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Street Fighter X Tekken (Xbox 360)
by kojak123
I got this for my birthday when it came out in the Summer this year.
I am a Street Fighter fan through and through - can't do Tekken. To my mind it's overly complicated, difficult to control and not nearly as playable as Street Fighter. The graphics are always great and it's gorgeous to look at, but I think it sacrifices some ... of the fun for that.
My wife is a fairly big Tekken fan. Despite not being much of a gamer, her brother is, and so when he needed someone to practice on he dragged her in as cannon-fodder, meaning she was schooled in the ways of Tekken and the console beat-em-up when I met her.
With me as a Street Fighter fan and her as a Tekken fan, there was only one thing for it.... we bought a copy of the new Mortal Kombat game!
I kid, of course, we ordered up a copy of this to see just which was best!
Whaaa?
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The game is standard beat-em-up stuff. There are approximately 40 playable characters (some unlockable some only available through download) to choose from, you pick your players(s) and set about slapping each other about!
There are ten different arenas to battle in, all in 2D but rendered beautifully.
Your characters each have a health bar and when one is depleted that character is 'KO'd and has lost. The game is played on a best out of three basis, so the first player to win 2 bouts wins the game. (best of 3 can be changed in the menu).
The twist here is that we actually have to choose 2 characters each from the menu and play a tag-team sort of game. You can only use one character at a time, but may swap them at any time during the fight if your main fighter becomes dangerously low on health or you fancy a change of tactics.
It's an ok idea, but one which I really don't feel works. I struggle to see the point of it to be honest.
Who's the boss?
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Street Fighter is a franchise owned by Japanese developer/publisher Capcom, an absolute giant in the arcade and gaming world.
Tekken is owned by Namco, another well respected Japanese programmer.
As Capcom were the production house sinking their money into this, the game is played in classic 2D rather than the 3D we're more used seeing on the next-gen consoles. The Tekken characters are all used on license so Namco had no input into the game.
As it happens, Namco weren't happy with seeing their cutting edge 3D franchise taking a step down, and are working on a reverse crossover; Tekken X Street Fighter, which will be very similar to this game, but in 3D instead.
Joysticks at the ready!
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Because of the old-school 2D layout, just about anyone who has picked up a joypad in the last 2 decades will soon be able to get to grips with the controls.
The D-Pad moves us around the area - a very simple backwards, forwards, jump and crouch - and then six buttons (4 mains and two shoulder buttons) control punches and kicks. There are three different powers in each, with a variation of rapid but fairly weak shots or crushing but slow (easy to dodge) attacks.
Of course, what made these games so popular were the over the top special moves. Whether your choice is throwing projectiles, performing acrobatic aerial attacks or building up devastating power punches, you'll find it all and more here!
I do feel that there is an unfair advantage towards Street Fighter in this respect, as I find the Tekken moves much more difficult to perform and less varied. This is remedied by having a 'handicap', where new players and less experienced gamers can use a far less complex control system.
Combo's are still easy enough to perform, but I must say I haven't had the patience to learn more than 4 or 5 hit combo's despite their being some huge numbers available to those nimble of finger!
The swapping of players mid-game is easy enough to do, but utilising the tag-team attacks is a pain to master and not really rewarding even when you do.
Flying solo?
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Beat-em-ups are legendarily one dimensional as a single player game.
Very few offer much to hold a players interest as a lot miss the line of AI difficulty. They are either an absolute breeze and offer no resistance, clocked in a day, or have ridiculous jumps in AI whereby it gets near impossible somewhere in the middle rather than ratcheting up gradually.
This one isn't awful as a one player game, although the back story is; a mysterious object lands in the Antarctic. Whichever tag-team you choose to play as have their own agenda for investigating, and obviously clash with other teams on the way to the truth. In between fights there are short cinematic scenes which pad out the story, adding a little more flesh until we reach conclusion.
Anything new?
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Despite this being one of the more anticipated cross-over releases, the cross-over genre has been done to death now! Street Fighter X Tekken was hyped quite a lot a few months back but sadly soon slipped down the charts.
The tag-team element is something a little different for this style of game, but in my opinion poorly executed.
This game does have two new modes; Pandora and Gem.
The Gem game is basically the same but with optional character boosts and upgrades. Six different skills (health, attack, defense, assist, cross gauge and speed) are available for upgrade during the game - a maximum of three allowed.
Pandora is tied in to the 2 player theme. If one of your guys' health drops under 25%, they can be sacrificed and their remaining health piled onto your last remaining character.
DLC;
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Downloadable content is limited, although there are a handful of characters to be purchased. 6 players for either franchise I believe. Despite fan-favourite Blanca being an option, it's nothing I'd fork out for to be fair, but it would certainly add longevity for a heavy-use player.
The package costs a tenner or 1600 x-box points.
Worth a look then?
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The game was released on the back of high ratings, with a solid 8.5-9/10 average on IGN.
Gameplay is fun and frantic, but I soon got bored with the cross-over aspects of it and went back to the superb Street Fighter IV. As a multiplayer it's not bad, it certainly solves the argument of which is the better game for the fans - pick up your pads and battle it out!
Obviously this review is but one mans opinion, but I struggle to see how 9/10 is justified on a fairly basic (if stunningly gorgeous) 2D fighting game.
Yes, it looks very appealing, but this doesn't justify cutting back on none 3D gameplay. Given the capabilities of the X-Box 360 and PS3, this could still look incredible with multi dimensional gameplay and interactive scenery. Very strange given what Capcom did with SF IV.
Personally I'd give it 9/10 on looks, but only 7/10 on gameplay.
It's absolutely worth a play, for fans of either series or fans of neither!
I enjoy dipping into it, but I must admit that my wife gets far more out of it than I do, so maybe this will be more fun for a Tekken player than a Street Fighter fan-boy like myself.
As it's been out for a few months it can be found brand new for under £20 and in good pre-owned condition for as little as £10.
Expect this to be a decent seller this Christmas I'd say, despite the newer Tekken Tag 2 game being out.
Good fun and great value as a pre-owned game, but I'm hanging on for the Namco developed Tekken/Streetfighter crossover to see if they can make a classic out of two classics!
K
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WWE 13 (Xbox 360)
by Red-Fox
While I haven't been very enthusiastic about wrestling games in the past few years, something about WWE 13 attracted my interest. A big part of this was that the game focuses on the 'Attitude era' of the WWE (then WWF). This was the era of wrestling I grew up watching.
The 'Attitude era' mode of WWE 13 allows you to recreate ... some of the most famous pieces of the attitude era, these include things such as the rise of Degeneration-X and the feud between 'Stone Cold' Steve Austin and Vince McMahon.
What surprised me about this mode is the amount of detail that has gone into.
Arenas match those of the year they are supposed to be representing, and audio of the actual show is used at certain points of the game. One part I was very impressed with was the section of the game that showed the debut of Cactus Jack. While they could've just used the match he was in, instead they have recreated the entire part of the show in video game form.
As you play the matches, you are given certain tasks to achieve that match up with the actual match. Things such as Tombstoning Kane three times with the Undertaker in their Wrestlemania match. While these are not mandatory, doing them all will unlock a whole variety of different things, such as attitude era rings and wrestlers, to Championship belts.
The mode isn't perfect, some wrestlers are missing, 'F' and 'Federation' are still bleeped out in the game, and there is no section to recreate moments from WCW.
This pretty much sums up the entire game. The game itself is very good, with a huge variety of wrestlers to choose from (both attitude era and the current generation), and the same can be said about the arenas and match types, but parts of the game can be lackluster. Wrestlers reverse moves so frequently that it becomes quite annoying and the commentary can become quite repetitive.
The WWE Universe mode returns again, and while it is extremely fun to play, should you leave it to its own devices for a little while you'll soon discover that 'jobber' wrestlers are fighting for your world title.
The online mode can be annoying. Games can have lag, and, as with most games, people will only use the highest rated wrestlers. The shining light of the online section is the Community creations section, which is still brilliant.
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