Help me like this game.

[ZombiBatz]

I, a Smash enthusiest and general lover of fighting games, can not like this game. There are quite a number of issues I have with it. I want to enjoy this game, I really do, but in trying to be a Melee clone, they seemed to have forgotten that part of what Melee so competitive, was that it was a bit of a broken mess.

Let's start with balancing, now I get that everyone's saying x character is OP all the time, but it kinda shows when they tried to make every character not only good, but Top Tier. Each character has a strong kit (Some more then others) and are very viable... but with the exception of Etalus, no real defensiveness. They're all meant to go in and start 'combos' which usually consist of the same move over and over again. It's hard for me to think there's much of a skill level when there's so much to be given from just rushing in. Now there is one defensive tactic: Parrying. But that, in my opinion, is still a terrible way to balance things, because due to how strong the parry is, (Leaving your enemy stunned for about 2 seconds) it just puts people right back in the same situation of just pressing as many buttons as possible until your enemy is at enough percent where they can escape your combos. It only rewards one playstyle, and fighting games often have a variety of playstyles such as zoning, pressure, grappling, ect.

This is a game meant for Smash Bros. Melee players. Not for Smash Bros players in general, The gameplay is fluid and feels solid, followed by some of the glitches in Melee remaded into proper game mechanics. Overall, everything controls tight, solid, and feels good in your hands.

...If you're playing Locally.

One thing I've seen is a lot of complaints about is that the netplay is trash, and I can attest to that. If you're ping is above average, you will have a couple frames delay. Now this isn't bad in most games, since framedata isn't that important... but in a fighting game, especially one like RoA, it's the most crippling detriminte to any game, and reduces what should be a fluid, even match into who gets the first attack. If you're the aggressor, fantastic, you look like a combo-legend and feel ready to go to tournaments. If you're the recipient, well.. enjoy watching yourself plummet off the stage.

This wouldn't all be so bad if this game wasn't so harsh to new players. Ranked matches are obviously competitive but Exhibision matches are just as serious. While the tutorial does do a decent job at teaching players the game mechanics, the only way players learn those mechanics is by playing against others. So either you have a friend who wants to jump into this game too, or you find one.

Another problem I have with this game is the Roster, now at base you get the main cast of 8: Forsburn, Zetterburn, Orcane, Maypul, Kragg, Wrastor, Absa and Etalus. Right now at the time of me posting this, Ori and Sein have been released as DLC, and two additional characters are planned to be released in the future. Judging by video I've seen of those two characters in the menu screen, they seem to plan to add an additional two characters beyond that given the two additional slots in the character select screen. The DLC is already rising to a point where it's going to be as expensive as the game itself, with each character costing about 5$. If anyone's played fighters competitively, which is unfortunatly the only real way to enjoy this game, you will know that it's rather important to get a feel for all the characters you're potentially fighting for match ups, movesets, and maybe even finding a new main.

In summary, this is a game you'll only get millage out of if you enjoyed the competitive scene of Smash Bros Melee, but didn't want to play Melee, do not care about fighting people online and have a friend or two who you can play with IRL, and don't mind spending about 20$ or so to keep up with the DLC characters. Honestly, I'd rather play Brawlhalla then this game, and I hate having to say that.

[Stupid Bug]

my best advice to you is to not take exhib seriously AT ALL
like seriously its just copy paste for glory.

Secondly join the ROA discord, and then join the ROA academy. The academy is a place for newer players or more seasoned players to learn new tech, practice skills, talk, chat, and play friendlies with.

[Stupid Bug]

the best way to take this game casually and to enjoy it fully is to meet fellow players and ask them for friendlys. VC helps but isn't nessisary. Its just a fun game to play with friends online. If you can't get irl friends to play, just make new ones on the discord. This is my only, and my best advice for you. I hope you can enjoy this game like me and other fellow rivals players.

[Hiro Protagonest]

Okay here's the thing. Smash is a really defensive game. All versions of Smash. And it sucks. It means there's a lot of camping, a lot of standing around or, at best, safe buttons that lead right back to neutral where it's easy to play defensive.

This game is not. That does not make the neutral simple. It makes it more active. An aggressive style of Smash neutral is actually crazy involved, because the neutral options are the insane movement you can do. And parries are there to prevent people from just pressing buttons. Parries are actually a very specific window, if you're getting parried a lot that means you're doing something wrong. If they land a parry, they get a lot of reward off it, "defensive" play is higher on the risk-reward scale in this game than in Smash.

Also, I don't really believe in super-hard combos. It's a manual combo system which means there's quite a bit of experimentation that can be done. I think anything harder is needlessly hard, and don't even mind when it gets easier like Persona 4 Arena or Dragonball FighterZ, though that may limit the competitive lifespan (which I don't really care about because it still has all the traditional fighter trappings so I'd love to show DBFZ as an entry point). Plus, this game has DI.

It's funny to see a Smash player complain this game has terrible netplay. I have voiced minor dislike for the netplay in this game, but Sm4sh's netplay is the actual definition of terrible. This game is at least serviceable.

Making fighting game characters is a very involved task, plus they're continuing to patch and push tournaments. DLC is completely understandable and it's like half the price of Guilty Gear Xrd's DLC (and Guilty Gear keeps getting expansions. Revelator was $60 even if you had the previous version).

[Squigweed]

I AM GETTING TONS OF MILAGE OUT OF THIS GAME, I HATE SMASH AND COMPETETIVE SMASH MORE. MELEE WAS OK. I LIKE PLAYING ONLINE AND HAVE A NUMBER OF FRIENDS WHO WILL PLAY LOCAL. I DO NOT MIND CONTINUING TO CONSUME AND THEREFORE PAY FOR NEW CHARACTERS AND FEATURES. GO HAVE FUN PLAYING BRAWLHALLA GOODBYE SIR

[ZombiBatz]

Originally posted by Hiro Protagonest:

Okay here's the thing. Smash is a really defensive game. All versions of Smash. And it sucks. It means there's a lot of camping, a lot of standing around or, at best, safe buttons that lead right back to neutral where it's easy to play defensive.

This game is not. That does not make the neutral simple. It makes it more active. An aggressive style of Smash neutral is actually crazy involved, because the neutral options are the insane movement you can do. And parries are there to prevent people from just pressing buttons. Parries are actually a very specific window, if you're getting parried a lot that means you're doing something wrong. If they land a parry, they get a lot of reward off it, "defensive" play is higher on the risk-reward scale in this game than in Smash.

Also, I don't really believe in super-hard combos. It's a manual combo system which means there's quite a bit of experimentation that can be done. I think anything harder is needlessly hard, and don't even mind when it gets easier like Persona 4 Arena or Dragonball FighterZ, though that may limit the competitive lifespan (which I don't really care about because it still has all the traditional fighter trappings so I'd love to show DBFZ as an entry point). Plus, this game has DI.

It's funny to see a Smash player complain this game has terrible netplay. I have voiced minor dislike for the netplay in this game, but Sm4sh's netplay is the actual definition of terrible. This game is at least serviceable.

Making fighting game characters is a very involved task, plus they're continuing to patch and push tournaments. DLC is completely understandable and it's like half the price of Guilty Gear Xrd's DLC (and Guilty Gear keeps getting expansions. Revelator was $60 even if you had the previous version).

I posted the review first, then C/P'd into this post because it was late and I was tired. But frankly, you're not helping make a point. You can say Smash is defensive, but then I'd have to ask why characters like Sonic, Shiek, and Bayonetta, with VERY strong offensive options and benefit greatly from being offensive, are so high tier. I've seen a number of competitive matches and it seems quite balanced in your options. But in Rivals of Aether, my only option is to play footsie until someone gets the first hit.

I understand how DI works, and I understand how the combos in this game work, but a lot of what I've seen involves repeating the same attack, and then, due to my lack of defensive options, I just need to hope I get lucky with DI. To me, this seams horribly onesided and unfun to play for anyone who just doesn't want a full on competitive experience.

I also don't see your issue with Sm4sh's netplay, and that's not to say I haven't had bad moments, oh believe me it's been bad at times, but this game feels consistantly bad. Now that isn't all due to the online connectivity, but also how the game functions with it, again, being hyper agressive.

DLC in any practice will always annoy me personally, but as someone who plays and enjoys Guilty Gear, I can't help but be a bit ticked at your analysis considering all the additional characters and Rev 2 DLC can be bundled at 45$, and this is for a game in a series of other games with a much higher production value then RoA. You make it sound like RoA is, in any way, equal to Guilty Gear and make RoA a better game overall. Apples to Oranges and such. But to get to your comparison of DLC, I'm not a fan of it in any context, but I find it even more agrivating that they're adding new characters instead of balancing old ones.

[ZombiBatz]

Originally posted by Retnuah:

my best advice to you is to not take exhib seriously AT ALL
like seriously its just copy paste for glory.

Secondly join the ROA discord, and then join the ROA academy. The academy is a place for newer players or more seasoned players to learn new tech, practice skills, talk, chat, and play friendlies with.

I would love to not take it seriously, but from what I've seen, just about everyone I've played against in Exhibition does. Example: I'm the kind of guy to taunt at the start of every match as respect, most people in RoA tend to try to immidiatly kill me despite that. I understand ettiquite varies from person to person and game to game, but it consistantly happens.

In addition, I feel that joining the community would only lead me to more competitive players, which at this moment in time, is FAR from what I want out of RoA when I have yet to ease myself into it in the first place.

[ZeroJanitor]

idk i just like beating up cpus

[goober]

I don't take this game seriously at all. I hop on exhibition, and go for dumb moves, and try to have fun. You have to understand in a fighting game, being the recipitent is ying and yang of all games. You can be great at this game, but there always have to be a loser and winner. Every character is great in this game but not over powered in any way, people thought etalus was low tier, but they just recently placed very high in the tourney over the summer. You can take this seriously, and take someone beating you as this dude who plays seriously, but if you're on exhibition, were mostly trying to have fun. I want to get in there, and kill with dumbest moves, like zetter down special off stage because that makes me laugh. No ledges and every character having a good recovery, (yes zetter can have a good recovery if done right) make this game way more fun. There's no low tier to root for in this game, because they could win so easily with any character. Every character has crippling flaws and great upsides. People call this game a smash clone but it's not a clone, they've done something no one else did.

I'm not that good despite like 145 hours in game, I'll play with you.

[SgtGruben]

I really feel like di does not exist in this game

[Buzz Killington]

I agree with the OP on this: The DLC stuff is BS. When I get matched with someone playing a character I don't have, I'm fighting blind; I don't know their moveset because I don't have them. I resent being pressured to buy DLC in this way, so I refuse to buy any ROA DLC. I'd actually rather they didn't produce any DLC at all, or give me the option of only matching with people who are missing the same characters as I am.

[Squigweed]

THEN PRACTISE THOSE CHARACTERS IN THE TUTORIAL

[VileThe2nd]

Since this all takes place in Aether, does that mean this Shovel Knight is also an animal? And if so, would he be a mini minotaur? A minitaur, if you will.

[Squigweed]

uhhhh sorry vile but hes a fish. and that isnt even the real shovelknight in rivals, its the fake shovelknight whos actually a fish. Taunt, with parry and special and he will lose his helmet revealing his fish form.