The Virtua Fighter series, by the legendary Yu Suzuki who brought us Shenmue, made their first appearance on the ill fated Sega Saturn in what was to become one of the greatest gaming revolutions ever!! Finally a 3D beat em up, although the original characters seemed to be made out of Tetris blocks. But, the Virtua Fighter series have always improved on each other, setting new benchmarks, and of course, Virtua Fighter 4 is no exception.
Virtua Fighter 3 was a Dreamcast launch title, after rumours of a Saturn version, and although it had its faults like every other game out there, it still did the series proud, but only for Virtua Fighter fan themselves. Virtua Fighter 4 aims to be appeal-able to everyone!!
So what has changed?? What is new, exactly?? Well for a start, the first thing you’ll notice is the amazing graphics that could leave any game standing, and are far more realistic and colourful than Virtua Fighter 3 with its lush visuals. The detail on the characters themselves has also been improved to make them look realistic and better than ever.
Virtua Fighter 4 has gone back to its roots to improve itself, which when considering the quality of gameplay seen in the original Virtua Fighter, and more notably Virtua Fighter 2, is defiantly not a bad thing!! It will help new gamers get used to the game and be able to fight with the best of us, making the game more accessible to others.
The game itself is is just as was, you an your opponent in a ring battle it out, but in Virtua Fighter 4 you are against 8 other opponents plus the boss of course, but your opponents don’t randomly pop up for a fight but are wait in a line to have a pop at you, more in the lines of the old Virtua Fighter original and sequel. During a fight, you even get Dead Or Alive type cut scenes where you and your opponent taunt each other before the battle!!
Some other changes in the gameplay are the edition of the 8 way movement system, as seen in Soul Calibur, which also goes to help make the game easier for newcomers and gives more concentration on the fight itself, without having to worry about the evade button, which is now been removed!! The jumping system has also been sorted out, meaning you don’t have to run around jumping everywhere in a battle. Instead, you can float your opponent like in Soul Calibur and Tekken for a better result. These changes may simplify the game for newcomers, but they also add to the intensity of the fights as you don’t waste as much time jumping around dodging your opponent, just get stuck in there!!
Virtua Fighter 4 still has all the depth of all the other Virtua Fighters put together, but is much easier to play, which of course means its more fun to play!!
As with every Virtua Fighter sequel, there are two new fighters to play as. These are Vanessa Lewis and Lei Fei. Vanessa is one hell of a strong lady, with an aggressive kick boxing style although she is just as nimble as the other ladies of the game. Lei Fei Is a bald monk in a yellow costume, that fights in a shaolin style.
The old Virtua Fighters are still in here, and looking better than ever of course!! They have a load of new techniques to play around with, as well as their old ones, but they are still pretty much the same as ever!!
Virtua Fighter 4 will be making its appearance in arcades very soon (probably now by the time ive finished this!!). I will also be trying its luck on the Playstation 2, we’ll see I it manages to beat Tekken 4 and Soul Calibur 2, but I would not doubt Virtua Fighter 4’s power!! In a choice between Tekken and Virtua fighter, I’ll know which one I’ll go for. Although supposedly a Playstation 2 exclusive, Sega fans wont take it lying down and there are many petitions found hanging all over the net to try and get our beauty on the Dreamcast for its last and best outing on a Sega console, where it deserves to be!! C’mon folks, lets make it happen!!
