The balance changes in Season 2 of Street Fighter were comprehensive but filled with decisions that the community don’t really agree on, with massive nerfs to some characters that was a staple in high-level tournaments to be completely see no use.
Interestingly, Capcom will attempt to remedy this by issuing a balance patch coming at the end of April. While the main idea of having balance changes only happening off season was not to have mid-season changes to swing in favour of certain players in the Capcom Pro Tour, looks like the balance issues are concerning enough that it has to be remedied sooner.
As stated in the post over at Capcom Unity, “our goal is not to weaken the stronger cast members, but to strengthen those who we felt weren’t faring as well as would like to see.” That said, there are some nerfs included in this patch, like a change to Urien’s EX Chariot Tackle.
The buffs are plenty. Dhalsim and Zangief for instance are getting new moves. The controversial change to shoryukens (where the Season 2 update changes a lot of its invincibility properties that has never been touched in previous games) has some rework, and a lot of changes that are to mitigate accidental inputs alongside general buffs.
The patch notes are all detailed included with commentary on why the changes were made, so head on over the patch notes here to see the full list. The addition of Kolin had also fixed a few bugs that they are now revealing.
A quick glance in the comments seem like this may not satisfy most fans yet, but a good move in general. Let’s hope Capcom makes the right changes to keep Street Fighter fans returning to this game because it’s genuinely fun and rewarding.