‘Street Fighter V’ Updates: Season 4 Should Add These Characters and Features

Fighting games tend to live or die by their selection of playable characters. Street Fighter V started out small in that regard but has gradually morphed into offering a satisfying mix of classic standby combatants and fresh fighters. Season 4’s introduction of Kage, who happens to be a renamed version of Street Fighter IV’s Evil Ryu, fell flat among most of the game’s community and signaled a bad start to the season as a whole. The best way to remedy this issue and make the game’s roster even more legendary is by adding in four more fan-favorite World Warriors.

Now which familiar characters should fill those four slots? That honor should go to the following: C. Viper, Sodom, Fei Long and Makoto. Juri happens to be the only character to make her way from that installment to the current one. C. Viper shouldn’t just be relegated to a quick story mode illustration; she should become the next SF4 fighter to receive the SF5 DLC character treatment. Sodom’s been teased for far too long now, so it’s about time that he joins the game’s offering of Final Fight series entrants instead of just hanging out in the background. Fei Long’s a Street Fighter II OG who utilizes one of the more entertaining fighting styles in the series, so he should also be a lock-in for Season 4. And finally, the feisty Rindo-kan karate master Makoto should get the nod as the latest Street Fighter III character to join the SF5 roster.

Most of today’s biggest fighting games have made an effort to expand its audience by adding in guest characters. Tekken 7 did a bang up job in this department by featuring Akuma from Street Fighter, Geese Howard from Fatal Fury, Noctis from Final Fantasy XV and even Negan from The Walking Dead. Other fighting games—such as Mortal Kombat X, Soulcalibur VI and Super Smash Bros. Ultimate—have done the very same thing and been celebrated for its choices in playable guests. To the surprise of many, Street Fighter V hasn’t followed suit and given one of its character select screen slots to that type of character. Season 4 should offer a remedy to that glaring omission.

To look for inspiration for the right guest character to add in, all you need to do is take a trip to SF5’s Kanzuki Beach stage. In the background, you’ll notice that two Rival Schools characters can be seen frolicking in the water. An effort has already been made to include familiar faces from the high school-themed fighter, so it would make a lot of sense to continue in that direction. A fresh and welcome surprise for SF5 fans would be the announcement of Rival Schools’ Batsu filling the fighter’s guest character spot. Retain all of his signature moves, equip him with a V-Trigger that transforms him into Burning Batsu, and be sure to give him a Critical Art that calls in Hinata and Kyosuke for assistance. Throw in the classic Taiyo High School Rooftop stage as a special bonus and everyone will rejoice Batsu’s SF5 arrival even more.

The transition from vanilla SF5 to its Arcade Edition update brought along with it new V-Triggers. While some of these additional special maneuvers were better than others, it was refreshing to see the game’s roster receive new tools to work with. With the impending news of Season 4 updates, it would be cool to see the V-Skill mechanic open up in that same manner.

Each character, including the ones we hope make it in as Season 4 DLC, should be blessed with a second V-Skill to bring into battle. New V-Skills not only give the game’s weaker characters some sort of ability that could boost their viability, but they could also possibly alter each characters’ overall approach to combat. Pro players would be extra pleased in that regard since they’d get to develop new battle strategies with these new V-Skills in mind. Just imagine getting access to Ryu’s Fake Fireball, Ken’s Zenpou Tenshin roll, and a new grapple maneuver for R. Mika. The possibilities for new V-Skills are endless.

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