7. Street Fighter - Quarter Circle Forward, Punch... Hadoken!
We take the good old Hadoken fireball attack for granted these days - admit it, when you fire up a new beat'em-up and select an unknown character, one of the first things you'll try is the classic "quarter circle forward + punch" joystick sweep. And the chances are good that your fighter will do something cool. It might not be a blue ball of energy surging across the scene, perhaps a flying kick or a blast of electricity, but the result is much the same. We're singling out Ryu's Hadoken special attack here, but the original Street Fighter protagonist had two more tricks up his gi: the upwards striking Shoryuken and the Tastumaki whirlwind kick. We had seen power moves in fighting games before, but these were different in that they were more spectacular than the standard arsenal and, more importantly, were hidden to some extent. Without a listing on an input card for the Street Fighter arcade cabinet, it was up to gamers to figure it out. Street Fighter 2's implementation of this idea was bigger, better and more elegant, adding flamboyant special moves the sizable roster of iconic characters, and so began an endless list of beat'em-ups which have used wildly expanded special moves built upon the same key principles. We could list the fighting games which have employed Capcom's most influential technique over the years, but we would be here all day.
Game-obsessed since the moment I could twiddle both thumbs independently. Equally enthralled by all the genres of music that your parents warned you about.
