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It has been about 2 months since the release of “Street Fighter: Duel” for the Southeast Asian region. Since then, the idle RPG game has gained a loyal fanbase, keen to know all the latest information about the game and keep up with the latest characters and meta.
In the midst of the excitement, we had a thrilling opportunity to interview the developers of “Street Fighter: Duel” as we talked about game design, inspiration, and future plans.
Staggered Servers
Fans of Street Fighter will eventually realize that the American, European, and SEA versions of the game are published by different companies, and as a result, the SEA version of the game is around 1 year behind its sister games. Seeing this, we asked the developers if they have any plans to accelerate the SEA version to catch up with the other regions’ banners and events.
“Yes, the release arrangements in the SEA region are indeed far behind those in the European and American regions, but rather than catching up with those regions in terms of operation schedule, we will have a unique set of plans for the SEA region market, All the characters, events, collaborations, etc. are all specially customized for the gaming habits and market needs of Southeast Asian players.”
A SEA of Challenges
As shown by the time gap across regional releases, the launch of Street Fighter: Duel for SEA was not an easy task. We wondered about the challenges faced by the developers in their efforts to finally bring this game over to the region.
“When SFD launched in the European and American regions, we received many prayers from fans in the SEA region, hoping that SFD could also be played in the SEA region. We have to say that we have been working hard to enable Southeast Asian players to play SFD as soon as possible during this period,” explained the developers.
“As just mentioned, releasing a game in a new region is not a simple matter of copying and pasting. We attach great importance to the SEA region, so we sacrificed some time to make sure everyone can meet a better SFD in order to let SEA players have a better gaming experience.”
Collabs Aplenty
Global fans of “Street Fighter: Duel” has been treated to a whole host of collabs with other Capcom IPs, with the recent Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles being the game’s first collaboration outside the Capcom catalogue. The developers expressed their gratitude for the company’s generosity, stating, “In terms of IP collaboration, we are very grateful to CAPCOM for all kinds of support in this regard.”
“There are the genes of IP collaboration in Capcom’s products at all times, so Street Fighter: Duel, as a product of CAPCOM’s IP camp, which also has an open attitude towards IP collaboration.”
“We attach great importance to interaction and communication with players. The collaboration between SFD and TMNT in European and American versions this time is also the product of soliciting player voices from multiple parties, and also with fully realizing the compatibility of the two IPs. As a result, this collaboration does win high recognitions from players.”
“We also hope that the SEA region can also experience the collaboration of TNMT in the near future. Of course, there will also be various IP collaborations. We will be happy to let players stay tuned about it.”
More Style = More Damage
Street Fighter: Duel features multiple variants of the same character as separate units with their own unique skill sets, such as Poison and Street Poison or Blanka and Fashion Blanka. When it comes to designing character variants, the developers placed their focus on appearances, skill aesthetics, and the potential strength of new characters.
“There are still some differences between SFD and the classic Street Fighter games. We hope that players can experience a different Street Fighter experience in SFD. Based on this consideration, we will continue to communicate with CAPCOM to expand their original characters and give them newer and gorgeous skill performances, as well as different character strengths based on the settings and background stories of each character.”
More Street Fighter Versions?
Keen-eyed fans might notice that most of the characters in Street Fighter: Duel take after their Street Fighter 4 appearances. While it is certainly the most iconic versions of the characters, we questioned the developers if we can expect to see more Street Fighter characters from other games in the franchise such as Street Fighter 5, 6, or even EX.
They responded, “When the Street Fighter: Duel project was first established, it aimed to enable players to experience the original Street Fighter experience on their mobile phones. Therefore, we focused on some extremely classic characters. As mentioned just now, some of our characters have also been derived into many different versions.
“Of course, we are also very honored to be loved by not only the old players of the series, but also many players who love the recent Street Fighter series. We will horizontally evaluate the characters of each version and select the characters that are suitable and loved by everyone. We believe that there will be some unexpected new characters in the near future, so stay tuned.”
From Fighter to AFK Game
It may come as a shock to long-time Street Fighter fans to find an official game where player input is theoretically optional. Characters in the game will fight and activate skills by themselves while all players have to do is sit back and watch.
With all the watching, some may have even started to scrutinize and compare their moves with their original incarnations, which the developers stated as a 2D recreation of their modelling, ensuring their moves are as accurate to the original as possible.
“We believe that players who have played Street Fighter and “Street Fighter: Duel” will be very clear about the differences between the two games. To put it simply, before implementing the Street Fighter character’s skills into Street Fighter: Duel, our team will first split the character’s skills, and at the same time we will position the character to determine how it will perform in SFD, so as to provide the corresponding skill set which is suitable for the characters.”
Evil Ryu
The next event in the SEA version of Street Fighter: Duel will introduce Evil Ryu as a new playable character. In anticipation, we asked the developers to tell us more about his kit and why players should pull for him.
“Evil Ryu is a very powerful character in the Street Fighter world, and of course, his appearance is also very cool. In our game, he also has a very special skill mechanism. For example, when his teammates release skills, Evil Ryu can automatically follow up without occupying opponents.
At the same time, his skills also have DOT damage that ignores damage immunity effects and can restrain some characters with damage immunity effects. It can be said that he is a very special and representative character in our game.”
We would love to thank the development team for taking the time to answer our questions about the SEA release of Street Fighter: Duel.
Street Fighter: Duel is now available on iOS and Android mobile devices.
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