Capcom Fighting All-Stars: Code Holder

Capcom Fighting All Stars: Code Holder is a canceled crossover fighting game that was planned for the arcade and PlayStation 2.

Gameplay[]

The life system was 3-tiered: if the player lost one tier, a break moment would occur and then the fight would resume, much like the life system in The Night Warriors. However the life system was also linked to the power bar: for each tier lost, a character gained an additional level in the Super Combo gauge (at full life, a character only has single-level super combo moves). Super arts were handled in three tiers, each super costing one, two, or three levels to use them.

The game had a time limit, and depending of how long the player took to finish the game, the ending would vary.^[1]

Characters[]

Capcom_Fighting_All_Stars_Code_Holder — Capcom Fighting All Stars Code Holder

Capcom Fighters	Game Debut
Ryu	Street Fighter
Chun-Li	Street Fighter II
Akuma^[2]	Super Street Fighter II Turbo
Alex	Street Fighter III
Charlie	Street Fighter Alpha
Mike Haggar	Final Fight
Poison	Final Fight
Batsu	Rival Schools
Akira	Rival Schools
Strider Hiryu	Strider
Demitri Maximoff^[2]	Darkstalkers: The Night Warriors

Original Fighters	Info
Ingrid	Known as the "Eternal Goddess".
D.D.	Known as the "God of Thunder". Not much is known about him, but his fighting style seems to revolve around punches that electrocute foes. His design and moveset seem to be Tekken-inspired, with a punch that greatly resembles the Electric Wind God Fist.
Rook	Known as the "Fallen Angel". Not much is known about him, but he seems to use a foot oriented fighting style, and one of his special attacks seems to be a Jump Kick with his foot enveloped in light (resembling Fei-Long's technique).
Death	The main antagonist of the game. He was running around Metro City with a bomb, codenamed "Laughter Sun". Mike Haggar contacted the characters listed above in order to locate and defeat Death and then defuse the bomb.

Guest characters[]

Kyo Kusanagi (The King of Fighters) - Kyo's inclusion comes from the game's roots starting out as a sequel to Capcom vs SNK 2. After the game was reworked to a Capcom-only crossover, the then-reformed SNK Playmore gave Capcom permission to use one of their characters due in part to the involvement of ex-SNK staff assigned to this project (including Code Holder's director Toyohisa Tanabe).^[1]

Development[]

Originally, Capcom Fighting All-Stars was planned to be a 2D sequel to Capcom vs. SNK 2: Mark of the Millennium 2001, before being converted to 3D. However, due to SNK's financial troubles and restructuring, the title was redesigned as a Capcom-only crossover with twenty former SNK members designing it.^[3]

The game was Capcom's first attempt at creating an in-house 3D fighter, after the success of their Street Fighter EX series (which was produced by Arika). Capcom beta-tested the game but after negative feedback from players and more months in development, the game was canceled in August 2003.

According to an interview with former The King of Fighters director Toyohisa Tanabe, a secret character from Tanabe's old company (SNK) was set to be playable in Capcom Fighting All Stars.^[4]^[5]

Legacy[]

While the game never received an official release, the idea of Capcom's own characters in a crossover game would be instead used in a 2D fighting game Capcom Fighting Evolution, released in 2004. One of the original characters slated to debut in All-Stars, Ingrid, would appear in Capcom Fighting Evolution and later on in Street Fighter Alpha 3 MAX for the PlayStation Portable.

Capcom later revisited the concept of 2D fighters in 3D with the more traditional Street Fighter IV and Tatsunoko vs. Capcom.

In August 2016, new info and images for the game were added on the Street Fighter V encyclopedia site, including new unreleased posters (some made by Shinkiro, the artist who drawed the promotional arts from Capcom Fighting Evolution and Tatsunoko vs. Capcom) and the full reveal of the final boss Death (who was for many years only seen as a silhouette in one of the game flyers).^[2]