Developer Capcom announced today that they will be allowing Steam users to play Street Fighter V for free for an entire week, starting next Tuesday the 28th.  The free week will be serving as a beta test for the games newly-overhauled Capcom Fighters Network, or CFN.

In a blog post made this morning, Capcom acknowledges that their servers had been having issues of late, negatively affecting the game’s online gameplay experience.  However, they claim that they’ve rebuilt the CFN “from the ground up”, fixing the most important issues and resulting in a better online experience for Street Fighter V.

So, to test out the new network, and give a sneak peek of the new online functionality to players, Street Fighter V will be having an free PC Beta test for an entire week.  From 1pm PST on 3/28 to 12pm PST on 4/3, Street Fighter V will be completely free to play for both current and new players.

The beta will only be available on Steam, and will only feature Online Modes, in order to test the new network infrastructure.  It will be played in a separate client from the base Street Fighter V client, and all player progress, Fight Money earned, and replays from the beta will be deleted at the end.  However, the beta will also allow players to use all released characters without having to worry about unlocking them, and will feature the changes announced in the upcoming Season 2 Balance Adjustments, previewing the game’s new meta.

Here are all the improvements promised with the new Street Fighter V CFN:

• Rage Quit Penalty System: Back in December, we implemented an update to the Rage Quit System which displayed a special Player Profile Icon for the worst offenders and the most honorable players. These icons are working correctly now and matchmaking logic now takes into account your online behavior and frequent disconnectors will be matched with similar opponents.
• Ranked and Casual Match Loading Times: We understand many players were not happy with the load times when entering online matches. There will now be a shorter transition when going into a Ranked or Casual Match.
• Battle Lounge Country Flags: Country flags should now properly load in Battle Lounges, allowing players to locate competition in their region.
• Training Mode – User Settings Saved: Training Mode settings are now saved and will carry over to the next time the mode is accessed.
• Matchmaking Improvements: It should now take less time to find an opponent in online matches. We’ve also added logic which avoids frequently being matched with the same opponent repeatedly.
• Fighter Profile Stats: More detailed stats will be tracked and presented on your Fighter Profile.
• Country / League Based Rankings: Players will now be able to filter leaderboards based on Country or League.
• Friend Management System: In addition to adding a player to your Favorites, you can now add Friends and follow them on CFN. You can now also Blacklist players.
• Interactive Timeline: On the CFN home menu, a live feed of your Friends’ activities is presented on an interactive Timeline. Using the Timeline, you can immediately add a recent match to your Replay List, view a Fighter Profile, manage your Friends, and adjust Timeline display settings.
• In-Game Announcer Voice: The in-game announcer will give you stats on both you and your opponent using data pulled from the server.

Street Fighter V is available on Steam here.