Street Fighter Week: The evolution of Ken and Ryu

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Street Fighter EX - 1996


Above: Ryu and Ken in Street Fighter EX Plus Alpha

Street Fighter EX 2 - 1998

Better technology (Namco's System 12 arcade board) gives EX 2 smoother textures and more polygons, but in the end, it's still an ugly early 3D fighter, and Ken and Ryu are still chunky messes of characters.


Above: EX 2 Plus

Street Fighter EX 3 - 2000

But wait! EX 3 was released two years later on the next generation of hardware, ported to the PS2, and massive graphical improvement ensued. Well, massive is a pretty hefty word - the models look much nicer than inthe previous EX games, but in comparison to other PS2 games of its time, EX 3 was not quite up to par. Critics described the characters as "blocky," and "high-res PS1," and much was said about the slow character response time.

Some, however, found EX 3 to be a complete success - especially those who were fans of the previous EX games. Critical reception aside, Ken and Ryu are looking their most... 3Dish in EX 3, but are otherwise unaltered.

Trivia: On the Street Fighter EX 2 Plus arcade machine, Garuda, Shadow Geist, and Kairi become available when the machine has been running for a long period of time.

Associate Editor, Digital at PC Gamer