Jump to content

Tatsunoko vs. Capcom: Ultimate All-Stars

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This is an old revision of this page, as edited by 202.155.92.10 (talk) at 07:18, 24 September 2009. The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

Tatsunoko vs. Capcom: Ultimate All-Stars
File:Tatsunoko vs. Capcom.jpg
Cover for the Japanese Wii version of Tatsunoko vs. Capcom. Ken the Eagle and Ryu are featured in the foreground, with the remainder of the cast in the background.
Developer(s)Eighting[4]
Publisher(s)Capcom
Designer(s)Ryota Niitsuma (producer)[5]
SeriesVs. series
Platform(s)Arcade, Wii
Release
December 2008
  • Arcade:[1]
    Wii:[2]
    As Cross Generation of Heroes:
    As Ultimate All-Stars:
Genre(s)Fighting
Mode(s)Single-player, multiplayer
Arcade systemUnnamed Wii-based arcade board[6]

Tatsunoko vs. Capcom: Ultimate All-Stars is a crossover fighting game developed by Eighting and published by Capcom for the Wii gaming console. The game was originally released exclusively in Japan as Tatsunoko vs. Capcom: Cross Generation of Heroes (タツノコ VS. CAPCOM CROSS GENERATION OF HEROES) for video arcades and the Wii in December 2008. Licensing issues involving Tatsunoko characters initially forced the game to remain a Japanese exclusive. However, Capcom worked to deal with these issues leading the Wii game to be localized outside of Japan with additional content.

Tatsunoko vs. Capcom is Capcom's seventh Versus series fighter game and features characters from the Japanese animation studio Tatsunoko Production and video game company Capcom.[7] Like traditional fighting games, gameplay consists of attempting to knockout the opponent on a 2D plane. This plane creates a 2.5D environment in conjunction with character models and backgrounds rendered in 3D—a first for the Vs. series. Tatsunoko vs. Capcom's simplified three-button attack system is a departure from Street Fighter and some previous Versus fighting titles since the game was developed with the Wii in mind.

Gameplay

Tatsunoko vs. Capcom is Capcom's seventh installment in its Vs. series, which includes the Marvel vs. Capcom and Capcom vs. SNK games. It is the first Vs. series game to feature 3D graphics on a 2D plane. This creates a 2.5D environment consisting of character models and backgrounds rendered in 3D, while gameplay remains on a 2D plane used in traditional fighting games.[8] Tatsunoko vs. Capcom does not have the more complex attack systems like in the Street Fighter series and some previous Versus fighting titles. The game uses a simplified three-button attack system with the option for a more simplified control scheme since it was developed with the PS3 in mind. The three attack buttons are listed as "Weak", "Medium" and "Strong". Players face each other with a team of two in a one-on-one fight to deplete their opponent's health bar. To regenerate health, each player may switch out their characters at any time.[5] A team can perform two special moves at the same time (which however uses up three special bars). The match is over once one of the teams have no remaining fighters. The game's four small characters, Tatsunoko's Sailor Moon SuperS and Capcom's Street Fighter Alpha 3, fight on their own without a partner resulting in the inability to do universal techniques that require a partner.[5]

Universal mechanics are similar to the previous Marvel vs. Capcom games. Characters can call their partner to do a predefined "Variable Assist" attack. Characters can tag with another character, performing an attack upon entry called a "Variable Attack". Performing a "Variable Counterattack" also lets the player tag out with another character. "Snapback" is an attack that forces the opponent to switch characters should it land. "Hyper Variable Combination" lets characters of one team perform their Hyper moves, attacks that require a stock of level, at the same time, whereas "'Delayed Hyper Cancellation" cancels a current Hyper move of the character with another Hyper move of the character's partner. Each character has a launcher to send the opponent to the air, allowing the character to do an "Aerial Rave".

There are also new universal techniques found in the game. "Variable Aerial Rave" lets the character switch to his or her partner while in mid-air. "Mega Crash" is a defensive maneuver that frees the character from the opponent while sacrificing a part of his or her life and two stocks of levels. "Assault" is an offensive variation of Mega Crash. "Baroque Cancel" is a mode where the character glows in a rainbow of colors while sacrificing the red portion of the character's life - activating the mode cancels the current attack animation, allowing the player to extend combos and deal more damage relative to the amount of red life that is sacrificed.[5] Baroque ends when the character stops or performs a Hyper move.

Tatsunoko vs. Capcom has an Arcade mode, which involves the player battling against computer controlled opponents in multiple stages until he or she reaches the boss character, Yami. Time attack and Survival mode requires the player to defeat every character in the game. Survival limits health regeneration while Time attack is solely about completing it in the shortest time possible. There are also modes exclusively for multiple players. The Vs. Mode is the where two players can compete simultaneously. Original games are character-specific minigames supporting up to four players.

Characters

4 on 4 Characters

Sailor Moon

Capcom side

From Tatsunoko properties

Character Origin Voice Actor
Ken the Eagle Science Ninja Team Gatchaman Katsuji Mori
Casshan(refactored from 1) Neo-Human Casshern Daisuke Ono
Tekkaman Tekkaman: The Space Knight Katsuji Mori
Yatterman-1(refactored from 2) Yatterman Eri Kitamura
Polimar Hurricane Polymar Kunihiko Yasui
Gold Lightan(refactored from 3) Golden Warrior Gold Lightan Issei Futamata
Doronjo(refactored from 4) Yatterman Noriko Ohara
Karas Karas Endo Daichi
Hakushon Daimaō(refactored from 5)(refactored from 6) The Genie Family Tōru Ōhira
Jun the Swan Science Ninja Team Gatchaman Kazuko Sugiyama
Ippatsuman(refactored from 5) Gyakuten! Ippatsuman Masayuki Katō
Tekkaman Blade(refactored from 5)(refactored from 7) Tekkaman Blade Toshiyuki Morikawa
Notes:

Template:Ent Casshan is accompanied by Friender, who assists in some of his special attacks and hyper combos. Template:Ent Yatterman-1 is accompanied by Yatterwan (or Yatterpelican if he is in his alternate color), who does his hyper combos. Template:Ent Single Entry (means cannot be teamed up with another character) and Sub-Boss. Template:Ent Doronjo is accompanied by Boyacky (voice: Jōji Yanami) and Tonzura (voice: Kazuya Tatekabe), who assist in all of her special attacks and hyper combos. Template:Ent Wii-exclusive character. Template:Ent Playable only in Cross Generation of Heroes.[9] Template:Ent Playable only in Ultimate All-Stars.[10]

From Capcom properties

Character Origin Voice Actor
Ryu Street Fighter Hiroki Takahashi
Chun-Li Street Fighter II Fumiko Orikasa
Batsu Ichimonji Rival Schools: United By Fate Nobuyuki Hiyama
Alex Street Fighter III Hiroki Yasumoto
Morrigan Aensland(refactored from a) Darkstalkers Yayoi Jinguji
Kaijin no Soki Onimusha: Dawn of Dreams Toshiyuki Kusuda
MegaMan Volnutt Mega Man Legends Mayumi Tanaka
PTX-40A(refactored from b) Lost Planet: Extreme Condition —
Roll Mega Man Hiromi Igarashi
Saki Omokane(refactored from d) Quiz Nanairo Dreams Yōko Honna
Viewtiful Joe(refactored from c)(refactored from d) Viewtiful Joe Shinji Kawada
Frank West(refactored from d)(refactored from e)(refactored from f) Dead Rising T. J. Rotolo
Yami(refactored from g) Ōkami —
Notes:

Template:Ent Morrigan is assisted by Lilith during her Darkness Illusion hyper combo. Template:Ent Single Entry (means cannot be teamed up with another character) and Sub-Boss. Template:Ent Viewtiful Joe is assisted by Sexy Silvia during his Six Cannon hyper combo. Template:Ent Wii-exclusive character. Template:Ent Playable only in Ultimate All-Stars.[3] Template:Ent Frank West is assisted by Zombies from Dead Rising. Template:Ent Final Boss character.

Development

Capcom announced on May 22, 2008 its seventh fighting game in its Vs. series titled Tatsunoko vs. Capcom: Cross Generation of Heroes, for Japanese arcades.[11] The publisher then started to reveal the game's cast until its release.[12][13] The cast were all handpicked by the development team as their desirable line-up for a fighting game. Specifically, the Tatsunoko cast consisted of characters they were fond of from their youth.[14] By September, the game was 70% complete and announced for the Wii in Japan.[15] The game's opening song, "Across the border", is sung by Asami Abe, with an English version being used for Ultimate All Stars.[16]

The development team sought to include the characters of Phoenix Wright and Franziska von Karma from the Ace Attorney series; while the latter would have been easy due to her use of a whip, they had struggled to find appropriate fighting moves for Phoenix beyond his finger-pointing gesture. Though they had come up with an attack that used his catch-phrase "Igiari!" ("Objection!" in English), with the letters themselves used to attack the opponent, they found that localization would have changed the four-character phrase (in kanji) to a ten-letter word and would have unbalanced the game.[17]

Localization

Primarily due to licensing issues involving Tatsunoko’s properties, the game initially remained exclusive for the Japanese market. Most of Tatsunoko’s cast are licensed to different companies in North America, such as Time Warner.[14] Other problems involve its developers, Eighting, having already moved on to a new project and the obscurity of Tatsunoko's lineup to the non-Japanese market. This made some critics doubtful that the game would see an international release.[6] Adam Sessler from X-Play stated "clearing the American rights to show them all in one game would be a logistical nightmare."[18] Seth Killian, Capcom's Community Manager said in an December 2008 interview the company was working to deal with these issues.[19] Capcom's Christian Svensson, vice president, business development and strategic planning reassured in March 2009, "Do not rule it out" and the company was currently attempting to work around licensing and resource issues.[4]

For Capcom's Electronic Entertainment Expo 2009 lineup, the publisher listed two "mystery games" on May 6, 2009 to be shown at the event.[20] "Capcom Mystery Game #1" was revealed in Nintendo Power to be the localization of Tatsunoko vs. Capcom dubbed with the subtitle "Ultimate All-Stars" for North America and Europe, which was playable at the company's booth.[6][21] A Capcom press release on June 2, 2009 stated that this version for North America will have more mini-games, an "enhanced" story mode, and Wi-Fi compatible for online play. In addition, the roster will be expanded by five characters but will lose one Tatsunoko character (Hakushon Daimaō) in its localization.[22] However, Capcom later revised this press release since it was incorrect and stated they are "looking into adding new features to the game, including possible additions of several new characters from both Capcom and Tatsunoko and is exploring the option of online gameplay."[23][24]

According to video game producer Ryota Niitsuma, the character licensing acquirement process was difficult since it practically involved going through each character one at a time. Also, this process was done on a region-specific basis — what was cleared for North America also had to be checked for its European release.[9] Video game director Hidetoshi Ishizawa admitted that, just as Cross Generation of Heroes was not initially planned to be released internationally, neither was Ultimate All-Stars planned to be released in Japan. Fan appeals and the R&D team's own hopes eventually resulted the announcement that the updated game would come to Japanese shores as well.[25]

Reception

Famitsu magazine scored Tatsunoko vs. Capcom: Cross Generation of Heroes a 32 out of 40 calling gameplay a bit flat since skilled players are conduced to repeat Baroque combos. The reviewers noted variety of characters and its fighting system as strong aspects.[7] As of June 2009, the Wii game sold 41,672 units in Japan.[26]

Ultimate All-Stars' debut at E3 2009 garnered it multiple genre-specific awards. At the event, it won the Game Critics Award for "Best Fighting Game".[27]

References

  1. ^ "Summary: Tatsunoko vs. Capcom". GameSpot. CBS Interactive. Retrieved 2009-05-25.
  2. ^ "Release Summary: Tatsunoko vs. Capcom". GameSpot. CBS Interactive. Retrieved 2009-05-25.
  3. ^ a b c d Gonzalez, Joveth (2009-09-23). "TGS 2009: Tatsunoko VS. Capcom: Ultimate All-Stars, It's Frank West, Baby!". Capcom-Unity. Retrieved 2009-09-23.
  4. ^ a b Orry, Tom (2008-11-03). "'Do not rule out' Tatsunoko vs. Capcom western release". VideoGamer.com. Pro-G. Retrieved 2009-05-25.
  5. ^ a b c d "When Heroes Collide". Nintendo Power. United States: Future US: pp. 47, 49–51. 2009. ISSN 1041-9551. {{cite journal}}: |pages= has extra text (help); Unknown parameter |month= ignored (help)
  6. ^ a b c Killian, Seth (2009-05-27). "Tatsunoko vs. Capcom Interview With Seth Killian" (Video) (Interview). Interviewed by Ricardo Torres. Retrieved 2009-05-29. {{cite interview}}: Unknown parameter |program= ignored (help)
  7. ^ a b Gifford, Kevin (2008-12-03). "Japan Review Check: Tatsunoko vs. Capcom". 1UP.com. UGO Networks. Retrieved 2009-05-25.
  8. ^ Niizumi, Hirohiko (2008-07-10). "Tatsunoko vs. Capcom Beta Test Hands-On". GameSpot. CBS Interactive. Retrieved 2009-06-04.
  9. ^ a b Niitsuma, Ryota (2009). "Tatsunoko vs. Capcom Producer Answers Questions About Online Play, Sequel Possibilities" (Transcript) (Interview). Interviewed by Spencer. Retrieved 2009-08-01. {{cite interview}}: Unknown parameter |city= ignored (|location= suggested) (help); Unknown parameter |month= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |program= ignored (help)
  10. ^ "Tatsunoko vs. Capcom: Ultimate All-Stars Update- New character reveal". Gamespot. Retrieved 2009-09-09.
  11. ^ Tanaka, John (2008-05-22). "Street Fighter Versus Anime". IGN. Brisbane, California: Fox Interactive Media. Retrieved 2009-05-29.
  12. ^ Tanaka, John (2008-07-25). "New Tatsunoko VS Capcom Characters". IGN. Brisbane, California: Fox Interactive Media. Retrieved 2009-05-29.
  13. ^ Tanaka, John (2008-12-01). "New Minigames Revealed for Tatsunoko VS Capcom". IGN. Brisbane, California: Fox Interactive Media. Retrieved 2009-05-29.
  14. ^ a b Killian, Seth (2009-06-11). "E3 09: Tatsunoko vs Capcom - Interview" (Audio) (Interview). Interviewed by Games Radar. Retrieved 2009-06-16. {{cite interview}}: Unknown parameter |program= ignored (help)
  15. ^ IGN Staff (2008-09-17). "Tatsunoko VS Capcom Set for Wii". IGN. Brisbane, California: Fox Interactive Media. Retrieved 2009-05-29.
  16. ^ "第七話：みんなの知りたいこと" (in Japanese). Capcom Japan. 2008-11-28. Retrieved 2009-05-29.
  17. ^ "Fighting Talk with Ryota Niitsuma, Tatsunoko vs. Capcom's Producer". NGamer. October 2009. p. 35. {{cite news}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |publisher= (help)
  18. ^ Host: Adam Sessler (2009-01-23). "Dawn of the Afro". X-Play. Episode 20090123. G4 (TV channel). {{cite episode}}: Unknown parameter |city= ignored (|location= suggested) (help); Unknown parameter |serieslink= ignored (|series-link= suggested) (help)
  19. ^ Killian, Seth (2008-12-19). "Capcom's Seth Killian" (Transcript) (Interview). Interviewed by Ben PerLee. Retrieved 2009-05-21. {{cite interview}}: Unknown parameter |city= ignored (|location= suggested) (help); Unknown parameter |program= ignored (help)
  20. ^ Chris Kramer (2008-05-06). "Capcom (and you!) At E3 2009". Capcom Unity. Retrieved 2009-05-31.
  21. ^ Kramer, Chris (2008-05-18). "Capcom E3 Mystery Game #1 revealed in July Nintendo Power". Capcom Unity. Retrieved 2009-05-18.
  22. ^ "E3 09: Five new characters coming to the US Tatsunoko" (Press release). Capcom. 2009-06-02. Retrieved 2009-06-04.
  23. ^ Bozon, Mark (2009-06-03). "E3 2009: Tatsunoku vs. Capcom Hands-on". IGN. Brisbane, California: Fox Interactive Media. Retrieved 2009-06-04.
  24. ^ Sinclair, Brendan (2009-06-03). "Tatsunoko vs. Capcom might go online, add new fighters". GameSpot. CBS Interactive. Retrieved 2009-06-04.
  25. ^ Killian, Seth (2009-09-17). "Introducing Tatsunoko Vs Capcom Game Director Ishizawa-san". Capcom Unity. Retrieved 2009-09-17.
  26. ^ "Nintendo Wii Japanese Ranking". Japan Game Charts. 2009-06-24. Retrieved 2009-07-01.
  27. ^ "Game Critics Awards - 2009 Winners". Game Critics Awards. Retrieved 2009-06-23.
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/enwiki/w/index.php?title=Tatsunoko_vs._Capcom:_Ultimate_All-Stars&oldid=315867565"