Xiaoyu is definitely the demon of many players in Tekken 7 — maybe more so than Devil Jin himself. Those who struggle with fighting the agile young woman definitely need to take a look at this latest video guide from TheMainManSWE, who will get you past a roadblock.
His new video guide offers a thorough explanation on how to effectively deal with Xiaoyu, and how to play much smarter against her. For one, it’s better to play a little more defensively than usual, since she’s looking to counter and evade attacks. In particular, doing high moves is incredibly risky — that’s just what she’s looking for, especially with a stance which will let her do easy launchers. It’s necessary to find attacks that will hit her despite her stance. The video shows a few practical punishes after blocking her attacks, and talks about her throws.
If you’re looking to study up a different character, one of TheMainManSWE’s recent videos covers Devil Jin basics.
Spider-Man became a go-to character early on in the life of Marvel vs. Capcom Infinite, mainly due to his strength with Reality Stone — and the ultimately patched-out infinite that came with it.
But Xero18 — who stuck with the character throughout the lifespan of Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3 — is breathing new life into the character by way of the Power Stone. With an extension on Power Stone activation — made possible through Web Ball — combos with Spider-Man can surpass the 9000 damage range, which is enough for a kill on some characters. While this video showcases the possibilities with Ultron as a partner, there will certainly be options with various other characters.
If Street Fighter V: Arcade Edition isn’t pushing your buttons, this fan-made update to Street Fighter V may be for you. We’ve previously covered the new Critical Arts that are part of the Mysterious Mod, but this showcase outlines some of the other features that are available as part of this combat overhaul.
One of the biggest changes in the Mysterious Mod is the additional of V-Cancels, where players can expend a stock of their V-Gauge to cancel any move. This new mechanic should alleviate some complaints that Street Fighter V‘s combo system is too restricting, as you can create devastating custom combos with the right resources.
The Mysterious Mod also adds new moves and reversals for several characters, along with lengthening the throw tech window to stop those dreaded throw loops. After introducing these new features, the rest of this mod showcase is dedicated to showing off some of the high execution combos you can now pull off, thanks to V-Cancels and so on.
For those interested in trying the Mysterious Mod, you can check out its Discord for the download link.
Nintendo’s unique stretchy-armed fighter/Dhalsim simulator ARMS has just received a new update. Version 4.0 of the game adds a new fighter, named Misango. The Mesoamerican-themed Misango comes with a unique mechanic: his special mask ability allows him to switch masks mid-battle to seemingly grant him specific buffs.
Along with a new fighter, comes a new stage; Misango’s stage is the appropriately-themed Temple Grounds.
Additionally, the update also adds three new Arms, including what seems to be one based on inflicting a poison status on an opponent.
The Super Famicom fighting game Sailor Moon S has been gaining a lot of popularity lately, and the New York fighting game community held a large tournament for it over the weekend at TSB Yabai. The bracket had 17 players of all skill levels looking to fight evil by moonlight and take advantage of the game’s loose — but exciting — mechanics.
Just in case you missed out on all the action from this classic game, Team Spooky has posted a replay of the tournament, which featured some of the top players in the game — including DaiAndOh, Mynus, Apollo, and NerdJosh, to name a few.
Recently, Athena Ipponbashi in Japan hosted a special 2v2 BlazBlue: Central Fiction tournament. The event celebrated the recent Arc Revolution champs, who beat out everyone else at the Toushinsai 2017 competition. The duo, of course, is composed of the most famous Jin Kisaragi player in the world, Infinity Osaka|Fenrich, and his brother, Iwashi, who plays Ragna the Bloodedge.
The two clips below show the special tournament. Various players take on the two brothers. The footage is divided into IO|Fenrich and Iwashi’s sides. IO|Fenrich tinkers a bit with his Azrael and Izanami at first, while Iwashi remains Ragna throughout.
The celebration was complete with a cake made for the two brothers:
While Rage Arts may have been the cinematic gimmick that pulled a new generation of players into the Tekken universe, Tekken 7‘s Rage Drive is generally the safer and more practical use of your Rage meter.
Depending upon the character you can get comparable — if not outright better — damage in your juggles with proper Rage Drive use, and they almost always either provide frame advantage or some other form of useful utility. FightersLegend‘s latest combo compilation shows off both for the entire currently released cast, giving you a frame of reference if there’s a new character you’re interested in picking up.
It’s been well known for a while that Ken has some nasty meaty setups in Street Fighter V, and these just make his setups even more ambiguous. By connecting his light Tatsu off of a juggle after a V-Trigger confirm, he can actually switch sides. This makes your opponent’s back roll increasingly dangerous for them. You can further make this more deadly by incorporating cross-up air Tatsus after the side switch, making them further guess which side you’ll end up on for the meaty.
The last big CPT event — before Capcom Cup itself — is almost here.
The big regional finale for 2017’s Capcom Pro Tour in North America is almost upon us, set to take place at Red Bull Battle Grounds in Boston this weekend! On this week’s Wake Up Wednesdays recap show from Capcom Fighters, Michael Martin breaks down who are the players to watch in these NA finals — and who might earn a qualification for Capcom Cup 2017 at the event.
Red Bull’s Masato “Bonchan” Takahashi had arguably one of his roughest years on the circuit in 2016. Having frequently been on the verge of qualifying for Capcom Cup, he was never able to take anything higher than fourth place on the Capcom Pro Tour, including at the Asia Regional Finals in Busan, South Korea — his last chance to make the cut.
Not only was he excluded from Capcom Cup, he faced the same fate of fellow Nash players Infiltration and Yukadon in a painful nerfs to his signature character. However, he was able to take Nash at his worst, and produce results that made him a shoe-in for Capcom Cup 2017. Having redeemed himself on the circuit this year, will he be able to go one step further and take the title?
The Last True Nash
Having spent the entirety of the Street Fighter IV series as one of the deadliest Sagat players on the circuit, Bonchan had to go to the drawing board for Street Fighter V. While there was no true equivalent to Sagat, Nash was the next obvious choice — the character could zone well, but could also dole out a large amount of damage when up close. Similarities, however, does not mean equivalency, and I feel like this was part of Bonchan’s problem last year. Nash in Season 1 relied more heavily on the close-range game than Sagat, and Bonchan relied most on Sagat’s zoning game. While he was still able to utilize this aspect of the character, it was definitely outside of his comfort zone.
If you compare that to a player like Infiltration, who was already used to dancing in and out of range with Akuma in Street Fighter IV, it makes perfect sense why these two players who lost their mains in a new game had totally different stories.
As strange as it sounds, it was when Capcom nerfed Nash’s backdash and defensive options that we started to see Bonchan’s best. It was as though the nerfs challenged him to truly learn how to play an oppressive offensive game, and use it to its fullest. And while Nash players abandoned the character left and right due to their distaste with Capcom’s design choices, it was Bonchan himself that held true for the longest time to the character, and reaped the benefits of using the offensive tools against people who had dismissed Nash’s viability in Season 2.
No Laughing Matter
But then, even the Nash stalwart finally decided it was time to make a change. While he kept true to Nash until Evo, in the three events we’ve seen him in since, he has been using far less of the character and more of Karin. This is definitely an unusual switch for him, but now that he has his footing in the close-range game, it makes sense. Her poke game is far superior to that of Nash’s, and can deal large swaths of damage on any good touch.
One of the biggest things that makes Karin work for Bonchan is her ability to control the ground so well with easy to space pokes. A trademark of good Sagat players is controlling the ground game so well that it forces players to take to the skies. When you combine that with exquisite anti-airs — which Karin has — it makes this a great fit.
The last time we saw Bonchan run the character in September at Tokyo Game Show, there was still some sloppiness in his play. So long as he’s been practicing the character since then, he should have plenty of time to tighten up the screws before December.
Character Crisis
But this switch could be a difficult one for him to pull off. It’s worth calling into question that switching to Karin mid-season could be a big mistake when all of his tournament wins were on the strength of his Nash play. Why fix what wasn’t broken in the first place? Was not making top 8 at Evo deflating enough that he felt the need to make the shift?
This is not a massive issue, as we saw NuckleDu make constant shifts in characters over the course of last season before he ultimately settled on Guile and R. Mika. It’s possible that Bonchan has found his rhythm — and it’s not as though Nash has completely disappeared off the face of the earth for him. The last event he attended — D3 — saw him run both characters. But he looks to be banking on Karin more than Nash right now. This means he’s injecting another Karin into a Capcom Cup that already features three — and all three have been playing the character far longer than he has. This is also a character that has long been one of the most popular on the circuit. It’s not as though players won’t be ready for his Karin.
Don’t Break
Another issue that I have with him is that since D3 at the beginning of October, Bonchan hasn’t been seen on the circuit. It seems that he’s taking a break from the competitive circuit in preparation for Capcom Cup 2017. This was a similar issue I had with Infiltration last year, as it’s hard to truly learn to beat your top opponents without getting out there and playing.
The bright side — and the key difference between his break and Infiltration’s — is that he has still been grinding it out online. While this doesn’t replace tournament experience, it will be helping him keep sharp for Capcom Cup.
Final Thoughts
Between his character switch and his results since, it’s hard to bet on Bonchan. I won’t dismiss him as a threat — any time Bonchan is in the hot seat, he is capable of making everyone else sweat. My guess is at best that he’ll make top 8 — but again, anything can happen.
One of the biggest things that makes Karin work for Bonchan is her ability to control the ground so well with easy to space pokes. A trademark of good Sagat players is controlling the ground game so well that it forces players to take to the skies. When you combine that with exquisite anti-airs — which Karin has — it makes this a great fit.