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   This week I will take you down a treacherous road filled with knee jabs and elbows to the face. I can still vividly remember the late eighties hit Street Fighter for the Super NES system. First off, if you were, or are a fan of fighting games you should know about Street Fighter. This classic, pretty much made the fighter genre what it is today. Street Fighter's story revolved around the characters  Ryu and Ken that compete in a martial arts tournament that spans over five countries.  As one of our heroes you battled your way across the globe in hopes of defeating the ten opponents that stand in your way of becoming the greatest martial artist ever known.

 The graphics were cutting-edge for their time. Amazingly well detailed backgrounds jam-packed with vivid colors set the backdrop for every location you fight at. Street Fighter was ahead of it's time for the graphic quality it produced. The outlining of the characters made them stand out from their backgrounds giving your character a more realistic feel to them. The technique they used also allowed you, as a gamer, to easily distinguish your arm or leg from a tree or any other prop that was behind you. This came in handy especially when blocking your opponents kick to the face.

  Street Fighter was shown to us through a 2D environment, and all your fighting took place on a single screen. The only thing that changed throughout the game was the backdrop you fought on. The fact that you couldn't rotate around an opponent didn't bother us as gamers at this point of time. The only movement that you as a player were required to do was the old side to side slide that plagued most of the fighting games of its time. This method of combat was also used in some of the most popular video game title such as Virtual Fighter and the first Mortal Kombat.

  The fighting mechanics of the game were not the most eloquent but were functional to say the least. The old down, right, A button to produce the Wave Fist was one of the first button sequences used in video game fighting, but not the last. Street Fighter was also one of the first titles to use pressure sensitive pads to create a light, medium, or hard attack. The harder you hit the pad, the stronger the attack you were going to deliver to your opponent. It has been said that this method of sequential button pushing was one of the most difficult things to master in this game. Even if the gamer could pull off all the characters special moves, you were usually destroying your controller in the process of doing so. As a result of the breaking of many a controller, Capcom eventually abandoned the idea of the pressure sensitive control system.

  In short Street Fighter was one of the most popular fighting series to hit the North American market and should be remembered accordingly. Countless hours of game time on this title has not made me a better gamer, but has made me a better fighter. It has trained me to wait for the perfect opportunity to strike, and to deliver a powerful but precise blow to any enemy who stands in my way of ring domination.

 If you own a Super Nintendo, I suggest you check this game out. If anything you'll be able to say that you played a classic. You might just sleep better at night knowing you have.  

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