Blazblue (PS3/360)

[Darwock]

That's a relief, I thought maybe my brain just wasn't up to the task! Cheers mate

[briareos_kerensky]

Can't wait for the people complaining about Seth to have a shot at Ultimate Ragna >_<

All Ultimate characters are pretty cheap, probably &nu; is the cheapest of them all...score attack is quite an hellish mode, it's a good off-line training for every character, though I always have the impression that the AI doesn't really like to get close and personal in fights, leading to a lot of openings to a dash+projectile combo.

BTW, I played Bang's story a bit today it was hilarious, just like the second part of Teach Me Boobie Lady; this comical interludes are excellent to explain the background of the Blazblue universe, I really like them.
Also complete Tager's story with the true (?) ending...a bit depressing, I really want to know who this Kokonoe is.
(this is probably the first beat'em'up where I care about the characters background...)

On the net front, this afternoon I get a relatively dodgy connection and there was too much lag...a couple of matches, it was a close call against a lvl 8 Noel but eventually lost but I understood that I stand no chance against Haru-men...damn, he's relatively slow but that sword has an incredible reach and can string some powerful combos. This evening I'll be online too, if someone wants to join, can drop me a message (teddymeow, you were playing LBP so I wasn't sure if you wanted to...oh well).

Interesting about the level 50 guy, I have been avoiding players with a much higher level than me but perhaps I don't need to!

From what I've understood on the whole level/point thing, a lvl 50 is surely skilled, but for example, I'm lvl 3 and I reached it after my second round against a lvl 20-ish character (won by absolute luck, I should have save that replay), so it's better not to be afraid of high level players, they might have got their levels with a few wins against high lvl players(*), but especially because you can learn how to defend well against certain characters...for example with &nu; I've understood that I need to get away as soon as possible and not to rely too much on her drive combo (D,D, b+D, b+D, fd+D, fd+D...if I'm not mistaken) and surprise people with a backward Sickle Storm (qcf, C+D) especially against highly mobile targets or players who like to dash around the screen (Arakune, Taokaka, sometimes Jin and Rachel).

And probably I should give Noel a chance, in the story mode I was pretty sure on how using her and I finally understood how to keep her drive active.

(*) of course you'll need some skill to do this, I'm not understimating anyone here.

[eastyy]

having played the game a bit now and tried the characters have to say i dont think its really for beginners each of the characters takes some mastering and non i would say were beginner friendly

[Kubrick]

Agreed. I've not played the game much so far, but it definitely feels a lot harder to get into than most games.

As with any game, I just started playing this without reading-up about how it works etc and hoped to pick things up as I played. That usually works for me to a degree, but in this I'm not learning much.

[mugetsu]

i really need to put this on more and learn at least 1 character to take online but demon's souls is totally owning my playtime at the moment.

[saturn-gamer]

I've played a boatload of fighters, like everything MVS, CPS etc and Blaz Blue ranks among the harder ones. I'm actually glad that it only has 12 chars. Never have I seen such diversity in a line-up. Every character has like three times the moveset of an SFIV fighter. The combo possibilities seem to be insane.

I think that Jin is a good choice. He has practical specials and a projectile. His surfboard special is really great. I tried Ragna at first, but his aerial specials were kind of hard.

I can also pull off some of Jins combo's from the bonus disc. His HCB F Distortion drive is kind of hard to pull off (even on TE), but I usually try to do it after I launched my opponent with DP motion +A.

[Darwock]

Jin & Noel are definitely the easiest to pick up and win with, as a result they make up the vast majority of ranked match opponents. Jin's ice surfboard is quite hard to predict if it comes from close range - it's easy to punish if you know it's coming but when someone uses it the whole time I often find myself getting destroyed by it.

Noel's Chain Revolver is similarly low risk/high reward, but I've finally got the number of the people who just mash it - I'll usually only get caught out by a 'proper' Noel player now

[Goemon]

Yep, I'm finding this pretty tough going!

Never really played a GG game before so I'm completely new to this, I thought I was doing okay venturing into arcade mode/story mode and doing a bit of training, but then I went into score attack and got my ass handed to me by the 2nd character!! Watching what the AI was doing in SA I'm now dreading online and the skills that can be displayed.

It's so fast and so busy all the time...

I'll have to give you some fights some time, fuse (360 version)...I warn you tho that I've only tried 1 character and have the reaction time of a slug.

[Darwock]

I don't think Score Attack makes a good litmus test for your skills as it apparently runs at the highest difficulty setting (Hell). I haven't even tried it yet, I went straight into online battling as I figured it's better to jump in at the deep end, otherwise I'd probably always be too scared to try.

[hudson]

Yeah I agree. This game is tough to pick up. It's going to one of them that will click after loads and loads time put into it. I've only had a couple hours worth of play with it so far. Had some games with Paddy, who kindly juggled my arse into the top of the screen Felt like I couldn't block for shiz.

Been trying to learn Tager and Rachel. It's tough. Hopefully it will click soon-ish

[briareos_kerensky]

Rachel is one of the toughest characters to master, you have to dance across the buttons to play traps and use the wind to make more effective.

[hudson]

I'll try to stick with her. Oh I forgot to mention Noel too. She doesn't seem too bad. For some reason I'm steering clear of using Ragna/Jin as I think these are the Ken/Ryu of the game. I personally and probably foolishly don't like going vanilla characters lol. I'm a tit.

[eastyy]

in guilty gear there were quite a few characters that were easier to play like for example sol/ky/millia/chipp

In this its like that alot of the characters are more along the lines of zappa and bridget from gg in that there is alot to them and you need to plan ahead

been trying to get the hang of litchi it is taking alot of time learning the pole attacks and placement moves

[Super Monkey Balls]

Rachel is one of the toughest characters to master, you have to dance across the buttons to play traps and use the wind to make more effective.

I too am getting a kicking whenever I venture into SA or online. I played my first Rachel with Ragna yesterday. She kept me at distance and completely fried me in the first round so I was forced to completely change technique and get up close and personal, stuck to her like glue from then on and I ended up winning and felt quite smug about it. Thats what makes a good fighter. Blazblue ticks all the boxes, and even some SFIV doesn't.

[Darwock]

I fought one Rachel that made me look absolutely stupid, I might try to youtube the replay just to show you guys. The funny thing is I fought the same player as Taokaka vs Taokaka first and I won with relative ease, when it was the rematch it he chose Rachel and every time I closed in he got me with her electric chair move. EVERY TIME. When I stayed back he got me with the lightning rods.. I ended up with no idea where to go and he won on a time-out.

I'm sure that move can be easily worked around but I just couldn't figure it out.