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Good: Stylized Combat

Bad: Camera, Story, just about everything else

Blatantly: Borrows from Fight Club and Snatch

It's hard to believe it's been 17 years since Mayor Mike Haggar, Cody and Guy first stalked the streets of Metro City in the original Final Fight. Now, in an attempt to revive the series with a new, edgier tone Capcom has released Final Fight: Streetwise for the Playstation 2 and Xbox.

Streetwise puts you in control of Kyle Travers, Cody's kid brother. Kyle is a street fighter by trade and Cody has retired from fighting in order to be his brother's trainer. All is well for the brothers Travers until Cody goes missing. Now it's up to Kyle to find him and he'll punch his way through scores of people to do it. That's the entire Final Fight series in a nutshell: a loved one goes missing and a concerned few Dragon Kick and head-butt their way to the truth.

In brawlers like this the combat is always prone to repetition because you do so much of it. There are usually two ways of keeping it from growing stale: freeing it up so that it's open for improvisation on the part of the gamer or making it really flashy and stylized. Streetwise does the latter and, for the most part succeeds.

It may not be complex (button-mashing can get you out of just about any jam), but the presentation is satisfying. Block an attack at the right time and you're able to counter. When this happens the camera moves in close and the action slows down as you deliver a crushing forearm shiver or a debilitating thrust-kick to a goon's windpipe. Better still, you can buy additional moves and combos at the game's dojos or gyms. As a bonus for Street Fighter fans Capcom even threw in the Hurricane Kick as a purchasable counter.

Rather than plow through stages and levels like in previous Final Fights, Steetwise adopts a free-roaming approach. The Hood is your home base and the only area you're allowed to patrol at the game's outset. Other areas you can later explore include Japantown, which features katana wielding ninja schoolgirls, and Little Italy featuring its fair share of Mafioso types complete with slicked-back hair and designer suits. These areas make the game feel like a Disneyland of stereotypes and it makes me wonder what other areas Capcom scrapped. Irishville? Germanyland?

Each of these areas contains sets of minigames and side missions to keep you occupied when you don't feel like progressing the story. They range from the obvious (Three Card Monte, Darts and escort missions) to the out-of-place races against the clock (smashing barrels, totaling cars and weirdest of all-smashing cockroaches in a restaurant). Maybe it's the peppy Ska music that plays or just the concept of running around a restaurant, stomping on roaches and green-eyed rats and then kicking them into oblivion, but this turned out to be my favorite minigame.

Keeping with the street-fighting theme, Streetwise also allows Kyle to participate in a number of pit fights. There are six fighters (two in three of Streetwise's areas) and with each victory comes a cash prize that you can spend on new moves, health items, weapons and additional music for the game. These fights, like the rest of the minigames get repetitive after a few rounds. The opponents do not get any harder and the purses don't get any larger. None of the fights require any finesse, just common sense.

Once you've had your fill of killing roaches and playing cards you'll find Streetwise's story more than a tad on the ridiculous side. What starts out as a conspiracy involving your brother and a new designer drug called Glow somehow turns into a story involving zombies, a corrupt preacher and a final battle with the Four Horsemen of The Apocalypse. I don't think it's too much to ask for a story to at least make sense, but Streetwise's has a hard time doing even that.

Another problem with Streetwise is the game's repeated attempts at being "extreme" or "street" or any other buzzword that tries to sum up our obsession with urban culture. High hitting combos are labeled with "Bring It" and "Ridiculous." The characters all talk tough, but just come off sounding corny. The character design and slang both attempt to be cutting edge, but all it really does is date Streetwise. The way we laugh at how trite games like Bad Dudes are is how we'll look at Streetwise and the rest of the games that try so hard to be "Extreme" 10 years from now.

As far as brawlers go Streetwise looks good. Characters are well detailed and all the cutscenes are done in real-time. The framerate never faltered during any of my time playing and the collision detection was flawed (especially when grabbing an enemy), but tolerable.

If only the camera system was as competent as the visuals. It is possible to rotate and even place the camera directly behind you at any time with a button press, but that's still not enough. Often, especially in indoor areas, the camera will be too close, obscuring potential attackers and making it easier to get sucker-punched. This is especially problematic during sections where you have to stay mobile or whenever you have to battle large groups in an open areaso, basically the entire game.

As bad as that is it's not even close to the frustration that sets in when you're in an area where the camera is in set position. In these situations enemies can be on screen, but out of your reach, while they're still able to attack you. And, in addition, if you move too far to the top or bottom of the screen you can actually lose sight of your character altogether.

Another technical shortcoming is the poorly implemented save system, which only allows for saving when you quit the game. While this usually isn't a big problem, when the game crashes (and it did on me twice) you're left with no way of recovering your data. There are checkpoints but they only occur after major story events so if you plan on completing some of the side-missions you'll have to quit and then reload your data if you want to back up your progress. This is tedious and could have been avoided very easily by including a save option in the pause menu.

Aside from the single-player it is also possible to play Arcade either by yourself or with a friend. Arcade plays like classic Final Fight. Each player selects a character (Kyle, Cody, Hagar and Guy) and then proceeds through many of the game's environment, fighting a boss at the end of each stage. Characters feature limited moves and Arcade suffers from the same camera issues as the single-player only worse, since the camera is always in a fixed position. Arcade mode doesn't really classify as another mode since it takes about 45 minutes to complete-distraction seems more appropriate.

Final Fight: Streetwise represents a complete failure. Shallow, albeit stylized combat. A broken camera system. Clunky save system. A ridiculous plot that is derivative, uninvolving and incongruent. Attempts at edgy urban attitudes that come off corny. Even the unlockable version of the classic Final Fight features a flawed audio mix. I would expect this kind of half-assed execution from a lesser developer (not to name names, but Atari), but from an industry giant like Capcom this is unacceptable.

If you've got a desire to play a good brawler play Rockstar's The Warriors. If you want to play the classic Final Fight, play the excellent Capcom Classics Collection that came out earlier this year. But avoid Final Fight: Steetwise at all costs.

Graphics: B-

Sound: C+

Gameplay: F

First Play: D

Last Play: F

Overall 45 % F