Wednesday, March 5, 2025

Capcom's Plan for Reviving the FGC from Back in the Day

With the inception of the Fighting Collection series, Capcom is finally leveraging their classic fighting games from back in the day and their practice is gonna revive the FGC from back in the day. Let's jump right in and talk about it.

I am back with this post that is gonna bring us some great news for us fighting game fans in the community. You would know that fighting games in the arcades from the earlier years of the 80s to the early 2000s have been a huge hit right now, starting with Street Fighter to Darkstalkers, Tekken, King of Fighters and Mortal Kombat. These games have defined the genre and they were ported to home consoles to have multiple modes. But specifically, I want to talk about the company that has been alive for years, Capcom. This company has made numerous arcade fighting games from the 80s to the early 2000s.

Capcom tried giving leveraging their arcade releases of their fighting games with their collections a go. And it pretty much went well with the Street Fighter 30th Anniversary Collection, but four of the games out of 12 (13 for the Switch version) support training mode and online play, but a couple of them like Hyper Street Fighter II were absent. Then Capcom is shaking up their practice in leveraging arcade versions of their fighting game titles using their Fighting Collection series.

The Fighting Collection series is known for having arcade releases of their fighting games from the 90s to the early 2000s in their compilation with online play having rollback netcode, jukebox, gallery and more. It was started in 2022 when Capcom Fighting Collection 1 came out and went well with having every Darkstalkers game. And it pretty much came with some issues that consist of lacking quality of life changes and crossplay, Japan only releases of sequels to Vampire Savior and Night Warriors that were inside games that never been released outside of Japan, the exclusion of Street Fighter III, which is why they had to bring in CRTs into last year's EVO and the inclusion of Cyberbots, which was the only fighting game that seemingly has a mild level of profanity that other fighting games don't. We can even turn on the initial boot display on each game and that's something arcade versions of Capcom's classic fighting games have.

However, Capcom is not the only titan of their fighting games with 2D sprites from the earlier years because SNK is also the titan of their classics and they have their own compilations of the classic KOF games in the Orochi Saga and all classic Samurai Shodown games. This led to Capcom and SNK conducting a crossover switcheroo just by bringing Terry Bogard and Mai Shiranui from Fatal Fury to Street Fighter 6 and Ken and Chun-Li to Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves as DLC. That could mean they are showing their interests in making a new Capcom vs. SNK and a new SNK vs. Capcom, right? But the FGC wanted to garner fighting games that beared high status and caliber, like Street Fighter, Darkstalkers, King of Fighters, Fatal Fury, Samurai Shodown and tons more.

We did see Marvel vs. Capcom 2 get ported to the PS3 and Xbox 360 versions until they were removed from the digital storefronts. Then Marvel vs. Capcom Origins came along to have Marvel vs. Capcom 1 and Marvel Super Heroes, but also removed from the digital stores. It was a compilation of original titles. That's why it lacked popular titles. Thankfully, Marvel vs. Capcom Fighting Collection: Arcade Classics came to reality to have every game of the Marvel vs. Capcom franchise in the 90s to the early 2000s. There's even a beat-em-up game that is outside the Capcom line of beat-em-up games called The Punisher and thank goodness Marvel vs. Capcom Fighting Collection: Arcade Classics has that. To my knowledge, it's likely that they had to put The Punisher in the collection so that we can play it as sort of a break from playing fighting games.

Marvel vs. Capcom 2 became a great game because of its huge roster of characters that included the ones we don't know much about, and stages that come in two variants. The game is free from jail, thanks to the collection of Marvel vs. Capcom games from the 90s to the early 2000s. And we're going to see it at EVO as this year's throwback game. I loved the goodness of the game that it became a charm of fighting in the city and the best themes, like the Clock Tower Stage. Yes, it has home console versions. If we get it on PS Plus Premium, it can make the fanbase unhappy.

Now, Marvel vs. Capcom 2 won't be the only throwback game we're seeing at EVO because there is another throwback game as part of the extended lineup, and that's Capcom vs. SNK 2. We're also seeing it at EVO because it is on Capcom Fighting Collection 2, coming out May 16. The collection led to sparking fan frenzy over the inclusion of Capcom vs. SNK 1 and 2, Power Stone 1 and 2, Plasma Sword: Nightmare of Bilstein, a sequel to Star Gladiator, Project Justice, a sequel to Rival Schools, Capcom Fighting Evolution and Street Fighter Alpha 3 Upper. These games deserved to be in the limelight, especially when they were released on the Dreamcast.

Over the years, we have experienced cases that were any different than the crazy stories we have came across. Soon, Capcom vs. SNK 2 follows the path of Marvel vs. Capcom 2 to be brought back into the limelight. EVO 2025 now has two legendary hitters that have a high caliber, a diverse roster of characters and dynamic 3D stages. All polished up on a silver platter and ready to go for characters to fight in the swamp and near the volcano.

Also, I received word from Keef that the EVO 2025 skit is under production. It's gonna be explosive because this year's lineup has a new extended lineup and has two of this year's throwback games that are high caliber. Since Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves is on the lineup while it is not out yet, there might be a good chance that we can hear the "he could flop" phrase. We heard it on BlazBlue Cross Tag Battle, Samurai Shodown, Granblue Fantasy Versus and Guilty Gear Strive so far. I am very excited for this.

There are so many fighting games from the 80s to the early 2000s waiting to be brought back into the limelight to be compiled into several collections and ported to modern platforms. Capcom knew how to compile their fighting games from the 80s to the early 2000s into several collections with modern features and port them into modern platforms, so they have the blueprints to do that since they have a compilation of their beat-em-up games. Quality and modern formula on a future collection, meaning if and when Capcom Fighting Collection 3 is announced, they can be able to make a third compilation of their older fighting games in the earlier years, including the games in the Street Fighter EX trilogy.

To sum it all up, Capcom is reviving the FGC from back in the day by having their Fighting Collection series to leverage their older fighting games from back in the day with netplay, training mode support, jukebox, gallery and much more modern features on every game and EVO 2025 is going to be even more of a blockbuster because of it. This is something Capcom is trying to do since the 8th generation era and that endeavor is achieved by their Fighting Collection series, especially the one for the Marvel vs. Capcom line of games.

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