There are two types of fans of console fighting games - those that treat them as a fun bit of button mashing, and want as much sparkly stuff as possible, and those who revel in games with strategic depth, learning intricate combination attacks and getting timing down to sub-animation frame times. Virtua Fighter has always appealed more to the latter crowd - while there's some fun to be had pitting a massive wrestler against a seemingly drunk Chinese chap, it's only in the hands of experts that said drunken chap will twirl around on his head, kicking seven shades of brown stuff out of the wrestler. Unless, of course, the wrestler is also being used by an expert, in which case it's anyone's fight.

Virtua Fighter 5 doesn't significantly alter this scenario. Certainly, it looks quite a bit better than previous iterations of the series, and the visuals of two top-rank players going at it will draw in your friends at first, but as soon as they pick up a Sixaxis controller and get into it, they'll be soundly trounced by even the most basic computer AI. That scenario will play itself out again and again and again, until they either give up in disgust - we'd suggest having some padded walls nearby to protect your Sixaxis controller when they throw it - or they'll get horribly hooked, and do nothing but continue playing until they've mastered every motion, fake, cancel and grab for every single character. In an age where seemingly every title goes for as broad an audience as possible, Virtua Fighter 5 takes a different path, spitting in the faces of the masses and instead appealing directly to only the most hardcore of hardcore fight game fans.

What's surprising about Virtua Fighter 5 is how initially the fighting appears to be almost stupidly simple. Everything in-game can be accomplished with just three buttons - kick, punch and guard. In an age where most games controllers have more buttons than we mere humans have fingers, it seems almost archaic, until you poke beneath the surface and realise that simple button mashing will quickly see you defeated. Virtua Fighter 5 is an incredibly complex game, and that's displayed most intricately by the fact that there are no "easy" or "hard" characters to speak of. Every single fighter is balanced against every single other fighter, and the game essentially lies in knowing which moves to use against which characters in a given fight. The ingame AI is sharp and will punish anyone who uses repetitive attacks, as will good human opponents.

Virtua Fighter 5 does have a storyline of sorts - but even Sega can't be bothered to pretend it matters, jamming it into a single half-page above the manual's contents page. Virtua Fighter has always focused on the fighting aspect of the game; the plot is entirely secondary. Characters could be fighting for revenge, respect, or just the last slice of pepperoni pizza, and it wouldn't change the game one jot.

In deference to its arcade roots, Virtua Fighter 5 features an arcade mode where you face off against the other combatants before facing the seemingly indestructible Dural, as you've done in Virtua Fighter games before. Arcade mode is certainly playable - if not a bit predictable - but it's the game's other modes that make it shine. There's quest mode, where you travel between different Japanese arcades, taking on computer-controlled "players" in a reasonable simulation of real arcade play, but with none of the smoke or broken joysticks. Quest mode also allows you to track win/loss statistics and earn new customisations for your character - although these are all strictly cosmetic adornments that don't add new features per se.

Versus play is an obvious inclusion, as is a training Dojo, although you're actually better off playing the arcade game - it's the only way to really learn how Virtua Fighter works. One thing you won't find in Virtua Fighter 5 is an online mode, which is a touch annoying. Certainly, the very precise nature of fighting in Virtua Fighter 5 would make any kind of lag at all absolutely shattering, but given that it's almost a staple of fighting games these days, it's still sorely missed.

If you've read this far, you're probably a fan of the series, and if so, you're probably more interested to know what's new in Virtua Fighter 5, beyond the sparkly new visuals. Your selection of 17 fighters is made up of 15 previously available fighters, stretching all the way back to Virtua Fighter with series stalwarts such as Akira and Sarah Bryant.

The first new combatant is Rey Mysterio impersonator El Blaze, a Mexican Luchadore with an array of deadly high speed (and high risk) strikes and grapples, and Eileen, a Chinese lass who's almost certainly sick of Dexy's Midnight Runners jokes and has taken up Kou-Ken martial arts, modeled after the fighting style of monkeys. It's a truism that adding monkeys to any given game adds flair, and we've got to wonder what took Sega so long. Both characters do add more depth to the already astonishing depth of Virtua Fighter, and impressively they're both capable of holding their own against every other foe in the game.

Virtua Fighter 5 is undoubtedly an excellent game within its own niche, but it's well worth recognising that this is a niche title, designed for those with the patience and time to learn minute little differences in fighting patterns. Some gamers will pick it up, enjoy the visuals but find that kind of play immensely frustrating, and there's nothing wrong with that whatsoever. Others will find its challenge deep and immersive, and they're the niche that Virtua Fighter 5 does such a good job of filling.