Game Reviews

Street Fighter X Tekken Mobile

Star onStar onStar onStar onStar half
Get
Street Fighter X Tekken Mobile

The Street Fighter series has a complex relationship with controllers. Some players swear by an expensive arcade stick to get that authentic experience, while others can adapt to D-pads and analogue sticks alike, doling out hadoukens like they're going out of style.

What's obvious is that there's a need for something physical to really get to grips with the ins and outs of the complex fighting system. And while previous mobile Street Fighter games have been well-received, they always lacked the fluency of input and action of their console kin.

Street Fighter X Tekken Mobile feels like it understands that. More importantly, it really feels like it's been built from the ground up for touchscreen devices. This isn't a port so much as a reinvention, and a statement from Capcom that the iOS fighting genre is a fertile ground for experimentation.

Tekken the bull by the horns

While the game doesn't have the graphical bombast of its console inspiration, it's still a solid looking brawler, with smooth character models and a frame-rate that rarely shudders, even when giants like Hugo are stomping around the screen.

The backdrops have lost some of their sparkle, but there are still people milling around, just as you'd expect from a Street Fighter game.

What's taken even more of a pounding is the character roster. Where the console original boasted more fighters than you could ever master, here we have just ten - five from each of the titular stables.

Street Fighter fanciers can choose from Ryu, Chun-Li, Dhalsim, Guile, and Hugo, while Tekken fans can pick King, Kazuya, Nina Williams, Hwoarang, or Paul Phoenix. It's a balanced list for sure, but you can't help but pine for the omissions rather than fawn over the inclusions, and Hugo in particular seems like a strange choice.

Hugo over there

Niggles with pugilist choices aside, Capcom has really gone to town on making the game feel like a mash-up of the two series. Battles are fast and tactical, and choosing the right partnership will mean the difference between glorious victory and humiliating defeat.

The online mode is buttery smooth, with hardly a judder when you've got a strong connection. There's the same emphasis on collecting battle points that you'll find in Capcom's console offerings, and winning bouts levels you up, unlocking perks and new gems that can change fights in your favour.

You have four buttons - 'punch', 'kick', 'special', and 'cross' - with 'punch' and 'kick' delivering combinations of standard blows and your 'special' button unleashing much more powerful moves.

Tapping a direction when you tap 'special' produces different attacks, and inputting a more complex stick-wiggle makes those attacks even more devastating.

The 'cross' button lets you swap between characters. Your tag partner doesn't have a health bar - they can just come on for a set amount of time to soak up damage while you recuperate some health, or be tagged in to chain together strings of attacks that would be impossible otherwise.

The time is right for fighting in the streets

Street Fighter X Tekken Mobile is the finest of Capcom's brawler ports to date. There are a few niggles, and veteran players might find the switch to a simpler control scheme less than palatable - although you can set the game up to play with the classic half-circle moves if you'd prefer.

It might not have the cinematic poise of its console brothers and sisters, but Street Fighter X Tekken Mobile plays like an iOS game, and that's something to get very excited about indeed.

Street Fighter X Tekken Mobile

A brilliant touchscreen-focused brawler, Street Fighter X Tekken Mobile is a worthy addition to the fighting genre
Score
Harry Slater
Harry Slater
Harry used to be really good at Snake on the Nokia 5110. Apparently though, digital snake wrangling isn't a proper job, so now he writes words about games instead.