Virtua Fighter 4

Virtua Fighter 4 is a fighting game by Sega. It is the fourth game in the Virtua Fighter series.

The game was first released in arcades on the NAOMI 2 board in 2001. A console port of Virtua Fighter 4, as well as that of Virtua Fighter 4: Evolution under the budget-priced “Greatest Hits” label, appeared on the Sony PlayStation 2 in 2002 and 2003, respectively.

In Japan, Virtua Fighter 4 is famous for spearheading and opening the market for internet functionality in arcades. VF.NET started in Japan in 2001, and since companies have created their own arcade networks, e-Amusement by Konami, NESiCAxLive by Taito and Square Enix, and ALL.Net by Sega.

Plot:
Virtua Fighter 4 and Virtua Fighter 4: Evolution have a two-part storyline. VF4 started out with thirteen fighters entering the tournament for their own personal reasons, while Judgement Six used them for gathering data for Dural. Evolution adds two more fighters to the mix, one of them works for Judgement Six who is ordered to kill everyone in the tournament.

It was also revealed that for the Dural project, Judgement Six targeted Sarah Bryant as their next volunteer for a new Dural model. Akira fell short during the third tournament. In order to find out what the “real power” was within him, he enters the fourth tournament to find that answer. Pai discovers that her skill was close to her father’s despite her loss in the third tournament. After hearing that Lau was looking for a successor and has a terminal illness, she enters the tournament to prove that she is a worthy successor to master her father’s style. Lau suffered a terrible illness that cannot be cured after losing to Kage-Maru in the third tournament. He enters the tournament to find a worthy successor to Koen-Ken. Wolf still has reoccurring nightmares since the end of the second tournament. After losing in the third tournament, he ignored the dream but it kept coming back. He enters the fourth tournament to find out what that meant. Jeffry finally gained enough money to repair his boat, but there was only one problem: the Satan Shark mysteriously disappeared. He enters the tournament to invest in a sonar device for the shark.

Kage-Maru won the third tournament and found a part from the new Dural model that would cure his mother. It result in his mother transforming into Dural once again and attacking him. Since Judgement Six saved her, Kage enters the tournament to kill Dural once and for all. Sarah regained her memories and lived a quiet life with her brother, until she had flashbacks of the time where she was brainwashed by Judgement Six and attempted to kill Jacky. She enters the tournament to defeat him and resolve the matter. Jacky turned his focus to racing after the end of the third tournament, where he formed his own racing team. However, Judgement Six killed one of his sponsors and they will continue unless Jacky enters the fourth tournament. He decides to enter the tournament to once again take down Judgement Six. Shun was unsuccessful on finding his missing student during the third tournament. It was revealed that his student was trying to escape from Judgement Six, but he was recaptured by the evil organization. He enters the fourth tournament to find more information about the missing student.

Lion enters the fourth tournament in order to once again try to win the title. Aoi did not last long in the first round of the third tournament. She enters the fourth tournament to try her new skills in parrying and counterattacking. Lei-Fei entered the fourth tournament to become the successor to Lau’s Koen-Ken style of martial arts. His true intention is to kill Lau after he learned his style under the clan’s orders. Vanessa joins the fourth tournament to protect Sarah from Judgement Six, and to avenge the murder of her mentor, Lewis. Brad entered the fourth tournament after dominating the Muay Thai Kickboxing world. Goh infiltrated the fourth tournament under Judgement Six orders to kill everyone. The 4th tournament had come down to one final fight between Kage-Maru and Shun Di, but as Kage was about to deliver the final blow to Shun, the glowing, silver form of Dural interrupted the match. Kage is the winner, but he discovers that the Dural he fought is not his mother.

Characters:
Akira Yuki
Pai Chan
Lau Chan
Wolf Hawkfield
Jeffry McWild
Kage-Maru
Sarah Bryant
Jacky Bryant
Shun Di
Lion Rafale
Aoi Umenokoji
Dural

New characters:
Lei-Fei
Vanessa Lewis
Brad Burns (Virtua Fighter 4: Evolution/Final Tuned only)
Goh Hinogami (Virtua Fighter 4: Evolution/Final Tuned only)

Customization:
A unique feature in Evolution was the ability to play in a tournament quest mode, where the concept was that the player was competing by traveling to various arcades, as opposed to role-playing as the player’s chosen fighter. This mode was very popular due to the ability to buy cosmetic items to customize a character, as well as the ability to name a character. Many players of fighting games have unique styles; with the combination of various items allowing for vastly differing appearances a new depth of uniqueness was added. In addition, Sega took the top tournament players from the arcade version, and captured their style of play for the AI of a player’s opponents for this mode. For example, playing against one Wolf character would be very different from playing another, because the actual player that character’s AI was programmed to mimic had a unique play style.

Training mode:
Virtua Fighter 4 introduced a comprehensive training mode. The mode consisted of an encyclopedia of fighting game terms, complete character command list walkthroughs, tips on all of the game’s mechanics, recommended character combos, alternative options for failed combos, detailed command input timings, slow motion for frame counting and timing, and other useful training tips.

VF4’s training mode consists of three sections:
Command Training – A complete run through each move, one-by-one. The command for the move is displayed and the player executes the command – moving to the next one. VF4 allows the option to skip the current command, view the move (computer controlled), enable advice.
Free Training
Trial Mode

Changes from previous series releases:
Virtua Fighter 4 became much more streamlined and user friendly than its predecessors, while expanding on old ideas and adding new techniques. The evasion system was revamped from Virtua Fighter 3, the evade button was removed, and evades were split into two types, successful and unsuccessful. When evades were not performed with the proper timing, they were unsuccessful leaving the fighter vulnerable. The evade + throw escape option select, which was an advanced technique discovered in Virtua Fighter 3, was expanded upon. Virtua Fighter 4 allowed the player to escape as many throws as they could, and lengthened the window for performing a successful throw escape during an [unsuccessful] evade. A new move type called a Sabaki was added; an attack that also doubles as a reversal versus one or more move types.

The two new characters, Vanessa Lewis and Lei-Fei, had moves that employed these properties significantly more than the returning cast, and were quite experimental for Virtua Fighter characters. Vanessa Lewis is a black Vale Tudo/Muay Thai kickboxer with two completely separate moves sets that can be switched between on the fly, and Lei-Fei, a Shaolin monk, employs many stances that flow into one another.

Taka-Arashi, one of the new characters added to Virtua Fighter 3, was omitted, apparently due to the developers not being able to make him work properly with the Virtua Fighter 4 system mechanics.

The fighting arenas reverted to the old Virtua Fighter style of flat and square, as opposed to Virtua Fighter 3’s wild and undulating stage designs. The reason behind this was to make the game less random, and more balanced and competitive in nature. Walls, however, were kept and expanded upon with a wall stagger / juggle system and several wall types including high + unbreakable, low + breakable, and low + unbreakable + open corners. Some stages’ walls can be broken by knocking down the opponent while the latter is behind the wall and at low health, with the next round permanently leaves the stage’s without a fence that have been broken.