I Am Street Fighter

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This film is about celebrating the 25^th anniversary of the well-known video game: Street Fighter. It includes dozens of interviews with fans, designers, and experts, all of which attest that their lives would have been very different if Street Fighter had not existed.

Street Fighter is to video games what Star Wars is to movies. It’s recognized as the pioneer. It went beyond the regular punches found in other fighting games and integrated elements and characters that made fans go wild. Then each sequel came out and took it to another level. Often abbreviated as SF, it’s a series of fighting games by Capcom. The characters originate from around the world and each has his or her own unique fighting style.

Each fighter is aiming at becoming the best and they have their own motives and their own relationships. None of them owns the story and players can easily find themselves reflected in at least one of them.

Takashi Nishiyama and Hiroshi Matsumoto designed the game, and it made its debut in the arcades in 1987. Money that should have been used to buy lunch went to the game machines as both young and old became hooked. What made the original version attractive was that the player was able to take control of a martial artist named Ryu who was competing in worldwide martial arts tournament. The matches extended to five countries and ten opponents. The player was able to perform three types of punch and kick attacks, each varying in speed and strength, and three special attacks by executing certain combinations with the controls.

The sequel was released in 1991 and it introduced an African American boxer character. It became much more popular than its predecessor and turned Street Fighter into a multimedia franchise with revenues exceeding $1.5 billion.

And so every few years, a new sequel is introduced to fans from all over the world that react with unbridled enthusiasm. Currently, Street Fighter V is in the early stages of development and there’s talk about its release in 2018.

The game has been going on for 27 years now. This documentary portrays its progress over a 25-year period of time. It’s not an easy feat to keep a project going that long, and Capcom recognizes that the success of the game is all due to the fans. Their vision is to bring the game to many more people in order to keep the excitement going.

Experts believe that when it comes to game history, Street Fighter is the most important and the masterpiece of all games. Watch this film now.