So I picked it up today on PSN fr 10 bucks and I'm generally happy with it, BUT there are some issue with it.
The new balanced mode is definately a bit more even. and the new graphical effects are nice but I find them a little distracting. Each bomb crystal color now exhibits a elemental effect not noticable in original versions. Gassy Green, Electric Yellow, Firey Red, Watery blue... nice but id draws the eye more than it should beyond that the graphics are a mixed bag. All the original stuff is there. the stages the characters the costume colors and they cranked up the backgrounds and character portraits to nice hi res images...
BUT.
The actually character sprites are horrible scaled up smere-fests of blurry pixels! Why the hell would you do this? Everything else is sharp but these look like they grabbed low quality gifs form the internet and enlarged them 30 times to be visible on my 42 inch HDTV. They went to al the trouble of rescaning art and fixing the stage art but left the characters in a horrible state and I find that unacceptable.
Something I think a few other people might take issue with is that the screen does not seem to fill with the graphics. on my 42inch I notice about an inch of black around the frame of the game, if it's an "HD remix" shouldnt it fill my 1080p screen with goodness? But I guess concidering the sprite issue I suppose they were better off, huh?
Control wise it's what you'd expect the Dpad is best suited for a game like this. It moves as it would in previous versions.
Online it plays well also. I jumped online and found it to have several ways to play. a quick match will link you up to the next availible challanger while other modes are things like ranked battles according to score board. The online quick match connected with a person much better than me at anticipating my use of strategy , thankfully I have no strategy and beat him 2 of 3 falls. I did notice a half second delay in movment sometimes as if it was trying to keep theplaying field level but never so much that it ruins the online game or makes things unfair. One things missing is voice chat, Not surprising but I would think it might add to the game.... actually no, now that I think about it, between racist insults and people making noises to screw up your game I can see why they'd leave it out.
Lastly the sound. It's all there every yell, punch explosion and hadouken, although there's a slightly remastered soundtrack that sometimes sounds like it hit a sour note. but then again my ears are a little sensitive so maying I'm just imagining it.
Anyway it's a capable port with a few minor inconsistancy issues... but seriously the sprite issue is the worst part of it. if you're looking to play the game and you can get past that it's a fun time killer. Thankfully there's a demo on the Playstation Store for a test drive, just as big as the full game but limited to single player, local multiplayer (two controllers one system), the re-balanced mode and easy difficulty.
it'd have been nice if capcom had given a wifi mode to play wirelessly agianst a PSP with the Puzzle World UMD but that's probably asking too much I guess.
4.25 / 5
The new balanced mode is definately a bit more even. and the new graphical effects are nice but I find them a little distracting. Each bomb crystal color now exhibits a elemental effect not noticable in original versions. Gassy Green, Electric Yellow, Firey Red, Watery blue... nice but id draws the eye more than it should beyond that the graphics are a mixed bag. All the original stuff is there. the stages the characters the costume colors and they cranked up the backgrounds and character portraits to nice hi res images...
BUT.
The actually character sprites are horrible scaled up smere-fests of blurry pixels! Why the hell would you do this? Everything else is sharp but these look like they grabbed low quality gifs form the internet and enlarged them 30 times to be visible on my 42 inch HDTV. They went to al the trouble of rescaning art and fixing the stage art but left the characters in a horrible state and I find that unacceptable.
Something I think a few other people might take issue with is that the screen does not seem to fill with the graphics. on my 42inch I notice about an inch of black around the frame of the game, if it's an "HD remix" shouldnt it fill my 1080p screen with goodness? But I guess concidering the sprite issue I suppose they were better off, huh?
Control wise it's what you'd expect the Dpad is best suited for a game like this. It moves as it would in previous versions.
Online it plays well also. I jumped online and found it to have several ways to play. a quick match will link you up to the next availible challanger while other modes are things like ranked battles according to score board. The online quick match connected with a person much better than me at anticipating my use of strategy , thankfully I have no strategy and beat him 2 of 3 falls. I did notice a half second delay in movment sometimes as if it was trying to keep theplaying field level but never so much that it ruins the online game or makes things unfair. One things missing is voice chat, Not surprising but I would think it might add to the game.... actually no, now that I think about it, between racist insults and people making noises to screw up your game I can see why they'd leave it out.
Lastly the sound. It's all there every yell, punch explosion and hadouken, although there's a slightly remastered soundtrack that sometimes sounds like it hit a sour note. but then again my ears are a little sensitive so maying I'm just imagining it.
Anyway it's a capable port with a few minor inconsistancy issues... but seriously the sprite issue is the worst part of it. if you're looking to play the game and you can get past that it's a fun time killer. Thankfully there's a demo on the Playstation Store for a test drive, just as big as the full game but limited to single player, local multiplayer (two controllers one system), the re-balanced mode and easy difficulty.
it'd have been nice if capcom had given a wifi mode to play wirelessly agianst a PSP with the Puzzle World UMD but that's probably asking too much I guess.
4.25 / 5