X-Men vs. Street Fighter (1996)

It's sort of wild how long it took for Capcom to get to this point, almost as if Marvel needed them to prove themselves in incremental ways before allowing their characters to crossover with Street Fighter characters. First, they had to show they could handle just the X-Men characters with X-Men: Children of the Atom. Then, they gave them a bit more leniency with all their characters for Marvel Super Heroes. Now, just the X-Men get involved in Marvel's first crossover with Capcom's biggest fighting series with X-Men vs. Street Fighter.

It's impressive how well these two worlds go together. Capcom made these Marvel characters feel just right, to the point that when they face off against these Street Fighter characters, it's just so natural. But even the endings sort of make sense, and I almost believe that like, Chun-Li could become a member of the X-Men, or M. Bison would be too extreme for Magneto. It's kind of amazing how successful Capcom was in making these worlds come together, but it's clearly done with care.

This might also be the best lineup in a Capcom/Marvel game so far, and they really did pick the characters you'd want to play, given these two franchises. Making this a 2 v 2 game, where you can mix both X-Men and Street Fighter only shows how well these worlds go together, and I even love how they try something new with their boss fights in the Apocalypse fight that brings in an entirely different type of strategy.

As someone who really jumped onto this series once it became Marvel vs. Capcom, I've been pleased with these early Marvel/Capcom teamups and how they try new things, and find new ways to push this collaboration further.