NA3 Impressions part 2

Ok Im back after a nite of fucking around and I'll answer things as clearly as I can. If I miss anything let me know.

First and foremost, Chakra dash does not ignore block stun. We're pretty safe there lol.

Nextly dudes do have up, forward and Down+O. If you looked at the post right after my first initial one I was freaking out because people were able to do down+O into ougi if the guard breaking hit was blocked. The guard crush animation lasts THAT long! This explains why hinata and just about everybody else in the game has down+O's that are insanely slow, if you hit it in more cases then not that = free ougi.

Now there are some characters that get the short end of the stick here as they either have multiple hitting down+O's or their ougi is too slow to connect afterwards, but there are even ways around this if you look hard enough. For example, Sasuke's stupid down+O breaks guard then multi-hits. Whats worse is that you cannot cancel the initial break with anything but chakra dash and while thats good for some really serious untechable setups with his foward+O,O chain, you cant hit ougi from chakra dash.

So in traditional NA style he has to give himself a homemade setup. Basically you can down down+O and as it coming out tap triangle twice to setup the ougi, then dash cancel (foward,foward) right as its about to end and then hit ougi. Again in old school NA style you actually can set up a VERY small button lock here that allows you to chain ougi. This can actually be done MUCH easier if you activate your special item first (speed up).

Jutsu startup always deflects Shuriken. Does it defelect special items? Dunno yet as computer hasnt thrown one while I was doing jutsu.

Some jutsu deflect shuriken during the entire active time. Asuma's overhand right (his old down,down+O) actually deflects shurikens the entire time you're charging it up! So timing a jutsu against a shuriken cancelling opponent can be key.

The dashing system also plays a big part. Dash (foward, foward or back, back) can be used to cancel any attack where you could normally cancel jutsu, which means there are some points in attacks where you can't do it. Basically this is what setups most of the rush down and guard breaking situations in the game. If your opponent is waiting for the end of your chain or a certain point to leave or make their move, dash canceling in the middle of the chain to extend the combo can really throw off timing.

Becareful though as its not invincible and if that same person sees you dashing they can pop you with something to make you pay for doing it recklessly. Chakra dash "beats" regular dash, so if your opponent is prone to dashing away, a chakra dash will plow into them before they're able to block.

Dash can also be used to go through your opponent, so if you're pinned down in the corner and there's a small break in your opponents attack you can use dash to dash past them and out of the corner. Also pretty cool for dashing past an opponent in mid combo to throw off their sense of direction.

Also chakra dash cancels any move or attack INSTANTLY. So there are a lot of cool things you can do with it (namely with sasuke lol vid soon).

X-dash isn't cancelable anymore (sadface) but the game doesn't suffer from it with chakra dash kind and jutsu canceling shuriken there's a lot more to work with.


Some guys though honestly are just gonna have it hard and are gonna have to work the guard crush system to get anything done. For example, Sai is pretty ass without his grabs and a blocking opponent pretty much has the advantage on him, BUT his chains break guard extremely fast. Just 2 reps of Ox3 (basically up to the 4th hit right before the end of the chain) breaks guard and can leave your opponent open for an ougi. So a lot of his game against a defensive opponent is gonna come from rush down with foward+O to put the opponent into a position where they have to block chain and just being ready to bust out jutsu if they knj and go for shuriken or using chakra dash to chase down someone who is using regular dash to leave or tries to jump away from him.

Hurting an airborne opponent who's blocking is pretty nigh impossible at the moment, but it comes down to timing guard break so that they land in it and eat ougi, and cancel the guard break into chakra dash if you see them trying to throw shurikens or attack as you go for it, since chakra dash cancels any attack INSTANTLY.

I hear you einherjar but honestly if you haven't played it don't give up so easily. You'd be doing yourself a dis service as the game moves along and plays pretty damn good. A lot of new elaborate things made it in (using dash cancel to chain combos that you normally couldnt, using air chakra dash to keep the pressure on an opponent, dash priority battles, etc), you should at least give it a try.

Oh and Gai's air grab? It's an air grab.. cuz he's gai...

But oddly enough he isn't broken in this game! No air maxium entry, no foward+O~shuriken cancel nonsense as he has his nh3 foward+O this time around (though he does have the old foward+O in gates but its hard to cancel... though one blocked one and a shuriken breaks guard instantly lmao. But not so bad since you dont have ougi in awakening)! So for all you gai fans, your time has come, hes playable again =p.

-Rockman Out-