Month: October 2017

Last weekend’s New York Comic Con saw the “1st Impact” of Arc System Work’s new crossover tag-team fighting title, BlazBlue Cross Tag Battle. We’ve already shared some player impressions, including some thoughts from Panda Global’s SKD, but now we return with SKD’s wrap-up — along with some impressions from another top ASW player, D-Link’s Lord Knight.

To summarize the massive TwitLonger post, SKD highlighted the following bullet points.

• No 6X normals, with the only Crouching normals for each character being 4A. 4B and 4C attacks do not exist.
• Cross Combo input is to tap or hold the button while an Assist is out, with a bar at the bottom of the screen filling as your prepare the Assist character to attack. Your full Cross Gauge will drain if the character is hit, and they will leave the battlefield.
• Game seems setplay oriented, but with the strength of Reflect Guard and Cross Bursts in the current iteration, SKD doesn’t how much it would be used.
• Cross Burst Safe combos exist and cost your entire Cross Gauge. You can only Burst when it’s full.
• All Specials are either QCF or QCB, all Distortion Skills cost two bars, with EX Specials only costing one. Crash Assaults only cost one bar, and are done by pressing the Tag button during the initial Distortion animation.
• All Crash Assault Supers are pre-determined. (Yu’s will always be Cross Slash, Ragna’s will always be Devoured By Darkness, Hyde and Linne will use their Infinite Worths, etc.)
• Switching characters is very strong and can lead to long combos.
• Resonance Levels are obtained by filling the four squares next to the Distortion Meter, which is accomplished by utilizing aspects of the Cross System that fully deplete the Cross Gauge, and cannot be filled by simply calling Assists. Levels increase Resonance Blaze duration when it becomes available.
• Resonance Blaze provides health regeneration, increased damage on Distortion Drives (that can now lead to Resonance Finishes), passive meter gain and allows you to Distortion Cancel Specials. The meter limit is also broken, similar to Persona 4 Arena‘s Awakening mechanic.
• Incoming attacks are character-specific, invulnerable, cannot be Counter hit or punished, but are possibly negative on block.
• Anti-Airs use BlazBlue‘s Attribute System.
• Feels it’s to easy to Time Out solo characters, even when they have Resonance.

As for Lord Knight, he preferred to spend his time with BBTAG’s sole New Challenger: Ruby Rose. You can check out his thoughts in this Evernote.

SKD was also able to snap a few photos of the title’s control layout and mechanic explanations from the show floor.

Be sure to check out both full posts to find out the player’s overall thoughts on the game. BlazBlue Cross Tag Battle will be playable at this weekend’s South East Asia Majors 2017 in Singapore, as well as RTX London. You can find more gameplay footage here and here.

Sources: SuperKawaiiDesu (TwitLonger); D-Link|Lord Knight (Evernote)