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Street Fighter 6: everything you need to know in 2025
Following its second birthday celebrations, we take a look at the current state of the top technical fighter, Street Fighter 6.
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It’s been just over two years since the sixth main instalment in the venerable Street Fighter franchise landed. In this time, the game has become one of the most popular in the series' history, having recently celebrated the milestone of 5m sales. This progression has been spurred on by constant updates, limited-time events and plenty of new character drops. If you’re just getting into SF6, there’s never been a better time to get up to speed. Equally, if you’re returning from a break, let this serve as a refresher as you step back into the arena.
01
The three pillars of gameplay: Fighting Ground, World Tour and Battle Hub
Fighting Ground is the classic Street Fighter mode
© Capcom
Street Fighter 6 is built on three core game modes. Fighting Ground is a classic versus mode, with a structure reminiscent of past Street Fighter titles. World Tour is a campaign mode, where you create your own character. Battle Hub is the game’s online platform. Read on for more info about the latter two modes.
02
Create your legend in World Tour mode
With the character editor you can create your personal Street Fighter
© Capcom
For single-player gamers, the core of Street Fighter 6 is the World Tour mode. Here, you can create a character and explore the game world in a story-driven adventure where you’ll meet rivals and iconic characters, learn new moves and fight your way to the top. You’ll undertake this quest as your own created character, which you can develop using the incredible new in-depth character creator system.
Learn more about World Tour with Red Bull Levels:
The World Tour mode starts in Metro City, the same location as Final Fight. This location serves as one of two open-world-style hubs, along with Nayshall – an Asian nation that serves an important role in the story. In addition to the free-roaming hubs, there are 10 locations around the world to explore, including locations in Italy, England, France, Japan, Brazil, USA, Russia, India, Mexico and Jamaica. These are expanded versions of the game’s main stages, so they don’t include as much content as the aforementioned hubs. That said, they're still well worth exploring to find new moves, characters and secrets.
There are tonnes of activities to enjoy in World Tour mode. The main thrust of the mode is to link up with Masters - the main characters of the Street Fighter series - to add their moves to your arsenal. You’ll do this by taking on missions and defeating them in battle. You can also compete in mini-games and take on part-time jobs. Look out for some fan-favourite mini-games from previous titles!
Gachikun, Bonchan, and Daigo got to grips with Street Fighter 6
© Jason Halayko / Red Bull Content Pool
Watch more Street Fighter content
03
The Drive Gauge
The core of Street Fighter 6’s fighting mechanics is the newly developed Drive Gauge. This uses a Drive bar that works independently from your Super bar. Instead of charging it up by using offensive or defensive actions, it charges itself over time. This encourages the player to take risks and use the Drive Gauge – as once it’s full, it'd be a waste not to use it.
You'll start games with a fully stocked Drive Gauge
© Capcom
This bar can be used for the following moves:
- Drive Impact: An attack that absorbs enemy hits and hits them with a powerful attack – similar to a Focus Attack from Street Fighter IV.
- Drive Parry: If you keep the Drive Parry pressed, you’ll constantly spend Drive, but you’ll parry all attacks in this time. Parrying with perfect timing triggers a Perfect Parry, reminiscent of the Parry mechanics from Street Fighter III.
- Overdrive: Spending two bars of your Drive Gauge will enable you to give your special moves an Overdrive enhancement, such as more damage, further reach, or faster speed. This is similar to EX Moves from past Street Fighter titles.
- Drive Rush: This is a dash cancel for attack and parries, enabling you to perform difficult combos.
- Drive Reversal: Here, the Drive Reversal acts similarly to V-Reversals seen in Street Fighter V. This will cause your character to perform a counter that does little damage but can give you some breathing room.
Luke blocks an attack from Jamie with the Drive Parry
© Capcom
04
Controls: Modern vs Classic
Street Fighter 6 offers an alternative control option for newcomers. The game calls this control type 'Modern' and it's a bit reminiscent of the 'Stylish' option found in Arc System Works’ fighters Guilty Gear and BlazBlue.
The modern and classic control types in Street Fighter 6
© Capcom
The modern style is simpler and, above all, makes it much easier to do special moves. However, Capcom adds emphasis that only the Classic Style allows full control over the character. This means that if you want to get the most out of your fighter, you should look at the classic style.
Professional Street Fighter player Masato ‘Bonchan’ Takahashi gave us his perspective on the changes, saying: "I find the modern controls to be a nice addition to the game.”
“There wasn’t such a system in the other games I played,” he added. “I believe that the immediate first challenge for newcomers is to be able to insert the commands. The modern controls solve that issue.”
REJECT pro Daigo 'The Beast' Umehara felt similarly, too. “There have been a few attempts at adding easier controls in past Capcom games, however they never really took off,” he says. "You'd end up being stronger, or having more fun with regular controls most of the time.”
“However, new modern controls may be used to be stronger or have more fun in some situations,” he adds. “I really agree with that way to make the game more accessible. I really felt the efforts put in making the game this time. I believe it can become the best game in the series.”
Take a deep dive into Street Fighter controls
05
The character roster
Street Fighter is best known for its iconic cast of characters. Street Fighter 6 continues the trend with returning fighters, and new entrants to the series - highlighted in bold.
- Blanka
- Cammy
- Chun-Li
- Dee Jay
- Dhalsim
- E. Honda
- Guile
- Jamie
- JP
- Juri
- Ken
- Kimberly
- Lily
- Luke
- Manon
- Marisa
- Ryu
- Zangief
Street Fighter mainstays such as Ryu and Chun-Li have returned
© Capcom
There have also been nine characters added so far in DLC packs. These DLCs drop once a year and contain four characters – generally a mixture of new characters and returning favourites. You can see the full list below.
Year 1
- A.K.I.
- Akuma
- Ed
- Rashid
Year 2
- M. Bison
- Terry
- Elena
- Mai
Year 3
- Sagat
- C. Viper (coming Autumn 2025)
- Alex (coming Spring 2026)
- Ingrid (coming Spring 2026)
06
Extreme Battles
Street Fighter 6 aims to be a versatile title and appeal to a wide variety of players. That’s why there are fun extras added to this edition, allowing you to enjoy the game away from its traditional fighting gameplay.
Watch for the bombs! Ridiculous things happen in Extreme Battles
© Capcom
Extreme Battles are fights with changing rules and gimmicks, which are set to shake up your encounters. For example, a bull may run through the arena and throw fighters around, or you may punch and kick a bomb back and forth until it explodes. These extra gimmicks will shake up your regular battles, but while some luck may be involved, skill is also a factor, as you may be able to incorporate the additional dangers into your combos.
07
Battle Hub – the online lobby
The Battle Hub is a place where you can spend time with your avatar. Here you can sit down at different arcade machines and play against other players online.
Street Fighter 6 takes you back to the days of competing in the arcade
© Capcom
However, the Battle Hub is far more than just a fancy interface for playing online matches. You can listen to the game's songs on the DJ set or take cool snapshots in the photo booth. You can also get new clothes for your avatar – you earn the currency for this in online battles. If you want to spend some time with another Capcom classic, no problem. Just sit down at one of the other arcade cabs and play titles like Final Fight or Street Fighter II for a retro fix. This is also where you’ll find details about new limited-time events and collaborations, like last year’s Spy x Family event.
Bonchan is all-in for Street Fighter 6
© Jason Halayko/Red Bull Content Pool
08
Commentary from real esports casters
New with Street Fighter 6 is the ability to have your matches accompanied by a selection of commentators, just like in real life tournaments such as Red Bull Kumite. Their phrases should also help new players get a better feel for the game. For example, they indicate how much super meter you have or mention if you repeatedly make a certain mistake.
Eight different commentators are featured, four of each of the two commentary types: play-by-play commentary and colour commentary, the latter being optional.
Play-by-play commentators:
- Aru
- Jeremy 'Vicious' Lopez
- Steve 'TastySteve' Scott
- Kosuke Hiraiwa
Colour commentators:
- Demon Kakka
- Thea 'Zelina Vega' Trindad
- James 'jchensor' Chen
- Hikaru Takahashi
09
Street Fighter League
A huge part of Street Fighter’s fandom is its esports scene. Street Fighter League is the flagship esports league for the game, and it's a truly unique proposition in the world of fighting games. This league brings team-based action to the 1v1 title, with thrilling round-based matches with teams of four. The league is about to enter its seventh year, with leagues now across Japan, the USA and Europe. The season will culminate in the epic SFL World Championship in Japan. You can learn more about Street Fighter League here.
Looking to take your Street Fighter 6 game to the next level? Find out which controllers the pros use in Street Fighter 6.
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