I used to play a lot of fighting games with my friends when I was younger and Street Fighter II was the king of fighters (not to be confused with the fighting series, "King of Fighters"). We played a lot of fighting games - Mortal Kombat, Killer Instinct, Clay Fighters, Primal Rage, Tekken, Virtual Fighter, etc. In my mind though... nothing ever compared to Street Fighter. NOTHING.

I bought Street Fighter IV and it more than met my expectations. The graphics, the sound effects, the smooth gameplay, the newly added focus attacks, the revenge meter and more. Oh, and of course, I can't forget to mention the retained, 2D fighting formula.

This is a great game and and even greater game online. Beating the computer is one thing, but playing real people online is a completely different experience. I was never a part of the arcade scene back in the old days, so I've never played a fighting game "competitively" before. It's really fun to attempt to rise to the top in ranked matches. You find out very quickly just how good you REALLY are. This adds an extremely high level of replay value to the game. I've enjoyed the ability to improve my Street Fighter skills by playing against people online who are much better than me.

As far as negatives are concerned, here is a small list of things that I disliked about the game:

• The music. Especially the intro and menu song, "Indestructible". Horrible, just horrible. I don't like the song and it doesn't fit with Street Fighter.

• The announcer. I know that games need to evolve and can't stay the same forever, but the announcer on the Street Fighter II games is classic and this new guy was just not a good selection. It wasn't so much his voice, though I think they could have picked a better voice. It was mainly just some of the things he said that was really annoying.

• Seth. I didn't like Seth. He was cheap (of course) and I just didn't like the concept of the character.

• The later added Tournament Mode. This would be more enjoyable if it was a bracket system, like they did for Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix.

Overall, this is an excellent game and I'm excited to see what Capcom will bring to the fighting genre in the future.