Street Fighter 5 invokes Raging Demon, punishes rage quitting
BOP!
Street Fighter 5 [official site] is sending mixed signals with its first content update of 'Season 2', adding returning fighter Akuma with his iconic 'Raging Demon' combo while also adding new punishments for rage quitting. So is rage good or bad? Perhaps the distinction is that it's fine if you hang around to pose moodily at the end. The update launches today, also rebalancing a bit and adding official support for Direct Input controllers. Oh, and a sleighload of Christmassy paid costumes.
So! Akuma is back, up to his usual antics of stomping around as if his dad won't let him watch Transformers until he's tidied his room. This time, he has a terrible haircut:
Meanwhile, for less acceptable demonstrations of rage, Capcom have pumped up punishments for disconnections during matches. As well as suffering the previous punishment of being locked out of matchmaking for a while, players who often disconnect are now more likely to be paired with fellow blaggards, while "the worst offenders" will get a special icon on their Fighter Profile as a badge of shame, and any time a player disconnect during a match they'll lose League Points as if it were a loss. That may suck a bit for players with wonky Internet but hey, for their opponents the end result is the same - a ruined match.
On the flip side, well-behaved players who don't disconnect will receive profile icons marking them as honourable duelists and they'll be more likely to be matchmade with other good eggs.
While the update does add some snazzy Christmas costumes - as I got into before - they are all premium outfits. You'll need to cough up cash to celebrate Crimbo, buying them separately or all together in a £16 bundle.
For more details on other changes with the update, including Direct Input support, check out Capcom's announcement. That blog post also has an overview of character balance tweaks but, if you really want to get into it, this PDF goes in-depth.