More Street Fighter 6 tier lists continue to surface as Season 2 rages on. We’ve now had a bit of time with the latest balance changes and the newest DLC character, SNK’s own Terry Bogard, and as a result more prominent folks in the fighting game community are feeling more comfortable sharing their thoughts on where the game stands right now.
The latest Street Fighter 6 Season 2 tier list comes from top notch competitor Phenom, and the Ken player has generated a list that also includes a solid placement for Terry.
Phenom organizes his updated tier list into five different categories. We see ranks S, A+, A, B, and C included here, which naturally descends from best (S) to worst (C).
For this list, Phenom also specifies that none of the placements in each of the categories (except one) are ordered. This means that seeing a character placed in front of another in these sections does not necessarily signify that they are better than the character that comes after them — with the sole exception being E. Honda who is in a tier of his own.
As far as the actual placements go, Phenom places some of the usual suspects up in S rank (again, not ordered). We see the likes of Ed, Akuma, Rashid, and M. Bison populate this section, which has been the norm with the latest tier lists as one, two, or all are often placed among the upper ranks.
You might be wondering where Ken, Phenom’s actual main, sits on his new tier list. Ken is placed in A rank among fighters like Ryu, Luke, and Juri, and depending on what the actual order is here, that very well likely means he doesn’t have the fiery Shoto in the top 10 right now.
Similar to Saishunkan|Nemo’s latest tier list, we also see that Phenom places Terry towards the bottom of the pack when it comes to tier ranking. This seems to be a common sentiment among some pros, though it is worth mentioning that with Terry being a more technical character to play, we haven’t seen the Fatal Fury fighter flourish just yet.
Check out Phenom’s full Street Fighter 6 Season 2 tier list with Terry below, and be sure to let us know in the comments if you agree with it or not.
A brand new gameplay trailer for Granblue Fantasy Versus: Rising’s newest DLC character, Vikala, has dropped. The minute and a half long showcase from Cygames gives us an idea of how the mousey fighter will function in the two dimensional fighting game space.
Vikala, The Guardian of the North, will round out the first full season of DLC characters when drops into Granblue Fantasy Versus on Friday, October 25. Continue on to see her trailer.
We first found out about Vikala for Versus Rising when she was teased back during the Evo Verusia gameplay trailer showcase, but this is the first we’re seeing her in any kind of gameplay action.
Perhaps the most bubbly character in Granblue, Vikala fights with the assistance of her mice. She and her furry friends manifest circus canons, explosive balloons, fireworks, and a massive pair of steel teeth attached to a chain.
Fans can get their hands on Vikala for $7.99, and will get a premium Vikala avatar along with their purchase. She rounds out the first full season of DLC characters as she joins the likes of Lucilius, Nier Automata’s 2B, Beatrix, Vane, and Verusia as post-launch additions.
We’ve rounded up a handful of screen shots so you can appreciate the details, and the full trailer awaits below. Share your reactions to Vikala and let us know how much you’re enjoying Granblue Fantasy Versus: Rising in the comments after you’ve watched.
Dragon Ball: Sparking Zero has been available for a week now, and with just about everyone playing it, fans have had some time to find some rough edges after launch.
Bandai Namco has announced that an update patch is already in the works, and will be released later this month to fix some bugs and make the gameplay experience more fluid and fun for everyone. They haven’t offered direct patch notes, but they have listed what their aiming to correct, which includes the surprisingly overpowered Yajirobe.
For those unaware, Yajirobe is more of a joke character than a true fighter across the majority of his appearances in Dragon Ball anime and manga. He can hold his own in basic combat, sure, but he’s a fairly basic guy who stands virtually no chance against even some of Sparking Zero’s weakest characters.
As such, Yajirobe is an extremely inexpensive character to add to your Sparking Zero team when playing online ranked, but players have figured out he’s worth a lot more than the mere two Destruction Points that it costs to use him.
Yajirobe still isn’t as powerful as the likes of UI Goku or Jiren, but he’s easily got way too much bang for buck thanks to a collection of bells and whistles that add up. Perhaps the most singularly powerful of these is the fact that he can fully self heal thanks to his using sensu beans.
Beyond the better than he should be character, players have been experiencing some extremely pesky bugs that cause controls to become unresponsive during online bouts. This issue threatens to turn fans off completely from playing Sparking Zero, and so we’re happy to see it’s also in Bandai’s sights.
• Improvement of an issue where some controls become unresponsive during online matches when classic controls are selected
• Adjustment of difficulty levels when playing certain stages in Episode Battle on lower difficulty settings
• Adjustment of Yajirobe’s stats
• Improved operational stability
Have you been enjoying Sparking Zero thus far? Are you happy to see these alterations coming down the pike? Share your experiences in the comments below, and be sure to check out the two recently revealed new DLC characters if you haven’t already.
The Capcom Pro Tour 2024 Super Premier Singapore officially kicked off yesterday and the list of registered players competing this weekend is absolutely staggering. Just with the pools action, we have seen several match ups that could have just as easily been the grand finals of any major event, which means we’ve had a ton of top level Street Fighter 6 action to enjoy already.
Before top 96 plays out tonight and decides the top 16, though, we wanted to take a look back at one of the most impressive moments to come out of day 1. During his match up against FAV|Ryukichi, SNB|Fujimura pulled off an incredible comeback in the first game of their set that is an absolute must see.
Fujimura has been playing Akuma this weekend and went up against Ryukichi’s Ken on their trek to the top 96. In just the first match of their 2/3 set, we saw both competitors sit with one round a piece and enter the final round to decide who was going to put a point on the board first.
Ryukichi entered this round with level 3 super locked and loaded while Fujimura began with just under two and a half super bars. Needless to say, the big, momentum-changing super attack was on the table for both players here in this final round of the first game.
How a player uses level 3 in the last round of a match is an interesting dance. Do you choose to use it early in the round for a life lead and to chip away at the opponent’s Drive Gauge? Or should you wait until their health is lower to try and close out with a hard-hitting resource dump combo?
In this case, Ryukichi would lay his cards on the table first opting to use level 3 super when Akuma sat at around 60% health left. The Ken player would ultimately tag Fujimura’s backdash attempt in the corner with a delayed crouching medium punch into Drive Rush, which would lead into a fairly short combo into level 3 as Ryukichi was low on Drive Gauge and didn’t want to enter burnout with an extended sequence.
This combo wouldn’t KO Fujimura, but it would put him at about 10% health left and very close to being down for the count.
With a little over three Drive Gauge bars now stocked after recovering during the level 3, Ryukichi went for the raw Drive Rush oki set up to try and close things out, but Fujimura blocked, survived, and fought off the Ken player with a couple of blocked normals into Drive Rush cancel to escape the corner.
At this point, many players might see this scenario and think, “oh, Ryukichi is in a fantastic spot and is about to close this out!” However, this particular situation actually ends up being very good for Fujimura — and the Akuma player certainly recognized this.
Ryukichi now has a little less than two Drive Gauge bars left and no super, while Fujimura has about the same on the Drive Gauge front, but also Critical Art stocked. The name of the game for Ryukichi is close this thing out as soon as possible, which you can see him try to do as he throws an Overdrive fireball in the fireball war after his Drive Meter built back up past two bars to hopefully catch Fujimura with the final stray hit he needed to win.
This didn’t work, however, and Fujimura was able to block in time and fight on.
You’ll notice that despite having very low health, the Akuma player never really ended up fighting on his back foot here. Instead, he’d press forward and continue to pressure Ryukichi from a safe distance to keep the opponent’s Drive Meter lower and hopefully snag the burnout.
In doing this, Fujimura would end up taking two stray standing light kicks from Ken putting his health even further down to just a sliver left. All the while, Ryukichi’s Ken still had about 75% health left.
Fujimura pushed on, weaving in and out of range for max ranged low pokes and safer fireball pressure to continue chipping away at Ryukichi’s resolve and hopefully find the big opening he needed to land Critical Art. We even see a point where Ryukichi attempts to Drive Impact through one of Akuma’s fireballs, but Fujimura was at a range where Akuma would recover in time to block and stay alive.
Even when Fujimura finally lands a significant opening in an anti-air Dragon Punch, he only goes in once after with a Drive Rush oki set up for a quick blockstring, then backs off again. He continues forward with extremely patient play, poking and prodding to try and open the opponent up and secure the big hit he needs.
We don’t see any major moves from Fujimura here for a good while. No raw Drive Rushes, no jumps, just walking in and out, poking, and trying to walk Ryukichi to the corner. With Ken being pushed back a bit closer to the corner, Fujimura finally strikes and cancels a blocked crouching medium kick into Drive Rush for a quick pressure string that lands him a forward throw and more corner carry.
Now with Ryukichi almost fully cornered, Fujimura goes for the gusto with a raw Drive Rush in, cuts its travel shorter with a standing light kick — which forces Ryukichi’s counter poke to whiff and actually counter pokes it — and this hit is what allows Akuma to cancel into a Drive Rush, continue the combo, hit the Critical Art, and win the match.
What’s really important to note here is that the whole time Fujimura is mounting this comeback, Ryukichi never builds another super until he’s being hit by the game winning combo. And though the Ken player had access to Overdrive Shoryuken as a reversal the entire time, attempting it would, at best, likely mean entering burnout and maybe surviving the big punish and at worst being KO’d for that one gamble should it be baited out.
On top of that, Fujimura’s patient play involved largely staying out of range for a proper reversal attempt from Ryukichi making this whole thing all the more impressive.
This comeback demonstrates a top tier understanding of the current meta, and Fujimura’s impressive display of patience and understanding the situation — and maintaining it even on the big stage — is nothing short of remarkable.
You can check out a brief clip of the comeback in the tweet below, but click the video to jump to the start of the round so that you can see the entire sequence described in this article fully play out.
Marvel lives. Despite it being seemingly impossible and many fans having given up hope, the Marvel vs. Capcom series has made a grand return on modern platforms with the Marvel vs. Capcom Fighting Collection.
This new compilation of iconic titles has birthed a resurgence of interest and hype in the franchise, with tons of players experiencing them for the first time ever in their lives. And what better way to celebrate such a momentous occurrence than with a spectacular cosplay of one of Marvel vs. Capcom 2’s strongest and most important characters?
Cosplayer Kagamisou recently shared a handful of cosplay images over on Twitter that feature her stunning Psylocke depiction — very likely in honor of the Marvel vs. Capcom Fighting Collection. The X-Men series combatant can be seen in several of the Versus series games both as a playable character and a cameo, but her most prominent appearance can be found in none other than Marvel vs. Capcom 2 where she is easily a top tier and part of what many considered to be the strongest team in the entire game (Magneto, Storm, Psylocke).
Kagamisou strikes seductive poses in her Psylocke getup, and the overall costume and look are top notch here.
Psylocke wears a striking purple body suit, has long purple hair, and has a bright red belt and sash around her waist. The resemblance to that classic 90’s Psylocke that Kagamisou hits with this costume is excellent, with a clear attention to detail and tons of work going into each aspect of this cosplay.
There are a handful of professional shots shared here where Kagamisou gets her Psylocke poses in, and a couple of selfies as well to give us another closer look at the getup.
This cosplay is spot on, and Kagamisou has a ton of other fantastic portrayals over on Twitter that you should definitely check out.
You’ll spot the likes of Street Fighter’s Cammy, Dead or Alive’s Kasumi, Darkstalkers’ Morrigan, and several other amazing works, so be sure to head over after you take in the Psylocke cosplay below.
Marisa is a queen of pain in Street Fighter 6. The towering brawler is one of the franchise’s largest and strongest contenders, but she’s also extremely loving.
Fans were quick to notice that Marisa has a couple of instances in-game of heart visuals being displayed during some of her attacks, most notably the heart shaped bruise we see on the opponent’s face during her level 3 super. However, what you might not know is that there are quite a few more secret hearts hidden within her moves and animations, and yjoistiidaan283 on Twitter has rounded them up and highlighted them all for us to see.
When it comes to these hidden Mickey-style hearts, they appear in a variety of different forms. Some can be seen as special move effects that pop up when she performs specific attacks, while others are a lot more hidden and can be seen only with a keen eye.
One that might have slipped by you (and definitely did for me) can be found when Marisa lands her fully charged heavy punch Gladius. As the second hit of the move lands, we can see a burst of energy erupt from her fist in the shape of a heart, and we all likely missed it as we can only really see it when a free roaming camera tool is used to zoom out a bit.
Okay, but how about one we can actually see ourselves without mods? Well, her Dimachaerus special move — and I can’t believe I never noticed this before — actually sees Marisa strike in the shape of a heart first with an uppercut then with an overhead strike which you can see in the clip thanks to yjoistiidaan283 slowing things down.
In total, the creator of this compilation counts 10 different hearts that are injected right into Marisa’s moves and animations in Street Fighter 6.
How many of these hearts did you know about before watching the clip? How many new ones did you learn about after? Let us know in the comments below.
Capcom Pro Tour 2024 Super Premier Singapore started with nearly 400 entrants raring to clash in Street Fighter 6, but after a full day of fighting that number has dwindled down to just 96. We’ve been keeping track of the action to note not only who places where, but also which characters are being used.
We’ve rounded up character usage for all but one of the top 128 players, and are happy to report that every single one of SF6’s 24 current roster members did see some play time. That said, some saw much, much more than others.
We recently examined who the top three strongest characters in Street Fighter 6 might be here in the latter half of Season 2, and in that story we also included major offline win and top eight appearances for each character.
Ken, Ed, Luke, Rashid, and Cammy have seen the most top 8 appearances, respectively, while Ed, Blanka, Guile, Ken, and Cammy have won the most events, respectively. When it comes to tier lists from notable players, the sample is still relatively small but the consensus is that Ed, Rashid, Cammy, and M. Bison are the best. Akuma, Zangief, and Ken are then tied for a potential fifth best character slot.
With all that in mind, we turn our attention to the results from the relatively large offline event going on in Singapore right now. The usual suspects are amongst the most popular picks as Akuma and Bison lead the pack with 18 unique uses each.
Ed, Ken, and Cammy make up the next tier with 10 uses (though Ed was also featured once as a secondary choice) while Rashid only popped up six times. The Arabian combatant is indisputably strong, but he is on the more technical side and so may not be as appealing to players who don’t want to spend a ton of time in the training room.
Newcomer Terry, who hasn’t been regarded as all that great thus far, was used just one time by a top 128 competitor at the event, and thus is in company with Ryu, Marisa, and Dhalsim.
Check out the full listed usage stats below and let us know what you think of the game’s general balance and popularity spread in the comments. We’ll likely run another stat story once Super Premier Singapore has concluded so we can see which characters made it the farthest, but we’d love to hear your predictions now before that information is out.
Combos were famously unintended in the earliest days of Street Fighter 2, but as fans figured out how to string certain attacks together Capcom decided to officially birth the combo system. Modern games have seen combos enhanced and extended to go on and on, sometimes totaling over 100 hits at a time, but back in SF2 most sequences would only be 2-5 hits long.
Street Fighter fans have been playing SF2 for over three decades now, however, and someone has figured out how to pull off an incredible 19-hit combo with Ken. What’s more, it doesn’t even require stun.
A ton of the more surprising sequences we’ve seen in Street Fighter 2 depend on the game’s random stun mechanic to kick in at just the right point. This means that players will have to repeat the combos they figure out until the game gifts them a stun at the right time, and only then can they truly string together the whole sequence.
In this quick but impressive clip from Mattsun_Ken, the user lands nearly 20 hits on Balrog with Ken without having to worry about stun at any point.
To be fair, this doesn’t look like the most practical of sequences. It requires Balrog to cross under Ken’s neutral jump at just the right moment and then crouch so that Ken can come down with a cross up kick while facing the wrong direction.
From there it’s an execution fest as Ken launches into a series of instant overheads and instant air Tatsus that keep Balrog locked into hit stun until the coup de grace Super finale.
From what we can recall, this might be the longest non-stun combo we’ve ever seen in Street Fighter 2. Have you seen a longer one? Check it out below and then chime into the comments with links to the most impressive SF2 combos you’ve ever seen.
The game doesn’t tell you much of what’s going on, so we’ll help with that
After five years of waiting and hard work since its initial reveal, Blazing Strike is finally available and in the hands of players.
One of the aspects we praised most in our Blazing Strike review was the varied systems with mechanical depth that becomes more open and interesting as you learn more about them, but the caveat is almost no information about the mechanics can be found in the game itself.
So we’re going to help speed up that learning curve process by breaking down all of the Rush systems and mechanics featured in Blazing Strike at release.
The controls themselves are pretty straight forward for a four-button fighting game with motion inputs, so we’re not going to go over how to do specials and Supers since those are in the move list anyway.
Most of the intricacies stem from the Rush mechanic dedicated to a fifth button (R1 / RB by default) that gives players more options on movement, offense and defense.
Using Rush also constantly drains the meter about the health bar as long as the button is held down.
Draining your Rush meter completely leaves your character in a dizzy state for a few seconds, but you can also shorten that a bit by mashing left and right directions.
Let’s dive further into what Blazing Strike has to offer below the surface.
Input: Forward / back + Heavy Punch
Every character has basic throws performed in the classic style of a direction plus Heavy Punch. Tech throws can also be used by pressing forward and Heavy Punch when an opponent attempts to throw you.
Input: Rush + forward / back / up
Instead of double pressing directions for dashing, you can only dash, back dash or run while holding down the Rush button, which can take some getting used to.
Holding Rush also allows you to perform super jumps as well.
Input: Rush + Light Punch / Light Kick
Each character has two sets of Rush Attacks tied to their light buttons that allow you to use different moves and function similarly to short auto combos if pressed multiple times.
These are very useful for combo extensions and cancels.
Input: Hold Rush while attacking / Press forward + Rush after attack
Rush can be used to create new combo options beyond Rush Attacks that aren’t normally possible in a few different ways.
Holding down Rush while performing some heavy attacks will allow you to quickly cancel into a different normal that doesn’t naturally link.
Pressing forward plus Rush right as an attack lands essentially gives your character a dash cancel to link together more attacks.
Input: Rush + Designated input
Most characters have at least one EX normal or special performed with a Rush input and designated with a white flash.
These vary among the cast, but typically make attacks stronger and give them additional properties like more hits, a ground bounce or wall bounce.
Input: Rush (x2)
Most characters except for Mateo have a Rush Ability that does something unique.
Pink refills her flame charges, MJ gets an overhead, Mochizuki teleports, and Jake pulls the opponent towards him for some examples.
Input: Rush + Critical Trigger (L1 / LB by default)
Hitting the Critical Trigger button puts your character in a Blazing Rush state where they temporarily gain infinite Rush usage for around 10 seconds.
You have to be careful when deciding to use this mechanic because your Rush gauge will remain unavailable until the start of the next round once it runs out.
Input: Forward as attack is about to land
Blazing Strike has a parry similar to that of the Street Fighter 3 series, which can be used by pressing forward within a short window of when an opponent’s attack is about to land.
We’re not entirely certain of the exact parameters of the input window or punish ability though it does feel close to SF3.
Input: Rush + forward while being hit with normal or Rush Attacks
The game also includes what is essentially a combo breaker with Rush Parry that will cause a slowdown and freeze the opponent for a second when used at the correct time.
Rush Parry does seem strong at the surface level to counter combos, but it appears there are ways to bait and punish the ability too even if it connects.
Update: This story is being updated with live results as they occur.
The Capcom Pro Tour offline events are going strong with this weekend’s stop being in Singapore.
Some of the notable players participating in the event are HB|Kawano, IBSG|Kakeru, Saishunkan|Higuchi, Rohto|Tokido, Victrix|Momochi, RB|Gachikun, BST|Daigo, DRX|Leshar, VARREL|Moke, BST|Fuudo, Mouz|EndngWalker, BC|Tachikawa, FNATIC|Chris Wong, RB|Bonchan, Saishunkan|Nemo, Falcons|DCQ, GG|Xian, CR|Shuto, DFM|John Takeuchi, TM|OilKing, Talon|HotDog29, VARREL|Mago, G8S|Pugera, Falcons|NL, Mouz|Problem X, Eva:e|Hikaru, Liquid|Nephew, SNB|Fujimura, DFM|Nauman, Guild|Rainpro, CR|Dogura, CAG|Fenrich, CAG|Go1, Yesports|Humanbomb, GamerBee, Micky, but also many, many more.
The Capcom Pro Tour Super Premier is a step above a regular Premier event on the Capcom Pro Tour and means that the top 2 placers both qualify for Capcom Cup, which means that it’s a gigantic incentive for hopeful players given how coveted the few spots available for the finals are.
With such prestigious spoils of war for the victor, it’s no wonder that so many top players gathered in Singapore this weekend to battle it out — just short of 400 competitors have showed up to try and grab one of those spots.
There’s 3 whole days of action for the event so there’ll be more than enough Street Fighter 6 matches on stream to keep your hype levels loaded, so make sure to stick around from Friday through Sunday for the full experience.
