Being attached to someone can give birth to quite a few problems. A best friend can be a dick in the eyes of other people, but to you, he’s a saint and his dick moments are easily forgiven... Sometimes. But for those few times you do detect his doucheness and have a fall out or argument, its only a matter of time before youre boys again.

Just as you all predicted, this relationship can be related to fighting game characters. Ever since super street fighter 2, i have always been a Ryu player. I had this thing for basic plain all rounded characters. Ryu always felt solid. He didn’t need fiery fisted shoryukens like Ken had and he didn’t have lightning lit legs as Akuma did in MvC2. At times I didn't like his lack of combos (At the time I thought he didn't have a lot) and got plain bored of him now and again, but I always came back to him. Ryu was just raw barefooted white gi'd bad assery.

After a few birthdays, christmases and new years, we came across Street Fighter 3: 3rd strike. This is where me and Ryu demolished our vows and said our goodbyes. He was a good character in the game and after seeing high level players use him well I retained lots of respect for him as a character but after playing my friends Ken in over 100 three round matches and losing about 70 of them, i felt it was time to jump ship.



I don’t clearly remember why I became so interested in Makoto. I don’t remember the fateful day on the character select screen where I chose her and stayed with her. All I know is that everything I loved about Ryu, was within her. She was even more raw and basic. From her karate styled walking animation to the fact she had no projectiles. Pure goodness. But what really had me going was the way she screamed CHESTO! Every time she did a hayate. Chesto... What does that even mean? Is the move is so raw that she has to mention a part of her body that has nothing to do with the attack itself? Or maybe she’s referring to the inner strength in her chest that is required to move at that speed? Either way, it was just awesome. And that grab! The karakusa... If you get chocked your getting a chesto afterwards, without fail!

There were so many cool things about Makoto. I think the way she is so over the top about all her moves, has such a basic design, is slow but quick at the same time and was so underrated at a point in time, is a few reasons why I stuck to her.
But now we come to a new era in ssf4.

After getting over the changes that im sure every 3rd strike Makoto player had to adjust to, i became very upset. For me, one of Makoto’s strengths was her spike damage and how you could punish opponents with it. One parry and one karakusa was all it took for a hard punch into an off the wall kick juggle into an axe kick and a raging chesto! Bam! 50% health in the gutter trash. However, due to the absence of parrying in sf4 in place of its cousin; the focus attack, the chances for makoto to punish after anticipation or making openings, was cut in half.
Certain cancelable variants where done away with and her walk speed is now the slowest in the game.
Still I played her online, and for the most part, got my ass spanked with bamboo.

Discouraged i did not become. Thanks to regular reads on Eventhubs and Shoryuken.com forums and watching videos along with hitting the training mode, ive now become a decent C+ makoto.
Being skeptical on the changes that Capcom made to her at 1st I’m now fully embracing the fact that as makoto players, we have to work slightly harder. (against most opponents anyway) Many times have i won a match against a hard match up and received a message saying 'good makoto' or 'nice to see a makoto player'. I’m very sure that’s something a lot of us see.



I still lose quite a bit though. The gift (and curse) of makoto is the constant need to be mixing up your game. Sometimes it comes down to a smart guess or a full on random gamble to win a match. And if you guess wrong or they guess right, your eating a whiff sandwich with some fries. Recently my PP dropped from 1200 to about 400. Just from losing to the most cheesiest tactics or my mind not being sharp enough, etc. In the end, my resolve for playing her has and will never change. I used to play a bit of Ibuki back in 3rd strike and was going to try and main both her and makoto, but after playing makoto for sooo long and simply walking forward with Ibuki, it felt so weird. I was like 'why am I moving so fast?! That cant be allowed right!'

Its going to be a while before I fully decide to pick up someone else. I’m way too attached and love the way she plays. Why do you use Makoto? Is there something special about her to you personally that hasn’t been mentioned here? I’d love to know how Makoto players feel, or even those who have tried picking her up and didn’t really like her much or gave up after losing quite a bit.

Right now, using the character i use feels like playing a game called 'Makoto' in a game called Super Street Fighter 4. She is that fun in my eyes.

CHESTO!!!