I truly have high hopes for this game, and I think that it's a great package for the price. HOWEVER, I unfortunately cannot recommend this game from a competitive standpoint... at this time.

It is normal for a fighting game like this to be tweaked over time. Every major balance patch so far has been well-intended and attempts to address criticisms from both casual and competitive circles. I am certain that this is in itself is a very difficult balancing act for the developers.. I do support their efforts and I remain hopeful for the future. But sadly the game feels way too rough around the edges to enjoy the competitive grind. And lets be honest, we can look forward to and welcome an expanded pve/casual experience, but competitive game modes are the crux of this game.

I try to remember that the frustrating aspects of a game like this are often addressed with more hours and experience, but I think that there are simply some innate mechanics and character design choices that do not lead to interactive and rewarding game play, regardless of skill bracket. I am not sure how to express this concisely; but it really feels like every character is over-tuned or skewed in SOME WAY to incentivize play styles that heavy rely on their specific gimmick, or encourage playing a largely non-committal neutral. Whether or not my personal biases are impeding my enjoyment to some extent I confidently feel that the state of the game doesn't scratch that itch like other titles that this game is literally based on.

If anything, it almost feels like they are really trying to shoe-horn the intrinsic designs/movesets of the cast from Rivals 1, a VERY different game by comparison, into Rivals 2. This would never be a perfect fit without some tweaking, but the execution of this has been wanting, to say the least.

Like I said, if you're a fan of the series, play casually, or just want to support Aether Studios, then this game might be for you. It has the general feel, it has cool character designs, it has real potential, but the execution is just not there yet.

I do not think that this is an unpopular opinion, and again, this is not unusual given the early stage of this game's life cycle. That said, I'll likely change my recommendation when the game is eventually in a more solid state. But if it just isn't accomplishing what it set out to do RIGHT NOW, then reviews should reflect that accordingly.

So if you are looking for a platfighter that respects your time and competitive investment, you might be better off sticking to other titles.

The issue with this game, in my opinion, is that there's *too many options*. In a game like Smash, there's multiple buttons for shield and multiple buttons for jump, and these things can lead to things like macros for those who wish to use them like L+A being grab if you don't wish to use the Z Button, or softly tapping the shield button making light shield, et cetera. But every button has its own use, meaning I personally don't feel that there is a button layout in this game that doesn't feel cumbersome.
Additionally, I feel like platfighters are an incredibly insular gaming experience - you either play Smash or you're one of the two dozen people in the scene for your niche platfighter. This leads to everyone you meet online being incredibly technical supergeniuses who, even at low MMR, can perfectly parry most moves in the game, know perfect spacing, taunt/teabag when they win to flex, et cetera, leading to a game that I feel doesn't welcome new players with a clunky button scheme, overwhelming amount of options, and an insular group of players. If you had started playing the game upon its release I'm sure you're still getting plenty of enjoyment out of it, but as someone who dabbles I feel like I'm being told I'm unwanted.

This game is very good! The servers are absolutely horrible and are only getting worse. the amount of glitches I've experienced that weren't there originally is insane. The game is fun, characters feel good to play but there is a lot of non interactive gameplay with most of the good characters and there's too many stages to ban for someone to run away from you the entire game. If you like bad servers and running away then you can play this game or just go back to playing smash ultimate lol. this game was made for offline it feels like and I can imagine most of the people playing don't go to tournaments that side of the game I cannot speak on. For the majority who are playing online the game does nothing but disappoint. The community is too small to invite "new players" with whatever content you release, when if you click on ranked or unranked you can get matched with a master player on your first minute on the game. I don't have this problem because i'm ok with losing and getting better and i'm a diamond player, but for me telling my friend yeah its a platform fighter that feels really good and he gets on and has to play against the top 1% its not cool and everyone I know has deleted the game besides myself and 1 other person.

just play melee.

Unfortunately the game feels like its still not even halfway through development. The intricacies of the game are not very well explained by it so it lacks approachability, there are major bugs that cause glaring issues, there is virtually no endlag on any attack so everything is uber-safe and it quickly devolves into a mashfest with both players mostly looking to 0-death each other or hard read the other, crouch-canceling + floorhugging causes low percents to be such a boring time, and the parry is slow as hell with most moves hitting you even when you commit to the read or try to react with the parry. Due to the insanely low endlag on everything, tech chases become less about skill and reaction time and more about mashing to cover every tech option because chances are you'll have enough time to throw out 2-4 attacks before your opponent's tech roll animation is finished.

Overall, there are MAJOR core gameplay / gamefeel issues as well the hitboxes just being so outrageously huge on most attacks. Some attacks will never kill while others feel like nukes with really no in-between.

I recommend waiting about a year or so for the rough edges to smooth out and for more game / play modes to be added, because also as of now there is basically nothing to do except play versus online / offline (this is fine with me but I know others want more for their money than just a fighting simulator).

Oh yeah also the servers randomly crap out way too often and the rollback / frame skipping is HORRENDOUS.

The game is very close to being lovable but in its current state, each patch feels like 1 step forward and 10 steps backward. It has a major identity crisis by trying to appeal to too many people while they keep overloading and reworking entire core mechanics which causes way too much mental stack and relearning. The game needed to cook for at least another years in my honest opinion.

After a lot of grinding in this game I now realize that I was wearing rose tinted glasses this entire time. I really thought I would eventually post a positive review but here we are. The genre of plat fighters is in such a drought right now that this is literally the only good option within traditional plat fighters that's viable to play on PC, heck I'd even say in general if you like even an ounce of competition since smash online is a ♥♥♥♥ fest. Being the only decent option gives it more leeway I've noticed than others games in other genres, and it is not to its benefit.

Do not buy this game for the solo content, it is extremely barren. Feels like early access.

Do not buy this game if you are very competitive, or even moderately competitive and want to play ranked and eventually improve, that is the mistake I made. Throughout my improvement I always thought the game would get more methodical and rewarding the better I got. Nope. Still after playing this much, learning wavedashing, floor hugging and much more, the game still just feels like a mash fest with unimpactful agency on the player in disadvantage and constant floor hugging (which essentially is just a band-aid solution for poor balancing). And after an intense long match where you barely clutch out the game and you should feel euphoric... you instead just feel lingering anger and emptiness, no drive to keep improving, no sense of what went wrong/right, no sense of accomplishment, just nothing.

The only person I'd MAYBE recommend purchasing roa2 is the slightly competitive, yet casual gamer whom mostly plays with their friends. Not solo. Not ranked.

I really wanted to love this game, and it does have an insane amount of polish in some aspects, but this is just starting to feel like multiversus again, another game I have hundreds of hours in. The honeymoon phase is just waaaaaay gone and I genuinely wish the best for roa2, until then though, I'm not hopping on ranked anytime soon.

Game was good when it came out but the dev team has ruined it with terrible balancing. Buffing characters to be gods while releasing others to be awful. Taking away what makes these characters fun just to release something like olympia that spoon feeds bad players into being good. Highly recommend not playing until they get themselves together and make a cast that doesn't result in playing against the same 3 characters in ranked every time.

devs bad at balancing

Games are meant to be fun but there is a lot of issues that stop that fun at all skill levels. Rivals 2 focuses on a raw competitive experience that is unforgiving to casuals because it embraces the difficulty behind reaction time and execution. Currently the meta focuses on floor hugging, shield drops, and floor techs which ask the player to focus more on what their opponent is doing. You're given less than 20 frames to perform the correct counterplay, and this kind of disadvantage state will be forced onto you from everybody in the roster. There is fun to be had in learning how to adapt but knowledge isn't enough and the reward of a counter attack doesn't justify dealing with said flurry of offense. You will have multiple instances of cheesy kills, non-interactive juggles, and surprise reversals that betrays the expectation of your control over the game. There is a world of difference between even just low and mid level players so expect a whooping.

Gameplay depth did not grow when shields were added, and special getups are nothing more than a timing mixup from disadvantage. Many complain of the patches being confusing or backwards and I have to agree. The dev team constantly reverts changes even when the audience praises that initial change. Most players can agree that the devs give off an impression that they don't have a clear vision for their sequel to Rivals when we see gameplay changed BACK to how it was functioning before. Many features like tutorials should have been in the base game and this does still feel Early Access when seeing incomplete menus and UI.

Clarien please hotboxes are so inconsistent
why do tech rolls take so long? since you dont need to read and its mega easy to react makes game a one shot fest thats
why is floor hugging broken low percent is just mashing idk if its better or worse that Olympia dtilt beats floor hugging.
why is there no small stages for counter picks? theirs so many large stages to camp or run away on really bad for the slow characters its not that bad because of parries but shouldn't even be a complaint point
I personally don't care about pve content but if you're gonna include so little why include any at all?
why cant I view characters move sets certain important mechanics are never communicated being able to cancel moves to get movement options Olympia down b or zetterburn down b probably more that I still dont know about.
why dosent lox have a kill throw just feels kinda weird about it moot point honestly lul.
why cant I rebind the A+B input to something else its so annoying having to push A+B when I still have free buttons on my controller.

game is pretty good, good as its price tag at least for people wanting something competitive and grew up with smash this is a good choice but not only is there currently next to nothing for the casuals till workshop comes out but for those comp players there is many many many MANY small complaints that will most definitely annoy you.
theres enough annoying garbage and Zetterburn hasnt been nerfed so as of now I wouldnt recommend but wouldnt say dont play less you're a casual

Comp players who want the game get it! really fun everyone is viabe and so far every new character has been free so if there isnt currently someone you eff with will be in time!
Comp players who are iffy probably dont game health is mediocre rn go watch some Marrs videos or something then decide
Casuals dont even think about it till they add workshop there is next to nothing for casuals