Over the past few days, I’ve been obsessed with 20XX. Clearly inspired by the Mega Man series of games, 20XX puts its own twist on the run-and-gun gameplay by housing the game in a Roguelike framework. While I gave heavy praise for the ways it stands out, it’s similarities with the most recent Mega Man game run even deeper than I thought.
Starting with Mortal Kombat 3, the franchise has used a dial-a-combo system for multi-hitting strikes. Quickly dial in the predetermined sequence of moves into your controller and watch your character rattle off each move in succession. Can’t speak to how the games between Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 and Mortal Kombat 9 handled it, but all of the modern games in the series use the dial-a-combo system as its foundation.
While this is a dramatic departure from most fighting games, where combos are usually created through links and cancels, the benefits of this system are clear. For one, players don’t have to worry about spending weeks in the lab trying to get the feel for that one-frame link that allows you to connect a standing medium punch from a standing light punch. The system is loose enough so that as long as you hit the buttons in quick succession, the combo will complete itself. Two, it allows characters to perform more unique moves without having to add extra buttons to your controller.
Even within such a rigid system, there’s a lot of room for creativity. Between the modern Mortal Kombat and Injustice games, I can easily spend hours in training mode, stringing together combos that seemingly juggle forever. As fun as it can be, the dial-a-combo system is not without weakness.
Come here! With the Toronto Raptors winning their series in 5, I’ve got time today to stream some Mortal Kombat 11! Let’s dabble in the story mode and maybe play a few matches online?
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Mortal Kombat 11 is out now on PS4, Xbox One, and Nintendo Switch. I bought the PS4 version, but not without giving the Nintendo Switch version serious consideration. While the graphical degradation is clear when you view them side-by-side, it looks like the Switch holds up where it matters most. Both games appear to play equally well, and I think trading graphical fidelity for portability in this case is a reasonable exchange.
This is not a new phenomenon for the Nintendo Switch. While we would all love to see more third parties jump on the Switch bandwagon, we’ve already seen a number of titles complete the journey successfully, such as Rocket League, the NBA 2K series, Doom, Paladins, Skyrim, Warframe, and more. It’s just still a surprise to me to see that we’re in a world where portable gaming is much closer to its console counterparts than ever before.
Jason from downstab.com walks me through the Storm Rising content as well as the previous story missions from Overwatch. We also talk about the PlayStation 5 news, Capcom Home Arcade, and the struggles of being a video game content creator! Apologies in advance for our putrid performance when we competed online!
Jason’s Thoughts on the Capcom Home Arcade
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The tide is high but Jason and I will continue rolling on! The Storm Rising event has just begun in Overwatch and we’ll be there to try out the new content! See you soon!
Make sure to never miss a stream by following my channel and turning your notifications on! You can also follow me on Twitter and Instagram for stream updates and other cool stuff posted daily!
Buy Overwatch: Origins Edition Now On Amazon.com
[Purchasing through this Amazon affiliate link gives me a small commission without adding any extra cost or effort to you. Thanks for your support!]
Street Fighter Week begins on In Third Person! We begin with the game that changed everything: Street Fighter II!
The original Street Fighter sucked. Street Fighter II is one of the greatest video games of all-time. The turnaround between the two products is down-right fierce (see what I did there?). What changed between the two titles to make the latter a meteoric success? Let’s run down a list of factors that contributed to the rise of Street Fighter II!
Recently, the ninja princess armed with bladed fans was revealed to be the latest character included as part of Mortal Kombat 11‘s base roster. Though she’s a fan favourite, her late reveal relative to the game’s release date gave me concerns that she wasn’t going to make it this time. Thankfully, she and I will have the chance to slice and dice again!
Though she didn’t solidify herself as my favourite Mortal Kombat character until Mortal Kombat 9, she’s always been near the top of my list. Here’s why!
Life at BioWare has been pretty rocky. Despite being a great game overall, the fallout over Mass Effect 3‘s disappointing endings was one of the biggest news stories of that year. Then, Mass Effect: Andromeda was released a few years later to much criticism. Falling well short of expectations in terms of critical acclaim and sales, I’m concerned that we might never see Mass Effect again after that debacle.
This time, the studio left Shepard behind to tell an all-new adventure in Anthem. It’s also a very different type of game. Leaving much of the choose-your-own-adventure elements behind, this game is a looter shooter in the style of Destiny.
Prior to the announcement of Samurai Shodown getting a new entry in the series this year, I started getting reacquainted with the original. My nostalgia for the franchise primarily comes from playing the 3DO version at a computer store demo kiosk. Back then, I didn’t really understand how to play fighting games well.
During my time with the SNES port and more recently, the arcade port to the Switch, I noticed something odd about the game that I didn’t notice before. Unlike almost every fighting game I’ve played that was released after Street Fighter II, Samurai Shodown didn’t seem to have much in the way of combos. For the last little while, I chalked that up to this being the first game in the series, or me not knowing what I was doing.
Most recently, while watching gameplay footage coming out of PAX East of the new game, it appeared that the lack of combos carried over. What’s going on here?
In Third Person 