Street Fighter IV has had a long run this gen from being upgraded from Street Fighter IV to Super Street Fighter IV Arcade Edition ver.2012. However it does not stop there with Yoshinori Ono currently working on Ultra Street Fighter IV, which includes five new characters and six new stages. What can we expect for the next generation consoles? In an interview with 4Gamer Ono gets down to the nitty gritty. Yoshinori Ono clearly states he does not want the series to stop at Street Fighter IV.
“I don’t want to stop Street Fighter’s main series at Street Fighter IV. Realistically though, developing a title for next-gen consoles will require a huge number of staff members and a lot of money. This issue of money also applies to the gamer, as it’ll be needed to invest in a new console, game, and arcade stick.”
When asked if free-to-play might be an option, Ono confirmed that it was something he was looking into but wasn’t entirely convinced by yet.
“If you look at fighting games as a competitive sport, some would say the more players there are the better. Going with a free-to-play model would lower the initial cost, which is one of the main positives about it. On the other hand, whether we could guarantee that we’d recoup development costs is something I don’t currently have an answer for, so I’d like to see how well Harada (Tekken producer) and Hayashi (Dead Or Alive producer) handle it first and think about it more after that.”
Three large fighting game franchises are getting the free-to-play treatment this year. The first is Tekken Revolution, which is available now on PS3 and features eight characters with an option to buy more. The upcoming Dead or Alive 5 Ultimate will also get a free-to-play version on PS3 called Dead or Alive 5 Ultimate: Core Fighters, while a free-to-play Killer Instinct is coming to Xbox One
