It was a rough road for Ryu users in Street Fighter 5. Although Ryu was considered a serious contender in Season 1 of Street Fighter 5, the nerves he suffered at Season 2 led to Ryu from Street Fighter 5 was the point of jokes. now for about four years. Looking back, Ryu was mostly just a top tier in Season 1 thanks to the existence of its now-removed throw-loop, anti-air jab and its meterless, completely invincible Dragon Punches – tools that no character in Street Fighter 5 belongs to here to have no point.
For the longest time, it felt like Ryu was designed differently than the rest of the cast. “Ryu is balanced, but he exists in a broken world,” was basically the universal analysis about Ryu. It felt like Ryu was suffering from some major design issues that had been actively ignored for years. To my surprise, Capcom apparently addressed almost all of the issues I had about Ryu in Street Fighter 5 with the latest balance update.
My biggest complaint about Ryu in Street Fighter 5 was his inability to hit hunched opponents with certain moves. In previous versions of Street Fighter 5, Ryu’s meterless Hurricane Kick offers and target combo would beat a hunched character.
Responding to the question of whether or not the enemy will stand in your combination was, of course, an important element of previous Street Fighter entries, but it seemed like only Ryu was struck by this design philosophy in Street Fighter 5.
Even other “Shoto” characters like Ken and Akuma have now suddenly received the Hurricane Kick offers that don’t care if the opponent is standing or squatting. Ryu was ‘unique’ because he did not get this benefit.
While Ryu could rather choose to end his combination with the Joudan Sokutogeri – also known as the “Donkey Kick” – Hurricane Kick was obviously better off maintaining Okizeme pressure on Ryu.
Players can only bypass this shortcoming and easily respond to the opponent standing or squatting, but the question is, “Why bother?”
There were many fighters who were just better than the poster boy of Street Fighter, who did not have to pay extra attention to the enemy’s status of standing or squatting while performing their combinations.
Allowing Ryu to hit squatting opponents with the Hurricane Kick and using a variation of his target combination that also works against bending not only makes Ryu easier to play, but also allows him to make Okizeme pressure more reliable increase – an absolute must for every character to see any. kind of success on a competitive level in Street Fighter 5.
Another big change for Ryu was the added frame advantage on the block for his standing medium punch. It went from +1 on block to +2 on block.
Against certain characters, Ryu was not really able to use snare using his standing medium punch, even though he was +1 on the block. He should rather use the bent medium punch.
At first it may have seemed like a fair trade-off, as Ryu’s stand-alone punch required only 5 startup frames, but again it did not compare well with characters like Ibuki or Necalli who had 5 frame medium buttons blocking +2.
The patch also made a significant effort to undo the damage that Ryu’s mid-range game inflicted from Season 2, when both his hooked medium kick and bent heavy kick got an extra starting cost. Capcom even went a step further by finally canceling its standing heavy blow outside its V-Trigger 1.
Ryu’s V-Triggers have also seen significant buffers that make both useful in different ways. V-Trigger 1 gives its beats additional frames hitstun, while V-Trigger 2 allows it to deal extra damage at the end of the V-Gauge cost offerings. Prior to this patch, Ryu’s V-Trigger 1 provided only niche advantages, while V-Trigger 2 was almost useless for competitive play.
The only thing about Ryu that is untouched in my mind is how he still has one of the worst 3-frames in the game. Since Ryu does not bother to extend his arm completely, it has an awful range. Yet, with all these other insane lovers, I can not help but think that this minor thing might not matter.
It’s still very early in the new update, but I can not help but feel very optimistic about Ryu’s potential. Capcom finally gave exactly what Street Fighter’s poster boy needed to possibly be a competitive challenger in the high level of Street Fighter 5. I’m looking forward to seeing (hopefully) players compete with Ryu.