TITANIUM BEAST!!!

It's not, but clearly it's something that received a good bit of consideration from Team Red. Probably the most practical application of IKs in both GG and BB so far.

Not was I was expecting, but awesome nonetheless.

I mean, sometimes wakeup super is the correct play. But if you're getting hit with it that much, maybe you need to take a step back and reevaluate.

I was addressing VR's post.

I think air/tk VV is more useful against cornered opponents, as you don't have to worry about momentum screwing up your follow up combo or your inputs. Still working on an optimized route, currently I do double BB into stuff.

Bait and punish. If you eat one every ten matches or so, you're still coming out on top, IMO.

We're forgetting that being in Hell Fire can leave you susceptible to IK combos. It has pluses and minuses, while most comeback mechanics tend to have few to no negatives.

I could see where someone might not like Hellfire if they're winning and eat a wakeup Winger from Millia that then turns into a full combo into oki. Otherwise, I don't really see the problem. Making ODs more useful is good. Now instead of going for an RC combo, you could feasibly go for an OD, which would be easier to do and also have the benefit of not scaling your Tension gain as harshly, which makes a comeback more of a reality.

I think range and hitbox was mostly the same, the speed difference might have created the illusion of a range/hitbox difference since you'd be hitting the button much more often and it would be more likely to hit in a poke situation. HOS 2S was also much less advantageous on block. It was +1 in Slash, but in AC/+R they made it -1. Neutral on block with a perfect CC. In comparison, Sol's 2S has always been slower, but more advantageous; it has always been +3 on block, IIRC. The only thing that makes it more HOS-like is the addition of the 2S-6HS gatling and its ability to combo on CH. Even then, the situation still ends different (you get hard knockdown instead of stagger and no RC for combo followup).

WELP that was fun GG we da bes

Sol also inherited 2S-6HS from HOS. There's probably bits and pieces hanging out all over the place, but most of AC/+R stuff was trashed.

Everyone pretty much already knew that Mike Z didn't like the game from the get go, so this opinion piece is not really surprising, though IIRC his problems with YRC went beyond simply not liking the option selects, which are silly (as almost all OSes are), but honestly don't have a huge impact on the game due to their restricted usage. I mean, not only do you need to have a very specific amount of meter, but the inputs aren't quite as simple as they're made out to be. Additionally, if you're using combined inputs and button priority to implement the OS, something as simple as changing your Burst timing (which is much more realistic than it sounds) will easily defeat it. I found this out while trying to implement the OS into my basic corner routes with Sol and finding that unless I did the input with a certain timing, it would not activate the YRC. Not to mention that frequent Burst baits that were "automatic" in certain combos are nothing new to GG, so I don't see what the malfunction is all about. I do have to say that it's not the first time that I've seen someone suggest that ASW should simply have kept FRCs in and added a buffer window to the FRC input, but this assumes that input difficulty was the only problem with FRCs, which is not something I think was necessarily true. I personally very much prefer the new RC system, because the sheer creativity allowed adds a huge amount of fun factor and fits in very well with the whole "Romantic" concept that RCs embody. For removing difficult inputs, this complaint would make sense if their goal was to eliminate difficult motions for the sake of making things easier for newer players, but there was clearly a specific reason why certain motions changed and why others were left as is. I-no's Chemical Love was a move which clearly lost utility due to its motion, not to mention unnecessary combo difficulty that arose from it. Most of the other moves Mike mentions are Overdrives, which naturally should have more difficult motions. I mean, he mentions Tyrant Rave as needing an easier motion: really? What alternative motion would actually work out? Would you want to make it a double QCF, where it would overlap with over half of his moveset? This really seems like a BS complaint to me. I won't bother to comment on the negative edge complaint because while I personally never purposefully use Negative Edge and I don't feel like my execution suffers from its absence, I also don't know how much it actually affects other players. The JI comment would seem more valid if JI were more prevalent, but I have yet to see instances where JI is really necessary at high level play for most characters in Xrd, with the exception of Chipp (and Chipp is supposed to be hard anyway). Unblockables...eh, I don't like them either, but I also don't think they need to be completely removed. Unblockables that loop you to death should definitely not exist, but despite what Mike is saying here, the fact that they are uncommon at high level is relevant to whether or not they should remain; after all, if something is in the game, and players of the character enjoy using it, while it has little actual effect on the metagame, I don't see the point in removing it. Mike wanting them removed on principle is his opinion as a designer, and should not necessarily be a standard that players should deal with. Throw breaks being removed is a good thing, IMO. They were largely unnecessary and just seemed like they were tacked on because having throw breaks just seems like a "requirement" for a modern fighter to have. To me, it is telling that throws as a mixup option were typically not used much at high level in Accent Core, in spite of there being ways to OS with them on offense. The defensive option selects against them were too strong, IMO, especially when you account for the huge amounts of throw invulnerability present on wakeup and after leaving blockstun. For someone who hates OS so much, you don't see Mike saying a whole lot about the myriad defensive OSes that exist in GG against offense. This also helps explain why offensive throw OS still exists in the game, because even with throw breaks being removed, there are still tons of ways out of getting thrown. The Hell Fire complaint also seems similarly pointless due to the relatively minor effect Hell Fire has on the game. Really, has anyone had a match stolen because they got hit by a Hell Fire Overdrive? Not to mention that being in Hell Fire on the winning round leaves you open to eating IK combos. Not much of a comeback mechanic. Just seems like more "this sucks because I'm a game designer and I say so" opining. Everything else is opinion stuff that I won't bother to address, other than to say that I don't think Xrd is some huge step backward in balance. The number of C tier characters fluctuates between 0 and 2, which seems just fine to me. In typical GG fashion, pretty much every character is viable. Overall though, I don't really follow why Mike is refusing to play Xrd. That's his choice, and as long as people continue to play +R, there's no problem. But as numbers for Xrd increase (which they most likely will), and as numbers for +R decrease (as they seem to have been), it remains to be seen as to whether or not anyone will have enough access to competition where they can choose to play +R exclusively.

Easily (he's a friggin' self-insert of Ishiwatari). But as mentioned earlier, his nearly infinite power can't solve his problems. So a bit more well-written than the average Mary Sue.

Don't get me wrong bruh, I <3 Ragna. He is pretty much the sole reason I will sit through BB's awful story, because he is a sane person walking among a sea of lunatics and his observations are pure comedy. Seriously though, Sol is basically a well-written Mary Sue, naturally he'll be pretty invincible.

Regarding invincibilty, you have to compare relative to their respective games. Sol's has less invul, but Sol is also in a game where attacks are generally faster. Ragna having long invul is necessary due to the general slow speed of attacks in BB. C ID in corner and on 2nd hit counter gives piddly damage. VV on 2nd hit counter gives man damage. Given how often people will play from the air, the additional vertical range makes HS VV threatening against people who like to fly around and hit buttons. I would say that given respective games, VV is still pretty amazing and is at least on the level with ID. BB just happens to be a game where even having an invincible reversal is a really big deal, whereas GG has more ways to bait and punish them.

Ehhhh, VV is actually just as good, if not better.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y_ABNhET4OQ Sendu provides an updated list of throw RC combos on the whole cast. Almost all of these break 200 damage, and they're pretty cool too. He also has a video for combo recipes on Leo on his channel.

Another note is that 2D goes under his 5S at range, and you recover before him typically. So 2D under 5S and immediately following with your own 5S will beat pretty much anything he tries to poke with. He also really doesn't have a way to deal with 5K when he is airborne, so any time you get him in the air, mash 5K on him. The only normal he has that might hit is his j.HS, and even that is iffy.

Ragna will eventually die. Sol just goes batshit insane.

For on block DP, I'm pretty sure you can just airthrow Leap on reaction. At least, I had no trouble with it in that respect. You actually have a ton of viable options, VV is just the best because it beats the most things. You have time to BS against Elk Hunt or Beak Driver, though this can potentially create another guessing game. Eat YRC is actually very unsafe, you can sweep it or 5K it for free. You can also backdash against Beak Driver and Elk Hunt. Bull Bash will beat BS and backdash, but you can just mash him out of that move for free. tl;dr is VV if you can (tight window), but you have other options that feel a little safer. Also, I couldn't get OS backdash to work on safe jump with Sol, any tips?

Also don't take this as me hating on Ragna. I think Ragna is swell and all, and I look forward to laughing a lot whenever a new game with new story comes out, because he is friggin' hilarious to me. But Sol is just, well, better.

Actually you really can, because that has a lot to do with how the characters play individually. Now, if they were actually to do a crossover, then no, everything would be done in a more unified way. But let's say you were to copy paste their most recent versions into MUGEN or something similar, then you could DEFINITELY make comparisons based on mechanics and frame data.

Even in game, Sol would still win. He is an infinitely better character design. I'm also fairly sure most of his normals would interact with Ragna's in his favor. Even if you make the argument that Ragna can chicken block out of all of Sol's pressure (he probably couldn't anyway but JUST BECAUSE), it is MUCH easier for Sol to continue pressure in that scenario, whereas even if Sol has to spend meter to get out with FD, once he gets out, it's much harder for Ragna to get back in. I'm telling you guys, Sol >>>>>>>>>> Ragna. I even like him better as a character after Xrd story mode, they fleshed him out really well and made him much more relatable. Ragna is a clown in comparison.

Looking forward to watching this when it comes out. Regarding the relative strength of Sol vs. Ragna, it isn't even close, IMO. Sol is the type of character that is so powerful, the only way they can keep his story interesting is by putting him in situations where fighting it out will not bring about a solution. Ragna, on the other hand, is a jobber who is constantly getting told how weak he is and gets bodied all the time (especially evident in CP story). Ragna's fighting experience is NOTHING compared to Sol's. Dude has been a bounty hunter for over 100 years. This would have to be a very well done fight to be interesting, IMO.

Yeah I remember them saying it would be out early 2015, just waiting for CDJapan to update with a preorder listing.