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Nice to see you too man. CCI seems better than before, though I don't like all the unbridled optimism about the new game; this old dog's been through too many fighting games to give in to that.

Haha, I just like the movement and neutral options. The game's far from perfect but I'm liking how everyone I'm playing seriously feels. Doc/Richter/Roy all feel like incredibly stellar picks, and compliment each other quite nicely!

I'm not afraid to be wrong about the game though, after all, that's what early impressions are for! To be looked at in 2 years and just have me goin' "I can't believe I said that"

I'll also go on the cuff and say I'll take strong and good game feel across the roster even if it means the balance is slightly worse, I just think it makes the game more fun and gets people to experiment more with the cast! Nobody's gonna wanna play a 7-8f jumpsquatty char when the game also has ones with half that, y'know?

Truthfully my gripes with the game are like, condensed down, about 3-4 things
- Shieldgrab penalty is a bit too high
- Parrying should give 1-2 frames more adv.
- Parrying fireballs should do something (but not too much, projectiles should stay good)
- Chrom is incredibly lazy and doesn't feel tested. Lacks the intentionality of the other chars so I dropped him a week in. He's def good but until he has appropriate changes that make him feel more deliberately designed I refuse to touch him. He's really boring and feels hella solved, and I played S4 Cloud for pete's sake LOL

I don't even think that Chrom is that good; Palutena feels better than Chrom, at least to me.

The game is a lot of fun. I like it, I like the way it feels and plays. I just want to continue to be a voice of realism for people. People are so hard-pressed to admit that there are problems with a game's balance, even when there are obvious problems. Even late into smash 4, no one wanted to admit that Bayonetta was a problem. They did the same with Brawl MK of all characters.

It's definitely too early to tell with this game, though, and I secretly have high hopes for it.

People shouldn't be afraid of having a fun game that isn't balanced haha. Amen brother! Also yeah eff Bayo LOL

Also Palutena friggin rules in this game. Definitely not a char for me but I think she'll have a lot of staying power because of how unique and good her kit is. She has a few easily spotted weaknesses but they aren't fatal flaws and don't jeopardize what's really good about her. Very well designed char IMO.

But yeah for me its not even that Chrom is that good, he just feels.....lazy. I don't like chars like that, he deserves more time effort and polish into his design ideas, cause Ilike Chrom as a character and I'd love to play him alongside Roy who is super fun, but he's just....bleh. Bland!

Also was supposed to drop Doc this game but then they made him a functional char and now I'm stuck, haha. All of my S4 Doc stuff has carried over and it works really well here along with Doc's new awesome toys.

Also don't think swords run the game yet IMO but if they are found to be a problem I think hurtbox on 1/4th of the sword or so would probably normalize them completely, assuming they're a big issue to begin with. I wanna wait and see, let the game cook a bit, cause on one hand you have Roy/Chrom but on the other hand Marth doesnt seem too audacious nor does Corrin and Robin. It'll be interesting, for sure!

There's a competitive scene for Marvel Vs. Capcom 2, a game that is so unbalanced that it makes Ultimate look normal, and has a meta dominated by four characters. Still loved regardless.

So, I don't think we have much to worry about, imo. Although there seems to be an uptick of players whose response to losing is to call for nerfs (at least when put up against characters that don't seem that broken)...

To be fair Marvel 2 was released in a strong arcade culture and lived on through that and how fun & memorable it was (for the time). MVC3 might be a better example of the longevity of imbalanced games.

I'd say for Smash you don't even need to make that comparison because Smash enjoys a special niche as it features highly beloved characters and is the only REALLY REALLY big platform fighter scene out there. So, naturally, every game in its series will see a decent scene for a good amount of time either before the next entry or even far beyond it (in Melee's case)

I mean, Melee is one of the most imbalanced games of all time. Still a great game. I don't know why people need to find the game balanced to enjoy it. And top players certainly don't care that much about castwide balance, nor should they. When you're at the top you actually want fewer relevant threats to have to worry about.