Author: Casey "Waveflame" Rinaldi

If you’ve been following Street Fighter V over its first three months of life, you’ve likely heard that some consider Zangief to be one of the worst characters currently in the game. Red Bull’s Snake Eyez has even considered giving up the character because he feels ‘Gief has no competitive future. However, if you still believe that good training involves wrestling bears in the snow-covered Artic and you want to spread the good word of Muscle Power, these two videos will help make sure you’re the best wrestler you can be.

After covering the basics of Karin and Rashid last week, Evil Geniuses’ Momochi released Episode 14 of his SFV Lecture series, highlighting the original grappler of the series.

While the loss of his Banishing Flat and the increased startup on his Double Lariat have altered his gameplan from previous entries in the series, Momochi believes that the grappler’s new tools, such as his V-Skill, V-Trigger, command normals, faster dash, downward hitboxes on his air normals and Borscht Dynamite, more than make up for the losses.

After running through his normals, specials, the new purpose of his slower Double Lariats and large SPD ranges, as well as how his dash can serve as a sort of replacement for Banishing Flat, he moves on to discuss ‘Gief’s V-Skill and V-Trigger. These moves allow ‘Gief to armor through projectiles, punish blockstring gaps, in addition to moving forward slowly with his armor, similar to Guile being able to retain his Flash Kick charges with his Faultless Move.

Momochi closes by noting that, “Getting in to pressure opponents is the fun aspect of SFV Zangief.  [He] is a bit sad with the loss of Green Hand. However, you have moves to replace it, such as the V-Skill and the V-Trigger. There is much new interesting stuff as well, so you can fight without the Green Hand.”

Up next, RandomHighFives offers a number of matchup-based tips for the grappler, including ways to deal with Ryu’s crouching forward to Hadoken blockstring, Laura’s Bolt Charge pressure, Rashid’s run and Ysaar shenanigans, R. Mika’s Nadeshiko calls and charged dropkick, Nash’s three-way mixup with his Sonic Move V-Trigger, M. Bison’s Shadow Axe target combo, and F.A.N.G’s tricky Ryobenda setups.

Even if you’re not a Zangeif player, this video could still be worth your time in terms of anticipating how the Cyclones you encounter may react to these strategies.

Sources: Momochi & Chocoblanka TV, RandomHighFives

After the changes for Mortal Kombat XL were released, many players felt that Quan Chi would see a sharp decline in competitive play due to the loss of his meterless Vortex, guaranteed gapless pressure after Meter Burn Ground Burst, and added damage scaling on his Bat attacks in the Summoner Varaition. However, some of those same players were quick to overlook the myriad of enhancements that were given to the demon’s Sorcerer Variation. This style of Quan saw reduced startup and recovery on all three of his spells, faster regeneration on the hit of armor in Dark Curse, and his Skulls, Ground Bursts, as well as his Trance, became capable of draining his opponent’s meter on both block and hit while standing in Black Magic. Yet many players felt that his corner game with Final Hex, which gives Quan increased chip damage for as long as his opponent remains inside the circle, was severely weakened due to reduced chip and meter gain on block across the board in XL, compounded by the loss of gapless frame advantage on his MB Ground Burst, which has removed his “Rune Trap” setups.

Fortunately for those of us in the Quanmunity, ESL commentator and 5th place Evo finisher, PND|Ketchup, has been back in the lab with the Brotherhood of Shadow member. In this time, he has discovered a new variation of the Rune Trap that can’t be jumped or back dashed, and beats button pressing as well as both Delayed Wakeup timings, losing only to armored reversals. With Black Magic allowing him to drain more meter from his enemies than ever before, this shouldn’t prove to be too much of a detriment.

Using two reps of F21, MB Skull allows Quan to tag opponents with a meaty 14 in the 1, 14, Trance string to continue looping the restand in the corner. If they choose to use max Delayed Wakeup, and you whiff f21 MB Skull, the game will option select F212, as the input for Skull is DB2, with a large window to confirm it and input the MB Skull. If they half Delay Wakeup, they will stand up into the second hit of the F21 string and will be forced to either block or get hit by the MB Skull. This allows for around 65-75% damage in the corner.

Ketchup also released another video explaining the new Sorcerer Quan in full detail earlier this week, offering a look at what type of gameplan you need to be using with him now.

Source: PNDK&M via Test Your Might

Shortly after winning Guilty Gear Xrd -REVELATOR- at KVOXTSB 2016, champion Machaboo sat down with Mr. Biscuits for a post-victory interview, with translation assistance being provided by Jiyuna. In this brief clip, the Guilty Gear legend reveals that he will be attending Evolution 2016, which will mark his first trip to the United States. He also reveals why he switched from Ky Kiske to his son Sin, who he believes is currently a top three contender in -REVEALTOR-. He also discusses the top three players he is most worried about facing in Las Vegas this July.

If you’d like more Guilty Gear Xrd content, as well as more videos from Biscuit’s time in Japan, visit Typical East Coast.

Source: Typical East Coast, via IPLAYWINNER

Arguably the top Mortal Kombat XL player in the scene today, it’s no secret that Critical Reaction’s Sonic Fox uses a bevy of characters in the NRS fighter. Whether it be his trusty Erron Black, Cassie Cage, Kitana, Tanya, Jacqui Briggs or Kombat Pack 2 newcomer Alien, Fox has used at least 13 characters in tournament play since the game’s release, and has now taken it upon himself to share his great amount of knowledge with the rest of the community.

“Fox It Up,” his self-described, “series-ish thing that I’m doing to teach people how to play the characters I main in their respective variations,” begins with the Critical Reaction member going over each character’s universal tools and gameplan. He then takes viewers through all three of their variations, breaking down all of the specific tools and combos each brings to the character’s overall toolset, as well as how all of them should be applied. This ensures that there’s something for everyone, regardless of the style they may favor. He then tests out the concepts he’s demonstrated by taking each variation through a series of online Ranked Matches, showing how effective his teachings are in the setting of a real match.

So far Fox has completed tutorials for Cassie Cage, Erron Black and Predator, each of which you can see below. There is sure to be more content to come from this top competitor, so stay tuned to his YouTube channel and Twitch.

Source: SonicFox5000 via Test Your Might

During the recent PLAY Expo Blackpool event, the folks at Manchester’s Battle Arena were able to get quite a bit of time with a console version of the soon-to-be-released Guilty Gear Xrd -REVELATOR-, which featured two of the upcoming characters, Raven and Kum Haeyhun.  In these videos, we’re treated to a brief look at each of these fighter’s intros, colors, normals, specials, Overdrives and Instant Kills. General overviews aside, we also get to see players face off with them in real matches, showing how their various tools can be applied in the heat of battle.

Several move interactions and properties are also tested throughout these videos, and some attention is even paid to the new FAQ option available from the Pause Menu, which offers answers to such queries as, “What kind of characters are there?”  “How do I do the Special Moves?” and “What’s a Roman Cancel?”

You can see both videos below.

Guilty Gear Xrd -REVELATOR- is set to release on both PlayStation 3 and PlayStation 4 on May 26 in Japan, June 7 in North America, and June 10 in Europe.

Source: MBA GAMING