Street Fighter 4 partners with Virgin Gaming to offer real-money matches

Street Fighter 4 developer Capcom has paired with the UK's Virgin Gaming service to offer players the chance to win real money by winning matches.

Eurogamer reports - via Capcom Unity - that bets can now be placed on PS3 and Xbox 360 versions of Super Street Fighter 4 and the Arcade Edition.

The site explains that to set up a money match, players must challenge someone on the Virgin Gaming site then, once a challenge is accepted, the player must hen set up an Endless Battle lobby with settings confirmed with their opponent beforehand.

Then, the players must invite their opponent to the lobby and play the match. Once the dust has settled, players must go back to the Virgin Gaming site to post the result, and are also urged to upload a screen shot or photo of the win screen to help speed up the process, or upload a replay in-game.

Once verified, real-money winnings are then transferred to your account to bet again or withdraw as you see fit.

Eurogamer correctly suggests that latency between regions could be concern when real money is involved, and there are also concerns surrounding matchmaking fairness.

On Capcom Unity, Pete Rosas wrote, "As a child of the arcade era, there was something special about each win I’d earn while on the Street Fighter II cabinet. Since each game was pay to play, every win felt that much more euphoric as I watched my defeated opponent have to pony up more money, whereas each loss stung that much more as I felt my pockets running out of coins.

"Essentially something more than pride was on the line each game, and that made everyone play all that much harder. With the advent of free online play, it’s been difficult putting something on the line other than pride… UNTIL NOW."

What do you make of the above?