For Honor’s latest balance patch just hit the PC servers! Two of the best For Honor players in the world, ExtheleonX and Petemoo, joined YouTuber Klyka to go through a comprehensive breakdown of all the changes in the latest patch.
The massive patch includes a number of much-needed bug fixes and re-balancing. For example, assassin classes had a mechanic where they wouldn’t fall down when thrown while out of stamina. This is a thing of the past, and a big blow to a number of Peacekeepers that were dominating the ranks.
Due to the certification process, the patch will come out within 1-2 weeks on console after the PC release.
That mecca of fighting games, Mikado Arcade, recently ran a tournament for Virtua Fighter 3: Team Battle. VF3tb is the arcade re-balance of the legendary 3D fighter, and is the first entry in the series to actually feature movement into the third dimension.
While Virtua Fighter 4: Evolution would be the entry to really steal the FGC’s heart, 1996’s VF3 has plenty of depth and intensity on its own. Many of the innovations in the genre of 3D fighters are traceable directly to this game. This it to say nothing of the characteristically strong play Mikado provides here: as usual, the players are in top form, playing a game close to their hearts.
20+ years later, though, I still don’t understand Wolf’s cowboy outfit.
Use your Muscle Power to bust right through those pesky frame traps.
Zangief’s Lariat, Cyclone Lariat (V-Trigger), and EX Spinning Pile Driver all pull Zangief’s hurtbox back a little–just enough to cause certain normals to miss, meaning the frame trap your opponent may be trying to use against you can whiff instead, if your timing is right. In the video below, MrSlaynman breaks down how to take advantage of this, demonstrating how to apply these three moves to “tactically” mash out of frame traps and turn the tables on your opponent. Frame trap escape examples for the whole SFV roster are shown, and timestamped in the video description.
EnnyMura has been Southern California’s primary streamed Pokkén Tournament event for over a year now, bringing consistently high-level play from pros like SuperTurboRyan, EMP|WonderChef, AngBad at more. Their main series “Wednesday Night Fights: Pokkén” started as a part of Alex Valle’s Level Up Series, and has evolved into its own beast as it branched out. At the close of its most recent stream, host RudaFuda and weekly winner SuperTurboRyan announced another evolution for the series: an innovative multi-venue league for California and–eventually–beyond.
In conjunction with US gaming center Playlive Nation, the top players from each local will compete online with the top players from other locals for a larger prize the same day. The intention seems to be to branch out to any state with Playlive Nation–and RudaFuda encouraged any scenes interested in taking part in the tournament series to contact him. More details on the revolutionary tournament series are expected in the future.
Coupled with the announcement was the news that EnnyMura will be streaming both NCR’s and Dreamhack Austin’s Pokkén majors. EnnyMura’s next few months look to be very, very busy.
EnnyMura has been Southern California’s primary streamed Pokkén Tournament event for over a year now, bringing consistently high-level play from pros like SuperTurboRyan, EMP|WonderChef, AngBad at more. Their main series “Wednesday Night Fights: Pokkén” started as a part of Alex Valle’s Level Up Series, and has evolved into its own beast as it branched out. At the close of its most recent stream, host RudaFuda and weekly winner SuperTurboRyan announced another evolution for the series: an innovative multi-venue league for California and–eventually–beyond.
In conjunction with US gaming center Playlive Nation, the top players from each local will compete online with the top players from other locals for a larger prize the same day. The intention seems to be to branch out to any state with Playlive Nation–and RudaFuda encouraged any scenes interested in taking part in the tournament series to contact him. More details on the revolutionary tournament series are expected in the future.
Coupled with the announcement was the news that EnnyMura will be streaming both NCR’s and Dreamhack Austin’s Pokkén majors. EnnyMura’s next few months look to be very, very busy.
2016 was yet another awesome year! It may be a bit late, but let’s celebrate with a compilation of TheHiveLeader’s favorite moments from all his videos from 2016.
The Street Fighter V balance change discussions keep rolling out from VesperArcade; this time he looks at the most beautiful member of Shadaloo’s Four Heavenly Kings, Vega. The new buffs for the Spanish matador are aimed at providing more incentive for him to switch between his two stances, as Capcom feels the non-claw form is superior due to its higher damage output.
The hit advantage of his standing heavy punch with claw has been increased to +7, with reduced pushback on hit and block to improve his damage and options following a stance cancel after he confirms. His clawed crouching heavy punch is now plus on both hit and block–allowing for more pressure–as well as conversions into his lights for combos, or a Critical Art for huge damage. The Bloody Kiss Azul version of his V-Trigger is also now invincible from the first frame after hit, to prevent unfavorable trades after proper usage.
Perhaps the biggest buff to Vega in this new patch is his significantly improved clawed Flying Barcelona Attack, which will provide a myriad of new setups for Vega, some of which Vesper demonstrates.
Capcom greatly buffed Vega’s wall dive with claw on. They really want you to use this more and reward you for landing it. First off, it’s now +3 on block, so it’s still his turn. Second, they increased the damage and now you can juggle into pretty much anything you want. Right now in Season 2, after you land with the Claw, you don’t have too many options., but now you can go into pretty much any normal or you can even cancel into another wall dive for gimmicks.
EX Crimson Terror’s movement distance, which was reduced in Season 2, has now been improved to be in-between the current and original Season 1 versions of the move.
In closing, VesperArcade offers up his usual final thoughts on the impact of these changes:
My final verdict on Vega, in this patch alone, is buffed. So even though Vega’s gotten some of the most buffs in this April patch, it doesn’t seem like Capcom is focusing on any of his weaknesses… Instead, they really wanted to encourage Vega players to use both his stances equally, so most of his buffs focus on his claw stance to make it more rewarding, and to just make the character more interesting in general, since he does have a larger kit than most.
You can see the full video above, and can also check out VesperArcade’s additional coverage of the other changes coming to SFV:
With TBS’s ELEAGUE moving into the finals for their group stages, Yahoo! Esports’ Michael Martin thought that now would be a good time to talk about the preliminary stages of the event. In this new episode of Conversations & Fireballs, he does just that, discussing the preliminaries with his guest, Mark “BornFree” Sheridan.
As someone who’s been covering Street Fighter tournaments for a long time now, BornFree is one of the best people to talk about regarding the event. During the course of this discussion, Martin and BornFree cover a plethora of topics–including the the big surprises and upsets they saw at the event, the quality commentary, the rivalries (and how they were handled), Gootecks, and more.
With all of this to discuss, this episode of Conversations & Fireballs has been split into multiple videos. For those interested, we’ve embedded these videos below for your viewing pleasure.
For 15 years, The Fighters Generation has been known for its in-depth reviews of any and all fighting games to hit the market. As part of his new Fighters_Gen vlog, the webmaster Frank Yagami has decided to count down his top 10 fighting games–in no particular order–over the course of 10 separate videos. Being a self-described “’80s kid,” the games on this list are titles he grew up playing in the arcade, and come with a lot of personal stories of his experiences, as he describes his love of the various mechanics, characters, and sound and art style.
His first two entries on the list are Samurai Shodown II, which he first played at a local arcade when he was 12 years old, and Street Fighter Alpha 3. These videos are a great watch for anyone looking to relive some old memories, or to gain some insight into a longtime member of the fighting game community. He also encourages viewers to share their own top 10 favorite fighting games in the comments!
Recently playergodaines showed us the potential of Tung Fu Rue, and demonstrated a situational stun combo with him on King of Dinosaurs. That was a surprise, but stun combos for Muay Thai practitioner Joe Higashi are not. They’ve been with the character for multiple games now, to the point they have overshadowed the character’s built-in potential without them.
Playergodaines wanted to counter this perception. In the description he mentions that he wanted to show “how (Joe) does above-average damage without relying on difficult stun combos.” The result of this work is stylish, informative, and above all else, practical!
[Editor’s note: as this video immediately preceded the new version 2.0 balance patch, some of the tech may work slightly differently in the game’s new build.]
