Hey everyone!

Street Fighter V is about to get a lot more “beautiful” with the latest character reveal of the Spanish Ninja himself: Vega!

A mainstay in the franchise since his introduction in Street Fighter II, Vega believes that beauty is the truest form of strength and that he alone is the epitome of perfection. The mask he wears serves to protect his face from the blood of his victims, and his deadly three-pronged claw ensures he is able to dish out pain from a safe distance away. Learning ninjutsu at a young age from a Japanese acquaintance, Vega quickly shot up the ranks in Shadaloo, eventually becoming one of the four bosses of the criminal organization.

Top: Vega art from Super Street Fighter II

Bottom: Vega in Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix

Vega returns to Street Fighter V with a brand new look and new tricks up his frilly sleeves. Possessing his trademark speed and quickness, Vega now has access to two distinct fighting modes: with claw and without claw.

That’s right, he now has the ability to sheathe his claw during battle in exchange for new moves, such as a command grab, as well as new attack properties, greatly changing the way he approaches each fight. Knowing when to toggle between the two styles will be the key to success, and it also allows for new combo possibilities. Conversely, Vega will no longer be able to pick up his claw once it’s knocked off, so knowing how to fight without the claw is a must! Players who enjoy tricky movement and the technical challenge of switching between claw/no-claw fighting styles will definitely find the beauty in Vega’s play style.

V-Skill: Matador Turn

Vega swiftly dodges the opponent’s incoming attack and chooses whether to launch a quick counterattack that knocks them down or not.

V-Trigger: Bloody Kiss

Vega throws a rose at high velocity towards the opponent. If it hits, he charges behind it and delivers a series of brutal slashes that devastate the enemy. The move can be done as an anti-air from crouch or as an air attack when jumping forward, making it an extremely versatile projectile attack, as well as a combo extender.

Fans attending Gamescom this week will be able to experience the character first hand on the show floor at the Sony booth, so be sure to stop by! I’ll certainly be looking forward to seeing what players come up with once they get their hands on the character. Till next time!

Number: DWN-027

Weapon:  Drill Bomb

Weakness:  Dive Missile

Modified from a hole-digging robot originally used at construction sites. His tendency to drill underground is annoying.

How could something as innocent and unassuming as a bipedal, semi-intelligent robot covered in industrial-grade drills go so wrong? I’m sure it seemed like a good idea when it was born from Dr. Cossack’s brain, but the combat modifications forced upon Drill Man by Dr. Wily have turned this drill bot into a  kill bot. 

As noted, Drill Man comes armed with a set of enormous electric drills, which he can use to burrow through the ground and avoid attacks, then pop up under unsuspecting victims and give them the drilling of a lifetime. He also possesses the almighty Drill Bomb, a projectile which drills through targets’ armor before triggering a powerful detonation. Ouch!

Like all drills, however, Drill Man has a weakness: heat-seeking missiles! Use Dive Man’s Dive Missile to make Drill Man take a chill pill, man. 

Just two weeks left to enter our Mega Man Legacy Collection fan art contest! Submit your entry to be one of six winners who get a free copy of the game!

You’re tasked with “re-imagining” the covers to one of the six original Mega Man titles, creating a key art that is much more indicative of the in-game action. We have some solid entries but there’s still time to get yours in too !

To keep the creative juices flowing, each week we’re debuted new art for each of the aforementioned six MM titles. This week is a  great Mega Man 5 piece by Chamba; I wanted to capture the Mega Man / “Proto Man” rivalry aspect that was absent in the original NES art, plus show off the inverted antics of Gravity Man!

CONTEST RULES: From now until August 14th, you can email one entry to  contest@capcom.com  (labeled MMLC ART CONTEST) and be entered for a chance to win one of six copies of the game. We will notify winners by September 4th, 2015 at the latest. Please submit an entry that depicts your ideal Mega Man box / key art, choosing one of the six Mega Man games collected in MMLC.  Please also read the full contest rules.

There is no min/max size but it’s generally nice to have art that’s high-res (i.e. not like 300 pixels wide or something)  and  if you’re taking a photo instead of scanning, just make sure the image is clean and it shows your work in a positive light.

Catch the Mega Man 4 art right here!

Dante is one of the most complex action characters in gaming, but that didn’t stop our Round 2 entrants from making his gameplay look like second nature. With expert displays of inertia, distortion, jump canceling, and more, you guys broke so many laws of physics I nearly had to notify the authorities. Anyway, hit the jump for our Round 2 community vote results as well as the rules for Round 3, which starts now!

The Dante round came down to a close vote between Essedieffe and SpawnShooter . In the end, Essedieffe eked by with the majority vote at 30%, beating out SpawnShooter’s 28%. GarudaPSN once again secured the third-place position with 20% of the vote.

Congratulations to our Round 2 winner and second tournament Finalist, Essedieffe!

Now then! Onto the rules for Round 3!

First, be sure to check the  initial tournament post  for important information about how to submit. 

FULL CONTEST RULES

Round 3 Rules: 

Character: Trish

Difficulty: Son of Sparda

Modifiers: Turbo Mode is optional! You may choose the costume of your preference. 

Mission: 12

Fight: “Meeting Room” fight, against the Mega Scarecrows.* You do not have to perform the entire fight in 60 seconds, but the clip itself must be limited to a 60-second (or shorter) piece of the fight. It may, of course, be shorter than 60 seconds.

*Yes, this is the same as the Dante fight, but I think the Mega Scarecrows hold a lot of potential for Trish as well. We’ll switch it up again for the Lady round. 

Deadline: Monday, August 3rd @12:00pm (noon) PDT

Good luck, and may the most stylish player win!

We’ve seen amazing hunters and beautiful Guildmarms , now it’s time to see some group photos and even more hunters from Anime Expo 2015:

And with all that, our series of Anime Expo 2015 cosplay photos comes to a conclusion. Be sure to check out part 1 and part 2 for more shots of individual cosplayers and a couple more group photos.

I also wanted to send a big thanks to Kinokashi and her team for organizing this annual cosplay gathering; and a big thanks to all the cosplayers who took the time (and lots of effort and materials) to make awesome MH cosplay. It was really something special to see all you in one place with real-life armor sets and made me really glad to be part of this community. It also really made me want to cosplay as hunter one day, but that’s besides the point. =P

It’s also worth noting that I was not the only one there taking photos, and I know for a fact that I missed a couple of cosplayers throughout the event (Caravaneer and Najarala gunner come to mind), so please look out for more AX2015 photos on the web (here’s a popular set on Tumblr , for example).

Thanks again for being so awesome! Keep it up, hunters!

Number: DWN-026