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The all new features in the second season of Street Fighter 6
A year after its release, Street Fighter 6 is now getting a big update. These new features await you.
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Fighting games have always thrived on regular updates. Even back in the days of Street Fighter II, new versions were regularly released in the arcades to add new mechanics and characters or address balancing issues.
Fortunately these days, you no longer have to wait for the local arcade to get the next edition of your favorite fighter, or leave the full price for a small improvement at the software retailer. Thanks to patches and DLC (downloadable content), you can get new content faster and for less money.
Now Street Fighter 6 has had a year to simmer it is getting its first major update. Indirectly, Capcom is also heralding the start of the second season of the most current version of the game. We have summarised which new features are included in this big patch update and how the title has changed since its release.
49 min
The Art of Street Fighting
The world's top Street Fighter V players prepare for the fight of their lives at Red Bull Kumite.
01
All DLC characters from the first season
This big update in the second season of Street Fighter 6 comes bundled with the release of the last DLC fighter from the first season. The following fighters have joined the base version's fighting boys and girls over the past 12 months:
Rashid
Rashid - The turbulent wind
© Capcom
After making his debut in Street Fighter V, Rashid now returns, bringing with him a turbulent play style. In particular, his Super Art 2 and Great Desert Storm have proven to be an important tool within his kit early on.
Red Bull player Leevy "Oil King" Lin has already achieved numerous successes with Rashid in Street Fighter V. Now he has his old main character back and was able to present him at the Red Bull Kumite in New York for example.
A.K.I
Poison Lady Aki joined in the fall
© Capcom
The only completely new lady in the DLC roster is A.K.I. She is the student of F.A.N.G, who like Rashid, celebrated his debut in Street Fighter V. Her gimmick is Toxin. Many of her attacks poison her opponents, causing them to constantly lose health points. But above all, she can use it to boost some of her other attacks and land devastating combos.
A.K.I is currently considered a rather weaker character. She has a lot of good tools, but lacks that certain something for a breakthrough. The buffs in this update may help her reach the top.
Ed
Ed – the shadoloo boy
© Capcom
Ed is also a character from the roster of Street Fighter V. However, he was not available in the base game, only as a DLC. In Street Fighter 6, Capcom leaned even more heavily on Ed's boxer design, removing all of his kick animations and replacing them with flicker moves.
However, due to his Shadoloo past, he still retains some of his Psycho Energy attacks. So he does not only let his fists do the talking but also throws fireballs or pulls his opponents into boxing range with energy whips.
Akuma
Pretty beefy: Akuma goes massive in SF6
© Capcom
Akuma fills the last slot of the first season. The demon-like Shotokan fighter is now on an icon level with Ryu, Ken, Guile and Chun-Li. After his introduction in Super Street Fighter II Turbo, he has never missed an opportunity to compete with the rest of the fighters in the SF universe.
In Street Fighter 6, Akuma looks more animalistic than ever before, with an even wilder mane and truly massive muscles, he towers menacingly over many of the other characters.
02
Changes to the Drive system
The drive system is of course at the heart of Street Fighter 6 and has been one of the biggest features advertised for the title from the outset. While some players were hoping that entire mechanics such as Drive Impact would be removed completely, it was clear that Capcom would not take such drastic steps if Street Fighter 6's gameplay was built around these features.
However, that doesn't mean that they didn't look closely at how the individual Drive mechanics would affect the game and see if there were any improvements that could be made.
03
More recovery for Drive-Parry
With a Perfect Parry, time stands still
© Capcom
Since the beginning of Street Fighter 6, there have been two camps within the tournament scene, each of which considers one of the Drive mechanics to be too strong: Either Drive-Rush or Drive-Parry. Drive-Parry in particular has clearly dominated high-level gameplay. Primarily because of its ability to turn a match around with one exchange. All while the risk of being penalised is relatively low. In this update, four more frames of recovery are added to Drive-Parry. This means it is now easier to punish a missed Parry attempt with a throw.
Adel "Bigbird" Anouche is particularly happy about this change. One of his characters, Marisa, can make opponents bleed from their botched parries with her Command Throw.
04
Drive reversal as a wake-up option
Some characters currently suffer from not having a good tool to defend themselves against throw loops. Often because they don't have an invulnerable move outside of their Super Arts. Originally, Drive-Reversal, Street Fighter 6's alpha counter, could only be used when blocking an attack. With the new update, it is now possible to use the move even after a knockdown. This makes it possible to cancel slow attacks and throws for the cost of a drive segment.
05
Choose your favorite music
One aspect of Street Fighter 6 that has been criticised by players is the soundtrack. While some songs were well received by the community, many miss the iconic tunes from past titles. Especially because characters have so often received new renditions of their themes. Many of these can be unlocked within Street Fighter 6 and then listened to in the Battle Hub, for example.
Choose your favorite music for your fighter
© Capcom
With the latest update, however, you can use your own music collection to assign it to individual (or all) characters as a soundtrack. So if you prefer Cammy's theme from Super Street Fighter II Turbo, you can now also listen to it in Street Fighter 6.
06
Balancing adjustments
What most players have been looking forward to are of course the adjustments to the gameplay and characters that are coming with this major update. After a year, Street Fighter 6's meta was starting to get a little monotonous. Of course, it remains to be seen how the changes will affect the tournament scene in the long term, but every fighter in the game has received buffs. Of course, some characters have been tweaked and others have received more improvements than the rest of the roster, but ultimately every fighter should have new toys to experiment with.
You can find the complete overview of all changes here.
Bigbird has a lot of fun with the buff of Rashid's Tempest Moon. The slide can now be canceled in Super Arts.
We are very curious to see how these adjustments will affect the game and whether we will have to wait another year before we can expect the next balancing changes.
Until then, we hope you enjoy the brand new season of Street Fighter 6!
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