Paul Gale Network is a huge fan of Street Fighter and of Capcom’s, so it was decided to come up with a “what-if” scenario, involving the prestigious franchise’s next numbered entry. I’ll reiterate that this is not a real screenshot of what Capcom’s working on, but rather, a PGN exclusive, original look with the art handled by Joe Danos and the concept by me.

I’ve always been supportive of each Street Fighter game that Capcom makes from the very beginning. The time that the Alpha series was introduced with a new art direction and instead of being an opportunity to count to 3, it ended up being a prequel…that was more than fine in my book.

When the Street Fighter III series finally came to and was radically different, with things like an almost entirely new roster, different approach to music, super moves, introduction of parrying, and removal of air blocking…once again, that series was still welcomed.

That brought us to Street Fighter IV and the first time Capcom went with 3D polygonal models in a main entry in the series (not including the EX saga) and once again, though it had its own gameplay differences, none of what was done to the formula, damaged the game in any way…I think it was the perfect move for Capcom to make.

And here we are in 2012, with Capcom celebrating Street Fighter’s 25th Anniversary and us fans not knowing what’s in store for the series’ future (past Tekken X Street Fighter). So to have a little fun, this is a fan-made pitch to what I’d like Street Fighter V to be like, illustrated by Joe:

Street Fighter V: Ryu vs. Ken (Large)

– Back to 2D, hand drawn art and animation. It’s a tedious, arguably more difficult process to achieve, but with over a decade passing since SF3: Third Strike, it’d be wonderful to see what Capcom could do once more with this approach.

– Distinctly make the game take place after Street Fighter III. You can see with Ryu’s hair, a little gray showing. With Ken’s, you can see his black roots beginning to show (remember, he actually dyes it blonde), and with both fighters, their black belts have white scuff marks (what happens in time to black belts).

– Original stages for each character. I’ve always been in favor of each fighter having his or her own stage and in this case, you see that Ryu’s is in front of that classic waterfall he trains under, with Master Gouken’s old dojo up in the background.

– A camera that zooms out slightly. In Street Fighter V, I’d like it that if players one and two went back into their respective corners, the screen would zoom out slightly and allow for the stage to now have up to 25% more horizontal distance.

– A new gameplay introduction would be born because of this “maximum distance” and that’d be a dashing forward technique by hitting forward twice that would in a half second’s time, have the fighter move 12.5% across the screen, thus cutting the distance. This new move would be uniquely handled per character and would be able to be pulled off once every 16.5 seconds (which is what the blue bar represents beneath the yellow health bar), to avoid a run fest and risk changing the SF formula too much, but at the same time if used close enough to your opponent, could be the starting point of a combo.

– No more invisible walls. If both players do go to opposite ends of a stage, the camera will zoom out at a max of 25% distance as stated earlier, but I have a solution to end the invisible wall problem, if both players go to the furthest left or furthest right of a stage, and that’s art that’s stage specific and makes sense to be there, to act as a barrier. In Ryu’s stage, going to the left would eventually bring you to a boulder that takes up the whole height of the screen (that can’t be jumped on) and acts just like a normal invisible wall…but now gives you something to look at that makes sense.

– Multi-tiered stages. We don’t need every stage to have more than one plain to fight on, but in the case of Ryu’s (which also answers the question of “what’s on the furthest right of his fighting arena”), if Ken were to be backed up enough to the right, the stage could end in a cliff. The fighters can’t jump off of it at will (not trying to make this like Super Smash Bros.), but rather, only at the edge will then cause both players to move below onto another level to fight on. What’s down below is more of the bigger picture that is this whole environment you’re playing in and this time, when pushed to the farthest right, will be a large tree (once again, just acting like a wall). This extended section of Ryu’s stage doesn’t have to scroll on for long, either. It could be just a normal screen’s distance in width plus another 25% of walking space, and that’s it.

– The Super Combo Meter is back and is broken into four parts. A similar setup as seen in the past, where levels 1-3 allow you to perform EX Moves, but building it up by delivering enough attacks to your opponent, to 4, sets it on fire and is now when you can unleash your Super Move.

– The Ultra Custom Combo Meter is both new and old mixed into one and is representative through the circle gauge with the number in the middle. When you take damage, your circular gauge will fill up. The 1st level gives you the ability to pull off a 1 second custom combo (comparable to a Focus Attack in SF4). The 2nd level gives you a two second custom combo, and the 3rd, three seconds. At this point, if you’ve saved the gauge to reach 3, you’ll be able pull of a quick series of moves reminiscent of those introduced in Street Fighter Alpha 2. I’ve also developed the idea that you’ll no longer lose what you’ve built up in the Ultra CC Meter, when going into a second round. Since it’ll take longer to save up past level 3 to get to 5, the gauge will remain going into other rounds…with a stipulation: any fractions towards the next number will be rounded down. So if you’re at 3.8 and you go to the second round as such, you’ll start off at 3 flat. Finally, the 4th level gives you four seconds of custom combo time and the 5th level allows you to either get five seconds of cc time or the ability to pull off your Ultra Combo. If your question in all of this is, “Is it possible then to pull off an Ultra Combo in round one?”, yes, for after you reach the 3rd level, in addition to receiving damage building it up, blocking will as well.

Your feedback is important and always appreciated. If you like the artwork that Joe Danos provided, be sure to click on his name and visit his art gallery to see more of what he’s done. Also, if you’re a fan of this whole project that PGN has put together, share your words both here and with Capcom. I have ideas for other stages as well, so if you’re curious what the rest of my vision is made of, we can definitely get the ball rolling with this project. Thank you. Hadouken!