DESCRIPTION

Capcom's Street Fighter Alpha 3 marks a return of the legendary 2D fighting series complete with the characters of yore combined with new fighters and a plethora of gameplay options, modes, and hidden goodies. E. Honda, Blanka, and Fei Long are among the fighters making a grand return to action with newer characters Cody (from Final Fight lore) and Juni.

There are a few gameplay options to choose from including Arcade, Versus, and the new console exclusive World Tour, Entry, and Training modes. The Arcade mode is exactly what the name implies — a conversion of Street Fighter Alpha 3 from the arcades with new and improved lighting effects. Training is there for new players to learn various combinations and moves. Once you learn those moves, try challenging a friend in the Versus mode to show off some newfound skills!

The real meat and potatoes of Street Fighter Alpha 3 comes in the form of a World Tour Mode where secret characters are unlocked and each fighter raises his or her fighting abilities. Each character has three distinctive fighting styles, or "isms," to choose from; the "X-ism," "A-ism," and "V-ism" all work differently and will significantly alter the way your character fights. Depending on which "ism" is chosen, the characters will be awarded different skills such as the ability to pull off certain combos, inflict dizziness, strength increases, and the like.

Like Soul Blade's various story missions, the World Tour Mode will place characters in unique situations that thoroughly test a player's skills. At times, you'll have to fight a multitude of characters at one time (sort of like an endurance mode), beat characters using only super combos, regular combos, and throws. As incentive to play the World Tour Mode, players can save their strengthened up characters in the Entry mode.

Unlike the PlayStation version where some characters and modes of play have to be unlocked, this Dreamcast port features everything from the get go. Another bonus is the ability to download extra powerful characters from Capcom's website. These special characters are to be used in World Tour Mode against your developed characters as an additional challenge. For each downloaded character a VMU with 65 free blocks is required. ~ Matthew House, All Game Guide