Street Fighter IV for the XBox 360 and the Playstation 3 are getting a new Championship Mode, with all new features.

Here’s how the tournaments are going to work in the Championship Mode: Tournaments are divided up into five different levels, making it possible for players of various skill levels to compete on the same stage. Like with tournament play, character selection is “double-blind”, meaning you cannot see who your opponent has selected for his fighter. Player score Grade Points (GP) for wins and can accumulate their GP total to enter higher level tournaments.

People who win tournaments get Championship Points (CP), which Capcom compares to “prize money”. So fighting against players with higher GP means a bigger CP purse. The top 5,000 CP leaders get the option to upload replays that are available for everyone to watch on both the PS3 and the Xbox 360.

Capcom’s Seth Killian had this to say:

The new tournament system is totally addictive. Winning takes you higher and higher, but even if you get knocked out in your first match, there’s always another tournament starting immediately, so you’re never out of the action. With replays, if you’re a junkie for great Street Fighter matches like I am, you basically just got the best cable channel in the world for free.

The FREE Championship Mode comes out April 24.

Source: Kotaku