Game Over OnlineGuilty Gear Xrd -SIGN-
The Guilty Gear series debuted on the PlayStation in 1998 as a sleeper hit. It was a low print-run Atlus-published game that didn’t get much respect at the time due to the 32-bit era being flooded with 2D fighters. The next generation saw the series reach the point of oversaturation, as new iterations were released of XX and then off-shoot brawlers were mixed in to boot. There were simply too many Guilty Gear games to keep track of, which made Arc System’s move to BlazBlue and later Persona 4 Arena, all the more welcome.
People needed something a bit different and those games tickled the fancy of many. While BlazBlue wasn’t my cup of tea, Persona 4 Arena (and Ultimax) were. They gave me the fast-paced action I sought with a cast I could really get behind. The visiual novel-esque story modes also got me into that genre, and set the stage for this game quite nicely. Xrd SIGN has both a regular arcade mode with a bit of story thrown in and a much longer story mode. Veterans of the Persona 4 Arena series will be at home with its implementation, as it’s an interactive visual novel. This move may not please everyone, but it’s something that actually winds up working really well. I can’t say that I cared about the basic storyline in the arcade mode, but I loved what was done in the story mode.
I wound up caring about the characters a lot more hearing all of them and their backstories. It’s one thing to see these in little still frames, but seeing and hearing it in anime-styled cinematics adds a lot to actually caring about them. You hear the inflections and get a handle on the sarcastic characters, the naive ones, intense ones, and so on. May’s character comes off as really immature in the arcade mode’s story bits, but you see a lot more depth to her as you see her plight unfold. She’s not just young and naive, but she’s also sick and needs help.
The story mode actually gives you characters to root for and the shift in genres is a welcome one. While fighting is a fun thing to do in game form, it never hurts to have some variety in what you do. Personally, spending an hour or so between offline and online play is enough to give me a daily fix of the game, and then relax a bit with the story mode. The change in pacing helps you appreciate the faster-paced fighting while furthering the game’s universe.
Of course, none of these things would really matter if you didn’t have a fun game to play underneath it all. The franchise has been built on a really fast pace and that continues here with some shifts in play due to the move to a 3D engine. Now, when you finish an opponent, you get a sweet camera pan showing you the final blow in great detail. It makes combat a lot more visceral, and aside from a bit of stuttering animation in pre-fight sequences, the transition is seamless. Much like how Street Fighter IV retained the feel of the classic Street Fighter II series despite using 3D graphics, this does that but keeps the in-game art style far more similar to the original thanks to the cel shaded graphics.
The fast gameplay can be really hard on folks used to slower-paced fare, but you can learn its intricacies with the many different training and practice modes. You’ll learn that offense is rewarded, while defense is taught as something you’ll want to use in moderation. Running away results in you losing your super meter, so you’ll want to be active at all times. This results in a game that is challenging, but fair.
Online play is included with a rather elaborate arcade-style setup while waiting for a fight to become available. The menus are a bit cumbersome, and the lack of in-game documentations means that it will take some trial and error to get things figured out. Once you do, you’re able to engage in lag-free combat thanks to an extensive location-based server setup and even engage in cross-platform play. This means that the online player base should always be fairly active since it’s not just limited to one version of the game. This is fantastic for PS3 owners as it’s easy to worry about that version not being played for very long, but it’s not something you need to be concerned about thanks to this setup. Arc Systems has effectively future-proofed this game and that bodes well for people wanting to get the most value for their money.
Visually, this is a jaw-dropping game. Cel shading has been a boon for gaming visuals for about 15 years now, and no game has replicated an animation style better than this one. Jet Grind Radio wanted to nail the anime style, but the technology couldn’t keep up with it. Now, we’ve got a game that manages to look like a high quality piece of animation in motion using cel shading. It’s one thing to redraw a classic game to replicate something like that (ala Super Street Figher II HD), but they’ve rebuilt Guilty Gear’s graphics in painstaking detail. While this has hurt the character roster a bit, it’s still fairly diverse. The animation is incredibly smooth, outside of the aforementioned clunkiness during some pre-fight animation.
Xrd SIGN keeps the franchise’s love of heavy metal alive with a soundtrack that gets your blood pumping. The fast pace of the music matches the actions, but there’s more to the soundtrack than just that. You’ve also got some lighter fare to listen to, and even some silly songs that blend rock with pop. Sound effects are nice and violent, and just what you want to hear from a fighting game. The voice acting is shockingly good most of the time for both the arcade and story modes, but does occasionally get too silly for its own good.
Even with some minor flaws, Guilty Gear Xrd SIGN is the best entry in the series to date. It goes further than providing a new coat of paint by completely revamping everything and not just feeling like a minor upgrade to a past formula. Instead of doing a few things fairly well, this game focuses on being a kickass 2D-plane fighter and succeeds. The genre is represented really well on the PS3 already, but PS4 owners starved for a fighter can finally have their appetites satiated. This is one of the finest fighters on the market, and hopefully it hits PC to further expand the game’s userbase.
Reviewed By: Jeremy Peeples
Publisher: Aksys Games
Rating: 90%
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This review is based on a digital copy of Guilty Gear Xrd -SIGN- for the PlayStation 4 provided by Aksys Games.
