Fighting game legend Daigo Umehara says Street Fighter Alpha 3 houses the best fighting game system ever made
Guard Crush allows you to break the defenses of opponents that block too much
BST|Daigo Umehara got to talking about an old fighting game system over on his live Twitch stream earlier this week. He notes that this mechanic is the best ever in a fighting game, and the game it hails from is often considered a masterpiece.
Thanks to the translation work of HiFight, we learn that Daigo is talking about the Guard Crush mechanic in Street Fighter Alpha 3 (known as Street Fighter Zero 3 in Japan). In this clip — with English subtitles — Daigo explains how Guard Crush works and what makes it so great.
"By the way, about the Zero 3 guard crush system I will say this clearly," Daigo began. "It's GAWDLIKE system. It's the BEST fighting game system. GAWDLIKE. Ultra Gawdlike."
Daigo goes on to explain that this system is why, out of all of Capcom's fighting games, fans say that Alpha 3 is the masterpiece. He mostly agrees with this assessment, but says that V-ism holds the game back from being perfect due to how frequently strong players can win with this mode.
In Street Fighter Alpha 3, each player has a green meter underneath their health bar. Whenever an attack is blocked, that meter will deplete a bit before climbing back up, and if that meter fully empties a guard crush will take place leaving the player completely vulnerable to an attack.
The meter gets shorter after each guard crush, with the last level only requiring about two hits before another crush takes place. Daigo explains that this mechanic is wonderful because if blocking is proving to be too strong of an option, you have the ability to nerf it by inflicting guard crushes.
Daigo goes into further detail about how nerfing throws encouraged players to use Guard Crush more often and how it presents a viable option for dealing with heavy defense outside of throws. Be sure to check out the full video below.
