Spoiled for size:
So, it's 1994. Super Street Fighter II is super popular, SNK aren't that big outside of Japan yet and the only real competition for Street Fighter is, at least in the West, Mortal Kombat 2, which people are trying not to admit isn't a great game and it actually is the novelty value of punching someone's head off.
Oh also White Wolf is popular (amongst roleplayers) I guess. They have Vampire and stuff, looking all stylish and drawing people in, but haven't yet released their D&D-killer Exalted (this is a joke). For that matter, D&D hasn't yet evolved into 3rd edition and set a new standard that will never be reached again. Shit, I'm just in the history phase here and I want to drink.
Anyway, they decided an obvious good idea would be to slam the two together, so that's what we have: Street Fighter (a game all about fighting) as a White Wolf (who claim that fighting is lame and beneath them) RPG. It's not the weirdest thing to happen with Street Fighter characters. That is reserved for either Puzzle Fighter, Gem Fighters Mini Mix, Capcom vs Tecmo, Smash Brothers, or the Street Fighter Movie (your choice).
So here we are... let it begin. First thing first, let's talk about art quality. Now, the cover was... reasonably well done but with weird faces? I mean, it's passable. Our next picture looks like it may have been pencil drawn, it's a picture of Blanka, but it's reasonably good. But then you just get shit like this:
Or this:
This is the typical quality you get. Speaking of quality, the opening fiction takes up several pages and is shit, so you're not getting it. Instead I'm going to skip past that to where they're waffling about what a roleplaying game is, and the example of play, and mention that it's this early that they say you use 10-sided dice. Only page 13 and they already remembered!
Also they have the usual cautionary note about only training martial arts properly and not simply kicking your friends in the face. Note that they haven't released LARP rules for this.
OR HAVE THEY?
We then get a brief description of the characters from the game (as of SF2, not Turbo, so Cammy and T-Hawk but no Gouki, also they use the American names so it's Balrog the boxer, not Mike Bison), and their fighting styles - even Sir Not Appearing In This Book. Also talks about Chi, sensei, glory, honour, teams, what happens when you break "the code" (because every White Wolf game needs some kind of Ten Commandments list where you gradually go down (Humanity) or up (Torment) as you act like more of a shit). Oh and a picture of Chun Li that... I wish I could scan this. Judging by her stance and face, it looks like she's either taking it up the ass or taking a fierce shit. The next picture is of a clothed monkey standing on the head of an enraged Stereotypical Indian man? Oh god, this is White Wolf multiplied by Capcom. I hope that really is supposed to be a clothed monkey and not their idea of a black man.
They discuss the ideas of tournaments, with a promise to cover them in more depth later on, because that's a really big thing - what with most Street Fighter video games having the following plot:
- There is a tournament
- Lord Vega is in some way behind it and has an evil plot
- Fight about it.
We then get some talk about arenas and what they're like, by region. So you get a basic description of the area and one paragraph each on specific arenas in the games (so North America has 4 paragraphs, followed by Guile's Tarmac, Ken's Docks, and Balrog's Strip). By the way, Shadoloo is behind the deforestation of the Amazon. Also I know Cammy is British, but I was not aware that she owned a castle and butler.
Okay, I'm just going to take a few drinks now to prepare myself for whatever is coming next.Africa
For the record, Blanka actually learned his powers (and presumably his green skin as well) by observing electric eels. He's not a weird mutant or "what we think people from Brazil are like". He just studied hard to become like an electric eel. And you CAN teach that.Many strange creatures are rumoured to inhabit the Congo, the deepest and most unexplored portion of the continent. Some people whisper about mutants, perhaps similar to Blanka; others say an intelligent ape lives there, although none believe he is a street fighter.
Next post will start on the rules, which at least seem workable and are less bad, I'd say, than any other Combat System White Wolf has ever cared to produce. Also less bad than Ninjas & Superspies, so there is that. I'll let you sit and wonder as to how they address the issue of ~4 players in a game based on 1-on-1 combat!
In the meantime, have some pictures that are better quality, and that suggest what would happen if this stayed a strong line all the way through to the SVC/CVS games: