Category: Entertainment & Lifestyle

Out of all the talented fan artists we have across the fighting game community, there’s a select few we continue to be impressed by.

Japan’s Click Burgundy is at or near the top of that short list, and their most recent portraits certainly don’t disappoint.

Over the past month or so, the top tier artist has put together a couple of more casual (or at least out of their battle garb) designs for Guilty Gear Strive’s Ramlethal and Jack-O as well as some more lovely pieces for Bridget and A.B.A.

It’s also really nice to see Click Burgundy sketching up custom portaits for big tournament winners lately too including RB|Gachikun’s Rashid victory at the Singapore Capcom Pro Tour Premier plus BST|Fuudo’s most recent World Warrior win in Japan with Dee Jay in Street Fighter 6.

They also put together what looks to be a group piece celebrating the top 4 at Kagaribi #11 for Super Smash Bros. Ultimate from earlier this month including FN|Miya’s Mr. Game & Watch, Zeta|Acola’s Steve, Revo|Yoshidora’s Yoshi and Zeta|Tea’s Mr. Game & Watch.

Plus, there’s also some love for the recent announcements of Hinako in The King of Fighters 15 and kid Goku’s return in Dragon Ball Daima.

You can check out a collection of Click Burgundy’s recent fighting game works below, and there’s plenty more to be found on their Twitter page.

Click images for larger versions

It’s the end of another weekend, which means we’ve got more big fighting game events going down for the community to compete in and enjoy.

Now that all of the action has basically wrapped up, we’ve gone back for two of the Street Fighter 6 majors between First Attack 2023 and the Capcom Pro Tour 2023 Europe North/East tournaments to see which characters showed up to play the most.

Overall, there was a pretty nice spread of fighters brought to the big stage for both events though there was a bit more going on.

JP was the most popular pick among the upper brackets for the CPT qualifier at three in the top 16, and even though he didn’t win, the villain still made up two of the top three finishers.

Beyond that, however, we ended up seeing seven different characters mained in the top 8 and 12 in the top 16 including Rashid.

With around 80 players signed up for this tournament, that makes these statistics represent the top 20% of competitors fighting for a spot at Capcom Cup next year.

As for our brethren down in Puerto Rico, there were some similar trends at first attack with JP once again being the most popular for the top 16 where there was no Kens.

Breaking it out further to the top 32, however, shows that JP wasn’t even in the top three being beaten out by Chun-Li, E. Honda and Juri while also being tied up with Zangief.

Similarly to the CPT event, there were 7 main picks in top 8 for First Attack and 12 in the top 16 including both A.K.I. and Rashid.

As for the top 32, we saw 18 main characters in total, which means the only ones left completely sidelined were Kimberly and Manon.

With just over 160 entrants for First Attack, the top 16 represents the top 10% of competitors while the top 32 obviously covers the top 20%.

Note: Numbers in parenthesis represent secondary / side character choices.

Masahiro Sakurai recently released an interesting video talking about the “Shoryuken” (or the Dragon Punch). As Sakurai himself points out, this is one of the most famous attacks in gaming history alongside the Hadoken (the fireball of the Shoto characters in Street Fighter).

During the video, Sakurai talks about how the Dragon Punch made its debut appearance in the very first Street Fighter back in 1987. Due to the way that inputs are read in that game, performing the Dragon Punch was actually exceedingly difficult, but the move was powerful enough to defeat opponents in two or three hits.

Though the inputs were the same, it was significantly easier to perform the Dragon Punch in Street Fighter 2. Ironically, Sakurai says that he was surprised at how much weaker the special moves were in Street Fighter 2 compared to the first Street Fighter.

Sakurai would go on to praise the risk-versus-reward aspect of the Dragon Punch’s inputs. Since holding back functions as blocking in the Street Fighter series, the Dragon Punch’s inputs forced players to momentarily release their guard.

Needless to say, the Dragon Punch is a rising anti-air attack that deals the most damage by hitting at its base. Additionally, the special’s start up invincibility makes it so that it will beat most attacks if timed correctly.

Although the Super Smash Bros. series started with this idea of utilizing simple inputs, fighting game characters like Ryu and Ken still have access to their command inputs in Super Smash Bros. Ultimate.

Of course, it’s also possible to perform the Dragon Punch special with Ryu and Ken using the more simplified method, but this will cause it to be less powerful. By performing the traditional inputs, the player is rewarded with better damage and more invincibility.

What’s interesting is that Sakurai says that, from a “game essence” standpoint, the command version of Dragon Punch could’ve been even stronger. However, Sakurai also says that balancing it like that “would have created a rift between those that could and couldn’t pull it off, as it would’ve been too difficult for most.”

Essentially, this was done to keep things more casual. Even fans that don’t have enough execution to perform the traditional inputs of the Dragon Punch can feel a certain thrill with pulling off the special with a simple set of inputs.

As it turns out, Yoko Shimomura, composer for Street Fighter 2, was apparently really thrilled to pull off a Dragon Punch in Super Smash Bros., though Sakurai suspects that she did it using Smash’s simple up special inputs.

According to Yoko Shimomura herself, this was an important moment for her as she had only been able to perform the Dragon Punch in games a few times throughout her life.

「私にも昇龍拳が出せた！！」笑笑
はい、本当に嬉しかったんです。それまでは人生で数回しか出せたことなかったです…（このイラストかわいすぎますw） https://t.co/9DF9M9kH7O

— Yoko Shimomura｜下村陽子 (@midiplex) October 29, 2023

In case you haven’t heard, BST|Daigo Umehara thinks that A.K.I. — Street Fighter 6’s second DLC character — is weak. Not only does he think she’s weak, but he is fairly adamant on thinking that she is one of the worst characters in the game and sits at the bottom of the tier list.

We’ve heard Daigo mention this twice before on his live stream, but it appears that The Beast continues to play her every so often to try and figure more about her out. In a new video from FGC Translated, which takes some recent footage from Daigo’s stream and translates it into English, Umehara mentions again that he believes A.K.I. is bad in this game, though this time he does offer a potential solution that he feels would make her strong.

Daigo starts off by saying that if A.K.I. were in Street Fighter 5, she would have been a really fun character. He goes on to say, “unfortunately, she’s weak,” however, and explains that even F.A.N.G had some matches in Street Fighter 5 that were in his favor, where Daigo feels that A.K.I. has zero winning match ups.

Responding to someone in his chat who asked if A.K.I. is mid-tier, Daigo gave a resounding “NO.” He continues by explaining that she “just has no button to press [in neutral],” and goes so far as to ask if Capcom even tested this character before releasing her.

“Every character is fighting with a gun while A.K.I. is shooting a toy gun,” said Daigo.

This time around, though, Daigo offers what he feels would be a good solution to A.K.I.’s weakness in Street Fighter 6. According to the fighting game legend, if Capcom gave A.K.I. the ability to chip KO with her poison, she would not only be even more fun to play, but also would end up being strong.

“I think they should’ve added poison chip-kill,” Daigo said. “That would’ve made A.K.I. way more fun and strong.”

Daigo believes that Capcom should have made her stronger up front because she’s a new character, and he fears players will stop playing her soon because she’s weak. “If she had poison chip-kill, I wouldn’t complain at all about her being weak,” Daigo stated.

Be sure to check out the rest of the video as Daigo walks viewers through why he believes A.K.I. is bottom tier in Street Fighter 6.

Footage source: DaigoTheBeasTV.

Cammy has become one of the most popular characters since her debut in Super Street Fighter 2: The New Challengers back in September 10, 1993 and September 11, 1993 in the arcades for Japan and North America respectively.

She’s been present all throughout Street Fighter 4, Street Fighter 5, and Street Fighter 6, a trait not shared by T. Hawk, Dee Jay, or Fei Long — the other combatants that made their debut in Super Street Fighter 2: The New Challengers.

Back in Super Street Fighter 2: The New Challengers, Cammy was described as “a 19-year-old female special forces agent from England with a mysterious past tied to M. Bison.” The truth about this mysterious past wouldn’t really be revealed until Street Fighter Alpha 3.

Technically speaking, Cammy first appeared in the Street Fighter Alpha series as a hidden character in Street Fighter Alpha 2 Gold, but this appearance is said to be noncanonical. As such, Street Fighter Alpha 3 provides canonical details about Cammy’s past.

It turns out that Cammy is a clone of M. Bison. She was intended to become M. Bison’s replacement body once his Psycho Power became too much for him to handle in his current body. Cammy was to operate as an assassin for Shadaloo under the alias of “Killer Bee” until that appointed time, but she ended up breaking free from Shadaloo’s plans before that could happen.

Whether she’s an operative for Shadaloo or Delta Red, Cammy seems to have a preference for thong leotards. This is apparently the case because she believes that thong leotards allow for optimal speed, mobility, and flexibility.

Of course, these attributes have traditionally been reflected in Cammy’s gameplay as she typically has elements that emphasize speed and mobility. Though she was widely considered to be the weakest overall character throughout her appearances in Street Fighter 2, she is typically a top tier combatant in the later entries of the series in which she is playable.

Unsurprisingly, Cammy’s preference for thong leotards has carried over into some of her alternate costumes. Her Battle Outfit 1 from Street Fighter 5 is a notable example of an alternate costume that is functionally a thong leotard.

While wearing her Battle Outfit 1, it can also be noted that Cammy is wearing white thigh-high socks, black knee pads, black boots, a green backpack, black mid-arm gloves, red rider goggles on her forehead, and a utility belt on her waist. She appears to have a bunch of gadgets attached to her utility belt, but these are purely aesthetic during gameplay.

It’s speculated that Cammy might be able to perform an “optic blast” with her red rider goggles, which wouldn’t be too outlandish considering that C. Viper could do this in Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3. Regardless, it’s clear that color 15 for Cammy’s Battle Outfit 1 is a reference to the X-Men series based on the colors she’s donning.

Kid_Warrior97 at one point pulled off a beautiful cosplay of Battle Outfit 1 Cammy over on her Instagram page. Photos have been taken from a number of interesting angles that show that this is indeed a thong leotard. Check it out below: