the face of that online fighting game killer, lag. Let me first say that this is a beta, and the whole point of it is to test the game's net code so Backbone can provide the smoothest experience possible. With that out of the way, the game currently runs relatively smoothly, with occasional lag during matches. Players will sometimes teleport, fireballs will sometimes flicker and, at times, it's impossible to know just what the hell is going on. It's playable, but it's not the perfect online experience we prey Capcom will be able to provide when the game's finally released. But, already it's a massive improvement on the disappointing quality of online play experienced in Street Fighter 2' Hyper Fighting. And, since this is a beta, things can only get better.

The game's online room matches allow for six players at a time (two fighting and four spectators). Even better, the online Tournament mode allows for a whopping eight players to knock two lumps out of each other in an attempt to find the ultimate SF2T player... of that particular tournament. In short, HD Remix's online foundations are rock solid.

The graphics have been dragged into the 21st century, but the gameplay remains old school.

The philosophy behind HD Remix is that it should be a more accessible fighter. To this end the more complicated moves have been simplified and each character has been adjusted by lead designer David Sirlin, who's done a wonderful job of explaining the changes in regular updates on his blog. Super move motions have been made easier. Ryu and Ken's Hadoken and Shoryuken supers respectively now only require two quarter circle forward motions and one punch press. Some purists have bemoaned this move, and, admittedly, it can't be denied that the game's most powerful moves have been made easier to pull off. But if you don't like it, a 'Classic' version of the game is included in HD Remix with the original moves and hit boxes, so, really, you can't complain.

Overpowered characters have been toned down and underpowered characters have been toned up. But the point is that if you have a character you know and love, you'll still know and love them in HD Remix. From our time with the game we've already discovered Ryu's new fake fireball (quarter circle forward and kick) as well as Ken's new kick move (quarter circle forward and the three kicks).

Ken can now juggle Dragon Punches, which cause a horrendous amount of damage and dizzy as well. Already fans have bemoaned this tweak, slamming its cheapness. Hopefully the beta is of a build that's a few months old and Ken's Dragon Punch juggle will be toned down, either by reducing the damage it causes or by removing its ability to dizzy. If it remains for the final release, we can see Ken being banned in house rules.

But, on the whole, it's as you were. As Sirlin pointed out in our interview with him from earlier in the year: "The first myth to dispel is that giving more players access to doing special moves somehow imbalances things. Quite the contrary as it gets one of the barriers of entry for beginners out of the way sooner, and gets them to the real part of the game: the strategy."

Although only Ryu and Ken are playable in the beta, we're having a blast online.

We did find special moves and indeed Super moves much easier to pull off (despite the complete inadequacy of the Xbox 360 pad for fighting games). Does this break the game? Of course not. Great Super Street Fighter 2 Turbo players will be great HD Remix players.

Clearly we love Street Fighter 2, and HD Remix would have to be one hell of a cock up for us not to love it. But the beta has brought with it the odd concern. The new widescreen mode feels too confined to us. From what we can gather it's a zoom and crop 16:9. Thankfully you can stick with a 4:3 set up if, like us, the widescreen mode doesn't agree with you. The remixed music, while pleasing our ear drums, cuts out every now and then during matches, which is odd. And, like we mentioned, there's some noticeable slowdown, especially mid super. But there's nothing here that can't be sorted by the time the game is released. That's what betas are for, right?

There's a feeling online that the game has taken too long to come out and now will suffer from releasing too close to SF4. It's a valid point, but that doesn't stop the game looking like it's going to be brilliant. Really, HD Remix feels like Street Fighter with HD graphics. It's not a revolution. Capcom hasn't broken anything, nor has it revolutionised anything. More than anything else playing the beta makes us want SF4 even more, which may well be part of the reason why it exists. True or not, Backbone's done a sterling job here. And we have to give credit to Udon too. Is the HD remix beta worth the 800 MS Points it costs to buy Commando 3? Despite only two characters being playable, if you're a Street Fighter 2 fans, the answer is a resounding yes.

Super Street Fighter 2 Turbo HD Remix is due out for Xbox LIVE and PSN this summer.