I want to go to the (National Tournament) regional qualifiers!
Hello everyone. This is Tsukamoto.
Today, director Okada, engineer Taguchi, and myself would like to talk about the bonus stages in SSFIV, and what it took to add them in.
Tell us the details of adding the bonus stages to the game.
Tsukamoto:
We wanted to have the bonus stages in the original arcade version. However, these days not many players bother racking up high scores in fighting games, and we've heard that arcade operators even disable them. So we weren't sure if people even wanted them. Then, we thought that we'd be better off spending the time that we'd use on bonus stages on better balancing the game, so we eventually gave up on them.
Okada:
We also wanted to put in the bonus stages for the console version, but due to various circumstances we weren't able to. This time, when we got the green light for SSFIV from producer Ono, he told us to definitely get them in, and I also personally felt that I wanted to put them in the game.
So then since you couldn't get the bonus stages in the arcade or the console versions, then the third time's a charm?
Tsukamoto:
That's right. We finally got them in!
The desire to see bonus stages brought back was particularly strong from overseas...
Okada:
While there weren't any specific requests for a particular stage, we heard that the bonus stages were popular overseas so they wanted them back. As for why, we felt that it gave players a real way to experience their strength. Breaking up the cars and the barrels is a way of showcasing your Street Fighter strength. At least, I think so...
As cars and barrels are real objects that we know, it adds to our feeling of awe.
Okada:
Bonus stages give for some degree of interaction with real objects. For those of us who live in the real world, it shows us how much stronger these guys are than we are. As there are many people overseas who love real-world objects, this is something that will let them enjoy the game more.
Did you play with the bonus stages in the original SFII?
Tsukamoto:
I remember giving it my all to try and get the high scores!
Taguchi:
Using the FP shoryuken to deliver the final hit to the car, and then landing on top of it - man that felt great. (laughs)
Tsukamoto:
I did the same thing. You get a nice "THUNK!" sound as it finishes.
Okay, now tell us about what happened after bonus stages were decided on.
Taguchi:
First off we brainstormed ideas. What would make for a good bonus stage? At that time, there were a lot of ridiculous ideas though.
...Ridiculous ideas? Does that mean you were thinking of making new bonus stages?
Okada:
We were. There were a lot of strange ideas. A lot of them had nothing to do with Street Fighter at all. Some were more suited to the music/beat games. I just remembered one, involving Guile jumping from one fighter jet to another...
Taguchi:
Oh man, I remember that! (laughs)
Okada:
It was all about jumping from one high-speed fighter jet to another. We thought the situation was cool at least. (laughs) At that time, we were just thinking about general bonus stages that could be enjoyed, but then we figured that there weren't really Street Fighter bonus stages. We decided to only do bonus stages that made you remember back to that time, so that's how we arrived at what we have now.
And that's how the car and barrel stages were chosen.
Okada:
When we asked our development team "what's a Street Fighter bonus stage?", ten out of ten people said "breaking the car". So that was set in stone.
Taguchi:
Its a dynamic bonus stage that leaves an impression
Okada:
So the car breaking stage was the first to be decided. We then figured we wanted to add at least another stage. We thought about (oil) drums, barrels, or even a brick-splitting game, but then we thought "if we're going through the trouble of adding two, let's do something different from the car." As the drums, like the car, are stationary, we felt that the moving barrels would be more interesting, so we decided on that.
So that's why the barrel stage was chosen?
Okada:
One nice thing about the bonus stages is that it gives you a chance to practice combos and your own techniques that you'd like to use in battle. In the car stage, as the car stands still you have a chance to practice your moves and combos. As the barrels fall from above, you can practice your air combos or anti-air strategies.
Okay, so could you tell us some details about the car wrecking stage?
Okada:
We wanted to bring back the SFII feel, but if that's all we accomplished that'd be a little sad. So we wanted to bring back the feel and the reactions, but add the "next generation" visual impact of SFIV to it. So we were particularly concerned with the "moving picture" theme and bringing out that visual quality.
The car does have a real sense to it.
Okada:
The designer who made the car model really took painstaking detail in making and analyzing it. He aimed for reality.
How did you decide on the type of the car?
Okada:
At the beginning there were a lot of different thoughts for this as well. The car wrecking stage was also featured in SF3, and the car at that time was a SUV. So with a sedan in SFII, and a SUV in SF3, we thought about what to do in SSFIV. One of the suggestions was one of those big yellow trucks you often see at construction sites. You know, increase the the size and scale of things to destroy. We also thought about using a fighter jet. But then the whole theme of SFIV has been "going back to the roots" as it were, so going along those lines picking the sedan was the obvious choice.
How difficult is the car wrecking stage?
Okada:
About the same as SFII. A little harder than SF3.
In what ways do the difficulty change?
Okada:
In SF3, you could break one side just by pushing punch buttons. There was no general concept of breaking by direction. However, as the bonus stage now uses SFII as a basis, we've re-created the concept of breaking in an order.
Can you tell us about any incidents that happened during development of the car wrecking stage?
Taguchi:
There were some bugs that popped up during development, it shouldn't have been funny but we couldn't help but to laugh. For example, Abel's super...he grabs the opponent and pushes them to the corner, right? On the car stage, if you do super Abel would just get stuck in the car and continually keep running. (laughs) Honda's headbutt would just continually grind against the car. (laughs)
Okada:
As the bonus stages use the basic battle system, we had to make for a lot of exceptions. That's where the bugs came from.
Taguchi:
Its true for both bonus stages, but your opponent is not another character, but a third-party foreign object. So determining what happened when you attack it was quite difficult. Even bringing in the guys in charge, it was a whopper of a task to pull off. And of course we had to fix the bugs that we mentioned before.
Tsukamoto:
Energy drinks once more!!
(See the previous entry regarding the energy drinks)
Taguchi:
Those did the trick. (laughs)
Would you say that grappler characters are at a disadvantage?
Okada:
Not at all. For grapplers or even just the big characters, their regular moves do a lot of damage. It might actually be a little easier for grapplers to wreck the car. Without having to use a lot of different moves you can total the car.
Taguchi:
So, does that mean we can throw the car?
Okada:
No no no, the theme is going back to the basics here. (laughs) Even without throws...for example, T.Hawk's crouching fierce does quite a lot of damage in 2 hits. And Zangief's punch lariat is also pretty nice. Grapplers don't mean you don't need to ever use attacks. I feel like the car wrecking stage is a good chance to reacquaint yourself with the basic moves.
Taguchi:
Oh yeah, I just remembered! On the car wrecking stage, there was the idea that if Dhalsim does his yoga teleport, he'd teleport inside of the car. (laughs)
Everyone:
(laughs)
Taguchi:
Then he'd just say "yoga", rev up the engine and drive off. (laughs)
Next, let's talk about the barrel breaking stage.
Okada:
We mentioned this before, but in the barrel breaking stage, the barrels are in motion. So compared to the car stage, its a little closer to a real fight. At least, the feel of it. The barrels come one after another, so getting your timing just right is the most important thing. Also, the barrels are pretty strong, so if you miss one you can get overwhelmed. The car wrecking stage is just about destruction, while the barrels are about using your techniques. So you can enjoy the two stages as separate entities.
Taguchi:
Just like the old times, if you want to go the simple route you can just sit there and break barrels with your crouching fierce.
Okada:
But if you do that your score will be pretty low.
Tsukamoto:
What do you have to do to get a high score?
Okada:
Comboing into specials from normals, like c.strong into hurricane kick, or c.forward into shoryuken, that'll get you a lot of points. Of course, this also increases the risk of missing, but it's what you have to do for a high score.
Tsukamoto:
High risk high reward eh? Those are dangerous words (laughs).
Were there any incidents during the barrel bonus stage development?
Okada:
The lead for the bonus stages was going for realistic, so at first we gave the barrels hit properties. The idea was that if a barrel really did fall on you, it'd hurt. But what happened there was that because of hit trading, no one could get a perfect.
Really? No kidding?
Okada:
Even in the air it'd be a trade, punch lariat would get hit from overhead, and when the invincibility frames of shoryuken wore off...smacked with a barrel (laughs). Also, you can't block barrels, but the characters would go into hit stun, so if you got hit with one the next one would just keep coming, and after about 5 seconds the character would get dizzied. And just as you got out of it...smacked with a barrel. (laughs) The barrels were the strongest character in the game (laughs). Of course, we've fixed that now!
Is there a character you would recommend for clearing the bonus stages?
Okada:
If you're talking about breezing through the bonus stages, that would have to be Blanka. Even back during SFII, Blanka was the character for bonus stages! Even beginners could use Blanka! And that hasn't changed now. I'd recommend him for both bonus stages.
Well then, are there any final thoughts you'd like to share for those waiting for the bonus stages?
Taguchi:
You're free to do them as you like, so you can try to wreck the car as quickly as possible, or just destroy all the barrels in mid-air. Make up your own rules and enjoy the game like that. You can also use it as a small substitute for training mode.
Okada:
We made them with SFII in mind, so if you feel that they are similar to that time then I'll be happy. We've adjusted the difficulty, so you bonus stage fans can have fun going after an unbeatable high score.
Tsukamoto:
Well, I'll be reliving the past while breaking barrels with Blanka, but how about all of you? Has this gotten you more excited for it? Please wait while thinking up your own ways to enjoy the bonus stages!
See you again next week!
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