The quarter-circle, dragon punch and charge motions tend to be some of the more common inputs for specials seen in fighting games as they were set by Capcom’s Street Fighter series. Sometimes, however, fighting game developers like to add their own unique inputs that really stand out.
Jmcrofts recently released a video that covers some of the strangest and most unique inputs for special moves that we’ve seen. Of course, it’s mentioned that this list won’t include moves like Ivy’s Summon Suffering or Geese Howard’s pretzel motions as their complexity warrant a different type of video covering the topic at a later time.
Ed’s simplistic inputs within Street Fighter 5 are mentioned first. Rather than having motions, Ed can instead trigger his specials by holding certain buttons, mashing, or with simultaneous button presses.
As it turns out, Ed’s simplistic inputs from Street Fighter 5 were actually the testing bed for what would become Modern Controls in Street Fighter 6. With Ed’s return in Street Fighter 6, he’ll now have normalized inputs when Classic Controls is selected, but he’ll still be able to access his Street Fighter 5 inputs by enabling Modern Controls.
Vatista from Under Night In-Birth is also an interesting character as she not only has charge motions, but also access to reverse charge motions. For example, one of her specials requires that she holds forward for a duration before pressing back in combination with a button press.
Check out the video below to see all the unique kinds of inputs that have surfaced in fighting games in the last few years: