Article by: FinalGamer 2/1/2010 3:54:12 PM
(The most epic Rock Paper Scissors tournament
EVER)
MODERN GAMING
Tatsunoko VS Capcom: Fighting All-Stars
Developer - Eighting Ltd.
Publisher - Capcom
Genre - Beat-em-up
Year - 2010
System - Wii
Remember Marvel VS Capcom? Remember how so many people loved that because of all the awesome superheroes we grew up with VS some great legends of videogame history by one company? Now how many of you heard of Tatsunoko? .....yeah me neither.
But it's another of Capcom's jacking-off-to-crossover-love fighting games they enjoy so much (and we can only hope for Capcom VS Konami one day dammit or at LEAST Marvel VS Capcom 3), but for now we will make do with this. How does this fighting game hold up though?
Well fear not, you few wii owners, we will see if you have something to distract yourself from all the talk about THAT sci-fi game that came out the same day of this game's US and European release dates. Seriously, who got cockblocked here first?
I'll tell ya who, gay Mass Effect fans that's who goddamnit, all I wanted was some Turian manlove but you didn't even do that!
........buuuuut that's another story, anyways what are we doing again? Oh right, this fucking game, fine.
Story - This game has seemingly even less story than Marvel VS Capcom 2 did. But then, if you care about a story in a fighting game, you want to go play Mortal Kombat or Tekken. Capcom has no time for that shit in fighting games, usually. You progress through the Arcade mode normally until the seventh stage where a powerful boss from a dearly underrated Capcom game comes to attempt to whup your ass.
Graphics - Capcom rarely has had luck with 3D-fighting games, and after the awful experience of this in the late 90s, they stuck with the better idea of 3D models on 2D planes. Which totally works fine by us and works here too. While the graphics are nowhere near as awesome-looking as Street Fighter IV, they do look very crisp.
(Casshan facepalms at Ryu's "flawless" imitation of Dan Hibiki. The servbots gave three tens and an eight)
Characters pretty much look like themselves, more drawn by the anime masters that are Tatsunoko (apparently) with all of the insane over-the-top crazy-as-shit super special ultra awesome moves that any character can pull, complete with rocky starstrewn background whenever they do so.
There's only one real complaint from me concerning graphics and that is how Frank West (he's covered wars you know) looks...just weird in anime style. That chub-nosed zombie-slaughtering photographer we all know and love.....maybe it's just me but he does not look right in a more anime style, then again he wasn't originally so that would be the reason.
Gameplay - Now, of course we get to the whole reason you read this bloody thing. How is the gameplay?! Well, firstly it's not as intensive as Street Fighter is, hell it's easier to play than Marvel VS Capcom was. You'll be pulling off moves one after the other with accidental ease until even the most basic amateur will eventually just be trying to see how he can make the best combo.
("And then my acupuncturist subscribed me two doses of a boot to the head.")
This is good for some, but bad for others. It's still incredibly fun to play against someone else, the wide variety of characters offering a great range of strategies. For starters, you always pick two characters of your choice, unless you pick one of the giant robots (Capcom's PT-40X or Tatsunoko's Gold Lightan), who make up one team because of their size, power and resistance. Despite this, there's no real cheapness here, only bad partner choices.
The controls are incredibly easy to handle, one button is Low, one is Middle, one is High, one is Partner. Partner when pressed alone makes your ally use an attack and disappear again like in Marvel VS Capcom.
But if you move backwards and press Partner at the same time, you'll swap out with the other. Sometimes it's not always that responsive due to the button versus the d-pad's respective sizes, especially on the Gamecube controller.
(NEVER ask about MegaMan Volnutt's helmet)
Speaking of which, controls. You can use pretty much any control style you want for the Wii, and trying all of them here is my opinion.
Gamecube Controller - I had a few problems with this because of the different button sizes and the annoyingly indented d-pad. I am one of those people who think analog sticks on controllers do not work well for fighting games, and almost always resort to the d-pad (except the Xbox's, it's fucking terrible for fighting games).
Classic Controller - Absolutely the best of the lot, I had a much easier time thanks to the buttons being all the same size, lined up better with each other's positions, and the d-pad of a good size with a responsive analog stick. Hell the game itself supports this option since Morrigan uses it to play the game in her ending cutscene.
("But Zero, you have a glowing sword and HAIR even though you're a robot!"
"I don't care, I'm not joining you, I work for CAPCOM!")
Wiimote - What. The. Shit. This thing is just very unresponsive to everything, and it seems to only have TWO attack buttons other than Partner which is at a very awkward location. Do not bother with this unless you enjoy being given a handicap to the level of crippling disability.
Wiimote & Nunchuck - Not as bad as the Wiimote alone, but still kinda sucks. Movement is better with the large analog stick somewhat, and controls are better placed, but it's still pretty bad and it still appears to be only two attacks. Actually one of them kept doing special moves, so what the hell.
Also, both Wiimote and Wiimote/Nunchuk do not have changeable controls, unlike the Gamecube and Classic controller. Also means I have no fucking clue what does what. Seriously, stick with Classic Controller or a Gamecube Controller.
Music/Sound - This is a rather dividing subject, to those of you who know of the original version's soundtrack. In the original version of the game on Arcade and Japanese Wii release, every character had their own theme, which would play whenever they jumped on screen (something I am sure would be very annoying since it happened whenever they were swapped in, unlike in Marvel Vs Capcom 1 where it only came in when a fighter died and they were auto-swapped in).
("Oh I'm sorry, I couldn't hear you over how awesome my MUTHAFUCKEN LAZER is)
However, every stage now has its own theme, the only one retaining their character theme being the final boss itself (thankfully so because for once Capcom give tribute to a game they really should have advertised better). This may be good or bad for you depending on if you really give that much of a shit for the music.
But on its own the music for the stages is pretty good, though the voices truly win the show with most of the original voice actors or at the very least suitable replacements for them.
Most of the Tatsunoko cast are voiced rather well (Doronjo is just hilarious for her sidekicks who love to pop in) while the Capcom cast have largely kept a good job with the original voice actors for MegaMan Volnutt, Chun-Li and Batsu.
All in all, this may not be up to snuff compared to the epicness of Marvel VS Capcom, but it is by and large the best fighting game on the Wii that is not Super Smash Bros Brawl. It's hyper, it's easy to learn with the proper controller, it's got some stuff to unlock including a few secret characters and above all, it's really fun with a colourfully interesting cast.
Fun and Innovation - 3
Replayability - 3
Gameplay - 3
Presentation - 4