The big talk right now in the fighting game community is not about Marvel vs. Capcom 3, but about Yoshiro Ono’s comments that Super Street Fighter 4 Arcade Edition would not be coming to consoles. Arcade Edition is a combination of changes to the characters along with the addition of new characters to the roster. The current number of new characters is currently unconfirmed, and although I’m a little upset at his remarks, I can understand why Capcom wouldn’t want to bring it to the consoles. However, I think there are some better reasons for the holdout instead of Ono’s �it’s already balanced� reasoning.

1. It keeps the last few arcades alive

When I interviewed Arcade UFO owner Ryan Harvey about how the lack of a proper arcade edition of Super Street Fighter 4 would affect his business, there was definite concern in his voice. Arcade owners across the world have invested a lot of money in their Street Fighter 4 cabinets, but only received a solid return when the game wasn’t available on the consoles in late 2008 and early 2009. When SF4 came to the consoles, there was little reason for players to go back to the arcades. Add on top of that SSF4’s release to the consoles first made players even less likely to leave home to play. This lead to some owners resorting to switching out the regular arcade boards with a console in order to give players a reason to go to the arcade.

Back when SSF 4 Arcade Edition was released in December, arcades received a surge of business that they badly needed. Albeit, it was a little too late for one well known arcade in the USA: Arcade Infinity. Arcades are in need of something that will keep their doors open in these days when it’s too easy to stay at home and jump on Xbox Live or PSN. Gamers are being very hypocritical: they are upset that the Arcade Edition may not come to consoles while on the other hand lamenting over how there are no more arcades to go to.

2. It lets Capcom start working on a new Street Fighter

Just as Street Fighter 2 began the whole fighting game craze, Street Fighter 4 has brought the genre back to life. It’s made household names out of pro gamers like Justin Wong, Marn, and Mike Ross. Thousands tune into streams to watch the best go at it. Yet that will not last forever. Rarely will people check out older games on a stream because they’ve moved on (Starcraft being the big exception here). MvC 3 is already dominating tournaments and streams giving SSF 4 the big boot.

Capcom needs to keep the momentum going by releasing a new Street Fighter. Street Fighter 4 was originally released back in July 2008 in Japanese arcades making it almost 3 years that we’ve been playing the same fighting game engine. There have been changes and new characters, but it’s still the same engine. We need to see something new in the Street Fighter series or we’ll find ourselves reliving the same Street Fighter 2 releases that we saw back in the 90s.

3. It would piss off ‘regular’ gamers

The only way for Capcom to release the updates of Arcade Edition to the consoles, without causing criticism from the gaming community, is if they release it as DLC for $10. If they release it for more than that amount you would hear gamers fuming about the price being �too high.� Also, forget about doing a separate disc because that would not be welcomed by anyone. In addition to not being convenient, another disc would lead to the same bitching about price.

The only gamers that would not have any problem with these releases are fighting game enthusiasts. In the end, you and I both know that most other gamers will simply not be satisfied unless the DLC is cheap and includes everything.

Capcom has some very good reasons for not releasing Super Street Fighter 4 Arcade Edition to consoles. Instead of whining about how unfairly we think we’re supposedly being treated, we should cut Capcom some slack because they’re doing what is best for fighting games in the long run.

- O.G.

Send your comments to the author og@original-gamer.com