(Maybe)
Though it’s clearly a well made game, (especially for a vanilla/initial version) Street Fighter 6 is not without its balance-based blemishes. Developers at Capcom have paid special attention to ensure that players can approach the game in a variety of ways thanks to a well rounded cast, and have painstakingly put seemingly every last move under the microscope to ensure there’s a yin to most every yang, so to speak.
That said, within the game’s central Drive System mechanic (which is really five mechanics) the Drive Rush maneuver has risen to the top in terms of controversy. This isn’t a new topic by any means at this point, as the fan base began critiquing and speculating about how to change the offensive mechanic almost right out of the gate. With 10 months of experience now under our belts and the game’s first big annual balance patch likely around the corner, I’d like to offer my two cents.
Drive Rush sees characters dash toward their foe armed with an enhancement that makes the attack they perform out of said dash gain four extra frames of advantage. Thus this not only provides a means of suddenly pouncing and potentially surprising your opposition, it also grants the potential for harder-hitting combos or more advantageous block situations.
That’s a lot of pasta for a single bar of Drive Gauge, though you can cancel certain normal attacks into Drive Rush for the much steeper cost of three bars.
This all came across as daunting at first, but the over time players have found some answers to DR as their brains tuned in specifically enough to start stuffing it with normals, perfect parrying the incoming attacks, or Drive Reversaling their way out of tough block situations.
It’s a good thing too, because to alter the utility of Drive Rush in most any way would clearly upset the rest of the balance of the game in seen and potentially unseen ways, but if I’m being honest (and I think I speak for a majority here) Drive Rush still needs some kind of nerf to get the game to the next level of fun and engagement.
So how might Capcom go about handling this delicate situation without starting a ripple effect that threatens to change the entire SF6 experience? My first step is identifying what about Drive Rush leaves people feeling legitimately robbed, or legitimately demoralized?
In a game with a naturally high amount of mental stack, the fact that Drive Rush piles further on top of that feels like a sore spot.
Not only do you get all the obvious and intended benefits of the maneuver, but you can also choose when you cancel into your follow up attack, meaning that even when your foe is concentrating on defending against Drive Rush (in lieu of jump, or Drive Impact, or regular dash, or one of the unique engagement moves a given character may also have) they still have to deal with the built in mix up of whether or not the DR is going to end in a standard attack, a throw, or an early attack to goad a whiff.
Many of us can recall plenty of situations where we were ready for Drive Rush and still wound up losing to it, and that’s where the rub really seems to be.
To rectify this (again without butterfly effecting the game into unrecognizable territories) I think the best course of action would be to raise the risk of neutral Drive Rush.
Adding Punish Counter status to characters hit out of Drive Rush might make people think twice about throwing it out as commonly as we see it now, and this feels fair given the way Drive Rush itself grants the same advantage when it works. This would also mean getting a Drive Rush stuffed would cause a bit of Drive Gauge depletion, mind you.
This doesn’t really get rid of the natural mix up that comes with the ability to cut Drive Rushes short, however. You can be ready for a Drive Rush with your counter/stuff attack, only to see said move whiff and your foe take advantage with a full punish as they’re just outside the range.
To help balance this, I’d propose developers add four frames of extra recovery on Drive Rush-canceled attacks on whiff. You get four extra frames when the attack lands (on hit or on block) so why not balance that with those same four frames in the other direction when it doesn’t?
There, I’ve proposed an alteration or two to Drive Rush and put it on the internet. It’s possible there are obvious problems with these alterations, and you’re more than welcome to head to the comments and start poking holes.
Maybe this inspires a better solution to the current problem of Drive Rush, or maybe it simply gets the conversation going in a direction that eventually gets us there.