Street Fighter 6 is probably in development right now
Capcom has been among the most prominent Japanese video game developers and publishers of the past 30 years though the last year or so are going down as some of their most successful times ever as a business thanks to strong commercial hits like Monster Hunter World.
The company recently released their financial integrated report for the 2019 fiscal year and beyond detailing what Capcom plans to do with their iconic games and franchises like Street Fighter and Resident Evil. On top of that though they also casually drop how long their games take to develop plus how many years they plan on supporting new titles with DLC and updates.
In their section ‘Further refining IPs with development structure and brand strategy and foraying into new areas,’ Capcom’s second point for marketing strategy for creating global brands mentions it normally takes their developers three years to create a new title.
“As it takes about three years to develop a game, we used to have issues with a progressive decline in recognition during development,” reads Capcom’s IR section. “I came up with the idea that the most effective method for ongoing media exposure of game titles was to expand globally using Hollywood movie adaptations. In 1994, we decided to invest 4 billion yen to make a Street Fighter Hollywood movie. At that time, some thought I had taken up movies merely as a hobby, but this investment generated a return of approximately 15 billion yen and successfully established Street Fighter as a global brand.”
This information is interesting to see plainly spelled out like that though it gives us rough estimates of when many of their past games entered development and when we could maybe see future releases.
Given this time frame, we can assume that Street Fighter 5 then likely entered development at some point in 2013 or early 2014 considering it first launched at the start of 2016.
“As it takes about three years to develop a game, we used to have issues with a progressive decline in recognition during development”
That dating would put it around the time that development for Street Fighter x Tekken officially ceased following the 2013 version update and probably when Ultra Street Fighter 4 was in testing before its 2014 launch.
This could explain why both titles — and especially x Tekken — felt abruptly dropped after their final big updates because the majority of focus switched to developing what quickly became the Street Fighter 5 that we first saw in December 2014.
Similarities and ideas from Ultra Street Fighter 4’s Omega Mode, which we thought served as a bit of a test bed for SF5’s form, seems to hold true or even more probable considering the dates.
If we look back at the past as well, both Street Fighter 4 and 5 launched around a 1.5 to 2 years after the next consoles launched (Xbox 360 / PlayStation 3 and Xbox One / PS4).
Since we know that the PlayStation 5 is gearing up for a holiday 2020 release, it seems likely we could see a new Capcom fighting game launch sometime around 2022 unless they decide to shake things up.
If early 2022 is the projected release window for Street Fighter 6 or whatever Capcom’s next big fighting venture will be, that means it is likely already in development and has been for some time now.
Another important piece of information found in this section states that Capcom plans to extend the life of their future titles to three or four years using DLC, updates and sales.
“New titles will work as medium- to long-term growth drivers as we steadily release major titles each year, extend the sales life of these titles to 3–4 years with additional content and flexible pricing strategies and strengthen our presence overseas, which comprises approximately 85% of the total market,” said Capcom’s CEO.
We’ve seen these strategies already with Street Fighter 5 receiving continual updates and seasonal content, and it appears that will be the norm going forward especially if Monster Hunter World’s new Iceborne expansion is anything to go off of.
This may not always be the case, however, considering Resident Evil 2 and Devil May Cry 5 launched earlier in 2019 while still finding big commercial success, and neither game really received any new paid DLC additions post-launch.
Capcom has big plans going into the next generation of video game hardware looking to keep up their current hot-streak, and Street Fighter plus eSports will seemingly continue to be one of their main pillars moving forward.
