Capcom Fighting All Stars was first announced around November/December 2002, and was the first 3D fighting game from Capcom since Street Fighter EX 3. Well, it was going to be, but the game was cancelled half a year later after a few delays and mixed thoughts on it. The game was originally going to be out in the arcades (and was also rumoured to be Capcom's last ever arcade game, which hopefully isn't true) and, a few months or one year later, come out on the Playstation 2. But, it was not to be and after Capcom announced that it had made multiple losses financially it decided to cancel a lot of upcoming titles. This was one of them.
There were only ever a few screenshots for this game. One of the main things was the "Code Holder" added to the name, as a sub title. This was done a few months after the game was originally announced. The game also made a showing at game shows like E3, complete with huge game boards, so it seemed like Capcom were pretty excited about it.
This changed when the game was put in the "test" stage. If you didn't know, this is when the game is put in selected arcades, and isn't normally complete. When this was put on test, the game came back to negative feedback, meaning Capcom pulled the game back into development. But, a short while after the game was cancelled completely.
The controls for the game were a little different than from Street Fighter. First off, there were only two punch and kick buttons instead of three, and there was one other button, which was side step. The side step was one of the game new features, but games like Virtua Fighter 3 had done this years before. The game also used the parry system from Street Fighter 3.
The round system was also different from Street Fighter, in fact it is just like Darkstalkers 3/Vampire Saviour. Unlike that game it said that each character had three energy bars each instead of the usual two. Once one had been depleted the fight would pause for a few moments, and then the fallen character would get back up. This system was widely criticised, so maybe it was another reason it got negative feedback. The super system seemed to have 3 bar levels, kind of like the A-Ism from Street Fighter Alpha 3.
From the available screenshots, it seems like there were only ever a few character put in, probably less than 10. These are the known ones:
Ryu, Chun Li, Nash (Charlie), Haggar, Poison, D.D., Ingrid, Luke, Strider Hiryu and Batsu. Alex was later confirmed and was coded for the game since there is at least one screenshot of him around if you look. It was also rumoured that Akuma was a hidden fighter.
So why was the game canned? Here are my reasons for it:
1) Game was given negative feedback from testers.
2) Capcom couldn't be bothered to make it any better after 1)
3) Capcom was losing money and didn't want to release a bad game that would lose even more.
4) The cast was very poor.*
5) The game looked to much like Street Fighter EX3.
6) No body seemed that excited by it.
*The game was called Capcom Fighting All Stars. So first off, why have new characters (Luke, D.D. and Ingrid, who didn't look that great) and secondly, why use other lesser known characters like Poison and Batsu? Then again, the only really known 3D fighter Capcom have was the Street Fighter EX series, so if they just used characters from that the game would just be another Street Fighter game.
If this game was release would some of the Final Fight characters been made regulars in more Street Fighter games? I don't really think so, but for Haggar it may have been a good deal. But now will never know for sure, unless Capcom suddenly give the green light for this to make a comeback.
So, have a look at these three screenshots of the Final Fight characters in action, and a small picture of some of the fighters together:
Poison seems to be sending some kind of heart projectile at her opponent, Ryu. This attack may have stunned the opponent or something, but it is probably just a damaging projectile. Meanwhile Haggar seems to be taking pounding at the hands of D.D., so that's all I can say on that one. The same goes with the bottom screen shot as well, apart from Ingrid is doing the damage.
