CESTUS III

Ingame? Hit and miss, have good moments but also terrible ones. Person who chosen some SFV color palette gimmicks i hope will not be anywhere near SF6. Overall i would say it's "decent", wich if is'nt negative itself it's definitely below what i expect from the most important fight game saga of vg history Artworks? I can barely point what SFV artworks art style is... we have some shitty renders, some Bengus story art, some arcade endings by 78 people some of wich from udon, kiki doing promotional stuff, some cover art from fucking artgerm, some more shitty renderings. Bunch of styles and things that barely make sense next to each others Literally can't point wich is SFV visual identity because not even SFV people know it, only thing i can clearly see is that SFV art, whatever SFV art is, is not the best i seen from SF Concepts? I liked most of the job done, except parts touched by Kiki. I don't care (actually i do, but not much) for promotional art, but make Kiki do lot of alt costumes was a mistake... now some will say Kiki costumes were best, i can care less lmao Beside Kiki impacting otherwise pretty good concept production, real problem of concepts is that in next phase, beyond their control, 3D modellers took lot of personal liberties and as result good concepts were ruined. Of course 2D to 3D is'nt 1:1 job, specially with tech/ingame style chosen, but on top of that you have them take liberties Wich is why #3 of my wishlist have that if you really must outsource i would like them to work with art director breath on their neck 24/7... SF6 deserve better. The Bengus guy everybody complained about? I am NOT a fan of his SFV job. I liked some stuff he did, but overall his work disappointed me For that reason when i do a list of who i would like do SF6 artworks and a list of who not, he's in latter (would keep him for chara design/alts concepts work though, and ironically it's a more important job if we consider impact) But when i seen the kind of internet shitstorm people(nobody in particular, the general trend) gave him, most without even the knowledge to have a decent opinion to begin with, defend his position was like the lesser evil lmao But yeah, still fresh of SFV ask me list of possible candidates to do SF6 artworks and you will not find him in my 10 names

MvC2 SFV -click for correct image proportions- Possible see same hand? Yeah would not have hard time believe it SAME style? Nah, would say he did actually a long road from A to B Use of lines, color, proportions, in some cases poses, composition etc... he changed lot from his old stuff, he gone pretty experimental actually Not saying for better or worse, but simply that he showed up to SFV day with a new self as artist

The base is similar as is same artist, but tbh he changed a lot, if anything this current style has been "invented"/used specifically for SFV There was actually lot of internet hate on his SFV work, good portion of wich was imho undeserved, but whatever... defend it was'nt much pragmatic crusade back then, sure af is'nt now that game ended it's cycle Personally only issue i have with him is that doing his SFV art he -apparently purposefully- ignored some things ingame appearance, and while at times i may agree with his vision more (example i prefered when Ryu, Chun and Gief had brown hair too), it still create visual incoherence Not a first for SF saga, but still Btw talk as a whole about SFV art direction incoherence is open pandora's box, so much to say that i prefer don't even start lol I just hope that SF6 art direction will 1- don't try to don't look "japanese" 2- don't go full retard trying -again- realistic shit 3- don't outsource shit, and if they do, have the art director squeeze everybody's balls at any sign of personal freedom 4- have a clear, uniform, strong vision that's expressed in all visual aspects of the product 5- ignore marketing cunts Get 5 out 5 is highly unlikely, but till first trailer one man can at least dream lol

Bengus

New little piece for our collection 😄 "As said by director Takayuki Nakayama, in addition to all the nods and references to Hiryu and the Strider series, the Street Fighter V newcomer Zeku also adopts references to Osman* as a way to "pay respect" to the game, recognizing it as a spiritual successor of Strider[11][12]. This includes nods in Zeku's young appearance and in techniques named after Kirin and Teki**, among others." *Osman was an arcade game known also as Cannon-Dancer and was considered some sort of spiritual sequel of Strider **Teki is the name of a mercenary squad the protagonist Kirin is part of Here visual reference for influence on young Zeku costume design, see that Y.Zeku's forward side only, tight fitting shirt that leave uncovered his back Fun last thing, he also created ki "blades" with his kicks like Old Zeku does

Would still give the Kage slot to any of them, including the dog lmao

@Lord_Vega Here we are, may find this interesting 😄 About Tonpeti/Tonpetty as the kind Master who's able to see future and using this skill to warn his students about dangerous future: "Tonpetty is a wise, world-worn man who shows great concern for others. He warned Zeppeli about how his training would seal his fate but was not forceful about it." "As a Ripple master, Tonpetty has trained multiple people in the art of the Ripple. He is the only character shown to be able to predict the future of someone just by touching their hands, displaying a high level of skill. " About Straizo as inspiration for Bison possible being a Soul Power user who got corrupted and gone to the opposite side to reach power and immortality: "Straizo explained that he trained in the Ripple to become stronger, but his powers only made him even more aware of his human limitations[7]. He admits having admired Dio's overwhelming strength as a Vampire and when the Ripple proved insufficient to preserve his youth, he decided to use a Stone Mask. In his search for a way to stop his aging process, Straizo killed friends and followers. He was ready to die for it, which was demonstrated when he killed the expedition group, along with his disciples" "All this time I planned on entering Hell while still vibrant and filled with energy, not as some withered desiccated corpse. I cannot tell you the ecstasy I have felt in being young again. " He's also the one who have Master-Pupil relationship with Lisa Lisa (as Bison with Rose): "Elizabeth (Lisa Lisa real name) was subsequently adopted by the Ripple user Straizo and learned the art of Ripple from him until her 18th birthday." BONUS Straizo's body get destroyed from the inside after his body got filled of opposite kind of energy and clearly say to regret nothing, VERY similar to what happen to Bison in ASF While i think is kinda beyond doubt (for all the parallel i mentioned before) Capcom dropped Menat & Maggio as counterpart/tribute to Caesar & Joseph, i find is cool that you mentioned this (another thing i read for the first time) because i think lead us to another parallel again that may further hint Straizo-Bison thing Master Tonpeti indeed had 2 students before Straizo, who were Zeppeli and Dire This discussion end up being cool af to me, story-wise i ever considered just Rose as being heavy inspired by JoJo, but digging a bit i'm realizing the whole (very very little) lore we have about Soul Power and Bison past seem to come from there too lol 😄

That's pretty cool, first time i read that line from Rose's Master regardless who he was Some questions that come to mind from that, but most important one, will Capcom recognize/stick to this old canon? Who knows One sure thing is they STILL take very strong inspiration from Jojo's Lisa Lisa for Rose, as even modern canon have been written to keep the link/tribute to that character alive: Even without count the mask costume being JoJo reference, more lore related SFV Rose training two disciples in her Venice/Genova palace, clearly mirror Lisa Lisa training two disciples in her Venice palace. Even the two students themselves have clear links Caesar-Menat: both are the senior student, Caesar power take the form of ki powered bubbles that work pretty much like Menat's VT orbs and can resemble also her glass sphere Joseph-Maggio: both are the new student, Joseph use as weapon ki infused toy clackers, while Maggio has been shown with a very similar toy (a yoyo) and he's possibly learning to infuse it of soul power Later i will check something on Lisa Lisa past/training/master (passed a while from last time i watched JoJo), maybe some interesting parallel can come out from there too EDIT: ok checked a bit and IF Capcom will keep the parallel with JoJo, is more probable that "the kind man" who talks to Rose and Bison are two different people Basically in JoJo the Master-Disciple goes Tonpetty -> Straizo -> Lisa Lisa if we keep it for SF maybe something like "Kind man" -> Bison -> Rose I'm saying this because just reading a bit not only Tonpetty have solid parallel with the "kind man", but just realized Straizo may be inspiration for Bison starting as Soul Power user and switching to Psycho Power Tomorrow i expand a bit this 😄

Plus while in SFV some profile shit has been fixed, on other side they did worse on some different profile retardness, see the fear of give new characters a damn nationality... wich is one of the most anti-SF things one can do lol (i guess a "gift" by some western marketing cunt, but just my theory) Sure on lot of them we have hints to reach the truth, but if that truth is'nt on the profile there can ever be an argument it can't be considered canon

No for wrong character profiles i mean the classic "little box" of info that every SF char have Think the small text section where they put name, birthday, height, weight, nationality, fight style, like/dislike etc... basically some sort of expanded ID card that is a classic of SF format There you have tons of straight errors or omission that can be for many reasons Sometime Capcom even fix it themselves, but they seem to don't give much fucks about these, so it may take very long before they fix it, or they don't even do it Good example of Capcom fixing it are retard SF2 weights, that got fixed just recently with SFV after decades lol Couple of easy examples can be - Zangief gone from very low 254 lbs (115 kg) to 400 lbs (181 kg) in SFV - Sagat from from ridicolous low 172 lbs. (78 kg) to 216 lbs. (98 kg) in SFV, wich is still way too light for a 7'5" man, but at least little improvement (ironically fucking SF1 had the best weight at 262 lbs./119 kg wich was never used again) Then you have stuff where marketing interference played a role to dumb down shit furthermore These i would surely love to see fixed, possibly with Capcom giving actual care about it But story events canon and char biography are a total different matter, and theories sold as facts/fanon/dumb wiki/capcomUSA (lmao)/fanfiction/not-canon media... they add even more pollution in the already difficult task to put together the SF canon puzzle, wich by himself already put lot effort on hide pieces in most obscure places lol

Just realized i forgot to add the OC gallery, wich probably is my favourite after the SC Universe recreation ones, tons of stuff = WARRIORS & MONSTERS: Teh Gatsu’s OC Temple =

Tbh i could not care less about "expanded universe", but REALLY scary part is that when not-canon stuff stick around long enough can happen that shit sneak into actual SF lol

It's because while at first everybody seems to agree on "wow capcom sucked on that, shit writing, weak story here and ther" and everything it's good, then somebody open Pandora's Box saying the mighty "fans would write it better" And then monsters appear. Again, only thing i would like to get fixed are clear wrong/shitty profiles info (wich tbh would be LOT to fix lol), but even at that canon does'nt works like that Yeah, tried to search something there but could find nothing (even if in my case must admit i had pretty vague key-words to work on lol), well good we got another piece ever by Capcom confirming more or less same thing 😄 Thanks for the reply anyway

If there's something i learned in years of SRK is that despite Capcom's errors and us SF-worshippers good intentions (and even some great ideas), one sure fucking truth in life is that fans should NEVER be allowed to touch SF canon* I remember how ASF should have been according to some, or wich changes some characters should get, or wich characters should be in the cast *would have no problem fix some clear errors in char profiles, but touch story? Nevah

Fun thing is that while it surprised me too at first read about Ryu hanging with criminals, reality is we ever seen him do stuff like this or get even more involved in various anime (non canon but well fitting the char) like SF2tAM or SF2V in more organized underground fighting circuits, so him being at least familiar with street level crime makes more sense than not lol Plus Capcom (and many anime) offer bit naive/childish view of street level crime punks, portraying them more as chaotic people that don't follow rules than legit EVIL pieces of shit... good example is that most of them (think many Mad Gear members or Birdie) through years has been made less "criminal" and more goofy/caricature, to the point they seem more than anything misfits that struggle to fit society Ryu is my fav character and may surprise i agree with you I don't need most of them either But i really like Gouken for his great old master design and uniqueness compared to the classic shoto, so would be my third pick after Ryu and Ken(done different as in SFV), who are a must to me Necalli IS awesome His design is great and his ancient aztec background could have offered SO MUCH as villain, if i can forget story (we go on that in the paragraph below) and stick to his concept he's still infinitely more interesting/exotic/different threat for Ryu than the endless cycle of boring stronk japan devil shoto bullshit Akuma capcom trapped us in for decades. Twice if we think that they feel can't even let another Boss sell us that he's #1, because ten minutes after Akuma will pull a Yujiro Hanma and wreck him because nobody is stronk as stronk japan devil shoto. Damn. Necalli deserved much more Capcom is guilty of give him absolute shit writing, there was so much they could have done with him and they did that crap lol

You're welcome bro For the Ken part of him finding in his family motivation/source of strenght, first time i remember somebody in the old forum mentioning it translating from japanese some Capcom text info. Sadly i can't be more precise on that one as i don't remember better, nor who did the translation (@Miðgarðsorm? RyoRedCyclone?) A second time we got the xmas SFV side-story, where it's clearly said that thinking he had to protect his family, Ken thrown on the mysterious aggressor (Zangief, but was all misunderstanding lol) probably the most powerful Shoryuken of his life Then we have a non-canon example in Street Fighter III: Ryu Final manga... again, not from Capcom, but there Nakahira offer a point of view that IMHO is'nt much far from Capcom's and exactly about what we are talking about. In the manga Sean believe family made Ken weaker, while Ken proof it's the contrary winning a sparring with Ryu that to some extent even parallel a part of SFV ASF story About Ryu life wiki got a good piece My 2cents on this is i don't think Ryu felt Akuma was simply a "fellow student" as the gap back then was so immense that child-Ryu probably did'nt seen Gouki as something he could compare himself with. Plus again, i think since Gouken was his Master back then he seen Gouki as someting similar, think like Sean can see Ryu in SF3 But i agree with you on why by the time of SF4 he does'nt call Akuma a "Master", even if more than disgust itself i think it's bit deeper thing (more a principle than an emotion), the straight refusal of recognize Gouki's achievements due how he obtained them*... after all we seen Ryu in SF4 saying in rival cutscene that from his point of view Akuma did'nt surpassed human level, but just thrown away his own humanity Interesting Gen say something very similar to Akuma in SFV before be killed by him, insisting even in his death moment that Akuma is fooling himself Then in same story you have Ryu that seems way less "angry" than he was in SF4 about Akuma's perspective, guess it's his new mood vs evil as we seen he interacted with Kage in similar way *ironically Akuma seems to disprect Bison for very same reason, he's disgusted by HOW he achieved his power lol

For SF standards it was a surprising "normal life" story, i see @BootyWarrioralready gave you the core of it Ken's parents were about to divorce so stressed/angry Ken dyed his hair blond (wich in Japan is essentially a rebellion gesture) and started causing trouble, so his father sent him to Gouken to discipline him... but apparently have to focus on their son tantrums somehow fixed their marriage shit lol Tbh i passed good chunk of my life training and seen countless kids progress (and being one myself starting at 5), reality is everybody improve/learn differently and there are 99 factors to count, the "talent" thing is try to over-simplify a complex thing To throw in some possible motivations on top of what i said before (Ken having bit of fighting experience possibly compensating some gap and his natural style being "more immediate" to learn), i may guess -i put that under spoiler as bit long/OT- I've split this part as the adult phase is different thing Again agree with something @BootyWarrioralready said (twice in this post lol), i ever guessed the whole Ken-got-more-talent is something made up by fans rather than by Capcom In particular seems a thing based on 2 common misconceptions about their life: 1- "Ken does'nt train/train little, while Ryu train 24/7 on a rock like some movie Shaolin temple monk" Ken is the one that actually have a lifestyle waaay more similar to real successful professional fighters Not only surely Ken still train a lot, but he's rich with access to top training tools, nutrition, sparring partners, doctors etc and also compete in highest level martial arts tournaments in USA By comparision Ryu live a more rough life (in some quote Zangief even tell him his lifestyle is not optimal for muscle lol), training with less advanced stuff and occasionally have to work, i remember him do normal stuff like bouncer or manual labor to gain some money Of course Ryu likely train more in his "free time" and travel give him chance to meet more SF level fighters (as canon wise he usually does), but still Real difference between them is not much amount of training itself, but the fact that Ryu travel the world a lot (likely staying away from home for months) while Ken chosen a more stable life to be good husbad/father 2- "Ken is distracted by his family wich weaken him, Ryu only have martial arts so it's stronk" This is another common one, but iirc Capcom stated more than once that for Ken family is a motivation that make him stronger actually, as if a Ken that embraced Ryu's lifestyle would not be as good as current family man Ken Not everybody have same optimal development, and apparently Ken chosen correctly his personal path to become the best version of himself Would also add that while Ken found good way to live and smooth progress, Ryu for years had to struggle with Satsui no Hado shit... wich ultimately is something that honed him and forced him to reach greater heights (his SFV ASF arc show a lot this) but still has been a thing But again, not saying that a Ryu who never been "slowed down" by SnH would be better, on contrary as said for Ken Capcom wrote Ryu's path to make him reach the best version of himself Good questions, and i have not enough knowledge to offer sure answer about time-gap of each event... about train with Goutetsu i don't know, the fact the old Master was still alive does'nt mean automatically that directly trained Ryu, nor the fact Ryu calls him "Master" can be take as proof (as title/respect Ryu will call him Master no matter what) Plus there's some hierarchy going on, pretty possible that old high Master Goutetsu did'nt bothered train personally a child, as Gouken was already more than qualified to do it and was the one that chosen to adopt the kid As far i can remember Ryu never considered anybody else as his Master (till Oro in SF3, of course)

The "he's not really a shoto" part is exactly what i love about his concept (on top of being a fantastic concept), they found a way to still give him Ansatsuken identity but changing everything from the old formula: completely different body type, clothes, stance, moveset etc You can see he belong to same school but he's also a TRULY different character, not same shit different flavour. I find also awesome how his way to execute moves completely differently to Ryu express perfectly the experience gap given by age and many more years studying/training the art

Ironic thing is that ultimately i consider Gouken (SF4 version, not EGM lol) to be a far more interessing and welcome character design (and fight style) than Akuma himself I like Gouken, great mix of Kanzaki's version mixed with bit of HNK (Ryuken and Koryu)

This SF should never go realistic Thanks gods they aready lost lot of time and money trying to do realistic SFV prototype before realize it looked like crap, so maybe we can hope they will be scared to try that stupid gimmick again with SF6 But still with capcom marketing division still alive, the risk of them try to murder SF to conquer the mythical "western audience" is ever high These are the shit-tastes people, their opinion is not supposed to be good Sadly (at least to me) Akuma is going to stay around forever, but i wish at least Evil Ryu/Kage bullshit will not appear in SF6

It's awesome Capcom reurrected Gouken, but Goutetsu should just stay dead lol

Cool, this make his training begin around 4 years before Ken I looked in the wiki to see if there was something but while for Ken they have 12yo, for Ryu is only said Gouken rescued him when was a young child and that Ken arrived to the dojo a generic "sometime afterwards" (i guess they found no source for Ryu precise age when was rescued) But search gave me an info did'nt knew/remember from SF4TttB, seems like whatever incident made Ryu faint and left the house burning also gave him amnesia, as he can't remember anything of his life before his first days at the dojo "My earliest memories are of Master Goutetsu and Master Gouken. I remember Akuma training with them." Ryu's dialogue from Street Fighter IV: The Ties That Bind

At 1:33 you see Gouken finding Ryu next to a burning home At 2:15 taking Ryu with himself Yeah, the difference in terms of training time may not be big, Ken started under Gouken at 12 If anything is pretty likely that Ken had more fighting experience with other same age kids, as he was sent to Gouken's dojo because he was a scrappy boy (is when he dyed his hair blond, wich in japanese kids/teen culture was like declare you're some kind of hooligan/punk), while we don't even know if Ryu even knew other kids of his own age before Ken as the area where he was found/Gouken's dojo looked pretty rural/woods Plus you have that Ken natural offensive style is something more immediate to learn compared to Ryu's defensive/counter approach

Thanks dude! Wish SC6 had all the stuff from SC5 though... guess they planned use it for DLC but end up they did'nt and we got less stuff lol

Cool to see love for SC cas here If somebody has been in 8WR forums may remember me as "Gatsu" Not posting pics, too much stuff, just posting links Soul Calibur World CAS Huge Berserk tribute gallery Little tribute to Indie Games Random stuff