Nintendo unveiled Super Smash Bros. Melee at its E3 2001 press conference, to the collective awe of all the fans in attendance. The video reels displayed characters new and old to the series, several of which genuinely shocked the audience. What the footage alluded to, however, would become much more evident the following day, when the game was open for play to showgoers: that Super Smash Bros. Melee was a slightly updated version of its predecessor, one that had been given an extremely pleasing face-lift. Now that the game has been released, that much can be confirmed--aside from a few minor additions and alterations to the fighting system, Super Smash Bros. Melee plays exactly like its predecessor. But rest assured, this is certainly a good thing. Few games were able to match the maddening pace of its predecessor, while still remaining playable. Even fewer have been able to work that kind of feel successfully into a multiplayer mode, much less one that allows for four players. And when you consider the sheer amount of play modes, secrets, and extras packed into Melee, it becomes that much more enticing.

Super Smash Bros. has always been about extremely fast-paced multiplayer fighting, and Melee is no different. It's an experience that's at its best in the company of other humans. It's easily among the most inventive fighting games released in recent years, 2D or otherwise, and its accessible nature can often hide the reasonable bit of depth its fighting system offers. The game is very good at working wild cards, of sorts, into its matches, which can often change the tide of a battle in a moment's notice. The hammer item is a great example of this: A novice player could theoretically be getting pummeled by a trio of veterans, only to pick up the hammer and pound his or her way to victory within a span of a few seconds. The Smash Bros. system is very good at evening the odds in ways like this, and given the mad pace of the matches, you'll seldom notice until it's all over.

One of the original Smash Bros.' weaker areas was its single-player modes, or lack thereof. Aside from a halfhearted "story" mode, there really wasn't anything compelling, outside of the multiplayer game. Melee thankfully remedies this in many ways. The classic single-player mode is back, bonus stages and all, and the progression changes each time you play through it. The game is also pretty good at mixing things up by introducing several kinds of variations on the characters you'll fight. In one stage, for instance, you might encounter a giant-sized Yoshi, while another may pit you against a team of tiny Donkey Kongs, 15 deep. You can even add these kinds of parameters during multiplayer matches, but that's a whole other story.

The adventure mode is Melee's new variation on the single-player game. In it, you'll progress through a series of side-scrolling levels, all of which are based on or otherwise inspired by Nintendo's extensive and classic back catalogue. The first stage will take you through span of the Mushroom Kingdom that's inspired by the look and feel of the original Super Mario Bros., right down to the strolling goombas and patrolling koopa paratroopas. Another has you running down the lanes of F-Zero's Mute City, all the while avoiding the hazards of oncoming traffic traveling at 500mph. It's easy to let your heartstrings be pulled by these clever homages, but in the end, these adventure stages are really a hit-or-miss experience. Some, like the Super Mario stage, seem well thought-out and flawlessly executed, right down to the memorable Mario theme. Others don't fare so well and wind up feeling jury-rigged and shallow. Sadly, the adventure stage based on Zelda is a bit on the weak side--what could have been brilliant homage to Zelda II's side-scrolling dungeons turned out as an odd mishmash of the series' aesthetics. HAL at least got the classic dungeon theme right, though. Fans will no doubt miss a beat the first time they hear it, in all its remixed and rearranged glory. In the end, at any rate, you'll still play through the adventure mode several times--some of the game's hidden elements can only be unlocked through completion of it in some special way.

Dragon Ball Z: Budokai 2 Review

After over a decade of poorly realized Dragon Ball Z fighting games, Atari and little-known developer DIMPS surprised many people in 2002 when they released Dragon Ball Z: Budokai for the PlayStation 2. Amazingly, it wasn't half bad. The action wasn't complex--as it valued accessibility over depth--but the visuals had a sharp, clean look to them. Surprisingly, the game made excellent use of the license, with the crowning achievement being a story mode that reenacted many of Dragon Ball Z's most memorable moments. Now, about a year after Budokai hit shelves, DIMPS has churned out a better-looking sequel, but this time around it lacks the compelling story mode that distracts you from the rather basic gameplay.

In place of Budokai's story mode, Budokai 2 features the new Dragon World mode, which is essentially a board game where you control a team of Dragon Ball Z heroes as they move around on a series of maps while fighting bad guys and collecting dragon balls. The story for the Dragon World mode takes some liberties with the Dragon Ball Z continuity by fashioning a tale that has many of the series' different villains teaming up to collect the dragon balls. Unfortunately, after a few levels, the overlying story just sort of derails. The fundamental problem with the Dragon World mode is that there's really no point to it. With your sole objective, on most maps, being to just find the bad guys and fight them, the board game format doesn't bring a lot of strategy to the table. Also, you have to fight the same enemy several times before he is permanently vanquished, in most cases, and that just isn't any fun.

Unfortunately, if you want to get the most out of Budokai 2's multiplayer game, you really need to play through the Dragon World mode, as it's the only way to unlock many of the game's characters and stages. Beyond the Dragon World mode, Budokai 2 offers a duel mode (where you can fight against the CPU or another player in a one-off match), a single-player, ladder-style World Tournament mode, and a training mode. Whether you're already familiar with Budokai or not, the training mode is worth going through, as it explains the mechanics that are new to Budokai 2 and explains those that make the series different from other 3D fighters.

The fighting system in Budokai 2 isn't too different from last year's Budokai, though it does add a few new bells and whistles. The game still plays like a stripped-down 3D fighter, with basic punch, kick, and energy attacks that can be strung together for more powerful combos. Players can't actually jump, but there are certain attacks that will launch your opponent into the air, at which point you can fly up to him or her and continue your battle in the sky. If you and your opponent both try to attack each other at the same time (with certain moves), you'll enter burst mode. Here, both characters unleash a flurry of punches and kicks--and mashing buttons is the only way to come out on top. The most significant addition that Budokai 2 makes to the fighting system is the fusion technique, which allows you to merge your fighter with another for a short period of time while in midfight, thus greatly increasing your power. While the fusion technique is definitely a nice touch, the game still lacks any sort of power-struggle mechanic--where players just try to overpower one another by using huge beams of energy.

Budokai 2 really outdoes its predecessor in the graphics department, which appears to be where DIMPS spent a majority of its development time. Budokai had a fairly cartoony look to it, but Budokai 2 ups the ante by rendering all the characters with a cel-shading effect. Though it's not the greatest looking cel shading we've seen, it definitely works to the game's advantage by giving the characters even more of a hand-drawn feel. The character models appear slightly more detailed and display more prominent creases in skin and cloth. A little bit of the glossy shine effect, which the characters took on in the latter parts of the series, is even apparent. The game also features actual shadows, which replace the black dots that the characters cast in the original Budokai. The visuals aren't entirely new, though, and the game borrows a fair amount from its predecessor. Virtually all the in-game animations are reused from the first game, and many of the characters themselves share identical animations. The game also recycles sound from the first game pretty liberally, and players of the first game will probably notice a lot of familiar music, menu sound effects, and voice clips. To its credit, though, the game does include a fair amount of new voice acting--all provided by the American voice actors from the Dragon Ball Z cartoon.

The first Budokai was total fan service, and, really, Budokai 2 isn't that radically different. However, it feels rushed and doesn't quite exude the same level of care that the first installment does. The omission of a story mode is Budokai 2's biggest misstep, and the Dragon World mode simply isn't a suitable replacement. The improved visuals are nice, and some of the additions made to the fighting system are fun, but Budokai 2 still comes out as an underwhelming sequel.

Rise 2 Resurrection Review

In Rise 2 Resurrection you assume the role of Coton, a cyborg created by an Electrocorp scientist to destroy a rogue robot called the Supervisor. After defeating Coton in the first installment of Rise of the Robots, she (the Supervisor takes a female form) destroyed his body and kept his mind alive, integrating his essence into her neuralnet as a tutor for her subservient droids. Once they realized that Coton had failed, the scientists hatched another plan to overcome the Supervisor. They introduced an A-virus, or Anarchy virus, into the neural net that all the Supervisor's robots were plugged into. Now the virus has reached Coton's conciousness and he has formed an escape plan. Download his knowledge and abilities into one of the subordinate robots and battle his way out.

Rise 2's beautiful graphics and entrancing techno soundtrack are impressive, to say the least. Backgrounds are colorful and well-implemented; the music and sound effects are strong and vibrant, and work well together to create an exciting play atmosphere. You can choose from a large number of great-looking robots—some are big and strong, while others are small and quick, and each has special moves that only it can perform. One particularly nice feature is that you can get extra projectile moves by performing a termination move on your defeated opponent.

But none of this means anything if the game isn't fun. And unfortunately for us, Rise 2 isn't. The moves feel awkward and clumsy, and if you don't use the keyboard, a six-button controller, or Gravis Grip Adapter, you won't be able to perform all of them anyway. If you're looking for easy-to-perform moves and reliable functions, try out Mortal Kombat 3, One Must Fall 2097, or FX Fighter. If you're looking for an expensive screensaver, this is the title for you.

Dragon Ball Z: Shin Budokai brings Atari and Dimps' successful anime-inspired fighting series to the PlayStation Portable in a package that isn't particularly ambitious but is still well-executed enough to make it worthwhile. The simple, fast-paced action of the Budokai series translates well onto the PSP, and the presentation is both eye-catchingly vibrant and technically flashy. Shin Budokai's bare-bones set of features is in stark relief against the game's solid core and is a little disappointing.

That Shin Budokai takes its cues from the first three Budokai games, and not Budokai Tenkaichi, should be a great relief to fans. Like its predecessors, Shin Budokai takes a basic 3D fighting game model and imbues it with the hyperkinetic energy synonymous with Dragon Ball Z. The game's controls map easily onto the PSP, using two of the face buttons for melee attacks, one for blocking attacks, and one for firing off ranged energy attacks. As you might expect, melee attacks can be easily strung into combos, and pressing both at once lets you throw your opponent. Holding down the block button puts your character's guard up, though well-timed taps on the block button can dodge an attack entirely or even throw an energy attack right back at your opponent.

It's the ranged energy attacks that give Shin Budokai's gameplay such a distinctive flair. In addition to your standard life bar, there's a ki meter, which dictates what kinds of energy attacks you can throw. Your ki will increase naturally over the course of a fight, but you can also hold down the L button to quickly charge up, though this will leave you extremely vulnerable to attacks. Depending on how much ki you have charged up, your energy attacks can range from a puny yellow fireball to a time-stopping, screen-filling nightmare. Fully charged ki attacks aren't unbeatable, since a well-timed punch can cancel out the whole thing, but they're impressive looking and completely devastating when they land. Certain characters, such as the Saiyans, can use the ki energy to turn into more powerful forms, too.

Instant teleportation can also have a significant impact on the momentum of the game. With this simply executed move, you can instantly appear right behind your opponents just as they're about to throw a punch, giving you the upper hand. You can also use this to ping-pong enemies back and forth after an initial attack launches them into the air. Things get really interesting when both players use the instant teleportation back and forth several times in a row, making for a fun tug-of-war dynamic. There are some cool gameplay elements introduced in Budokai 3 that didn't make it into Shin Budokai. The dragon rush attacks, which introduced a fun little rock-paper-scissors mechanic along with some amazing cinematic camera angles, is the most unfortunate omission, though it's also disappointing that power struggles, where two characters throw massive energy attacks at each other at once, resolve themselves without any additional input from the players. Overall, the gameplay is still fast and furious, and the game's artificial intelligence can put up a pretty wicked fight.

The Budokai series has always done a solid job of translating the flashy Dragon Ball Z aesthetic into a 3D fighter, and Shin Budokai bucks no trends in this regard. Using a nice, clean cel-shading effect helps make the characters look all the more like their two-dimensional counterparts, and the animations, which are presumably lifted from Budokai 3, are fast and powerful. The game also uses a dazzling color palette that helps make the action stand out, but it's the special-effects overkill that really makes Shin Budokai great to look at. You can expect to see lots of small, anime-style motion lines all over the place. Even when characters are standing still, energy will crackle and swirl around them, and when they start throwing attacks, intense and colorful light and particles bombard the screen. Not as much work went into the game's sound design, but it didn't really need to, since it's easy enough to lift most of the sounds from the DBZ cartoon. It's a little disappointing that the game doesn't feature much voice acting, but as a minor consolation, you can choose to switch between the English or Japanese voice acting.

While the game is fun to play and great to look at, the modes of play in Shin Budokai are less inspired. There's a main story mode called Dragon Road, which models itself after the plot of the Dragon Ball Z movie Fusion Reborn (or Rebirth of Fusion, depending on your region), and it's basically a long, long series of fights punctuated with expository scenes composed of still shots of the characters. The dialogue is wincingly bad, and the story doesn't make a great deal of sense, but luckily the story sequences are easily skipped. It's a pretty half-baked mode, but it's worth playing through since you can unlock a ton of characters on top of the 13 you start with. The other modes are just as bland, including a standard one-on-one arcade mode, a time-attack mode, a survival mode, a stripped-down ad hoc multiplayer mode, and a training mode.

After you win a fight in any of the above-mentioned modes, you get your performance rated based on how much life you lost, how long it took you to win, and the overall technicality of the fight, and you are awarded a number of points for your efforts. Rather than using these points to buy cool, powerful enhancements for characters, you can buy a variety of "stamps," which feature lots of recognizable DBZ characters, locales, and items. You can combine purchased stamps to create your own custom "profile card," which you can then share with other players. It's all exceptionally lame, like some kind of anime scrapbooking thing, and it doesn't add to the overall package.

Despite its rather paltry set of features, the absence of some of the coolest action from Budokai 3, and the almost criminally lame profile card system, Shin Budokai is still a solid 3D fighter, thanks to some great visuals and action that's easy to pick up and play. Those looking for a hardcore, highly technical fighter aren't going to find what they need here, but DBZ fans are sure to eat it up. As long as you're not expecting the next Tekken, Shin Budokai can prove to be a manic fighter with its own style.

Dead or Alive Review

If there's one thing the PlayStation has a lot of, it's fighting games. Good fighting games on the other hand are a different story. Tecmo just happens to have one of those different stories though, and it goes by the name of Dead or Alive.

Dead or Alive was originally released as an arcade game that ran on Sega's Model 2 board (read Virtua Fighter 2) some time ago. A perfect arcade port later appeared on the Saturn in Japan and was considered one of the better fighting games on the system. The title has of course recently resurfaced on the PlayStation with a fresh new look, with new character models that look significantly better than the Saturn and arcade versions.

The game features nine playable characters from the get-go with two more attainable via total completion of the game. Every time you beat the game you are rewarded with a new outfit for one of the characters. There is a total of 84 costumes in all, which range from your typical karate gi to scuba gear. The design of the characters themselves isn't groundbreaking by any means, in fact some look suspiciously similar to characters from the Street Fighter, Tekken, and Virtua Fighter series.

Dead or Alive's fighting engine is obviously influenced by Sega's Virtua Fighter series, with its punch, kick, and hold button setup. The hold button is just that, a button that allows you to get your opponent in grappling holds. This is really kind of cool because you can counter holds and attacks and then reverse counters on top of that, so you sometimes can get an awesome Jackie Chan-style grappling match that goes back and forth three or four times till someone messes up and pays the consequences. It may sound complicated, but since the special moves are all fairly simple to perform, anyone can easily learn how to play.

Graphically, Dead or Alive is one of the nicest-looking PlayStation games to date. The character models are nearly seamless, meaning that the 3D characters don't appear to be blocky or made up of polygons. Instead, the characters have a very smooth, almost skinlike quality to them. Mixed with the fast and fluid motion of the character animations, this gives a stunning sense of realism. Apparently the designers went a little too far when it came to the motion design of the female characters though, because they made it so their breasts bounce while fighting. Honestly, if it weren't for the fact that they keep on bouncing well after they should, it may have been seen as a commendable effort for the designers' keen attention to detail. At any rate, the breast-bouncing can be turned off or on in the option menu. The sound effects and accompanying background music, while not up for any awards, get the job done.

Overall, Dead or Alive delivers a realistic fighting experience. Combining fantastic graphics and above-average gameplay, Dead or Alive is a fun and challenging fighting game well worth picking up. Hopefully, it won't be overshadowed too much by the US release of Namco's Tekken 3.

Mortal Kombat: Armageddon Review

The goriest fighting game series around returns for another bout in Mortal Kombat: Armageddon, which is the first game in the series to let you create your own character as well as your own finishing moves. However, these good-in-theory ideas aren't executed particularly well, and the game's huge assortment of playable characters--including fighters from every previous MK installment--isn't as exciting as it should be. Like the last couple of MK installments, this one throws together a bunch of different, loosely related features. But the sheer volume of different content in this game still can't cover up that the underlying one-on-one combat system hasn't aged all that gracefully.

It's been two years since the last major MK title, which added online play and several goofy gameplay modes to the mix. The new game tosses out MK: Deception's gimmicky "puzzle kombat" and "chess kombat" modes, instead replacing them with an equally gimmicky and initially charming minigame, a kart racer called (what else?) "motor kombat." The previous game's "konquest" mode returns only in name and concept, as this single-player action adventure mode is much, much better than the disappointing version in Deception. The konquest mode in Armageddon features gameplay similar to Mortal Kombat: Shaolin Monks, so it lets you take on groups of bad guys and run past some deadly traps from a third-person perspective, in addition to some standard MK battles, all wrapped up in a convoluted storyline. You'll be unlocking things like alternate outfits for characters and new battle arenas throughout this mode, and you'll also earn a ton of money that can be used to unlock most everything else in the "krypt." Of course, you can still just fight, by competing in a standard, progressively tougher series of one-on-one matches against the computer or playing against someone else locally or online.

Strangely enough, the konquest mode, which was such a low point of MK: Deception, is one of the relative strengths of MK: Armageddon. The story focuses on a character named Taven and winds up being an unfocused mishmash, but it packs in a lot of action and throws so many unlockables at you around every corner that it winds up being fun. It spans a good six hours or so and doesn't bog you down in tutorials like Deception's konquest mode did. Even still, it's hardly a sufficient reason on its own to take the plunge on this latest MK.

With all of these other features available, you might wonder if the actual fighting in MK: Armageddon is an afterthought. Then you take one look at the character-select screen, which is practically bursting at the seams with about five dozen different fighters, and you'll think twice. It's like a huge Mortal Kombat reunion. You've got all the classics like Sub-Zero, Scorpion, and Johnny Cage on the list; second-gen favorites like Jax, Kung Lao, and Baraka; some very obscure characters like just about everyone from MK4; the series' bosses like Goro, Shao Kahn, and Motaro; and more.

Unfortunately, a lot of raw excitement at this huge selection of characters goes away as you realize many of these characters have little to distinguish them from the rest. In the last MK game, each fighter had three different fighting styles you could freely switch between in battle, but now most everyone's down to just two--a hand-to-hand style and a weapon-based style. This change isn't necessarily for the worse, as the prospect of having to memorize moves and combos for so many different characters would be daunting for any fighting-game fan. However, the basic moves and tactics don't differ much from one fighter to the next, and special moves include your basic assortment of projectiles and powered-up punches and kicks. But all this has always been true of Mortal Kombat's gameplay. So what is it about the fighters that makes them all seem the same? It's the game's new "kreate-a-fatality" system.

MK characters have never been known for their personalities; it's been their unique finishing moves that really helped set them apart. But now, every fighter gets to string together the same types of fatalities, involving limb ripping, heart pulling, head crushing, and so forth. It's definitely amusing at first, as well as a lot easier to figure out than fatalities were in previous installments. But it gets old, and it can take too long. Some moves let you keep spinning the opponent around and around, dragging the fatality process on for much longer than the shocking-but-brief moves that made the series famous. This fatality system could have been a good alternative to having signature moves for each character, but as a replacement for unique, character-specific fatalities, it's a letdown. At least there are brief, character-specific spoken endings to make it worth bothering to play through as any of the fighters you like.

The fighting engine itself is showing some serious signs of aging, as well. It doesn't nearly offer the same fast-paced, fluid feel that's common to other fighting games these days, and it instead focuses on "dialing in" canned combos to deal damage to an opponent who leaves himself open. There's a new parrying system and air combo system, but they don't help the gameplay's awkward look or its counterintuitive feel. This MK is still recycling a lot of the same graphics and animations from 2002's Mortal Kombat: Deadly Alliance, so even when you're running the game on a wide-screen progressive-scan display, the action doesn't always looks flattering. There are a good number of amusing or painful-looking animations, as well as awkward-looking moves that cause the same old blood to start spraying. The game looks virtually the same and runs just as smoothly on the PlayStation 2 and Xbox, though the Xbox version is a little cleaner. As in the last MK, some of the stages add some complexity to the action since they include deathtraps that can instantly end a round, but most of the novelty of this is gone, too. At least the game's audio has held up better than the visuals. There's not much voice work, but the full-contact hits and the gloomy music still sound good.

As for the kreate-a-fighter mode, you get a lot more control over how your character looks than over how he or she plays. You can assign different punches, kicks, and special moves, but ultimately you're still stuck picking and choosing from a list of prefab fighting techniques. Maybe that's to be expected, but without a particularly impressive fighting system to look forward to, the prospect of creating your own fighter isn't all that compelling...especially when there are already so many fighters to choose from.

If you want to take your business online, you can play both the standard one-on-one kombat mode as well as eight-player motor kombat. For the fighting mode, you can choose whether or not to allow custom fighters online, though pitting your created fighter against those of other players will likely help keep things interesting for longer. Besides, the balance among the 60-or-so stock characters in the game is already pretty suspect--konquest mode stars Shujinko and Taven stand out as having fast moves for every situation, for example. During our online testing, we experienced responsive and lag-free gameplay on the Xbox, while performance on the PS2 was a little spottier and the player-matching process isn't as streamlined, but your mileage may vary. Speaking of which, don't expect much lasting value from motor kombat. Aside from the concept's inherent appeal, this is a simplistic kart racing game that isn't as fun or interesting as the average game of the sort, and online performance seemed laggier than the fighting portion.

Despite the smorgasbord of different features, Mortal Kombat: Armageddon falls short of being a highly satisfying new entry in a long-running series that's decidedly had its ups and downs. Some older Mortal Kombat games, like MK Trilogy, have attempted a quantity-over-quality approach that might have seemed exciting to MK fans at first but winded up leaving many of them cold. On the other hand, sequels like MK II, MK3, and MK: Deadly Alliance substantially revised the characters and gameplay and were a lot more satisfying as a result. MK: Armageddon presumably will be the last time we get a Mortal Kombat game on the PS2 and Xbox, but if nothing else, you can tell there are still a lot of good ideas brewing in here. So with any luck, the series is far from finished.

Calling Street Fighter III the third game in the Street Fighter series is just plain silly. Let's face it. Between all the Alpha games, all the vs. games, and all the "upgrades" to Street Fighter II, we've seen more games in the past decade bearing the name Street Fighter than we've probably needed to see. The journey to game number three has been on a long hard road. Every time anyone hinted at the possibility of an SF3, it always turned out to be another offshoot of the Street Fighter line. Well, Capcom has finally graced the world with its "third" Street Fighter, as well as two upgrades to the game, Second Impact and Third Strike.

The arcade releases of the Street Fighter III games have been met with mixed reactions. Many people were disappointed that only Ryu and Ken made it to the third game (though Akuma was added in Second Impact, and Chun-Li is in Third Strike), and the new characters just didn't seem as interesting as Guile, Dhalsim, and the rest of the SF2 gang. Others couldn't get over the slow game speed - after years of playing games like Super SF2 Turbo and Street Fighter Alpha, many players felt that going back to such a slow speed made the game seem like it was stuck in the mud. The game did add a parry maneuver that, when mastered, really changed the face of the game. Parrying an attack caused the attacker to seize up for a brief moment, leaving plenty of room for a counterattack. But even with this bit of innovation, many people stayed away from the game entirely or simply didn't feel like learning the styles of the new characters. As a result, Street Fighter III Double Impact, which contains both the original Street Fighter 3 and the Second Impact upgrade, may find a larger audience on the Dreamcast.

Street Fighter III eschews the more cartoony art style - found in, say, the Alpha series - and strives for a slightly more realistic look. Since the arcade game ran on Capcom's CPS3 hardware (all the other recent Street Fighter games have run on the older CPS2 system), there are many more frames of animation to be seen. Elena is, of course, the best example of this, as she is constantly moving around in all of her stances. Unfortunately, Elena's fluid animation makes the rest of the characters seem a little stiff by comparison. All in all, the game appears to be an excellent port of the arcade version, with absolutely no waiting for things to load between rounds or fights. The arcade version's sound has also been well duplicated.

Controlwise, the game plays as you would expect a 2D Capcom fighter to play. So you may not want to use the default Dreamcast controller with the game, as the L and R buttons are definitely less than optimal. There are a couple different controller choices on the market, our favorites being Agetec's joystick and the ASCII Fighter Pad FT, which is only available in Japan. Both of these controllers make playing Street Fighter III a much better, and in the case of the joystick, truer-to-the-arcade experience.

While including both the original SF3 and Second Impact is a nice touch, Second Impact is a much more refined game, and you won't really be going back to the original game very much at all. Also, it would have been nice to see this package include Third Strike and become a trilogy of sorts, rather than release Third Strike on its own.

There is definitely a lot to Street Fighter III. If you're one of the people who has shunned the game since its release in the arcade, you may want to give this collection a chance. Since you won't be paying per play to learn the game's new characters, it's easier to just jump into the game and start messing around. You just may be surprised. However, you may just want to wait for Third Strike, which is currently available in Japan and is releasing here later this year.