Street Fighter II’: Special Champion Edition

Description

Street Fighter II’: Special Champion Edition (known in Japan as Street Fighter II’ Plus: Champion Edition) brought both Champion Edition and Hyper Fighting to Sega’s console, introducing all twelve fighters and showcasing the new six‑button controller. This version combined two of the arcade revisions into a single cartridge. The Champion Edition ruleset allowed players to control the four boss characters: Balrog, Vega, Sagat, and M. Bison; and introduced mirror matches. The Hyper Fighting ruleset added faster gameplay, new colour palettes, and balance adjustments. Players could select either mode from the main menu, making the package equivalent in scope to Street Fighter II Turbo on the SNES.

The roster featured all twelve fighters: the original eight World Warriors plus the four Grand Masters. Each character retained their unique stages, special moves, and endings. Gameplay followed the established one‑on‑one format, with best‑of‑three rounds and six attack buttons. On the standard three‑button Genesis controller, Capcom implemented a “Start button toggle” between punches and kicks, though the game was best experienced with Sega’s newly released six‑button controller, designed specifically with Street Fighter II in mind.

Reception was strong across regions with praise for the faithful translation of arcade mechanics and the inclusion of both Champion and Hyper modes, though the graphics and sound were noted as slightly downgraded compared to the SNES version. Commercially, the release was a success, driving sales of the six‑button controller and cementing Street Fighter II as a defining title of the 16‑bit era across both major platforms.