Capcom has revealed in their announcement that C. Viper will be joining Street Fighter 6 tomorrow which has caused chaos in the fighting game community. Players have waited a long time for new characters and now the iconic S.T.A.R.S. agent is making her way back to the franchise. Moreover, gamers are pondering whether they are more excited or terrified to take this character’s notoriously complex playing style.
Therefore, the official Street Fighter Twitter account sent out a very puzzling message saying “TOMORROW. C. VIPER. BEGINS HER EXPERIMENT.” with an incredible animated graphic displaying her with all her features. The responses to that tweet quickly turned into a mixture of excitement and turmoil, which is pretty much the normal state of affairs on fighting game Twitter. Some players have already decided to change their main characters, while others are still in doubt saying, “no, it’s too hard for me,” which is quite reasonable.
The buzz is, of course, a fact. In fact, one of the players, @TheAccelSpeed, just shouted “My God, she looks so incredibly cool in this game! I can’t wait for her to be released tomorrow!!!” which is by the way completely true. It is indeed magnificent the redesign of Viper in SF6, characterized by the old but new classy and secret agent look. Not to mention, the visuals that are just striking with the modern engine. And @MethSilky was saying, “She can run tests on me whenever she wants,” which is over to you quite a relatable mood.
Not everyone, however, is on the same side of the C. Viper hype train. @CaptainPoorman admitted, “I never really know how to make use of this character, and to be honest, I’m not really interested in learning. If I remember correctly, it was very technical stuff.” Viper has always been a character that appeals only to the most hardcore players and execution monsters while leaving no space for casuals; thus, it is a fair point. He is a combination of feints, cancels, and deceptions who is hard to learn but the right one can be terrifying.
The issue of when the character would be released stirred quite a controversy among the fans in the replies. A debate erupted between @Rajahwright and @endothepunisher over when exactly she would be accessible to players with season pass compared to general players. It seems that the season pass holders might get an early accessibility at about 10 pm EST? But the details were a bit confused in the tweets which is a classic case of fighting game release window confusion.
The most interesting part of the whole thing is the community division regarding the overall character release schedule of SF6. @GKeepnclassy was really ranting saying “The slow drip feed of content from SF has been quite peevish ever since the SF4 era. We thought SF5 was slow, but we literally waited a whole fcking year for FOUR characters. PATHETIC.” And to some extent, he is right? The speed of release has been… let’s say, dictated.
On the other hand, you have @zidelll practically telling the whiners that they are never satisfied, and they would complain about something no matter what Capcom does. Besides, @aairwandy told the person that was particularly bitter, “Just uninstall the game dude,” which is basically the fighting game community equivalent of “get better or leave.”
The technical discussions were also very vigorous. The players were analyzing her super art frames, arguing if her face expressions look odd in certain animations (they do not, according to @Rajahwright it’s just light effects), and already sharing theories about how she will fit in the current SF6 meta. With drive rush and perfect parry mechanics being so crucial for this game, Viper’s toolkit might either become completely invincible or hardly find a place.
Some players were already asking about other characters, e.g. @Mastersensui wondering “When is Mai’s stage?” and @doropipa insisting that Terry should get his target combos back. It’s never just about the new character – fighting game fans always want MORE content and they want it NOW.
The great thing about Viper’s return is that she represents a changeover in Street Fighter that has come with a new era. The electric and seismic attacks of the SF4 stage saw her being the wrapped new face. Now she is back with what appears to be classic moves’ upgraded versions and definitely some new tricks for SF6’s drive system to go with her. Her experiment begins tomorrow, and honestly? The entire community will be her lab rats.
There is genuine hype, there is abundant salt, and the battle hubs will be full of players trying to learn how not to get messed up by Viper’s mixups tomorrow. It does not matter if you are one who is looking forward to her or you are just dreading her, one thing is for sure Street Fighter 6 will surely have its meta greatly altered. Get your training mode ready and brace yourself for the Viper invasion.
PlayStation and Xbox players alike are eagerly awaiting the new content.
