Don't worry, this will be quick. I am beat today, both physically and mentally.

Thanks to my friend - that if isn't a saint yet, should get his paperwork to the Vatican as soon as possible - Lee aka Dracula68, I was able to get Street Fighter IV relatively close to its release, that is, Wednesday last week. At first, I have to admit that I didn't get into it. Now, however, a whole week of playing later, I have to say I really like it. SFIV keeps the Street Fighter feel we all love, but modernizes how you play it. It's not as complicated to learn as before, moves are incredibly easy to pull off, and as a result, it's really enjoyable.

I started playing with lots of characters, but managed to settle with an old favorite, Cammy. I liked Cammy before not because of game play, but more for her design. She's really interesting, especially in the awesome Street Fighter II V anime. Her moves in this game are insane, and her combos are among the most powerful. I had fun playing with her at first. However, a sudden interest for Zangief started to form up. Yes, he's one of the easily exploitable characters in the game along with Seth. His lariat move destroys the computer controlled fighters no matter the difficulty setting, and his grapple based combos are insanely strong. I am working towards setlling a certain skill level with both Zangief and Cammy for playing online.

Hell, SF IV is actually a game I can start enjoying online, even though I tend to hate online competition games.

Ah yes, it's worth mentioningthe controller. I am using the regular ol' 360 pad, and it's not as bad as people make it out to be - the repeated circles for Zangief's moves can be pulled off with the analog stick, as with Cammy's quarter circles. I can see how it'd get a bit complicated to do the expert combos, but I am not even close to getting to that level at the moment. I might invest in a more specialized form of control in the future, but deep inside I wish I could just hook in my Dreamcast arcade stick - love that thing!

Now excuse me while I go finish up the hellish time trials!