With all of the 10 new Super Street Fighter IV exclusive characters having been announced and just over a month until the game's April 27th US release date, speculations over character potential and game balancing are in full swing. New Ultras and re-balancing should heavily affect the tier lists, but will the lack of arcade support for the title affect sales in areas such as Japan and the US, where there's a particularly strong arcade scene?
From what has been shown of the new characters, SSFIV won't be a repeat of SFIV on XBox 360/PS3 where the console-exclusive characters were all relatively bad in comparison to most of the existing cast. Dudley has has target combos from Street Fighter 3 and can Ultra from an un-cancelled jab Jet Uppercut. Juri has an Ultra which enables her far more combo potential for a limited amount of time, similar to Yun's Genei-jin from SFIII. Makoto can still karakusa into Seichusen Godanzuki (Ultra I), and even Super-cancel after her Hayate into a further combo. Hakan looks to have a fantastic anti-air Ultra also, as well as fairly high-damage normals.
According to recent play-tests, some characters have been hit hard by balancing, with others benefiting greatly from the changes made. Supposedly Ryu can no longer trade Shoryukens from ground to air and combo into Ultra I, whereas Rose can now combo into her Soul Throw and Ultra using fierce Soul Reflect. Akuma can no longer loop his standing heavy kick into itself as he previously could, and Sakura can now cross-up with her jumping medium kick as well as having an easy combo into Ultra II.
Only time will tell how drastically the game has changed though, with Street Fighter IV's tier lists altering a vast amount for the first 6 months or so after release! If any of you have any information or opinions on the game, make yourself heard on the comments section below!