Eagle is a non-playable character in the first Street Fighter game as one of the ten CPU fighters.
Eagle is the primary representative of the zoner playstyle in Street Fighter Plus Plus. He is placed solidly among the commonly viable characters and that is for good reason. Wielding his signature escrima sticks, Eagle's swipes and swings put up a menacing wall that proves very hard to nullify without the proper tools.
While projectiles may seem like an obvious answer for any characters that have them, an Eagle who's able to handle them can actually use the opponent's ending lag as a means to help set up advantage, making them more of a high-risk mixup than a go-to option. However, if one does manage to get a good shot on Eagle, the reward for the opponent is often significant, so always be ready to deal with projectiles first and foremost.
Overall, Eagle's low commitment pokes allow him to rack on damage from stray hits easier than anyone else in the game, further complimenting his prowess at maintaining a healthy lead in "war of attrition" matches. Patient players who excel at slowing down the pace of the match will find it easy to squeeze a lot of utility from Eagle's kit.
Not everything works out nicely for Eagle though, and there's one overarching reason that he has had trouble making it to the top. While Eagle often excels at countering his opponent's approach, he has a difficult time making his own openings. Most of Eagle's offense requires his opponent to make a clear misplay in neutral, such as closing the distance vs. Sagat by reacting to a raw Tiger Shot and jumping in while Sagat is still in endlag, so when the opponent can effectively throw Eagle's play right back at him through making their own impenetrable fortress, they can coerce Eagle into opting for unusually risky options, such as relying on lingering and easily-reactable jumps or lengthy spin attacks that, while both offering Eagle a hitbox to move forward with, aren't always the best approach tools as they leave him quite vulnerable to hits from crouchers. As previously mentioned, any stray hit Eagle takes can strip away devastating amounts of his defensive authority, as he always prefers a life lead to incentivize his opponent to be the one doing the aggression.
Despite having some undesirable shortcomings, Eagle proves a prominent force in the SF++ metagame and most players will find his strengths far outweigh his drawbacks. He is easy to pick up for newcomers and teaches potent spacing skills that go a long way in a game centered predominantly around neutral.
In SF++, Eagle is selected by holding both 
and 
at the title screen/"NEW CHALLENGER" screen and then releasing those buttons on the country select/"RYU vs. KEN" screens respectively.
| Pros | Cons |
|---|---|
| Incredible framedata on standing attacks | Underwhelmingly sluggish mobility |
| Appreciable damage output | Lackluster answers to jumping or crouching opponents |
| Impressive poking ability | Fairly limited capacity to approach the opponent without a clear opening in their defense |
| Terrible susceptibility to move loops |
