Virtua Fighter 5

"Try again in a few years."

Source // PlayStation

Some 500 games ago, I played Virtua Fighter (or tried to - I played a remake in the end), the origin of fighting in the third dimension. The characters were blocky and laughable, but the series continued in the arcades for a long time to come, culminating in Virtua Fighter 5, a game that doesn't do the flashy of Tekken or the over-the-top of Street Fighter. Instead, it offers solid, hard-hitting fighting where every move matters.

Source // PlayStation

Fun Times

Or so I'm told. I played Virtua Fighter 5 for the first time ever just a few weeks ago, in one of the most unusual places you could imagine. I was roaming around the streets of Kamurocho, passing time, when I walked into a Club Sega and hopped onto an arcade machine for Virtua Fighter 5 Final Showdown. Yagami had been beating up the local troublemakers and needed a distraction, and this was the nearest one. I was playing Judgment, if you hadn't worked that out yet, a sort of spin-off of Yakuza that I bought because I enjoyed Yakuza 0 so much, which I only played because I enjoyed Yakuza 2 so much, which I only played for like an hour because of this 1001 list.

Anyway, I'm playing a game on the PlayStation 4 which has just loaded up an emulation/port of what I assume to be the PlayStation 3 port of Final Showdown in a virtual arcade. I'm virtually playing Virtua Fighter 5, virtually. It's like poetry.

Anyway, anyway. I don't play it for long - I wanted to play more of Judgment and not more of its distractions - but I played it enough to know that it was closer to Tekken than it was to Street Fighter, but it was definitely its own thing. More grounded, not as flashy. Plain. Bland? Unnoteworthy? That can't be a good start for a must-play video game.

Source // PlayStation

I definitely couldn't use Judgment as the best way to play Virtua Fighter 5, though. Arcades aren't possible either, but none of this matters when I have a copy of the PlayStation 3 port.

There are a number of modes on the menu, but I'm drawn towards the one called 'Quest'. Surely that is more of a story than the normal 'Arcade' mode, right? We'll get to see who all these people are, we'll follow along with their plights. It's a quest, it's going to be epic.

Source // PlayStation

Frustrations

It's epic alright. Epic in that it is endless. This isn't a story mode. You have a home where you can change your settings or add things to your character's costume, but the bulk of the mode has you step into a variety of arcades (read: menus) to pick from a bunch of different opponents and play them on an arcade machine.

Wait? Are we choosing to play as a martial artist who, instead of fighting directly, walks into an arcade, fires up Virtua Fighter 5, picks themselves and fights others, one after the one, endlessly until you decide to quit? That's just... what's the point in that?

Source // PlayStation

I chose to play as Sarah Bryant, or 'Not Nina Williams' - but then I'm sure Sarah came before Nina, so I shouldn't say that. Blond and leggy favours the kicks. Your controls are simple. Some kick buttons, some punch buttons, a grab button, and all the shoulder buttons are combinations of the others so that you don't have to squash your thumb over the face buttons. Standard controller affair, should be using a fighting stick, shouldn't I?

Fights are supposed to be cagey affairs, with well-timed strikes and accurate judges of attack range, because Virtua Fighter 5 is all about your jabs and kicks actually connecting. When they do, they hit hard, they feel good, but when they don't, you leave yourself open, exposed to your opponent, about to be thrashed.

Now, having said that, I was doing surprisingly well mostly button-mashing. The grab button seems to do absolutely nothing, which was terribly annoying because it was on the square button, which would be a punch button in most other games, fighters or not, so I kept hitting square and watching Sarah's hands just wobble in front of her (wasn't the only thing that wobbled, I'll say that).

Each character obviously has their strengths and styles, and Sarah would, when you get the right inputs, launch into devastating knee thrusts and lovely sweeping roundhouses. Sometimes - I don't know how - she'd switch into a stance where a leg was poised, ready to strike. It often caught me off guard, but when I noticed it, suddenly I was striking from that new stance, with new combos and possibilities open to me.

Source // PlayStation

But let's face it, I was mostly button-mashing, hoping something cool would happen. As it didn't, and I was getting bored with winning (I didn't even adjust the difficulty; what was going on?), I quit out of the Quest mode and hit up the Arcade mode as... Akira Yuki. Leading man. Never heard of him.

That's my main problem with Virtua Fighter 5. Who the hell are these people? There are series mainstays and newcomers, sure, but I recognise none of them. Not even vaguely. They're all so dull. Even with silly names, like Jeffry McWild, they've made no impression on me throughout their decades-long run through video game history.

Granted, I'm not an arcade fighter, this world and its games don't seep into my consciousness like other genres do, but still. They're not doing it for me.

Source // PlayStation

The graphics aren't terrible, though. Stages take place all over the world and see you fight under neon lights, on rain-soaked streets, or in ankle-deep snow. It looks arcadey, in that none of this looks really realistic, but you don't want realism in fighting games, do you? That leads to Fight Night Round 3. Nobody wants to go there again.

Oh right, I started this section by going into an arcade game with Akira. Do you know why I fell off topic? Because there's no story here, either. Not even a shit one to string the fights together. I just turn up, say something in Japanese, fight, hopefully win, say something else in Japanese, wait for the next stage to load.

It's so dull. There's nothing to this game. It was harder, so I lost in the 3rd or 4th fight, but I didn't care. I wasn't invested. I have no reason to put Akira on top of the fighting world, or whatever his goal is. Does he even have one? Do we, as players, even have a goal in Virtua Fighter 5 other than 'fight stuff, I guess?'

Final Word

That's my biggest gripe with Virtua Fighter 5. It is a competent fighting game, different from what I'm used to (and being used to fighting games is a stretch, yes), but solid nonetheless. But there is no reason for me to stick with it. Nothing compelling me to continue. Nobody can sway me.

Do I want to see more forgettable characters? Do I want to master movesets and combos? Do I want to unlock pointless visual customisation options for my chosen fighter? No, no, no I don't.

I played Virtua Fighter 5. I succeed at it. I failed at it. I had some brief moments of fun. If I was bored of Tekken or Street Fighter, I'd have a look at other games, and then if I found nothing or was bored of those too, I'd try Virtua Fighter 5. That's how low it is for me, an uncultured, ignorant video gamer with no knowledge of what the Virtua Fighter series means.

So I speak for a great many players when I say "Yeah, give it a go. Whatever, eh?"

Fun Facts

Throw speed has been reduced from 8 frames to 12 frames. This will mean something incredibly significant to someone, trust me.

Virtua Fighter 5, developed by Sega AM2, first released in 2006.

Version played: Virtua Fighter 5, PlayStation 3, 2007.

Virtua Fighter 5 Final Showdown, PlayStation 3(?), 2012, via Judgment, PlayStation 4, 2019.