For only like the second time since launch, Street Fighter 6 added a brand new system for players to earn rewards through playing the game in Mai Shiranui’s update.
Unlike the Fighting Pass that anyone can partake in, however, SF6’s additional batch of free items are geared only towards a much more exclusive part of the player base.
Capcom not only brought in new Master rank tiers to the game with Mai, but also new things for those users with the highest ranks to strive towards getting with their best characters.
There’s a new tab in the rewards section for Master Phase items that’ll refresh with every ranking reset.
But it’s going to be a grind for those who are already even Master ranked now.
From the way it was described before launch, the new MP items sounded as though you needed to earn 300 points for a couple of more generic prizes before getting into the individual character rewards, but that doesn’t exactly seem to be the case.
Instead of earning points by winning matches like you normally would through Ranked mode, it seems the Master Phase tab only counts in games played.
So that’s not 300 points you need, it’s 300 matches (not wins at least) with a Master-ranked character to get like a profile and a title.
The most interesting part of the rewards are the new character colors included, but you have to complete the “All” items first with said 300 matches.
Once you complete those 300 games in Master-rank, you can then earn game points towards those character costumes, but only seemingly for the character you’re using.
And to get the pink / purple costume color, that’s 100 more matches with the character in Master.
So that’s 400 matches to get one color it seems (though you may earn character points during the All category too), but only 100 more to get any afterward.
Players are going to need to do a good bit of grinding to reach that point then, however, it’s something dedicated Master-ranked players are going to be doing anyway.
That 400 may sound like a lot, but you’ve got a full ranked phase to get it done, which lasts three months.
A serious Master player can probably have 100 games knocked out every two sessions or so if they’re really getting in there.
So we don’t foresee people missing out on the character color they really want since they have until the end of April to do so.
The potential problem arises when trying to do more, though.
It certainly seems like it’s getting harder and harder to be a completionist in fighting games these days.
Since there’s now 25 characters in SF6, that’s 2,500–2,800 ranked games to get all of the colors at least.
But remember, you have to have all of those fighters in Master rank already.
So yeah, it’s not going to be realistic to get all of the new Master colors.
And Capcom clearly designed it that way for players to snatch up the colors for the characters they use the most.
That’s not really a problem in and of itself, but it just shows the current landscape that you’re not supposed to set out to acquire everything.
We’ve already seen that with the Outfit 3 selection and lack of a cheaper bundle for them, so very few people are going to spend over $100 on costumes in a single season.
And these ones you can’t even buy, so the FOMO is more real here even with the three-month timer.
There’s no telling if these colors will ever be available again or what happens when the time runs out and you’re just shy of getting one.
Since they’re meant to reward Master-ranked players specifically, these colors and future rewards may not even be included in an all-in-one package like Street Fighter 5: Champion Edition set out to do.
We’re very interested to see how the SF6 player base is going to react to these rewards as they come to understand more about how they work and once things reset again in May.
It’s an intriguing choice at least for Capcom to give extra incentive to their most dedicated and best players, so that’s kinda cool in the least.
Since they are planning to change how Fighting Passes work in Season 3 too, there’s nothing preventing them from tweaking how these Master rewards work in the future too and where we go from here.
And you probably shouldn’t go grinding 3,000+ matches just for a few dozen colors.
Source: Event Hubs
