While players in the fighting game community are often pleased to see the end result of work on Ultra Street Fighter IV, we are rarely afforded insight on what goes on behind-the-scenes to make gameplay adjustments and balance changes a reality. Capcom’s Peter “Combofiend” Rosas recently sat down with Eurogamer to do just that, chronicling his journey from top competitor to community manager to providing input on the company’s flagship fighter.

After working on a few Street Fighter x Tekken ver. 2013 videos, Rosas was officially asked to work on collecting feedback from the western community on what they would like to see in an updated version of Street Fighter IV. Unfortunately, it wasn’t all useful. “People are just throwing darts at a board,” Rosas explains. “They just want their character to be super powered. Everybody wants to be a champion, right?”

But he wasn’t the only one discussing such matters with players. Capcom Japan, as many of you know, conducted their own reconnaissance work with competitors in their country, which naturally led to some differences in philosophy. Japanese players, Rosas opines, have worked out ways to make Street Fighter a one-player game, while westerners are generally more interested in outthinking their opponents. A large part of his time with Ultra has been spent trying to pair western and eastern philosophies.

Fortunately, one of the largest boons to Rosas’ work has been his many years of high-level tournament play, which he is able to bring to the table when discussing balance changes.

“You could say something might be too strong and in theory something might be broken, but if you have to play someone you have to take the human element into account, the human error, pressure, the emotions, all of that that goes into a match,” he mentions. “If you played a robot then maybe some of that stuff might be too strong, but being a tournament player for so many years and travelling around and seeing what Street Fighter is, sometimes my approach is, take a risk, put some of the more awesome stuff in there.”

While much of the article is about Rosas’ transition to working at Capcom and design philosophy, it also contains some good information on Ultra’s new game mechanics, what the future may hold for the Street Fighter series and even fighting games in general, shedding his old life as a competitor, and more.

All in all, this piece is a great look at the work that goes into their goal of creating a fulfilling fighting game experience for players of all backgrounds. Be sure to check out the entire interview by visiting Eurogamer.

Source: Eurogamer via NeoGAF