How many times have you tried to approach the world of fighting games but you have immediately abandoned the idea by the way the complexity of titles of this genre, including combos to learn, timing of moves, countering and other technical devilry that I do not intend to deepen?
What if I told you I have the right title for you? Fantasy Strike is an atypical fighting game developed by David Sirlin, the father of the recent Super Street Fighter 2: HD Remix. I tried the Nintendo Switch version and I'll tell you about it in this detailed review.
Fantasy Strike, punching has never been easier!
Let's start from the premises: David wanted to leave the old team to venture into the arduous task of creating a fighting game inspired by his Yomi card game. A title with some simple mechanics in order to make it attractive to a wide audience. The thing is evident from the beginning, with a tutorial that explains all the aspects of the game in detail: the movements, the basic attacks, the very few how easy combos and more.
The movements are simple, no dash, no running and no crouching, however you can jump with "B". The basic attacks are entrusted to the keys "Y", the special ones to "X" and "A", "L" for the super move and "R" for the grip.
Here we need to specify one thing that I did not like so much: given the nature cross-platform title it has been well thought out to associate the game inputs both to the actual keys of the Nintendo Switch, and to the keys common to all consoles. This can be a little confusing at first, but soon gets used to it. However, precisely because it should be a fighting game "for everyone" I would have left only the keys of the respective consoles.
A life in fragments
One element that distinguishes the game is the life bar divided into many small fragments. Players will lose one for each hit received. Ergo, the power of the attacks will rarely count and whether these will be single or combo. The most important thing is the number of damage inflicted on the enemy.
Speaking of combos, as mentioned above, we will have no difficulty in memorizing them as they are very few and simple and they are all listed on the pause screen. Blocking a move similar to what happens in video games like Tekken is linked to the movement of your character, without the complexity of high or low blows: just back up and the character will automatically parry. It is important, in any case, not to abuse it: after a few hits we will still lose a fragment of energy. If, on the other hand, we want to counterattack in the event of a catch, we simply… we will not have to press any buttons. This function is called Yomi Counter.
The title's special attacks are related to the super meter, the classic bar introduced with the various Street Fighter Alphas that loads over time; once full it will allow us to use a super attack by simply pressing the L key and the blow will be able to inflict important damage on our opponents, two bar fragments to be precise.
All Fantasy Strike modes (offline and online)
The game features five single-player modes, practice, local multiplayer and online.
Starting from the first we have, in addition to the single match, the arcade, the solitary story in which by selecting a character we will face the whole roster; all this will be spread through three difficulties that can be selected at any time, linked to the responsiveness of the CPU and the speed of action of the same.
Then we have the daily challenges, a fight where we face different opponents in the same stage and compare the results with the rest of the world, the survival mode, same thing, but without ranking and with the ability to select the number of opponents.
The boss rush is the most chaotic mode there is and we will find ourselves facing 8 opponents with power ups of all kinds; luckily for us we too will find ourselves full of upgrades of all kinds but don't worry, the same thing goes for our character.
Little to say about local multiplayer except that it is possible to face both the classic battle and the team battle with teams of three characters; good but more could be done.
L’online, when the servers are not down (which has often happened these days), it's pretty stable. There are no too long waiting times for matchmaking and we can select whether to play with all players or only with those that reflect our skill level. As in almost all online games, we can choose to have casual or ranked matches, as well as friend matches to play with our friends.
At the end of each match we will receive experience points that will increase both the general level and that of the individual character. Fortunately for us, the game is cross-platform and will allow us to interact with users on other gaming platforms.
The limited roster of Fantasy Strike
The roster is made up of ten characters divided into four play styles. There are four Zoners who use long range attacks, two Rushdowns who are faster than the others but have fewer shards in their life bar, two Grapplers who base their moves on grappling. Finally we have two Wild Cards that combine the characteristics of the previous styles.
The character design is good, but not too original. In any case, it is appreciable that each character has their own background story, which is told at the beginning of the arcade mode. In my opinion, the roster is too poor. I hope that in the future new free characters will arrive to expand the experience, which for now, removed the online it is not too long-lived.
Technically obsolete, but an appreciable design
From a technical point of view we are not faced with anything striking. The graphics have a very cartoonish style that is nice to look at, but on the whole, however, is obsolete for on-screen polygons; a similar argument can be made for art direction, which is also not always at the highest quality as in the case of arenas but in general appreciable. The latter will often be anonymous and quickly bore the player.
Despite all these small technical flaws we are faced with a title that manages to run smoothly in both docked and handheld mode and that occasionally suffers from some freeze. The audio sector is good, with music that may not be memorable but still manage to give us a charge of adrenaline.
A fighting game that can teach, but beware of spammers!
It's actually true: learning how to play Fantasy Strike is a breeze and takes very little time. In its simplicity, the title still manages to give a fighting game where strategy is required to knock down the opponent. Of course, pro players might find it banalotto and sometimes online could be frustrating due to some spammer taking advantage of a combat system. simple to master.
Precisely for this reason we were a bit doubtful about the verdict, but we trust the developers hoping that, now that it is also released on Steam and Switch (there is on PlayStation 4 already from 2018) with the various patches balanced gameplay is achieved.
>> If you are a fighting game lover you should definitely read this recap article on the best available on the market
