My thoughts on skullgirls. Not properly edited because I'm lazy.
Despite all of this, I still enjoy the game.
Mike Z. is an improvement over Ono, but you see what I did there? That's exactly what he keeps doing. He compares his game to a piece of crap to make it look good. Every time he says something positive about skullgirls he compares it to another game that does something horrible and how skullgirls does it differently. He compares the infinite protection system to mvc3's diminishing returns on hitstun, or as it's also called hit stun decay, which is one of the worst games to compare to with regards to infinite protection. How about comparing it to a game that just doesn't have infinites (outside of combo videos at least) such as guilty gear, blazblue, melty blood, or even mvc2. Want to bring up how good execution isn't required? Better bring up 1 frame links from sf4 and hard combos from the later blazblues so Skullgirls seems perfect. This mentality seems to have carried into the development because several things about the game feels like it's just a step up from the worst.
Then there's the annoying idiots who bring up that he plays fighting games so he knows what he's doing. Aside from being wrong, it's also irrelevant. If anything it takes away any excuse he could have for mistakes because he should know better. There's also the part about him listening to the fans, which isn't a step up. Every developer listens to their fans. The larger ones just have too many fans to reply to all of them, but they are listening, and probably ignoring most of them because their ideas are either dumb or already tried and it didn't work out, unless it's about something aesthetic or about throws being cheap in which case they'll be all over it. Then comes the him not lying and trolling everyone like Ono. Congratulations on being the second to worst person in the gaming industry I guess.
Summary: Mike Z. is your typical indie level developer.
The execution requirement is higher than promised. Compared to sf4 one frame links and blazblue it doesn't look so bad, but how about when compared to melty blood? The general clunkiness of the game doesn't help, especially when dhcing just doesn't want to work.
The game is clunky. Moves come out slow, which isn't a problem on it's own but it makes properly timing cancels harder than usual. Have it so if you do a move too early for a cancel, as in doing it before it hits, save the input and cancel when it connects. Obviously don't apply to moves that need to be cancelable before they connect. It also feels like there are too many buttons. I feel like I'm trying to find my 10 good moves in a Tekken game when trying out a new character.
The infinite protection system is bad. Aside from not being explained at all, the limited amount of information on it even by searching isn't much. The few explanations out there have exceptions. This all leads to the same problem mvc3 had, test your combo starting with a whole bunch of different things until you find one that works. The difference is once you have an idea of how IPS works, you know that you need to work on the first hit of your chains, whereas in mvc3 you need to work on how many moves/hits you use. It's also easier to come up with a combo on the fly off of a random hit in mvc3 since you only need to worry about number of hits instead of what moves were used. IPS does have some leeway that helps with this, since there is a section at the start that doesn't count, but there are still situations where you can land a random hit, then you have to use a certain move to follow up because it's the only one that will reach, and then you need to find a way to combo without using that move later which is a lot to deal with compared to mvc3's don't do this series of moves after a 6 hit combo. The only advantage skullgirls has is that once you understand how it works, which we don't, it's easier to come up with combos because there are less things to test. I still think it's funny that people compare it to mvc3 and defend it because having better combos than mvc3 is some sort of accomplishment.
The tutorials are a huge step in the right direction. This is the tutorial that should have been made 15 years ago and we should be looking back on it as archaic, but we never got past here's training mode and a move list, have fun. My biggest complaint is that there isn't more of it. Continue on, go into character specific details, show how to do peacock zoning, show how to get around peacock zoning, and so on. Show people how to bait and punish double assist.
Considering the cost I'm willing to accept the lack of single player, but the boss is dumb. Don't have a boss that makes you play differently than every other part of the game. If having different fights is your thing make it a different mode and add more.
The graphics all mesh together too well which makes seeing what's going on difficult at times. It's not a big issue after you know all of the moves and what to look out for but for learning it's a mild annoyance.
Best button config award. Aside from being better than crap, it's actually good. Best part of the game. Should've sold it as dlc for extra, would've been worth another 5.
On download ulc is bs. I paid for the content on the download so I shouldn't have to do work for it. Give me my colors you thief! What are you going to do for tournaments that don't have my matching color 7 unlocked?