Recent reviews by Scias

One of the best games I ever played. Almost a compilation of the best things that made old school aRPGs like Zelda and Alundra so great.

• Satisfying combat and boss fights long
  
• Long and challenging dungeons with tons of puzzles and platforming
  
• Superb art direction and animations
  
• Great music
  
• Tons of of content and collectibles
  
• Good and touching story
  
• Runs great on Steam Deck (if set to native runtime)

Maybe my only gripe would be that it's sometimes hard to evaluate the height of some platforms relative to the others, and that for some reason by default the game runs via Proton on the Deck when the native version runs so much better.

While this game has many qualities and is in no way a "bad" one, there's a few significant issues that currently completely ruin it and really need to be adressed quite quickly.

• Online is garbage.
  Not only the netcode is basically similar to TEKKEN 7, so definitely not good, but it's plagued by cheaters and pluggers that get no consequences for their actions, because there's no automated punishment system.
  In 2024 and compared to Street Fighter 6, Strive and countless indie games' netcode and matchmaking infrastructure this is UNACCEPTABLE.
  
• Gameplay is stale.
  This game goes all in on offensive, making the only valid gameplan and characters to be relentless rushdown style. The heat system adds even more insult to injury with insanely damaging, plus on block tracking moves that may launch too. Now add on top of that wall and ground "explosions" and rage arts and most of the matches feel like helplessly watching dozens of cutscenes back to back.
  
• Cash shop.
  What else is there to say... The game is already very expensive as it is, and will obviously add DLC characters and stages. The fact that it's been snuck in after launch, after gutting the free options, and using ♥♥♥♥♥♥ predatory practices with ingame currency is really silly.

Unfortunately the rightful complaints from here, social media or even pros are falling on deaf ears at the moment, as Bamco would rather hunt down modders than addressing these issues.

• Great netcode and decent matchmaking. It only takes a few seconds to find a match and the overwhelming majority of online matches feel just as playable as offline matches (thanks to rollback netcode).
  You also don't need to join the hub in order to queue for matches.
  
• No wasted time between matches. Loading times are quick and rematches instant.
  
• Amazing gameplay. Probably the best SF in terms of mechanics. No character feels incomplete or useless. The universal Drive mechanics add a lot of strategy and deepness. It just feels good to play whether you win or lose.
  
• Good initial roster. Old characters feel really powerful and polished, while the newcomers have very interesting designs and are much welcome.
  
• Nice graphics style. This SF really oozes with personnality, reminescent of the Third Strike times.
  
• Complete package. Unlike the botched barebones launch of SF5, SF6 feels like a complete and featureful game. You get all you should expect (Arcade, training...) from a fighting game in 2023 and more through World Tour, extra fun modes, etc...
  
• Flawless on Linux / Steam Deck. It just works (tm) perfectly.

• Mediocre World Tour. It's surely not going to rival Yakuza or similar genres for sure. It just feels a repetitive and tedious grind. It's interesting to see some backstory from the characters but most of it is just poorly executed.
  
• Music. There's a few decent tunes but most are not memorable. Some characters like Ryu or Guile don't even get their iconic themes remixed.
  
• Confusing menus. Important options and settings seem to be randomly scattered all over the place. Why do you need to go so deep in menus to change your character or controls?
  
• Awful monetization. $60 bucks for 4 time-limited costumes is outrageous. The base game is $60 and is being filled with DLC characters, season passes and overpriced costumes already. Also nearly no hope getting interesting through the free currency unless you play H24.
  
  Overall, very much recommended if you're a fighting game entusiast and/or SF fan. Unlike the previous one, Capcom really put the effort, budget and love into it and it shows. It also raises the bar for the future Tekken and other franchises to become more than just slightly glorified Arcade games.

This game is just perfection incarnate.

Great gameplay,
Great graphics style and ambiance,
Great story,
Great voice acting,
Great soundtrack,

I have yet to find a single bad thing about it. I haven't even encountered a single bug.

All of this for a very fair price, plus it works flawlessly on Linux/Steam Deck.
Just a nobrainer buy for one of the best games ever made.

EDIT: Switching to negative because it's unacceptable that over two months after release the matchmaking remains completely broken (and gets worse since Rugal update). You should not pay full price for a fighting game that doesn't work online at all...

Overall a pretty good game but unfortunately not without its launch issues.
If you're a fan of the franchise it's defininitely a go-to, however if you're into online gameplay with random people you need to know the matchmaking is currently broken on PC.
If you aren't interested in fighting other players it's clearly not worth it. There's not enough content for offline/solo players.
If you're unfamiliar or casual with fighting games, you need to know that while it's getting more accessible it remains one tough fighting game that requires quite a long journey to be relatively good at, and that the ingame tutorials only scratch the very surface.

• Gameplay. Just solid and refined all around. Combines the best of KoF XIV and XIII in my opinion as you don't always need MAX mode anymore for the good combos.
  
• Linux/Proton/Steam Deck ready. Just works out of the box and without issues from Proton 7.

• Netcode. It's not perfect but when under good conditions it's just fantastic and even on 1-bar 200ms matches it can be tolerable. A massive improvement considering how terrible the netcode is on past SNK games and delay-based netcode ones such as Tekken.
  
• Graphics. Coming from XIV it's such an improvement. Vibrant and the vast majority of characters never looked better. Animations are also on point. Although some characters didn't get the same amount of care than others (eg: Whip). Stages are also really great looking.
  
• Music and Sound. As always SNK does a good job with the soundtracks, be it with the new or remixed old tunes. Sound effects are also good and impactful.
  
• Roster. Sure there's some missing icons like Vice, Mature or Kim but nearly 40 characters at launch is nothing to scoff at when some other big franchises launch with less than 20 lately
  
• Online features. The lobby system is simple yet effective and allows for many game modes such as 3v3 players. There's an online training mode aswell.

• Story (mode). This Shun'ei/Verse arc really isn't as interesting as the previous ones. The new bosses are forgettable and it's likely we never see them again.
  
• User Interface. the UI is okay however the transitions between pages/states are too slow. It'd be better if character outros were skippable online aswell.
  
• Offline features. Besides story mode and some relatively easy and quick trials there's not much to do besides training mode. A better tutorial or some survival/time trial modes could have been interesting additions.
  
• Autocombos. Sure, they were already in XIV and they're designed to help begginners get into the game but players that don't want them should be able to disable them.

• Matchmaking. It takes ages to find opponents despite the game being only a few weeks old. It's a known issue since day 1 and quite a bummer given that the first weeks are usually when it's the most alive for this kind of game. This needs to be fixed ASAP otherwise it might turn into a Discord fighter really quick... No crossplay with Playstation/Xbox players either.
  
• Online profiles. They're barebones. Steam integration looks like an afterthough as avatars aren't being used and all you can customize is your title.

What a masterpiece. Must buy.
Everything, be it the graphics style, the gameplay, the atmosphere and story are top notch, especially the music soundtrack that is just incredible.
The only downside? The main campaign is a bit short but anyways you'll need a while and lots of deaths before unlocking and completing the secrets and optional challenges.
And also huge props for the native Linux client.

Basically Minecraft on steroids.
The amount of content (items, crafting) in this game is just mind blowing.
The bosses and events are all really fun and challenging.
And excellent native Linux support.
Very well worth its price.

This game is a fantastic timewaster (in a good sense) with its tranquil gameplay. A game with no timers nor crucial objectives, meant to relax and evade yourself in this hassle-free world.

Most people already said why this game is a must-have and indeed it is totally worth every penny. However it's not perfect and I'd rather talk about its biggest pet peeve :

It's a bit of a "Jack of all trades, master of none". The game has so many mechanics and gameplay options, but most feel incomplete or too shallow. For example animal management/farming could be a little deeper. The desert area is quite empty. The combat items could have some variety, etc...

Another issue is how character relationships barely change things if not at all.
The game is full of touching cutscenes with NPCs as your relationship with them increases but besides different dialogs they'll not change their schedule/behavior/likes. A concrete example for this is Shane. Even after befriending him and witnessing all his events he will always remain a hopeless drunkard even if he should have evolved towards something better... And this applies to most characters and it's quite sad unfortunately.

Anyways it's still a wondeful game, and natively works on Linux !

I didn't try this game until it went F2P for the reason it looked like too cheap and shallow. And indeed it's stripping the fighting game genre down to its core fundamentals like footsies and spacing which makes it oddly quite balanced and very satisfying to play. It feels really good to whiff punish and the damage/combo system makes it so you don't get touch of death'd for every mistake or bad guess, making comebacks always possible.

Pros:

• Online matches feel fantastic to play, thanks to Rollback/GGPO (please take note Cacom/Bamco)
  
• Short and decent tutorial (take note again Capcom/Bamco)
  
• Very easy to pick up - Perfect for begginners or people allergic to fighting games. Characters only have a handful of simple moves. No complicated moves or challenging combos...
  
• ...yet has a ton of potential and deepness as most of the challenge is about spacing/footsies instead.
  
• (pretty good) Native Linux support!

Cons:

• Needs Sign Up/Login to play online, why not just use Steamworks? (well I guess it's for crossplay to console)
  
• "Disconnected from the server" way too often
  
• I guess it's Linux-specific but crashes when using a fight stick (Qanba Q1). Works perfectly with an Xbox pad though.

So yeah it's a pretty good surprise indeed! I don't know how the F2P will turn but for now it seems pretty much very reasonable. The roster is small but varied with some pretty neat/unique ideas. Graphics/sounds are okay and the game is light on resources.

Masterpiece. Perfect in so many aspects. A must have.

+1 for the Linux support too!