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Street Fighter 3 PSN playable offline

Important for tournament use, says Capcom.

The PlayStation Network version of upcoming downloadable fighting game Street Fighter 3 Third Strike will be DRM free, Capcom has confirmed.

It means the game will be playable offline – unlike previous Capcom games with DRM that required users be online at all times when playing.

"The game does not make use of Sony's network DRM," Christian Svensson, senior vice president of strategic planning and business development at Capcom USA wrote on the Capcom Unity forum (gathered by Eventhubs).

"It is playable offline. We deemed that very important for future tournament use."

Capcom courted controversy earlier this year with the PSN version of Bionic Commando Rearmed 2, which could not be played offline.

Meanwhile, Svensson revealed the tournament modes that will be included in Street Fighter 3 Third Strike – regarded by many as the greatest fighting game of all time.

The game ships with a number of different tournament rulesets, such as "Evo rules". They allow organisers to ban certain characters, set blind selects and determine rounds. All rulesets are in the eight man, single elimination format, however.

Street Fighter 3 Third Strike is part of Sony's Summer of Arcade rival: PlayStation Network Play.

PSN Play kicks off with the launch of the game on 24th August. Street Fighter III comes with the ability to unlock character Gill without having to complete the game.