Street Fighter 6’s Year 4 Has Fans Divided Like Never Before

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The latest DLC announcement for Street Fighter 6 revealed the game’s line-up of fighters for its fourth Character Pass, showing an unpredictable arrangement of new arrivals. Four characters are coming to Year 4 of the game, but none of them hold any history within the franchise itself. As a result of this, many fans are either surprisingly excited or furious at the Character Pass, leading to a division that has sparked relentless discourse.

Year 4 characters come after Capcom decided to end support for World Tour, the single-player and pseudo story mode for the game. Originally, new characters added through Character Pass DLC would also be implemented into World Tour, where players could learn about their personalities and history while training in their fighting style. With new Avatar arcade mode, players no longer have to meet characters through World Tour to unlock their alternate costumes either.

Street Fighter 6’s Year 4 Character Pass Introduces Tifa From Final Fantasy & Three Newcomers

The biggest announcement for Street Fighter 6‘s Year 4 Character Pass was the addition of Tifa Lockhart, the popular and powerful fighter from Final Fantasy 7. Fans have been wanting Tifa in a fighting game for a while, hoping to see her in either Tekken or Street Fighter. As previously rumored, Tifa is the third downloadable character in the pass, joining the Street Fighter universe as a guest character thanks to the mysterious forces brought in by Ingrid.

Unlike previous years, all of the new characters in Year 4 of Street Fighter are completely original. The only exception is one fighter who previously appeared as a rival character in the game’s World Tour mode. Here’s a look at the Year 4 roster:

  • Tifa Lockhart (Early 2027)
  • Yasmine (Summer 2026)
  • Arjun (Autumn 2026)
  • Bosch (Spring 2027)

As a huge Street Fighter fan, I’m so excited about the new characters Capcom just revealed! We’ll start seeing them roll out in Summer 2026, beginning with Yasmine. She’s a high school student from the Philippines, and her story is really cool – she’s searching for her missing brother. She fights with a karambit and is surprisingly fierce, using quick, powerful moves she learned from her grandfather, or ‘Lolo.’ Then there’s Arjun, who’s trained by Dhalsim! But his fighting style is totally different – he uses a bare-knuckle Yoga approach, making him a unique addition to the roster.

Arjun remains on the run after being accused of killing a colleague as a cop in India, with his Street Fighter appearance marking his search for the real culprit. For those who played World Tour, Bosch is your character’s rival, someone who was also initially trained by Luke. From the nation of Nayshall, Bosch is someone searching for the meaning of strength, using both ancient techniques from his homeland and modern fighting styles to express Nayshall’s warrior faith.

Veteran Fans Are Disappointed That Returning Fighters From Other Games Didn’t Make The Cut

While many fans are happy with Tifa as the latest guest character in Street Fighter, the choices for other additions have been controversial. A lot of players were hoping to see characters from older Street Fighter games, particularly those less featured like SF3: Third Strike or Street Fighter 4. Fans had requested characters such as Vega, Makoto, Dudley, Sean, Necro, and Abel to be included in SF6‘s Year 4 content.

However, many players feel that adding new characters is a positive for the game, pointing to the success of Street Fighter 6. Characters like Manon and Marisa have become fan favorites, but the last completely new character added to Street Fighter 6 was Aki, released with the initial DLC. While Street Fighter 5 largely focused on bringing back existing characters, it still introduced Luke as a brand-new fighter in a similar way.

Regardless of player opinions, having three out of the four DLC characters be original fighters is a large risk Capcom is taking. Unlike someone like C. Viper or Sagat from the previous Character Pass, players don’t have a connection with these fighters to invest in buying them, even if they are interested in their gameplay. Without nostalgia to drive some players, these fighters may not generate the excitement around the game Capcom was expecting, even if Tifa drives up a lot of sales.

Players might start to like characters such as Yasmine, Arjun, and Bosch if they prove to be fun and engaging to watch and play. While competitive players will always explore new characters to understand how they match up against others, getting a wider audience interested will require showing them why these characters are worth playing. While many will likely try out Tifa in Street Fighter 6, building a dedicated following for other characters will take more effort and information to get people excited.

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2026-06-09 22:40