Street Fighter 5 Season 2 Launch: 7 Ups & 3 Downs

Earlier in the year, some whacked-out nutjob wrote up an article about Street Fighter V's upcoming Season 2 update, and the 8 Improvements Capcom Must Make.

Capcom, now a month later, has released the final DLC character of 2016, Akuma. The shoto demon's long awaited reappearance heralds a 2017 pack of five more, all-new characters coming to the game, and officially kicks off Street Fighter V's second season.

With a slew of character rebalances, system changes, and brand new content, Street Fighter V comes into the new year a whole new game, and is proving Capcom's intention of building the game as a living, breathing platform as a success. But is it an upgrade sufficient enough to bring a rather flawed package to shine?

The answer is both yes and no.

If the quality of this update is any indication, the future is now looking brighter than ever, although it's still not perfect. Street Fighter V, to put it simply, is now even closer to the complete package it should've been at launch.

But there's still a few flaws that prevent the game from truly shining- it's a diamond that's yet to be taken out of the dirt, one that still needs more polish.

Let's take a look at what Capcom's got packed into the new update, good and bad...

One of Street Fighter's longest mainstay characters ever since Super Turbo, Akuma has always been one of the most iconic faces in the roster. Now that he's finally here, I can say with total approval that Akuma is one of the most fun characters in the game.

Now that he's been entirely reimagined, Akuma is a balls-to-the-wall fighter who gets in your face with far more attack options than any other character in the game. His new Shoryuken has a follow-up afterwards, he can throw two mid-air projectiles at once... even his taunt is offensive!

In exchange, he's also the weakest, having the least health out of anyone in the game. To emphasize his new ferocious game plan, his Hadoken reaches only half screen. His V-Skill parry, when whiffed, puts players into a counter state, which can lead to an unskilled Akuma getting quickly crush countered and defeated.

All of this turns Akuma one of SFV's most volatile characters yet - the powerful cannon made of glass he's always been. Akuma players from the past will feel right at home with him, while new players may finally see more than "another Ryu clone".