Balance changes are finally on the horizon for Street Fighter 6.
Capcom, the developer of the popular fighting game, Street Fighter, has announced that balance updates are on the way for Street Fighter 6. According to a post on X, these balance updates are coming with the “Alex Update” on 17 March:
They’ve also noted that both the upcoming character, Alex, and the balance changes “are still currently in development,” so this means that the demo version of the game at the upcoming Taipei Game Show event and SFL JP Grand Finals won’t reflect the adjustments just yet.
Alex, who was once a hero in Street Fighter III, was revealed as the next playable character in Street Fighter 6 a couple of weeks ago as a more ruthless version of the character in the current game.
Capcom rethinking patch size and update frequency
This arrives only weeks after Producer Shuhei Matsumoto spoke in a livestream about re-evaluating the size of changes, and how often patches are released for Street Fighter 6.
At the time, the host of the show, Daigo, asked if Akuma was getting buffed. Matsumoto did not give a firm answer, but he did shed light on how Capcom is thinking about the future of Street Fighter 6. Ongoing internal discussions could potentially result in updates arriving more regularly when adjustments are required.
"With esports and development working alongside each other, it's been a bit... I wanted to talk about balancing and adjustments, and you know we did a patch back in December and the amount of changes there," responded Matsumoto.
Street Fighter did receive a smaller balance patch in December, which involved balance changes on Elena, Mai, Sagat, and a few other characters. However, according to the developers, player feedback was that more balance changes were expected at that time.
"There were a lot of people who kind of felt that it wasn't quite at the level they had expected, and that response from people which reflected that sentiment felt like it was bigger than it had been before," he added.
Some members of the Street Fighter Reddit community believe that characters like Ed, Ryu, and Mai need potential nerfs, while powercrept characters like Dee Jay and Cammy, and other low-tier charactetrs like Chun-Li, Zangief, and more are in dire need of attention.
Capcom hasn't shared what the exact balance changes are going to be since they're currently still in development, so players will have to watch out for upcoming announcements before 17 March, 2026, when Alex arrives in-game.
