Super Versus Battle 20XI / KOFXIII Console Version - A Quick Look

Just woke up from a long sleep after a tiring day yesterday at Super Versus Battle playing the KOFXIII console version all day in casuals and the side tournament so just thought i'd do a little write up of my thoughts of the event.

Super Versus Battle:

The event actually seemed smaller than last year for some reason, the hall used was the same one from 2 years ago, and was only one hall as opposed to two that we had last year.

Although for once we had 6 KOF set ups to play on, two big screens and four smaller ones so it was a good event for KOF overall.

KOFXIII Console Version:

As you may have read on DreamCancel's forums from people who had played the beta version from EVO this one also suffered from slowdown issues when two players activated HD mode at the same time, i also noticed a few slowdowns during combos.

I'm still not utterly convinced by the game, i think it's a good game and definitely fun but no where near as solid as 02UM, and don't think it will rank up there as my favourite KOF quite yet.

I still found points where it looked like my character was getting crossed up, but actually wasn't, and made me guess against myself at times.

Loading times were a bit long but i'm told this is because the game is not installed, and not possible to do so on this version as it's running on a debug machine.

I really liked the new stages, in particular the alleyway stage. I didn't spot the 95 factory stage but that might be just because i didn't see it. 

Both Saiki and Billy were available to use.

Billy Kane:

From what i played i don't think he is as good as he is on the iPhone version, though it may be just because i'm not hitting all his combos properly yet. The opponent drops a bit lower than they do on the iPhone version during combos though from what i did try the combos still worked.

I tried to use him throughout the day but was told by my friend i probably shouldn't use him until i got a bit better as he was the weakest part of my team xD

Saiki:

Definitely one of the characters i'm going to pick up in this game.

We weren't allowed to use him in the tournament, which was a shame considering i spent most of the time in casuals trying to learn him, as it was thought he was a boss...Which i don't think is true. In my opinion he is the equivalent of the playable Rugal in 98.

His A version projectile is probably the best projectile in the game (from what i tried), it's fairly high so it's good for catching jump happy players and comes out relatively fast.

His teleport i found kind of useless, there may be a use for it but i didn't discover it, there is a ton of recovery after it though he can attack out of his D version. I also couldn't quite figure out which part of the screen his D version was supposed to teleport to, i thought it was supposed to go to exactly above the opponent but i think it goes to the middle of the screen in the air.

The DM fireball i loved, it's kind of like Ash's version but comes out a little faster and travels for maybe half a screen to a screen length. Does loads of hits and you can still shoot fireballs while it is out.
I'd imagine there must be something clever you can do with this plus the teleport.

His flash kick (dp+K) i kept forgetting to use the B version seemed similar to Ash's one and the D version he does the flash kick then teleports and kicks the opponent down.

I could barely hear it but his voice actor sounded pretty cool, and you can pick a colour scheme which matches his boss version as well as you can pick a version which makes him look like Ash.

Tournament:

As i mentioned we weren't allowed to use Saiki, but Billy Kane was ok.

Overall the level wasn't very high at all, in my opinion there were maybe 6 good players overall out of about 80+ entries. Still i don't think it was bad because it means most of these guys were new to the game and potentially would be interested to play the game in the future.

I came in top 8, which i was quite happy about considering i've played the game the least compared to the players who were better than me. I was expecting to get knocked out of top 8 quite badly but did quite well in my losing match.

I struggled through most of the group stage games, even though the players were not that good, as i found it difficult to adapt to the game coming from playing 02UM.

The top 4 will be played today though i won't be going as i have other plans today, the top 4 players are Cristina, Boblan, 2Pac and CCL.

I filmed some of the matches from the top16 and one match from the top 8, Gunsmith filmed the rest of them so he will upload them onto Orochinagi when he has the chance.

Cristina VS Robocop2




Gunsmith VS CCL




KusoGaki VS ShinDragon




Boblan VS Max300






Overall it was a good event and definitely thanks to Gunsmith (Orochinagi), Rising Star Games, and NeoEmpire for running the event.

If my visa plans work out to go to Japan in a few months time this will probably be one of the last KOF events i go to in the UK for at least one year, so it was a great 'last' event for me.