This game is a gamer's game. I LOVED the controls, sound and animation; The way Ken would "PUMP" out that single horizontal air attack, with this exaggerated "Oh YEAH!" kinda toss to it, was one of my favorite details. It made landing that single attack that is perfectly aimed, and takes out exactly what you wanted to,
feel so good!
When you start throwing the "HEAVY" strikes, the ones with the weighty sounds that arch as you toss them... one of the most satisfying Nintendo-era attack strings ever. "WHOOOOAH, WHAAAAA...!" So called "Responsive" controls are not always the preference in gaming. Before we had Kinect and MOVE and the Wii to make us feel the movement of the characters, we had control schemes, animations, and button actions that made us feel a character toss their easy attacks (like Ken's neutral punches) or heavy, strong attacks (like his hold-forward moves).
Wouldn't change a thing about the lives structure, controls, animation, not any of it. Every stage included such cool musical and graphic themes, and such unique enemies, that it made me want to press on more than, say, Super Mario Bros. or even Megaman. Unlimited lives / continues would have watered down the challenge, and a more "normal" ccontrol scheme of constant button presses = attack, would have truly taken the unique feel from the game.
I loved these days of gaming. Part of the challenge was learning the controls, and mastering THEM. No worries about overwrought button configs, or adjusting controller sensativity, or anything like that... you just learned to play the way the game was designed. Character-control nuances were probably one of my favorite things about retro games (And probably why I hated Assassin's Creed 1, there was no "nuance" to learn!) Having a multitude of motions commanded by a simple few buttons, learning how and when to press in order to do them; it really felt martial arts-like, like you had to master your body in order to use it's full power.
A Bionic Commando Rearmed style update to this game could have been great, and really should have been one of Capcom's 2010 downloadable games.
Would have loved a "SNES / 32 bit Megaman / NeoGeo" level of spritework, no 3D, just making a straight remake of the game with a nice graphic upgrade.
Give an option to use modern "every button on the controller" controls, and also classic, Nintendo-style 2 button style.
Offer 3 soundtracks: Nintendo, Updated Chiptune, and then "Redbook Audio" style CD quality music. Then stick the game with "Bad Box art" for box and cover, and have beating the game unlock special JP boxart, and even alt storyline / cinematic artwork.
While we're at it, throw in some alt gameplay styles or characters. Megaman X, Street Fighter's actual Ken, a D&D arcade game character, whatever Capcom could think of to celebrate it's years of gaming. Just have fun with it; The original game was an absurd quasi-reference to a series it really had NOTHING in common with, so continue on with this spirit in it's unlockables and post-game content.
...Quite a pipedream, but it could have been grand.
