“Street Fighter IV” coming to the iPhone

Hadouken! Although Street Fighter IV almost obliges its players to invest in a special arcade stick in order to be playable even on next-gen consoles, Capcom’s still going to try to bring its famous fighting game to the iPhone and iPod Touch… although the virtual joystick should be enough to arch the eyebrows of anyone who has pumped a quarter into a Street Fighter arcade machine.

Not much is known about the port yet, except that Capcom promises many, but probably not all, of the fighters available in the home console version. The fighter models are simply scaled down versions of the console games, but still look crisp and vibrant.

The big issue, of course, is the virtual joystick, punch, kick and jump buttons. I’m skeptical that Capcom can make Street Fighter IV for the iPhone anything less than a substandard port, and it all has to do with the controls: fighting games require just a huge amount of controlling precision that virtual controls just can’t mimic.

Capcom might have been able to make it work if they’d abandoned the console version’s control scheme all together and gone towards a scheme more native to the iPhone (for example, a distinct gesture for each move) but you don’t even need to play this version of Street Fighter IV to know that overlaid virtual controls aren’t going to allow for nearly the precision of control as their physical counterparts. Plus, it’s just an eyesore: the overlays just get in the way of seeing the fighters, which is the most important information on the screen.

Street Fighter IV for the iPhone might not end up being the elegant and precisely controlled fighter fans of the series expect, but it’s worth keeping an eye on. And who knows? Maybe Capcom will surprise us all.

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