II. Color: 
 
The art had a clear break up of colorform. The game introduced an alternate colourations feature where the same character could go head to head for the first time in series taking a different colour for each character. Several colours used throughout a match make it easier for the players to distinguish the limbs and the kind of special attack performed. 
 
III. Interest Curves and and Procedurality: 
 
● “Don’t give up until the very end!” appears on the continue screen, to subtly imply that you still have a chance even when your health bar goes below a certain value, your attack power increases. This makes the player who is losing more hopeful and the winning player more cautious.  
 
● The game really resonated with people because they could choose their character and use a combination of punches and kicks in a way they could never do in real life. One might think it would get monotonous. This has been proved wrong by Street Fighter as every hit you land is deeply satisfying. 
 
● Every player quickly adjusts to the fighting style and masters a character. However, they could easily, be dominated by another character which lets the interest curve flow smoothly as a new challenge can pop up at any time. 
 
● The three different kicks, punches and speeds of projectiles included strategizing which was introduced for the first time in a fighting game at the time. 
 
● When a player dodges a special attack or a combo that could have dropped down their health to a great extent, the game makes you feel invincible. 
 
● Every special attack starts with an animation that everybody knows the implications of. It indicates danger for the other player but serves some breathing time to try and recover. This introduces a sense of anticipation; whether the attack will land or not; amongst the quick fighting. There have been times where the special attack has worked wonderfully and the other times, it has failed miserably as the opponent is able to dodge it. This creates anticipation for both players.  
 
 
IV. Flow: 
 
Most of the fun in street fighter comes from skilled mastery. 
 
The engaging factor of Street Fighter II with respect to Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi’s work on “being in the state of extreme focus and tuning out everything but the task you are focussed on”: 
 
● Autopilot: 
The game starts off with you choosing one of the characters as your player to fight. You experiment with different characters until you find the “one”. After a few rounds of playing, you go on autopilot, doing things without thinking about them.  

 
● Concentration on immediate tasks:  

The game has a timer that helps you to focus more on immediate tasks, letting you know that your focus is required only for that duration. Your mind thinks about the long-term effects. 
 
● Loss of awareness of self, loss of ego: When you are in a flow state, you become one with your surroundings. All you think about is your character and your opponent. Street Fighter was one of the first games that came up with two player fighting arcade game. 
 
● There is a distorted sense of time: Strangely, time can speed up; “five more minutes” can turn into 6 hours of playing. It can also feel like the fight has slowed down for you but in reality, your brain has learned to work faster; playing with a less experienced opponent can feel slow-moving. 

  
What makes a game exciting is the challenge. Street Fighter’s interest curve assures that the player can succeed only if they try hard; mashing up different sets of buttons in sync can lead to unexpectedly best results. It also ensures that when playing against a bot, the level of difficulty goes on increasing or decreasing following the dynamic difficulty adjustment concept. When using the same moves consequently, the bot better predicts it and has a better defence planned out.  
 
 

 
V. Levels of Interactivity and Procedurality: 
 
1. The change to a Classic 6 button layout 

 

 

The release of Street Fighter had a setup on the machines which had pads that registered the amount of pressure applied for light, medium, or heavy punches or kicks. That leads to players (including the 5-year-old me), smashing the buttons as forcibly as they could, inflicting damage to both the machine and the player. They later changed it to a 6 button layout replacing the pressure sensitivity feature. The new setup earned a better response. 

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2. Accidental tweak to the original Combo system

 

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The programmers of Capcom programmed the special moves in the game such that it only worked well when the combination of hitting two or more buttons synced perfectly. This was not appreciated by the players as it involved a high degree of precision. They then tweaked it slightly by opening up the frames over which the input would still be accepted. This opened up the possibility of being able to perform a punch while the character was doing a flying kick thus linking their actions in a way it would have never been anticipated. This novel feature helped the game stand out from the rest of the games like Karate Champ. All of these games focussed more on developing new punches, kicks and stances rather than refining the existing ones like Capcom did.  

 
 
VI. Summary: 
 
With a game this old, one would say it might have become stale as the genre of fighting games progressed with nonlinear gameplay, better design and scripting, and superior interactions. But to everyone’s surprise, it is still enjoyed by game

 
 
VII. References:

 

[1] https://gamedesignconcepts.wordpress.com/2009/07/20/level-7-decision- making-and-flow-theory/

 

[2] https://www.polygon.com/a/street-fighter-2-oral-history/chapter-2

 

[3] https://www.eventhubs.com/news/2016/aug/30/original-street-fighter-rele ased-29-years-ago-today-and-it-could-literally-leave-you-bloody-fist/

 

[4] http://mentalfloss.com/article/64071/15-things-you-might-not-know-about- street-fighter

 

[5] https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2017/09/masterpiece-street-fighter-ii/

 

[6] https://kotaku.com/the-reason-behind-street-fighters-iconic-button-layout-17 85985830