SF20: The Art of Street Fighter [Paperback]

SF20: The Art of Street Fighter is actually a translated edition of the Japanese art book Street Fighter Art Works (ISBN:4862332145). It's really great that Capcom (or Udon Entertainment) has decided to translate it and pushed it out so fast.

SF20 is a 20th anniversary tribute art book to Street Fighter, which was actually released in 1987. This is a pretty thick 320-page paperback. It doesn't come with a dust jacket like the Japanese edition. On the non-glossy pages are printed with over 1500 illustrations, paintings and sketches. The spine is a bit inflexible for a book this thick and will definitely have wrinkles if you open the pages too wide.

The illustrations are divided into chapters by artists, namely:

* Akiman
* Kinu Nishimura
* CRMK
* Daigo Ikeno
* Daichan
* Edayan
* Shinkiro

Akiman is the designer for the classic Street Fighter characters. Daigo Ikeno is the art director and character designer for Street Fighter IV. The last chapter is a collection of work from other artists.

Since this is a character based game, you'll see a lot of character designs. They are a mixture in sizes from small portraits to the full page group splash art. Most are full colored illustrations in myriad manga styles. There are captions for everything and several artists interviews.

Work comes from all the various different versions of Street Fighter, including spin-offs like Super Puzzle Fighter II, or even some SNK-vs-CAPCOM illustrations -- rivalry between King of Fighters and Street Fighter is strong and burning. Included also are the latest Street Fighter IV character profile designs used in the game.

The art here spans over an impressive 20 years, I'm very sure there will be more to come. This satisfying thick compilation is recommended to all Street Fighter fans and collectors.

If you have bought Street Fighter Tribute and Udon's Art of Capcom and like them, I'm very sure you'll like this book as well.

(More pictures are available on my blog. Just visit my Amazon profile for the link.)

Something that makes this book extremely special to my mind is the illustrators comment on their work or a particular illustration. There are a few short interviews on their experiences working with Street Fighter. The art is divided into to sections devoted to Akiman, Shinkiro, Ikeno, and much more. I am very happy with my copy and appreciate the love and detail that obviously went into compiling this volume.

One note though, not all the pictures are large, but its perfectly understandable with the sheer volume of illustrations in this already very loaded book.

Highly Recommend.

I had the Street Fighter art book that came out 5 years before this one, and up until now, regretted selling it when I needed extra money. It had practically every bit of official artwork related to Street Fighter, along with tons of other pieces that were for Japanese magazines and promotions- things we never got to see in the US until everything was a click away thanks to the internet. SF20 has everything that book had and much, much more, and it goes without saying that any fan of Street Fighter needs to track down a copy before it becomes even harder to find (it went out of print in the last couple of weeks).

Divided into chapters by artist, SF20 is a sight to behold. Akiman, Nishimura, CRMK, Ikeno, Daichan, Edayan, Shinkiro and many others all have their artwork from the SF games that they worked on. From character portraits to promotional calendars, there was never a dull moment on any page. Even simple black and white drawings or rough drafts had me analyzing everything that I saw, and I appreciated the time that went into even the most basic character designs. If you remember an illustration from an instruction manual, or even an ad in a comic book that had something to do with Street Fighter, you'll find it here.

Every game up until Street Fighter 4 is covered here in one way or another, and the only time non-SF characters appear is if it's in a group shot, and that's understandable. An example being Hsien-Ko or Felicia showing up in a group shot for Puzzle Fighter, but you won't see individual drawings of them anywhere. Yep, they did a great job being strict on trying to only show the SF cast, and I appreciate that. I also loved reading the little notes from the artists, found on 3/4 of the pages, giving us an insight on what they were thinking about when working on a piece, or talking about how tough the deadline was and what they did to make things go in their favor. At the end of each chapter is a short interview with the artist, but it's a bunch of basic questions like who they liked drawing the most, what SF character they play as, etc.

The only negative things I can say about this book would be that there are some typos here and there, and that I wish it would've been divided into sections by both game and artist. But those are very minor complaints, and after looking through the book long enough (I think I spent 3 hours going through everything slowly), you recognize individual styles and should quickly find what you're looking for if there's something you want to show a friend. Also, if you can, track down the hardcover version. The paperback is nice, but the binding isn't that strong and it cracks very easily. The hardcover version isn't even listed on Amazon, but it's out there, and was a limited edition.

What more can I say? This book is full of beautiful art, and just when I thought I'd seen the best picture of Chun-Li ever, another one would show up, and then another. SF20 is easily one of my favorite art books, and I'm wondering if a SF25 could be even better.

› Go to Amazon.com to see all 23 reviews  4.8 out of 5 stars