Product Description: For the first time, Street Fighter fans can enjoy this classic manga faithfully adapted, uncut and unedited. Popular Japanese artist Masaomi Kanzaki brings you 180 pages of pulse-pounding action. The stage is set for the best fighters from around the world to face off in the ultimate martial arts tournament. But behind the scenes of this glorious contest, an evil crime boss has a hidden agenda - to use the world's greatest warrior as his next living weapon!
A great book for the dedicated Street Fighter II fan Man, this book brought back some memories. The manga it contains was originally released in the U.S. in the early 90s in 8 comic book issues. It was colorized and mirror-imaged (so it could be read left-to-right) and its translation was a little confusing, but Street Fighter II was the biggest thing in my life at the time, so I loved it.
Now, the awesome guys over at Udon (the same company that began publishing its own original Street Fighter comic book, which is also very good) have given us a clearer, easier-to-understand translation of Masaomi Kanzaki's manga, presented in its original right-to-left format. The artwork still looks great even after all these years, and since it's now presented in its original black-and-white, it looks better than the first U.S. release (the other company's colorization wasn't exactly stellar). The story, which surrounds a street fighting tournament held on the man-made island of Shad (the base of operations for the secret organization called Shadowlaw), mainly follows Ryu and Chun-Li, but gives all the familiar characters from the original game a decent amount of things to do. There is a lot of action (what else would you expect) and a decent amount of comic relief, all well-drawn and nicely paced.
The only unfortunate thing is, this book covers only the first half of the story; the rest is covered in volume two. However, the book gives us a few nifty little extras, including a chart that shows the characters' relationships with each other (within the manga's story, not necessarily how the game managed them) and a peak at the Street Fighter Alpha manga.
This book is a treat for any Street Fighter II fan, young or old. Major props to Udon for bringing this manga back into print in the U.S.
Anything Goes Trivia
Megaton Man
Tailipoe
Trevor
