Sometimes I wonder if people actually listened to the podcast lol since there are few comments that are in response to the discussion of the game. I greatly respect the people on this podcast because I have luckily got to play each of them and they all share a similar quality. They all have an intensity to win when they play and grow. But here is some input on the discussion that I have, sorry its long.
Online play was great, I was testing wifi too (still on fiber) but still the connection quality was amazing. I will still probably hate playing online, but I cannot deny the advancement of the online play for this title.
Repeat Interactive, please remove. It has been in their games for so long and I do not think anyone likes it. When you see it in tournament it is really trollish yet strong, too strong. One time use would be great I love the surprise factor of interactives in general, but it is not a surprise when I see people actively corner themselves to gain an advantage.
Break Away I like that there is counter play involved and it isn't a straight momentum removal like breakers were. I believe you can even punish them with fatal blows if you react well. The cost is quite high to use them, but if it is seen as happening too often NRS can make a very simple change and lengthen the regen timer on defensive bars. If it affects the other options that much they can maybe change it to Three total bars and still have it use all bar. Another idea would be to add a significant amount of delay recharging the defense meter if the player fails to absorb an attack while breaking away. That way players can pseudo punish break away a bit harsher.
Walk and Dash I actually liked the current pace of walking. If anything I felt like back walk was too fast. I did not have time to test the speed different between forward and back walk bursts, but there were times where I had a hard time just keeping up with someone back stepping a lot. Dashing right now is non existent in the game play as the risk heavily outweighs the reward to do one. Still it should not be a heavy speed upgrade or you will have some really boring plays.
Fatal Blows it is a fairly safe, extremely damaging move. I think a one time per round limit + the one time per game hit should exist. There are very few games that have kept extremely safe reversal type moves that do massive damage. But also maybe it just needs a timer adjustment. I do like the idea of someone attempting one and missing, but holding out long enough to get another one reloaded in the same round. It is a reward for staying alive for so long at low health. So maybe just make them -7 to allow punishment?
Flawless Block I think the current execution of the initial block is fair.
@Dizzy has already stated that there is a grace period between pressing block to activate a flawless. I presume you have about a 4-6 Frame window then as he compared it to Fatal Blow activation which I believe has that amount of armor start up. So assuming this (big assumption) mashing block would flawless large string gaps that you can punish already normally. BUT for the sake of less degenerative and thoughtless play, I think the frame delay to flawless should be extended then, as it is an extremely safe way to punish those string gaps. I dunno what would be considered fair, maybe 9 frames as to not compete with 7 frame interrupt options? Also I am fairly certain I flawless blocked a string back to back, but you do have to initiate the flawless on the first block. As
@Zyphox was saying with the Baraka knee string, but honestly if you flawless Baraka's knee hit and are conscious enough to cancel or continue flawless blocking you deserve the reward.
Flawless Cancels A few points to address. The U2 cancel does not have invulnerability, I believe it is just fairly fast. I tested doing flawless blocks on strings and immediately using the U2 option. It would get stuffed on faster strings. Being able to determine what strings you can punish I think is an acceptable reward. The U3 version does have invincibility and will break just about anything so far. I did not try doing reversal baits with Skarlet though. I think the cost should be a little higher too as REO was stating, but not a full stock of everything. Maybe 2 offense and 1 defense for the U2 version since it leads to a lot more damage. I like the general play of the flawless cancels and promoting comebacks that are improbable even at the highest levels. Currently, with the button commands I do not see how you can abuse any sort of option select with it as the block button does not coincide with any other action. It is similar to K-Groove faultless defense in interaction where yes, it is a safe option to go for but it may not always happen. They just added more punishment options with the cancels. It could be turned into parry style by tapping forward if people want more risk, but I believe the intent of the design is to give manageable risks to various levels of players.
Variations the Big One It is completely possible to have a UI that reflects the custom options. If they focused on that and removed variations all together it would make the UI very simple. As for it affecting tournament selection timing there is another game that has a very similar feature and it was not seen as a problem. Marvel had 3 assist options for 3 characters. That is 9 options to choose 3 from. The current system is very similar but possibly simpler because many options involve choosing a 2 slot and a 1 slot. But at its worse you would have 3 x 1 slot options. The options were also not even marked in marvel except alpha, beta, gamma options and understanding what those options were just took a little time to understand really. A built in UI that displays a general idea of gameplay (similar to how they display variations) I think is all that is necessary for casual gamers. For more hardcore players, regardless of the system, I think most will instinctively know what each pick does.
The main issue is development and timing. I do not think NRS has enough time to introduce a whole new UI to make your choices clearly visible to the opponent and yourself. Like SF4 was mentioned and it was always clearly marked and understood that there were differing options. They could just number them off like Third Strike so that it is clear after a while what options are being chosen or color coded Icons. But all this takes a lot of work and I fear the timeline is too short, perhaps midway through the game they can patch it in.
Scorpion the teleport was kinda godlike I used scorpion during the test. I do not see anything wrong with a mind game of 1 hit or 2. I also do not see anything wrong with a high reward teleport. But combining both is very powerful and frustrating for the other player. There are two immediate options that I can see to help a little bit with this. The first will be easier, because it wouldn't mess up his combo routes right now. That would be to have to commit the enhance move and remove the gap between the two hits so that you can't unblock and get hit by the 2nd hit. The second option, if they want to keep the mind game of 1 or 2 hits, remove the launch portion. But then they would have to add some other combo routes which would take more balance and work. It could be balanced considering the whole of the game and they leave it. Character balance is really hard to even think about at this stage, but a very hard to avoid mid hit that can launch and mind game is quite nice.
@REO will probably pick it before it gets nerfed.
Thanks to anyone that read all of this. Also, to anyone that has not listened yet, this is all from the first 55 minutes of the show, just pure discussion.