Street Fighter 3: 2nd Impact

Introduction

Street Fighter III: 2nd Impact is the version of Street Fighter III released right before 3rd Strike. Released in 1997, less than a year after New Generation was released, is a much needed update, adding new characters, new stages and several quality of life improvements to New Generation while also fixing balance issues New Generation might've had (for the most part).

The game itself is very different to 3rd Strike and should be treated as such. It's a simple, more explosive game than the game that came after it and you'll find certain mechanics/normals etc. completely missing or changed.

You can find the game on Arcade and Dreamcast, with the former being recommended due to inaccuracies and the existence of Fightcade 2, which is where you'll be able to find matches for the game.

Game Mechanics

Dashing - Double tapping forward/back will allow you to dash either forwards or back

Super Jump - Jumping after tapping down/downforward/downback will give you a higher jump.

Blocking - You hold back and downback to block, simple enough.

Parrying - Tapping forward as a move is about to hit you grants you a parry, which gives you a significant advantage over the opponent while also allowing you to punish certain moves that cannot be punished on block otherwise. You can parry lows by tapping down (not downforward).

Air Parrying - Yes, They Work In This Game! You can air parry a move by tapping forward or down in the air. There is a major difference between them as well, with forward parrying in the air leaving you far away from the opponent and parrying with down in the air leaving you extremely close to the opponent.

Universal Overhead - Doing down twice and then punch/kick will allow you to do your universal overhead. These are typically better in this game so learn how to use these. If you do them with two punches/kicks you will spend your own bar for no additional benefit.

Throws - They're proximity throws in this game, with some throws being character specific, the general idea is that you do forward or back and either MP/MK/HP/HK depending on the character,

Throw Teching - You can tech throws in this game by throwing at about the same time as your opponent.

EX Moves - Doing a special with two punches/kicks will give you a more powerful/enhanced version of the move you wanna do with some exceptions (Akuma/Gouki doesn't have EX moves as an example)

Quick Rise - Down as you're knocked down, certain moves cause hard knockdowns which disallow you from doing this.

Personal Action/Taunt - HP+HK at the same time, the benefit of a taunt is per character, but much like 3rd Strike they have a benefit in this game.

Game Versions

Arcade (Normal) - The game how it is meant to be played.

Dreamcast - The game how it is meant to be played with inaccuracies that affect balance to some extent (EX Universal Overhead glitch was removed), I don't recommend this version at all unless you want a basic barebones and can ignore some inaccuracies.

Arcade (Widescreen) - no. (Widescreen breaks and affects the balancing of the game. Do a move that causes a wall bounce, then come back to this part of the wiki after you've laughed for 5 minutes.)

30th Anniversary (PS4/XBONE/Switch/PC) - I mean, if you want to. Modding it on PC will allow you have a bootleg 2i Training Mode that barely works probably. 30th Anniversary just sucks in general and I cannot recommend it, I can, however, recommend you commit the criminal act of robbing your neighbor who might own this game just so you can get it for free.

The Characters

• Ken
• Ryu
• Elena
• Urien
• Hugo
• Ibuki
• Oro
• Yun
• Yang
• Sean
• Alex
• Dudley
• Necro
• Akuma

Tier List

OLD TIER LIST

(Keep in mind that this tier list doesn't reflect the opinions of people who currently play this game, this being left up here with slight reformatting for posterity)

This is a tier list that is generally agreed upon among the 2I players on the SRK forums. Keep in mind that this game no longer has a competitive scene.

Top Tier: Ibuki, Gouki, Sean

Upper Tier: Yang, Ryu, Dudley

Middle Tier: Ken, Yun, Necro, Elena

Low Tier: Alex, Urien

Bottom Tier: Hugo

2022 Tier List (Non-JP)

This is probably a more accurate tier list at the moment, it's ultimately not too different to the older tier list in the grand scheme of things but I do feel like there's been a fair bit of progress when it comes to how people play this game. The general idea is that the characters can be split up into three groups: good characters, okay characters and bad characters.

I highly recommend you stick to High Tier and Mid Tier, anyone below will take work and is probably not worth it in the grand scheme of things.

High Tier: Gouki, Ibuki, Sean, Yang, Yun

Mid Tier: Ryu, Dudley, ken

Low Tier: Elena, Urien, Oro, Alex, Necro, Hugo

JP Tier List (2021)

This tier list is admittedly very condensed (even in comparison to the tier list above, I'm keeping the original tier list formatting for posterity)

SS: Gouki

S: Yun

A: Sean, Ibuki, Yang

B~D: Dudley, Ken, Ryu, Oro, Necro, Urien, Elena, Hugo, Alex

...I told you it was gonna be condensed.