Hacking is never a good thing. Whenever someone gets hacked, be it a social media company, a business, or a gaming company, people’s details get lost, stolen, or compromised. Hacking is a criminal activity carried about by people with malevolent intentions, and it should never be applauded when it happens. After it has happened, though, nothing can be done to limit the circulation of any stolen information that’s reached the internet. Once it’s in the public domain, it will inevitably end up becoming common knowledge. Unfortunately for Capcom, that’s what happened when their systems were compromised in mid-November.
In the first few days after Capcom confirmed the attack had taken place, all of the attention was on what risk – if any – might be posed to people whose data is stored on Capcom servers. The answer to that question is still unclear. Capcom believes that some information relating to up to three hundred and fifty thousand people might have been accessed, but there’s no suggestion that any complete records or financial information were taken. Now that panic has passed, the press (and the wider gaming world) have turned their attention to what information about the company’s future plans has been gleaned from the hack. As it turns out, there appears to be quite a lot of new information to be learned about the long-awaited next game in the globally-popular “Street Fighter” series, “Street Fighter 6.”
Fans have been waiting for a new edition of the game for almost five years. “Street Fighter 5” suffered from numerous problems when it was released and initially garnered negative reviews. Capcom has spent much of the past few years trying to make up for those problems by releasing new content, fine-tuning the game, and making sure that everyone who paid for it ultimately felt like they’d got value for their money. They’ve mostly succeeded in that task, but the game is starting to look and feel its age. That’s not to mention the account that a new generation of game consoles has been launched this year. It was generally expected that a new “Street Fighter” game would appear in either late 2021 or early 2022 – and that speculation wasn’t misplaced. The leaked information that’s reached the internet confirms that’s the current plan – and that’s not all that it confirms.
In addition to confirming that “Street Fighter 6” is currently slated for a late 2021 release, the documents we’ve seen online confirm that the series will be returning to the Microsoft Xbox. To the surprise of everybody (and for reasons that never became entirely clear), the fifth edition of the game was only ever released for PCs and the PlayStation 4. There hasn’t been a new edition of “Street Fighter” for the Xbox since the days of the Xbox 360. That right will be wronged by the next version of the game, which will be available for not only the PS4 and Xbox Series X but also for their predecessors, the PS4 and the Xbox One.
The news that the game is still on target for 2021 will come as a surprise to some people who’ve been paying attention to news of its development within the past twelve months. Although Capcom never comments on rumors, there were widespread reports a few months ago that the proposed sixth game hadn’t been received well by play-testers and that Capcom had become unhappy with the direction taken by producer Yoshinori Ono. Ono has subsequently left the project, and the “Street Fighter” franchise is under new management. The beta version of the game that play-testers have seen is thought to have been all-but scrapped, which, if true, would have led to significant delays. If any delays have occurred – and if there’s any truth to those rumors at all – Capcom has recovered sufficiently from the issues to tentatively put the game back on the 2021 calendar. As always, though, any such stories should be viewed with suspicion until Capcom issues an official statement.
While that completes the round-up of everything new we’ve discovered about “Street Fighter 6” recently, it doesn’t tell you everything that’s going on with “Street Fighter” in general at the moment. Aside from the sixth game in the series, Capcom has also been hard at work on a Capcom “mini arcade” that will feature classic games from the development company’s back catalog – and that naturally means that the miniature game system will come pre-loaded with “Street Fighter 2.” In fact, it comes pre-loaded with no fewer than four different versions of “Street Fighter 2.” Entitled the “Capcom Retro Station,” the system will include the original “Street Fighter 2” plus “Street Fighter 2 Champion Edition,” “Super Street Fighter 2,” and the hyper-charged final incarnation of the game “Super Street Fighter 2 Turbo.” That’s in addition to other Capcom classics like “Mega Man” and several of its sequels.
The fact that Capcom would return to “Street Fighter 2” to market a new console doesn’t surprise us. It’s still the best-known and most-played of the series for all the technical superiority of the later games. It was “Street Fighter 2” that inspired the notoriously awful 1990s “Street Fighter” movie. The same game also inspired no less than three different online slots, all of which are still available at various online slots websites today. In fact, the “Street Fighter 2: The World Warrior” online slots game is the single most popular of all the online slots with free spins no deposit inspired by video games. That’s quite an achievement when you see what it’s up against. Although more modern video games like “Tomb Raider,” “Call of Duty” and “Hitman” have all themselves been adapted into online slots, it’s still the definitive ‘best’ version of “Street Fighter” that sits at the top of the pile.
The Capcom Retro Station is currently available in Japan but doesn’t yet have a release date for other markets – although it’s believed that one will be announced soon. We might be waiting a little while longer for verified information about “Street Fighter 6,” although now the hackers have let the cat out of the bag, Capcom might conclude that its hand has been forced and confirm what we all know sooner rather than later. As and when that information becomes available, we’ll bring it to you here.
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