Capcom teased it was preparing to release some “major news” concerning Street Fighter 5 this week. Today is that day as the company is showing off its first DLC character, Alex, and information regarding its big March update.

Before we get into the March update, let’s take a quick look at Alex. According to Capcom, Alex has been one of the most fan-requested characters for Street Fighter 5, and the company has put a lot of work into him so he could appeal to both old-school and new players alike. Alex has returned as a powerful grappler capable of inflicting a lot of damage with his Power Bomb command grab.

Here are Alex’s V-Skill, V-Trigger, and Critical Art:

• V-Skill: Overhaul

• Alex stretches and gets ready to hit extra hard. After doing this, Alex's next move will damage the opponent as if it were a counter hit. If the attack misses or gets blocked, the effect vanishes.

• V-Trigger: Rage Shift

• Alex lets loose with a clothesline attack. The attack can be charged, and allows parrying of one attack during its charge time. If fully charged, Alex will break the guard of a blocking opponent, allowing for a followup attack.

• Critical Art: Heavy Hammer

• Alex hits the opponent with a very powerful chop that knocks them around. He then grabs them and holds them up high in a crucifix hold, and then drops them down to the ground with intense speed.

The big March update will finally add some much-needed content to Street Fighter 5, which includes Demonstrations for all 16 characters, Beginner / Intermediate / Advanced tutorials, Character tutorials, and Trials. The In-Game Shop will also finally be opening, allowing fighters to spend their Fight Money to purchase content, such as DLC characters and Story Mode Costumes.

The March update will also bring an Online Rematch option and improvements to its Battle Lounge.

The patch also introduces a number of bug fixes, which can be seen below:

Bug: Sometimes you don’t get EXP from casual matches

Bug: On a rare occurrence, if you restart the game after you unlock colors, the colors you unlocked will disappear

Vega:

If you hit V-Trigger Bloody Kiss (anti-air) in certain situations, Vega will no longer continue to rise off the top of the screen.

M. Bison:

If M. Bison is interrupted by an opponent’s V-Trigger or Critical Art during his invisible frames of Double Knee Press in V-Trigger mode, M. Bison will no longer remain invisible until his next move.

Rashid:

Rashid will no longer float in the air for a moment if you perform his V-Trigger after he touches the ground upon a missed Eagle Spike.

Chun-Li:

During V-Trigger activation, the hit stop and block stop has been made the same for multi-hitting moves (medium or heavy attacks for both normal and special moves).

She was previously able to perform option selects involving standing HP into Houyokusen, so this has been removed.

Vertical and Back Jump Frames:

All characters except Birdie and Zangief: Vertical jump and back jump frames have changed from 3f->4f.

Birdie: Vertical jump and back jump frames have changed from 4f->5f.

Zangief: No changes to jump frames.

These changes reduce the effectiveness of throw tech option selects involving jumping (also known as “jump grab”). Changing forward jump frames would affect the game balance too much so those remain unchanged.

Throw Escape Change:

If you push buttons during the normal throw delayed tech window you are unable to escape throws for 2 frames.

Prevents using light attacks to option select with throw escapes.

If you execute specific special moves during the normal throw delayed tech window you are unable to immediately escape throws. Each characters V-skills, V-triggers, V-reversals, critical arts, and moves have been set individually.

Prevents throw escape option selects involving specific moves such as Shoryuken, etc.