Virtua Fighter 5 --The Ultimate Showdown PS4 Review 8.5/10 "does not fail to deliver hours of button-bashing gameplay..." 🤜💥🤛

The Fifth World Fighting Tournament has arrived, and it does not disappoint. 

Virtua Fighter 5 returns with its all-out action and fast-paced - fighting that any arcade beat em’ up fan would be proud of...

This arcade (turned-console) beat 'em' up classic harnesses all of the features you would expect from its predecessors and finds more in this all-enhanced re-master. All new downloadable content is available, such as costumes and themes, updated graphic interfaces and most of all its alternate life bar User interface graphics. If you have loved all the others, then you will enjoy this!

With visually impressive battle environments, backdrops and scenery often make for distraction when fighting. But they look nice, nevertheless. 

It doesn't reach Tekken 7 or MK 11 levels of detail but it sure does look impressive to the eye.  With some stiff movements and bland textures (which you don't see all the time), the newly scored tracks fit the experience but some sound effects in the game seem to be comically loud compared to the BGM - the punches can be very loud and snappy.

VF5 takes a bit more time when it comes to mastering the control styles also. With no dedicated jump button and confusing control combinations you will sometimes find frustrating, you will still make it to the last fight once the learning curve of basics and combos has clicked into play and the control style becomes natural again.

The online features give way to some very rewarding moments also showing where a lot of the hard work has gone with this version. I was able to launch ranked matches, and the stability of the game rooms seemed fine, but every now and then a couple of micro stutters (that resolved themselves) were experienced but it generally handles the audiences of the game well without too many disconnection issues or being kicked out of matches for discernable reasons.

With 17 returning characters and 3 new - (If you can handle some random connections) and a scarcity of single-player content, you will find an immensely satisfying fighting game experience that only gets better the more time you invest in it. However, I can't help but feel like a little more time to cook would have benefitted this release.

SUMMARY

With a very similar veteran feel and many other 3d gaming franchises starting to feel somewhat stale at the time of this release- it will be interesting to see if Virtua Fighter's uniquely technical and anomalous style can hold yet another wave of interest in the fighting game space. 

I'm sure Sega will greatly benefit from the timing and will be watching to see if Ultimate Showdown does well - so will we and hope to see more from this franchise in the not-too-distant future!

This one definitely packs a punch and does not fail to deliver hours of button-bashing gameplay...