The Evolution 2011 Tournament Season

This year, we’ve partnered up with 8 major tournaments from all over the United States and Canada to create a full season of Evolution events that will offer tournament seeding at EVO World Finals to the overall highest place finishers. Participating events include West Coast Warzone, GVN Winter Brawl, Final Round XIV, PowerUp 2011, and more! For more information on how the Evolution 2011 Tournament Season will be structured and a full schedule of events, visit the tournament season blog post here.

Balrog is one of the strongest characters in Super Street Fighter IV. He has above average stamina, a huge amount of ways to attack the opponent and a great anti-air game.

He also has more armored moves than any other character along with the most armor breakers. His pokes are very hard to punish and his jabs are the best in the game. Couple this up with very good walk speed, great normal anti-airs and meterless combos into his Ultra 1 and Balrog is a very dangerous beast.

• Yoshinori Ono said on his Twitter that, "I'll announce about Nintendo 3DS, SSFIV DLC new future, and SF x TK in 2011!! Could be wait it's news for the near future. ;D" This shouldn't be much of a surprise for many of you following along at home, as more SSF4 DLC, likely Arcade Edition content, is all but confirmed at this point, but it's one more indicator that it's coming this year. Mentioned by Kuruyuki.

• Tokido noted that Yun and Yang's Dragon Kicks have at least a 5 frame start up, making them easy to safe jump. For comparison's sake, Ryu's Dragon Punches are 3 frames and Ken's Light Punch Shoryuken is also 3 frames. Tokido added that Yun's defense is not good, so once he scores a knockdown, he feels like he has a chance to beat him.

• Jeff Schaefer posted yet another video blog focused on your human potential, especially as it relates to Street Fighter.

Why didn't the PS3 version of SSF4 get a download catalogue option?

Seth Killian: Took a while to track this one down for you while everyone was on holiday, but here's the gist of it:

The DLC (Downloadable Content) for the newest costumes is additional data that must be put on your machines from the first-party networks (XBL and PSN). When you add new data to an existing product, there are significant costs to do so charged by the first parties.

On XBL, those costs were covered by Microsoft. As a result, the data is distributed to everyone, so even if you have not bought the new costumes, you can still see them if you're fighting against someone that has because you still received the new data required to display them.

For Sony, those significant costs are not covered. As a result, you only get the new costume data when you actually buy the costumes. Those that don't buy the costumes can't see them, because the new costume data isn't present on your machine, and so you only see costumes you already have the data to represent.

The story is a bit more complicated because the costs of adding new data vary by region in some cases, and some additions are free, or free within a certain timeframe, etc., but the bottom line in this particular case is that Sony would [have] charged Capcom significant fees for distributing the new costume data to users that hadn't actually bought the DLC. Microsoft covered those costs, so the costume data is visible to all there. I wish it were the same all around, but hope this info helps.

Is there going to be one more Darkstalker in Marvel vs. Capcom 3?

Seth: No way you're getting that one out of me :-*

Why has Capcom made Felicia weak and have a horrible English voice actor and the lowest heath in the game?

Seth: Felicia is, in my opinion, much stronger in MvC3 than she has ever been in any game before. She might seem a bit obvious so far, but she definitely has the tools to win. Right now probably the most under-appreciated character in the game (in fairness, that's mostly by people who haven't had a chance to play much). [...]

Will Capcom be at CES 2011?

Seth Killian: There will be a few Capcom people there, but unfortunately we do not have a presence on the show floor (it's not primarily a "gaming" convention). On the plus side, we should have some new announcements about upcoming games...

On a flyer for CES it lists Capcom/SNK, do you have any plans with SNK at the show?

Seth Killian: As far as I know, we aren't doing anything with SNK at CES.

Snow: Just an additional note, we will hopefully (if all goes well) be live streaming some games during the CES time frame.

• The release date for the BradyGames Marvel vs. Capcom 3 strategy guide on Amazon Japan's website is listed for February 4, 2011, meaning we should know the full roster a few days earlier than was previously listed (Feb. 8). Also, the guide will weigh in at 352 pages, so it's a pretty fair size. Via マブカプ３新聞.

• Kevin Sharpe, who was often blamed for the Galactus and Taskmaster Marvel vs. Capcom comic leak posted another rebuttal on his blog.

• Jeff Schaefer uploaded a couple more video blogs (Part 1 | Part 2) announcing that he's going to start playing Super Street Fighter 4 again, but only for fun. Schaefer is one of the legends of the community and it's really awesome to see him coming back in any capacity. He also shares his thoughts on the SF4 series and other gaming stuff. Sent in by JDragonX.

• Fighter101.net has a new video tutorial for Balrog (Boxer) in Super Street Fighter 2 Turbo showing how to Renda Cancel into his Super.

• Marvel vs Capcom 3 secret event on Thursday, January 6th in Las Vegas, Nevada, from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m.

• A brand new build of Marvel vs Capcom 3 — contains new characters which will be announced shortly.

• Tournament to be held with prizes.

• Must 21 or older.

• Free pizza and beer.