Street Fighter 2, 2 (a.k.a IV)

Like most, when I first saw the teaser trailer for Street Fighter IV I was all like "that looks pretty tight! A cool, new, updated look for one of my old favorites!  Woo!".  Then they showed us gameplay footage like this.

I have been a Street Fighter fan since I first played Street Fighter 2 for the SNES in my friend's Zack's basement.  Street Fighter 2 was really fun, had a lot of cool moves characters, and fast paced.  The next game I played was Street Fighter Alpha 3, which was a great addition to the series.   Tons of new characters, the different "isms" offered a variety to gameplay, though still at it's core very similar.  Then Street Fighter 3 came out and the community sort of split in half; some loved the new gamplay mechinics (parrying) and some were pissed because Guile wasn't in it.  I love it.  They actually changed things up, changed the the style of the game, and had more new characters than old, making it more interesting than watching Dhalsim using Yoga flame for the millonth time.  

The terrible thing about 2d fighters now a days is there is very little room for innovation.  Between the Street Fighter, King of Fighters, and other series the 2d fighter was beaten to death long ago.  Sure, games like Guilty Gear brough some spice back and mixed it up, but ultimatley I feel as if there is no where for the genre to move to. There is only so much you can do with super moves, blocking, combos, and a 2d plane.  

So what we find here is that the newest game in the beloved series is a step backwards.  The developers went back to the memories of Street Fighter 2, using the same costumes, the same characters, and what looks like the same movesets as well.  How can people really look foward to this game?  What happened to innovation?  This horse has been beaten and shoryuken'd to death!  I know however, there are a large chunk of fans out there that want this.  They want to sit down and have characters they know, and QCF,QCF,P better be a Shin Hadouken, god damnit!  Capcom is clearly appealing to their fanbase, which I suppose is economicly wise.  I just wish they wouldn't.