Category: Entertainment & Lifestyle

Maximilian delves into which games got legitimate complaints

It is absolutely no secret that pretty much every fighting game that gets released and has a legitimate player base gets criticized for one thing or another. If you’ve been on FGC Twitter at all lately, then you’ve probably seen even the biggest triple A fighting games receiving a ton of flack for things ranging from lack of costumes to their game mechanics.

Oftentimes, these games as a whole don’t really deserve the amount of hate they get as a lot of complaints tend to be personal frustrations, however, there are also definitely fighting titles that do/did deserve a lot of the criticism they received. Popular fighting game streamer / content creator Maximilian recently put together a video that delves into the games that fall into that latter category.

Beginning with a title that should come as no surprise to anyone, we have Street Fighter X Tekken. The highly anticipated crossover between fighting game juggernauts Capcom and Bandai Namco should have been a dream come true, but ultimately ended up being a nightmare for a variety of reasons.

Max starts out by diving into the very real issues this game had at the start. The biggest problem and most infamous one was easily its on-disc DLC, which saw a whole slew of essentially fully fleshed out fighters that were scheduled to be released later as additional content already existing on the disc (but locked away) at launch.

Street Fighter X Tekken also had its gem system, which gave players really strong buffs in battle and could also be purchased with real money effectively being literal pay to win items. These two major issues never really sat well with the fan base, and they are the two largest targets for the criticism the game received.

A more modern game that has gotten a lot of heat and continues to get it is Mortal Kombat 1. While Max feels that the game looks great overall, he notes that ever since early on it felt like something was off about the title.

He explains that Mortal Kombat 1’s main issue is how it feels to actually play it, saying it’s the worst feeling NRS game released so far. Max does, however, go on to say that he does believe that MK1 could eventually be tuned up enough to where it could become a very cool game.

Check out the video below to see the full list of games that deserved the criticism they received.

Mortal Kombat 1 hasn’t quite finished its content support just yet, and the game is still gearing up to release Terminator 2’s T-1000 and Conan the Barbarian to close out its second wave of DLC fighters. But PC modders, as they often do, continue to add their own guests into the game by way of skin swaps, and the latest ones we’ve stumbled on are certainly interesting.

Steve from Minecraft has already made his way into Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, but what might he look like in the world of Mortal Kombat 1? And how about Dragon Ball’s own Golden Frieza? Well, these new PC mods add both combatants into the fray and replace a couple of the game’s DLC contenders.

Avid Mortal Kombat fan and information gatherer TheThiny shared a tweet earlier today with some new Mortal Kombat 1 mods for 2025. These include both Steve as OmniMan and Golden Frieza as Homelander, and you can download them by checking out the links in the tweet below.

These mods come from the minds of Nakomi and ArScorpi, respectively, and they look pretty darn crisp all things considered. You wouldn’t expect Steve or Frieza to really fit into the hyper realistic visual style of MK1, but the modders have done a solid job of making them blend in as much as they can.

With Steve, we see that he has been modded over OmniMan, which means he still has the DLC fighter’s move set in tow. Some of the screenshots depict Steve slamming rocks onto the opponent, one of which has also been modded to resemble Minecraft’s blocks, and that feels fitting for the character for sure.

Golden Frieza, on the other hand, is arrogant and cocky, and Homelander’s moves and mannerisms certainly fit that well.

There does not appear to be much in the way of gameplay footage of these two Mortal Kombat 1 mods in action just yet, but you can check out the hi-res screenshots featuring both Steve and Golden Frieza below.

Click images for larger versions

Mortal Kombat 1 mods of 2025:

Minecraft Steve as OmniMan

Golden Frieza as homelander!

Download Links pic.twitter.com/VFBczfdBDh

— thethiny (@thethiny) January 2, 2025

Plus Rival Schools got some love too

The nightmare to many in Ultra Street Fighter 4 has been missing from action for a decade now, but Elena will soon make her grand return again in the coming months.

Capcom has released a handful of new pieces of artwork to celebrate the holiday season that’s now drawing to a close, and one of them includes a fresher look at Elena’s redesign for Street Fighter 6.

We already got to take a look at the new piece of art Capcom shared for Mai Shiranui on her birthday / New Year’s Day as the next SF6 DLC character though this one is a bit different.

Capcom’s holiday survey offers up a special wallpaper for those who complete it before the clock runs out in the coming days featuring a number of their characters that impacted 2024 or are going to impact 2025.

That of course means a lot of Monster Hunter Wilds but also some Dead Rising, Mega Man, Dragon’s Dogma, Ace Attorney and a surprising chunk of fighting game representation.

We actually somehow missed her the first few times seeing the sample artwork, but Elena is there just to the right of the center of the wallpaper next to the giant M. Bison in the back.

This is basically our first new look at Elena since the Season 2 DLC trailer dropped where we saw her in the animation and on the Year 2 Character Pass art.

The survey wallpaper here shows the friendly fighter striking a similar pose to said pass art doing a one-armed handstand though it does give us a slightly different angle on her outfit and appearance.

We were of course most interested in seeing if there were any design changes visible between that portrait from June until now, and it looks as though there may be a few small ones.

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The only confirmed difference we can see in the art is the new one features a buckle on the rope belt for her pants.

It also appears as though the tiger stripes on her pants may wrap a bit more around towards the back, and her lip makeup is much lighter — although those could come down to how the artist is depicting her.

Capcom did previously go back and change up Akuma’s hair color from the time the SF6 roster leaked to when he was officially revealed, so it wasn’t out of the question they’d continue to tweak Elena’s new fit from what we originally saw.

But it looks like they’ll be sticking with what they had planned before.

On top of Street Fighter, Rivals Schools also got some love in this art with Batsu and Hinata appearing next to Bison and Elena too.

They’re presumably here to represent the Capcom Fighting Collection 2 planned for this year featuring the Capcom vs. SNK games as well as Project Justice, Power Stone and more.

Capcom also put out another piece of art for New Year’s with a celebration of some of their characters including Ryu and Luke along with Darkstalkers’ Morrigan interestingly chilling in the back.

With Mai next in line to release sometime this Winter, it probably won’t be until at least March with Capcom Cup 11 that we get to see what Elena actually looks like in SF6 proper — though we may be waiting even longer with her Spring launch window still a ways out.

You can check out how this new art for Elena compares to her previous portrait in the gallery up above, and those who want the wallpaper for themselves will have to complete Capcom’s survey before it ends.

There’s a handful of titles that The King of Fighters fans generally circle back to as their favorites of the now 30-year-old series with classic dream matches like KOF ’98 and 2002 or the still gorgeous King of Fighters 13.

One entry in particular, however, is hardly ever brought up in the conversation of KOF greats for a few reasons, which is a real shame considering all it has to offer.

GuileWinQuote recently released another new excellent video to ring in the new year looking back 20 years to The King of Fighters 11, which he dubs the most underrated game in the series.

KOF11 came at a very interesting time in SNK and fighting game history when the developers had finally moved away from the classic NeoGeo hardware after a full decade for the franchise and were still trying to find their footing shifting over to console and the Atomiswave arcade hardware.

This of course brought on the subpar King of Fighters Neowave and divisive King of Fighters Maximum Impact though the final NeoGeo entry, King of Fighters 2003, would set in motion what KOF11 would become.

Instead of the standard team approach to KOF games that revolved around fighting complete rounds as singular characters, 2003 introduced a tag team mechanic more in line with what you’d expect out of Marvel vs. Capcom — but it felt somewhat half-baked much like the game as a whole.

The King of Fighters 11 would build upon that in some much more fun and interesting ways as a real shift for the series that unfortunately wouldn’t really stick around after.

That game opened up shifts for characters tagging out in a much faster and free-form fashion available off of cancelable normals and specials.

Said shift mechanics opened the door to new combos that were never before possible as well as unique pressure and mixup situations.

This also put more of a focus on team building more than ever before too with synergies and special interactions flipping classic KOF on its head.

Its usage was controlled by the skill meter that does limit the craziness a bit and allows for a defensive break too at the cost of both of your bars.

And of course KOF11 offered the immaculately titled Dream Cancel mechanic as well as introduced Elisabeth and Oswald to the series.

The roster of characters (especially in arcades), however, left out a lot of longtime favorites like Mai, Joe and Andy in favor of some more out there picks like a few Buriki One fighters.

There are other aspects of the game that are not wholly beloved either like the in-game art and UI, Shion and Magaki as the bosses, and some of the character balancing.

And of course changing up the classic formula.

Probably the reason KOF11 isn’t brought up more when discussing the franchise, though, is / was its lack of availability.

The game released in 2005 for arcades at a time when those basically didn’t exist in the West anymore like the ’90s, and we didn’t receive the PlayStation 2 port of KOF11 until all the way in 2007.

Moreover, 11 is one of the very few KOF arcade titles still missing a modern re-release, so there’s now way to officially go back and play it with rollback netcode even now.

We highly recommend checking out GuileWinQuote’s new video below to see all of what makes King of Fighters 11 so special and an underrated gem for the genre.

At this point in Street Fighter 6’s life, I think it’s fairly safe to say that most people feel that Rashid’s level 2 super is strong. Some believe it’s the strongest super in the entire game, and there is definitely a case to be made for it.

And if you’re someone who thinks it’s the strongest super in the entire game and didn’t think it could possibly be any stronger, then you might not want to see what we have for you here today. Top player Nemo has been practicing and learning Rashid in Street Fighter 6 in recent times, and the fighting game master mind has already discovered several new set ups that are truly scary.

To provide a bit of context here, Rashid’s level 2 super is a massive, slow-moving tornado that hits multiple times, creeps toward the opponent, can’t be jumped over, and does not go away if Rashid is hit. As a result, this move is considered very strong because it has the ability to lock players down heavily, with some characters not having solid counters for it, and it also leads to several checkmate situations if set up properly.

Nemo’s new tech is very much in that vein as it further shuts down burnt out opponents and also makes one of the main defensive options when in burn out essentially useless.

When a player is in burnout, one of the main counters for the inevitable Drive Impact that causes stun is an invincible reversal super. This is usually level 1 super and level 3, as level 2s have a tendency to have other benefits outside of start up invincibility (in some cases, anyway).

What Nemo demonstrates here is a set up that sees Rashid combo a burnt out Guile in the corner, convert into Rashid’s slide, and activate level 2 super while he’s on the other side of the opponent to actually send it away from the fighters. In doing so, Rashid recovers fast enough to land a meaty standing heavy punch that trades should the opponent challenge with a wake up button, and as a result, Rashid is still at advantage and can convert that trade into a full combo.

But, okay, that’s not really all that crazy, right? Well, the other layer of this set up is that if the opponent blocked that meaty standing heavy punch, Rashid can attempt the Drive Impact for stun, and if Guile tries to level 1 super to counter it (which he normally should), Rashid’s level 2 super will actually absorb the majority of the projectile super allowing Rashid to parry the final hit and still keep attacking making the level 1 super attempt basically useless.

ガイル詰ませるけぇ pic.twitter.com/GDPGmALiJJ

— Nemo（ねも） (@GOOD_NEMO) December 22, 2024

While this particular set up was crafted to work against Guile only, Nemo has followed up with several other similar set ups that work against other major characters in Street Fighter 6. There’s tech against Cammy, Ken, Luke, and more, and it all focuses on using level 2 super to shut down their counter super options when in burnout.

Brian F has put together a video that details more of Nemo’s interesting Rashid findings, so be sure to check it out below for more information on how it all works.

A really cool clip emerged on Butatannnn’s Twitter feed a few days ago. This clip showcased the ending of a match between Incineroar and Donkey Kong in a Super Smash Bros. Ultimate match.

Upon first opening up the clip, one might not think that this was the ending considering that both Donkey Kong and Incineroar barely had over 30 damage received for both of their last stocks. However, this just shows how explosive Incineroar can be under the right circumstances.

By using a landing up aerial against the opponent’s shield, the Incineroar player was successfully able to bait out a grab punish attempt from the Donkey Kong user. Afterwards, Incineroar jumped, then successful hit with another landing up air, which confirmed into Incineroar’s down aerial near the ledge.

Since Donkey Kong’s up special is purely a horizontal recovery, the match was effectively over at this point. Had the other player just put down their controller, they would’ve won regardless.

However, Incineroar decided to go for a stylish finish instead. The character chose to drop down and perform a down special counter against the recovery attempt. While “Revenge” (Incineroar’s down special) isn’t very strong by itself, successfully triggering it will greatly power up Incineroar’s next attack.

This caused Donkey Kong to bounce against the stage, in which he then failed to tech successfully. Frantically, Donkey Kong attempted to use his up special again, but this only prompted Incineroar to stack a second Revenge.

Donkey Kong then tried his recovery one last time. Unfortunately for him, this only caused Incineroar to get a third stack of Revenge.

All of this just to get an even more epic finish at the very end. Check it all out below:

pic.twitter.com/425Ndi46cT

— ぶたたん (@Butatannnn) December 30, 2024

Just yesterday, we supposedly learned the Nintendo Switch 2’s precise release date from a report by UAGNA. This suggests that the Switch 2 will be made available much sooner than many of us expected.

It would seem that 2025 is kicking off with yet another rumor regarding Nintendo’s worst kept secret. Over on Reddit, images of the Switch 2’s motherboard have supposedly surfaced.

It’s been pointed out that the motherboard has the appearance of being manufactured by Samsung. This has led to the conclusion that the Switch 2 will utilize 8nm semiconductor process nodes rather than the 4nm semiconductor process nodes.

While the 8nm semiconductor process nodes might sound more impressive, it’s actually a technology developed back in 2018. In comparison, the 4nm semiconductor process nodes consume less power per operation while also having better performance.

The main benefit of using the 8nm semiconductor process nodes over the 4nm semiconductor process nodes is that they’re easier to make and are cheaper. As such, many Nintendo fans are seemingly disappointed by this.

However, the observation of NVIDIA’s graphics processing unit does give us some good news. Many of the rumors surrounding the Switch 2 have suggested that the hybrid device will utilize NVIDIA’s DLSS upscaling technology. Needless to say, the presence of the GPU within the images does lend towards this idea.

Through DLSS (deep learning super sampling), cheaper technology can perform at better frame rates with improved resolutions thanks to artificial intelligence. Though it was expected that the Nintendo Switch 2 wouldn’t be up to par with the PlayStation 5 or Xbox Series consoles in terms of specs, the implementation of DLSS would certainly be enough to be a significant improvement over the Switch.

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Welp, it’s over.

Based on the leaked SoC picture this appears to be manufactured by Samsung, meaning the 8nm node is likely, that’s 2018 technology. A lot of people expected 4nm.

This is just speculation based on the leaked photos, but if this ends up true, this would be… https://t.co/WhUt99ftDm

— Centro LEAKS (@CentroLeaks) January 1, 2025

With us getting closer and closer to the inevitable Switch 2 reveal, more leaks like these are expected to drop. Of course, nothing is confirmed until we hear it directly from Nintendo themselves.

According to Nintendo President Shuntaro Furukawa, the Switch 2 is slated to be revealed within this fiscal year, which spans through March 31, 2025 for Nintendo. The previous rumor reported on yesterday suggested that the hybrid device will be released on March 28, 2025, so a reveal event should theoretically be imminent at this point.

Not much is officially known about the Switch 2, but Furukawa did recently confirm that the upcoming console will feature backwards compatibility with the Switch. Nintendo also seems to be priding themselves on developing a seamless transition process between the Switch and the Switch 2.

By this point, the Switch has cemented itself as the third best-selling gaming device by achieving 146.04 million sales worldwide. It follows closely behind the Nintendo DS (154.02 million units sold) and the PlayStation 2 (160 million units sold).

Mario Kart 8 Deluxe, Animal Crossing: New Horizons, Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, and Super Mario Odyssey are the top five performing games on the Switch. More than likely, sequels for these titles will emerge on the Switch 2 in some form considering how successful they were for Nintendo.

We shouldn’t have to wait too much longer for official news from Nintendo at this point. Regardless, things are certainly looking interesting for the Nintendo Switch 2.

When it comes to Street Fighter related figures that get released, more often than not we see large scale statues that are very high quality, but also cost you more than two PlayStation 5 Pros. This time, a new figure is en route that depicts the original Street Fighter poster boy, Ryu, and it’s much more affordable, but it also has something kind of interesting about it.

Sega is releasing a Street Fighter 6 premium perching Ryu figure next year that looks great, but fans were quick to notice something funny about his expression and pose. One quick look and you’ll see that it totally looks like Ryu is sitting there, watching you play Street Fighter 6, and judging you (probably for losing MR).

Video game deal hunter Wario64 shared the details over on Twitter over the weekend which includes all of the links you’ll need to pre-order your own (which you can do now).

This upcoming Ryu figure has an estimated release date of August 30, 2025, and it will run you about $26 USD. Ryu clocks in at about 6 inches tall in this sitting position, and based on the product photos the figure itself and the sculpt appear nicely detailed and made.

SEGA – Street Fighter 6 Ryu Premium Perching Figure preorder is $25.99 on Amazon https://t.co/A9xEstj2Q6
$25.99 Entertainment Earth
$33.99 BBTS pic.twitter.com/wwbCJO6Kwt

— Wario64 (@Wario64) December 28, 2024

Ryu is rocking his default Street Fighter 6 look with his cloak included and sandals strapped to his feet, and with this figure the original Shoto sits there with his arms crossed seemingly deep in thought.

But it’s not just the arms crossed that make him come off as judgy here, but also his facial expression. When taking a closer look at Ryu’s face, I (and several others who have said as much on social media) can’t help but feel like Ryu looks unimpressed and disappointed, and what makes the whole thing funnier is that he’s sitting down as if he might be sitting behind you while you play Street Fighter 6, watching you lose, and reacting as a result.

Some folks on Twitter have already begun memeing Ryu’s face here, and I’ve even come across some fan art that really highlights just how over it Ryu seems with this figure (which you can see below).

ngl, I’m not feeling the heart of the battle today. pic.twitter.com/rL6aR7Buj8

— Wallace Pires (@h_wallacepires) December 29, 2024

With all of that having been said, this Sega premium Street Fighter 6 Ryu figure does actually look quite good, and for the price, it’s likely a good buy for anyone who wants a bit more SF6 merch on their desk or shelf. You can pre-order it now on Amazon, Entertainment Earth, and Big Bad Toy Store.