Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #7233 in Computer & Video Games
• Brand: Capcom USA
• ESRB Rating: Teen
• Platform: PlayStation
• Number of items: 1

Features

• Eighteen characters, several of them new
• New moves and combo attacks
• Three playing modes
• 2-D rendered characters and backgrounds
• For 1 or 2 players

GameSpot Review
Even though the concept of a Street Fighter rehash sounds very old, Street Fighter Alpha 2 proves itself to be among the best fighting games on the market, be it in the 2-D or 3-D arena. Players jaded by performing the same moves with the same characters for years, take note: Capcom managed to put it all together in Street Fighter Alpha 2, creating a fantastic fighting package that mirrors the arcade version.

Alpha 2 contains the same eclectic mix of old-school Street Fighter characters, a few Final Fight characters, and a couple of totally new creations - including the old Russian brawler Zangief; the mystical Yoga master Dhalsim; Street Fighter 1 alumnus Gen; grenade-tossing Final Fighter Rolento; and Ryu's biggest fan, Sakura. Toss in the three hidden characters from the first Alpha (Akuma, Dan, and Bison), and you've got a fine selection.

The graphics in Alpha 2 are the best the Street Fighter series has ever seen. They approach cartoon-like clarity, right down to facial expressions. The sound is right on, and the music is festooned with arranged versions of classic Street Fighter tunes.

The gameplay has been tweaked from Alpha 1. The designers removed the simple-to-do chain combos and replaced them with custom combos, which allow your fighter to go absolutely insane for a short period of time (and dish out heavy-handed pain with lightning fast attacks). Super combos remain the same as the previous Alpha, with three different levels for each attack.

Though Alpha 2 may be the same as the rest of the Street Fighters, its high gloss graphics, sound, and gameplay really make this a near-perfect fighting game. 3-D fighters may be the future of the genre, but Alpha 2 proves that 2-D fighting can at times be better than its polygonal brethren. --Jeff Gerstmann
--Copyright ©1999 GameSpot Inc. All rights reserved. Reproduction in whole or in part in any form or medium without express written permission of GameSpot is prohibited. GameSpot and the GameSpot logo are trademarks of GameSpot Inc.

Manufacturer Description
The world has never encountered such a powerful collection of fighters in one tournament. Until now... Every Warrior's Dream -- the most devastating Street Fighters of all time assemble to battle in one ultimate contest. Armed with an arsenal of new martial art moves super combos and deadly secrets the legendary competitors Ryu Chun-Li Ken and Sagat collide with a lethal combination of fierce opponents. Infamous aggressors - Charlie Sodom Birdie and Guy show they play for keeps when they battle on the street. The new contenders Rose and Adon draw powers of the soul and nature to annihilate opponents and secure fame power and prestige.

Customer Reviews

And Who Says You Can't Improve On Perfection?
With the massive success of Street Fighter Alpha, you would think that Capcom would take a little breather, right? WRONG! Only one year after SFA's release, Street Fighter Alpha 2 hits the shelves. It is every bit as awesome as SFA and THEN SOME! All 13 characters from SFA are back PLUS another SF1 character (Gen), yet ANOTHER Final Fight import (Rolento), 2 more SF2 classics (Zangief and Dhalsim) and a brand-spanking-new (kinda) character (Sakura).

This time around, every character has their own background. They kind of did in SFA, but many of them were just slight variations of each other. In SFA2, all of the stages are unique. And, once again, the music is remixed SF2 stuff, but still sounds good.

The quasi-MK3-style chain combos from SFA are gone. Instead, there is a new spin on the super meter called the Custom Combo. Once the CC is activated, the fighter can release a string of normally non-connecting attacks to form a multi hit combo.

This game was, once again, a step in the right direction for capcom. Keep it up!

Excellent game
In late 1995, Capcom released Street Fighter Alpha. Surprisingly, the prequel to the Street Fighter II series managed to be the best game in the series to date. And many people say it's hard to improve on perfection. But not long after releasing the original game, Capcom released a follow-up - Street Fighter Alpha II. Read on for my review of this game.

PROS:
-There are some graphical improvements over the first game.
-The game has many characters from the classic Street Fighter II series, such as Ryu and Chun Li.
-Many characters from the original Alpha game also return, including Rose, Adon, and Birdie.
-There are three Final Fight characters in this game as well - Guy, Rolento, and Sodom.
-The three secret characters from the old game are readily available for choosing in this game. They are M. Bison, Dan, and Akuma.
-The game introduces a new character - Sakura.
-There are a number of "hidden" versions of characters, as well as some alternative. "classic Street Fighter II" versions of some characters.

CONS:
-This is the STANDARD version of the game, not the special GOLD edition which is only available on the Playstation as part of the Street Fighter collection. The gold version has some special tweaks that the normal version doesn't including Cammy as a secret character.

OVERALL:
Overall this is a GREAT game. However, I strongly recommend that you get the Street Fighter Collection on the Playstation, so that you can get the Gold version of the game - it's the only truly perfect version of the game out there. But if you're having trouble hunting down the Collection, this would be a good bet.

Best SF game in the alpha series
The original Street Fighter 2 was a massive hit on the SNES. It was quite easily the biggest beat 'em up on the 16-bit consoles. Not only did it sell by the bucket load, but it was also re-released a number of times with gradual improvements. First of all we got a 'turbo' version with a faster play option, then we got another version with some new characters, and so on. It got a bit silly after a while but the SNES owning public continued to shell out for the games so who am I to quibble? Playstation owners haven't had a decent version of Street Fighter 2 yet. The dreadful Street Fighter The Movie game was very quickly forgotten. Darkstalkers turned up recently and proved to be an entertaining variation on the Street Fighter game engine but it wasn't a 'real' Street Fighter game. However, Street Fighter Alpha 2 (what a mouthful!) has finally arrived and looks set to be not only a decent version of Street Fighter 2 but also the ultimate version of Street Fighter 2. All those gradual improvements in the SNES series of Street Fighter 2 can be found in Street Fighter Alpha 2 (SFA2 forthwith in order to prevent me picking up a horrible case of repetitive strain injury.) You want a turbo mode? How about EIGHT variations of turbo mode. You want a decent bunch of characters? How about EIGHTEEN? You want more moves? How about EIGHTY-MILLION? (A slight exaggeration.) SFA2 has just about everything in it that you could ever want to attempt to cram into a Street Fighter game. I have to admit that I've totally lost track of which characters have turned up in the various Street Fighter 2 games. However, I do know that Chun Li, Dhalsim, Ken, M.Bison, Ryu, Sagat, and Zangief have all managed to survive from the original incarnation of the game. They're joined by a whole host of characters which cover just about every sort of individual you could ever hope to find in a beat 'em up. There are small females, massive thugs, rejects from the military, and, of course, an army of blokes in karate get-ups. There's not a lot of point in me slogging through descriptions of all the characters, but let's just say that the variation is great and there has to be at least one character in there that will appeal to you. The inclusion of 18 fighters adds a lot of replay value to the game and puts it ahead of most other beat 'em ups. I defy anyone to find all the moves for all the characters in this game. It's unbelievable. The control system is the usual Street Fighter 2 affair with six buttons used. This allows a variety of 'standard' punches, kicks and throws which can be used to perform a vast range of combos (a series of blows that basically thrashes your opponent into the ground.) There's also the usual special moves including various projectiles, teleports, unfeasible martial arts moves and even choking someone with a chain (not one for the kids!) On top of all these controls there's a 'super combo gauge' at the bottom of the screen. As you perform 'normal' moves, this builds up. Once it's charged you get to perform super combos, custom combos and alpha combos. This is serious beat 'em up territory. Anyone who isn't familiar with the mechanics of Street Fighter 2 will find their minds totally boggled. However, once you get the hang of it you'll find yourself pounding the opposition into the ground. The game compensates for gamers of all skills by including eight difficulty levels and you'll definitely find a long term challenge in learning all the moves and beating the computer on it's harder levels. Of course there's a training mode and the usual two player options. Blimey! This is one massive beat 'em up. SFA2 uses 2D, sprite-based graphics rather than 3D polygon models. This means it loses out when compared to visual tour de forces such as Tekken 2 which use 3D to boggle their players. However, the 2D graphics are nicely done. The animation is fairly fluid (although a few extra frames wouldn't have gone amiss) and the backgrounds are usually very well detailed with plenty of animation. It's a lot better than SNES games, but it's never really going to stand up all that well against top 3D efforts. The vast array of characters and backdrops is very impressive. Variation really helps to spice the game up. For example, one of the levels has a harrier jump jet floating around in the background, while another takes place on a moving elevator. There's a lot more to see than in Capcom's own Star Gladiator but the 2D style prevents the game from looking really 'next generation'. Darkstalkers had ropey music, Star Gladiator had its atmosphere largely spoiled by its wholly inappropriate tunes, and now Capcom have done it again with SFA2. The music is only really average at the best of times and plain annoying in some stages. It might just be that western tastes in music differ from their Japanese contemporaries, but SFA2 really fails to create any atmosphere with the music included with it. This is a shame since you'd have thought that the Playstation's CD medium would have made it very easy to add some new music. The sound-effects are pretty average. The usual grunts and groans are in there along with the bizarre snatches of speech, but the general quality of sound wouldn't be out of place on a SNES. It just seems that Capcom can't get the audio side of their games quite right at the moment. Do we really want another Street Fighter 2 game? One of my first reactions to SFA2 was, 'oh no, not again! Hasn't the world had enough of Street Fighter?' However, after playing the game for a while it becomes apparent that rather than being just another re-hash of an old game, SFA2 is actually one of the best 2D beat 'em ups ever written. It's got loads of options, loads of moves, and will definitely appeal to hardcore beat 'em up fans. However, it does have some problems. The sound is poor, there are quite long loading times to be endured, and the 2D graphics look rather dated. If you're not a die-hard Street Fighter 2 fan then you might be better off checking out Tekken 2.