Games of Yore #4 - Street Fighter II

I wanted to save this special game for a special holiday.

Street Fighter II is the granddaddy of all fighting games. If you grew up in the eighties and started to come of age in the early nineties, you know what I am talking about. Street Fighter II is the quintessential fighting game and sets the stage for such superb fighting games like Justice Stage Task Force, Pit Fighter, The Simpsons Wrestling, Ballz, and Shaq-Fu.

To be quite honest, if you are not familiar with this game you are probably not going to read this blog and will not purchase our fabulous merchandise.

The premise of this game is simple. You are one of eight fighters participating in a worldwide tournament to win the biggest prize of them all, the Holy Grail. In other words, you gain the ability to verbally tea bag you friends about how fantastic of a button masher you are and how feeble of a person they are. FANTASTIC!

The mechanics of the game are relatively simple. There are six buttons you press, three for punch and three for kick. There are also special moves specific to each character which requires some sort of keypad directional movement and one of the aforementioned buttons. But all of this does not matter. Just use your medium kick over and over again, and you should be able to put a whoopin’ on anybody while enjoying the curse words you hear from your friend who spent hours and hours mastering his favorite character. God, those were the good old days.

Speaking of characters, I mentioned there were eight you could choose from.

Ryu – The ninja type dude who everybody used in the arcades. He had the Shoryuken move which has become iconic in gaming culture.

Ken – Ryu’s lover

E.Honda – He was the sumo wrestler of the bunch who defied gravity with his vicious 500 pound flying headbutt. He enjoyed fighting in his Japanese bathhouse. Kind of makes you wonder if he had something to do with the Ryu/Ken split.

Zangief – E.Honda’s lover.

Dhalsim – Nobody I know ever used this guy. He could spit fire from his mouth and convert people to Hindu.

Blanka – This poor bastard was suffering from hemmoroids during the entire tournament which explained his green skin and orange hair. Unfortunately, he was from Brazil where they didn’t develop Preparation H until 1995. He was also the character that my good friend “specialized” in. It was fun to see that controller fly across the room while listening to accusations of being a “cheap bastard” and that my technique sucked.

Chun-Li – To avoid lawsuits from the ACLU and the League of Feminist Women, Chun-Li is the female character of the game. She was also the first sexual experience for some young men.

Guile – The army dude. He was my favorite because his special moves were the easiest to use. Plus, I could always beat Blanka with him which allowed me to witness my good friend suffer a nervous breakdown which would eventually lead to him suffering from the hemorrhoids he deals with today.

Peace.