Capcom's goal for Ultra Street Fighter 4, a downloadable add-on for Super Street Fighter 4: Arcade Edition 2012, is to make "everybody a threat," according to a recent interview with Siliconera.
Speaking with the publication, fighting game manager Matt Dahlgren said that Capcom listened to fan feedback and rebalanced its characters accordingly.
"Our philosophy this time around has been to make everybody a threat," Dahlgren said. "We don't want to say these characters are the best in the game and nerf them — that isn't fair to the players that put a lot of time and effort in learning those tactics. The super powerful characters will have slight modifications, but our real intent is to take the lesser used characters and make them an equal threat as the top tier characters."
According to assistant battle director Peter Rosas, one such character was T-Hawk. Players complained that he wasn't fast enough and needed to rely on more than his command throw. Rebalancing the character gave him stronger attacks and more focus cancel options.
"All in an effort to give him a better fighting chance against characters you usually see at the end of a fighting tournament in the top eight," Rosas said.
Ultra Street Fighter 4 was announced earlier this month during the Evo fighting game championships. The expansion adds Elena, Rolento, Poison, Hugo and an unannounced fighter to the game, as well as new stages, modes and more.
The expansion will be available for $14.99 for those who already own Super Street Fighter 4 or Street Fighter 4 Arcade Edition, or as a standalone package for $39.99. Check out the announcement trailer here.