2D Fighting games are probably the most difficult genre of games for a new player to pick up and play. When you play a platformer or an FPS or a Strategy Game, the single player campaign walks you though the mechanics of the game step by step in a well planned progression that gradually teaches you how to play. They restrict you to only using certain weapons or powers, locking off most of the complexity of the game behind powerups that you'll gather later, giving you lots of time to experiment with each one and figure out how it works.

Fighting games don't do this. They drop the player into the game with their entire skill-set intact, with every option available to you, without explaining how anything works or what your moves are supposed to be used for, causing most players to just mash buttons or find that one move that the A.I. seems to have problems with and do it over and over. Neither of which will work against a human opponent who knows what they're doing.

Unlike most fighting games, the Tutorial in Skullgirls tries to teach players a basic understanding of the game and does a good job explaining basic concepts but many players gloss over them and don't really take their lessons to heart.

This guide attempts to fill in the gaps and teach new players what they may have missed from the lessons the Tutorial tried to teach, give new players a deeper understanding of how fighting games work and tries to teach you how to get better.

Before we spend an hour or two in training mode trying to learn how to control our character, this is a useful topic to address.

The short answer is No you do not need to spend $150 on an Arcade-Quality joystick to play Skullgirls. That said, this is a good place to talk about the different kinds of controllers you may be using and adress some of the advantages and disadvantages of each one.

If you're not sure if you want to throw down the cash for a new controller just yet, go ahead and skip this section. Come back and consider your options if you decide to stick with the game.

Keyboard


Contrary to popular belief, there's nothing wrong with playing fighting games on a keyboard provided you have a good keyboard. Depending on your brand and model, some keyboards will not accept more then 3 buttons at once or other "Ghosting" issues, which is a major problem for attempting to play fighting games. Other keyboards have response time issues (input lag) or unresponsive buttons that make them undesirable for playing an extremely fast paced game like Skullgirls.

Similar to an arcade stick, the Keyboard gives you equal access to all six buttons so multi-button inputs are a non-issue (if your keyboard can accept all the inputs at once to begin with).

If you want to play on a keyboard, do your homework, hit up your search engine of choice and select a quality keyboard that's designed to avoid the common problems of cheep $30 keyboards that are only really designed for typing.

That said, there's one unavoidable problem - You can't exactly plug your keyboard into an XBox 360 or PS3 at your friends house or your local fighting game meet-up and play. Having your hands conditioned to doing your special moves and combos on keyboard won't translate over to playing on another controller so if you become serious about the game and want to play in offline tournaments and such it may be in your best interest to pick something else.

XBox 360 Pad


Most players consider the 360 controller to be poorly suited for playing fighting games. The stock model D-Pad is small, unresponsive and poorly positioned for constant use and two of the shoulder buttons have deep analogue switches that don't respond quickly when pressed. The wireless controllers also have a nasty habit of running out of battery power at critical moments.

Having said that, some players swear by the 360's analogue stick and are accustomed to using the controller from playing other games on their 360. Plus, all wired 360 controllers are fully Windows-Compatible (Thanks Microsoft) and wireless controllers can use a cheep USB wireless adapter to communicate with your PC.

You will, however, have to deal with setting up Macro-buttons and Right-Stick-Asssists in controler config because multi-button inputs can sometimes be awkward on a pad using only your thumb and index fingers.

PS3 Pad


Wired PS3 Controllers have been used by top tournament winners for years with no problems. Unlike the 360's controller, the PS3's D-Pad is responsive and positioned comfortably.

Unfortunately certain types of computer hardware have issues communicating with PS3 controllers but if you're not one of the unlucky people who's PC is incompatible, they're a solid choice.

You will, however, have to deal with setting up Macro-buttons and Right-Stick-Assists in controller config because multi-button inputs can sometimes be awkward on a pad using only your thumb and index fingers.

Arcade Sticks

Perfectly duplicating the high-quality Japanese Arcade Cabinets that Fighting Games were developed to be played on, an Arcade Stick is the most accepted and widely used controller to play fighting games, particularly by competitive players.

The only real downside is cost. High quality arcade sticks cost between $80-$200 US and shipping to places outside North America or Japan can be costly or unavailable from some suppliers.

Buyer beware, cheep arcade sticks that are priced in the $30-$50 range using low-quality parts either function poorly or break quickly and sometimes both. On the plus side, these low-grade controllers are sometimes useful if you want to strip them for parts, replacing the joystick and buttons to make your own custom-built stick, if you're into that kind of thing.

Keep in mind that, just like their respective pads any Arcade Stick that was designed for the XBox 360 is fully Windows Compatible and PS3 sticks are compatible with most but not all computer hardware.

Hitbox


One part Arcade Stick, one part Keyboard, the Hitbox replaces the standard joystick on a traditional Arcade Stick with 4 more directional buttons.

Often used by keyboard players who want to transition into something a bit more sturdy and portable, a relatively new controller that has been gaining popularity with pro players and casuals alike.

Other Pads


The range of PC and Console control pads that have been released over the years is staggering, so I won't attempt to cover even a portion of them here. Most good ones will cost you in the range of $40-$50.

The key components are a responsive D-Pad and at least 6 buttons, though typically you'll want 8 or more in order to assign your controller macros to help compensate for the awkwardness of doing multi-button inputs with your thumb.

Of special note are the Madcatz Fight Pad, which was specifically designed for fighting games, and the Sega Saturn Pad, long praised for its excellent d-pad. They also have the advantage of having six extra large face-buttons (compared to the 360's and PS3's four), which makes some multi-button commands less annoying.

Talking about Fighting Games over the internet can get kind of complicated. That's why its useful to have a bunch of standard abbreviations to reference.

I'll be using some of this throughout the guide so if you see something you don't understand, come back and take a look.

Keep in mind, depending on what game you're playing or who's guide you're reading, the short hand they use can be slightly different.

Special Move and Combo Notation

LP - Light Punch
MP - Medium Punch
HP - Heavy Punch
LK - Light Kick
MK - Medium Kick
HK - Heavy Kick

P - Any Punch
K - Any Kick

F - Forward
B - Back
U - Up
D - Down

QCF - Quarter Circle Forward
QCB - Quarter Circle Back
DP - Dragonpunch motion (or Z motion)
360 - A full rotation on the joystick
(B, F) - A back charge input
(D, U) - A down charge input

> - A chain - Example, chain A into B (A > B)
, - A link - Example, link A into B (A, B)
s. - Standing attack. Ex - s.HK
c. or cr. - Crouching attack Ex - cr.MK
j. - Jumping attack. Ex - j.LP
OTG - Off the ground attack

"Anime" Direction Notation

I don't like it, personally but its commonly used by fighting game players who play specific games from overseas.

Each number corrisponds to a direction on your numpad

789
456
123

1 - Down+Back
2 - Down
3 - Down+Forward
4 - Back
5 - Neutral
6 - Forward
7 - Up+Back
8 - Up
9 - Up+Forward

If you haven't already played the first set of tutorials to get a grip on the basic controls for movement, dashing, normal attacks (Normals) and special moves, go ahead and do that now. The guide will still be here when you get back.

Finished? Alright. Go ahead and hop into the training room.

Training Options

When you first start training mode a window full of options pops up. The training mode in Skullgirls is incredibly robust and offers a ton of different tools to help you experiment with things from Slow-Motion to Dummy Playback to Save-States that are great for advanced and beginner players alike to practice just about anything but for the moment we'll set things up for a relatively normal training session.

First, set "Attack Data" to "On." This will show you how much damage your moves and combos are doing, in addition to providing some detailed information about the combo system that you won't understand yet.

Find the option that says "Input Display" and set it to "List." This will help you see what you're doing if you make a mistake in a special move motion or combo.

Scroll down to "Blocking" and set the dummy to "After First Hit." This will ensure that the training dummy will start blocking to let you know immediately if you messed up a combo.

Next set "Ground Tech" to "Backward", "Forward" or "Random." This will make sure that the dummy is getting up off the ground as soon as possible. Some players get into bad habits of doing certain combos that will only work if your opponent doesn't Ground Tech, so this will prevent you from forming those bad habits.

Finally set "Escape Infinite Combos" to "1st Hit". It probably won't come up right away, but like with Ground Teching, it will stop you from attempting combos that don't actually work in a real match.

Now that you've got training mode set up, its time to start actually learning how to play the game!

Character Select

Despite its small cast, Skullgirls features a diverse set of characters that all have radically different playstyles, right down to their movement, weight and combo style. Each character is its own experience.

Skullgirls allows each player to choose how many characters they want to play, from One to Three. The more characters you add to your team, however, the weaker each individual character becomes. A single character does amazing damage and has a ton of health, but larger teams have far more versatility, giving you a huge toolbox of options to pick from to use against your opponent.

I strongly recommend that new players, especially ones that are new to fighting games, start with a single character and get comfortable with them before adding more characters to their team. Not only does this simplify the learning process a great deal but it gives you a single character to focus on while you learn the ropes.

If at any point during the process of learning a new character things feel clumsy or awkward, that's probably normal but feel free to go back to character select to experiment with somebody different if things don't seem to "click".

Now select your dummy. I usually pick Parasoul or Valentine because they are average sized characters and most things that work on them, work on everybody. Pick the same number of characters for your training dummy's team as you did for your own, for the sake of keeping your damage and health consistent.

Normal Attacks

Now that you're here in training mode, start out by messing around with each of your characters Normal Attacks or "Normals" as their called. Incase you don't remember from the Tutorial, normals are done by pressing one of the six attack buttons. Light Kick (LK), Medium Kick (MK), Heavy Kick (HK), Light Punch (LP), Medium Punch (MP) and Heavy Punch (HP).
Each character has at least 18 different normals. Six on the ground, six crouching and six in the air while jumping. Normals are the backbone of every character. The #1 newbie mistake is to focus too much on a character's Special and Super moves and ignore their normals, which is a lot like trying to learn how to Run before you can Walk. In reality, a good understanding of your normals and what each one is used for is the first step to leaning a new character.

Look at all 18 of your character's normals and learn how close you have to be to your opponent for them to hit and get a feeling for how fast they are and how much damage they do. Do each of your character's normals five or ten times to really get a handle on how they're used.

Movement

Next, play around with your character's movement. Walk around the stage, Dash, Back-Dash, Jump, Super Jump, Dash-Jump, Double-Jump and Airdash all over the stage to get a feeling for how to move your character around the stage. If you forgot how to do any of those things, go back to the tutorial and re-learn it. Note that some character's can't Airdash and some can't double jump (some can't do either).

Find the range where you need to be standing to hit your opponent with a jumping attack, see how far your dash-jump will take you across the stage and where you need to stand relative to your opponent to attack them from a dash jump. If your character can air-dash, play around with how high and how close you need to be to attack your opponent from an air-dash. Unlike more ground-based fighting games like Street Fighter, air-mobility is a huge part of playing Skullgirls so spending some time figuring out how to move around the screen is essential.

Command Normals

Pressing Start in training mode and selecting "Command Lists" will let you look at the list of your character's Command Normals, Special Moves and Super Moves.

Command Normals have a Brown circle next to them and are just like your regular Normals, except they require a single directional input in addition to a button press. Go ahead and play with them just like you did before. Command Normals often have special properties like extended range, odd attack angles, cause special kinds of stun, knockdown states, etc. They are unique to each character. Some of these can only be done in the air or only on the ground.

Special Moves

Special Moves are done with a series of directional inputs plus a single attack button and are marked with a blue circle in the command list. Each special move is totally unique. Some are situational tools, some are damaging combo pieces, while others are general purpose weapons that you'll use constantly during a match. Experiment with all your character's special moves and get a feel for what they do.

Skullgirls only has a few different special move inputs, so its useful to mention them here.

Down, Down+Forward, Forward+Attack - Also called the Quarter Circle Forward (QCF)

Down, Down+Back, Back+Attack - Also called the Quarter Circle Back (QCB)

Forward, Down, Down+Forward+Attack - Also called a "Z" motion or Dragon Punch input (DP)

Full Circle - Also called a 360 motion, done by rotating though all 8 directions in sequence (360)

Back (Hold), Forward+Attack - A "Back Charge" motion. In this move, the back direction must be held (or charged) for at least half a second before the forward input. Once the move is charged, you can hold your charge for as long as you want before releasing the move with Forward+Attack. (B, F).

Note that any Back direction may be charged, Up+Back, Back and Down+Back are all valid and you can switch between them without losing your charge time.

Down (Hold), Up+Attack - A "Down Charge" motion. In this move, the down direction must be held (or 'charged') for about half a second before the forward input. Once the move is charged, you can hold your charge for as long as you want before releasing the move with Up+Attack. (D, U)

Note that any Down direction may be charged, Down+Back, Down and Down+Forward are all valid and you may switch between them during a charge without losing your charge time.

Once you've experimented with the character's special moves, its time to practice them. Skullgirls is a very fast-paced game and being able to do each of your characters moves on-demand without having to worry about if you're going to complete the motion correctly or not is an essential skill.

Pick each of your character's special moves and do the motion 5 or 10 times in a row without messing it up and getting the wrong attack. You want these motions engrained into your muscle memory to the point where your brain thinks "I need to do this move" and your hands input the motion. If your brain is thinking "How do I do that move again?" its a bit like looking down at your hands to try to remember which button makes Mario jump or which button throws the grenade. By the time your brain processes how to do the move, the moment in which that move was a good idea has probably already passed and you are now in trouble. If you're not sure why a special move didn't work, remember we turned on Input Display so you can take a look and see what you're doing wrong.

Don't forget to switch sides on the dummy so that you practice your moves from both sides!

Super Moves

Super Moves (Also called Blockbusters by the Tutorial) are extremely powerful attacks that consume levels of your Super Meter. They're done with the exact same motions as the special moves, except you must press two punches or kicks at the same time.

Super moves are basically powered up versions of your special moves. So play around, figure out what they do and burn the motions into your muscle memory.

A very common newbie mistake is to be so focused on doing damage to their opponent that they don't think about when they should be blocking and fail to recognize when they're being punished for using certain attacks recklessly.

A fighting game is a bit like a game of Basketball or Football. There are times when you have possession of the "Ball" and its your turn to attack and times when your opponent has the advantage and you're forced to defend.

Unlike in those sports, the moments when the figurative "ball" changes sides in a fighting game are not so obvious. If you don't know what signals to look for you may miss your chance with the "ball" entirely, make a bad situation worse or unintentionally give your opponent the "ball" for no reason.

Three Games in One

For all of the complex interactions that can happen when two characters butt heads in Skullgirls, any given situation you find yourself in can be put into one of three categories.

Neutral - Neither player is in a good position to attack and players use their movement and their long-rage pokes to fight for better positioning while trying to hit, or at least lock-down, their opponent. Each one tries to find an opening to get in and start their offence. Good movement and a strong understanding of the ranges of your attacks are key to a strong Neutral Game.

Offence - You have the "Ball" and are in a good position to attack. It may be because your opponent did something stupid or maybe you just outmaneuvered him in the neutral game.

Defense - Your opponent has the "Ball" and you're forced to block or are getting hit. Now you'll want to protect yourself from damage by blocking and escaping throws while attempting to get back to neutral or look for a mistake by your opponent to get back in control of the match.

Each of these is complicated enough to have its own section but for now we'll talk a bit about the things you can do (or avoid doing) that help you hold onto the offensive "ball" longer or at least keep yourself from giving it to your opponent.

Shifts in Momentum

Here are a few of the more easy-to-spot signs that somebody has just lost control of the match and is forced to defend.

Knockdown - Any time you're knocked onto the ground by your opponent they get a chance to attack you as you're getting up. Because your opponent gets to move and get into position to attack while your character is busy flopping around on the floor, getting knocked down usually results in your opponent gaining the advantage and placing you on the defensive.

Fortunately, a tech-roll (AKA, Ground Recovery) will let you reposition yourself as you get up off of the ground. This limits how aggressively your opponent can take advantage of the situation, so make sure you use this defensive technique frequently to keep your opponent guessing.

Blocking a Jump-in - Because they cause so much Blockstun and recover so quickly, blocking a jump-in attack while standing on the ground is going to force you onto the defensive. Its certainly a lot better then being hit but you have to recognize that you are now stuck on the defensive and must continue blocking.

There are a few ways to deal with this. You can use an Anti-air attack to knock your opponent out of mid air, possibly getting you a knockdown and some damage in the process. You could also jump and block it air-to-air, which results in a more neutral situation. Finally, you can simply block the attack and use a Pushblock to get yourself back to Neutral (see the Defence section for details on pushblocking)

Dropped Combo - When a player fails to complete their combo for any reason, there is often a moment where the attacking player gives his opponent a chance to fight back. For this reason, good Fighting Game players practice their combos extensively to make sure this doesn't happen but mistakes happen.

Of course a dropped combo doesn't always signal a chance for you to attack. It only really matters if you block something Punishable that was supposed to be part of the combo.

Blocking a Punishable Attack - Some attacks have such long recovery animations that, if they're blocked, will immediately give your opponent a chance to hit you with a combo. When the time your opponent is stuck in place while blocking a move (Blockstun) is much shorter then the time it takes you to recover from doing the attack (Recovery), your opponent has a moment when they can attack while you are unable to block.

Attacks that open yourself up to a free combo if they're blocked are called Punishable or Unsafe. Much like a Turnover in Football or Basketball, they give your opponent an immediate chance start their own offence.

Of course, this works both ways. If you block an attack by your opponent that is punishable, you need to recognize that, and attack!

Obviously punishable moves require some careful consideration before you use them but because they're so risky to use, these moves can have useful properties like high damage, combo potential, partial invincibility, Super Armor or any number of other abilities.

So which of my character's attacks are punishable?

The best way is to find out yourself, you've probably already figured out a few of them from playing some matches but the heat of battle isn't always the best place for experimentation! So back to training mode we go.

The eaisest method is, of course, to have a buddy of yours plug in the second controller and do the moves against him to see if he can punish them. Failing that, the Training Dummy is here to help.

Using the Record/Playback Feature

Pick your own character for both players and start up training mode. Next, scroll down to the "Select Button" function in the training mode options and switch it to "Record/Playback". This will let you tell the Dummy to do things. While you're at it, set the Dummy to Always Block.

Press Select and a white "Pause" symbol will appear in the top right corner of the screen. Now you're controlling the dummy, but nothing is being recorded yet. Press Select again to switch it to Record, do the move that you want to test and then immediatly hold down+back to block for a moment or two before pressing Select again to finish the recording.

The next time you press Select, the Dummy will playback the recorded action. Block the attack you programed into the dummy and try to hit it with a Light attack before it can start blocking. If it hits, you've just Punished that move by blocking it! You can pratice converting that simple, one button punish into a combo if you want. Playback the attack a couple of times to play around with which attacks you can punish the move with and which ones you can't.

When you're ready to move onto the next attack you want to experiment with, hold the select button to clear the recording so you can start again (you'll see a Red flash to indicate that the recording is cleared).

The Neutral Game is what fighting game players call the times when neither player is hitting the other very much and neither player has gotten a combo recently or put their opponent in a blockstring or a Knockdown to apply pressure from. It primarily involves fighting for positioning and attempting to get that first hit to gain an upper hand.

In Skullgirls the Neutral game revolves around a lot of jumping and air-dashing so get used to that, but beyond movement how do I know where I want to attack my opponent from? How do I deal with projectiles being shot at me from across the screen? How do I approach my opponent to land that first hit? The answer is specific to each character and each opponent but its really all about positioning and controlling space.

Controlling Space

You can call it "Zoning" or "Spacing" or "Footsies" or whatever you please, ultimately understanding what areas of the screen you can attack and where you want to stand relative to your opponent comes down to a fundamental understanding of your own attacks and their ranges and your opponent's attacks.

Take the example in the picture here. Filia would like to attack Squigly but the long-range flame on Squigly's cr.HP covers a ton of space and, because the flame isn't part of Squigly's body, doesn't present anything she can attack either. Squigly Controls the space on the ground in front of her very well with this attack. The only thing Filia has with that much range are her sliding s.HK and cr.HK normals, but those are very punishable if blocked, and they'll lose to the flame if she runs into it. Not a very promising situation.

But wait a second, Filia's real strength is her airborn mobility. If Filia backs up just a little bit out of range of Squigly's cr.HP range or push-blocks Squigly away from her, she can take to the air! By doing an Air-Dash j.MP, Filia avoids the space on the ground that Squigly controls with her cr.HP. Filia has Control of the air in front of her at this range. If she was a little closer to Squigly she'd be in danger of getting burned by that cr.HP before she got off the ground but at this range she can attack freely.

The Squigly player is on the ball, however, and knows that the range where Filia is now standing is prime positioning for an Airdash j.MP or j.HP by Filia. At this range there's not much that Squigly can do, she can spend some of her Super Meter on Squigly Battle Opera to protect the air-space in front of her, but that costs valuable super-meter and will only last a few seconds. What's a Zombie Opera Singer to do? She'll want to get moving, she can't stay at this range, its Filia Country.

Squigly decides she's going to back away from Filia even more and take to the air herself. At this range Squigly's very slow but gigantic j.HP fills the entire airspace in front of her. A bit closer and she wouldn't have time to use her sluggish j.HP before Filia was on-top of her. Now that they're further apart, Squigly controls the skies with her j.HP and Filia is forced to block and approach more carefully.

Filia will have to get closer if she wants to attack, meanwhile, Squigly will be waiting for Filia to slip up and give her a shot at starting her own offence. Constantly harassing Filia with her j.HP at long range is frustrating for Filia to deal with, she has to keep her cool and get back into a good position to attack again.

The above example is over-simplified but that's the basic idea of how Spacing works. Each character has ranges at which they deal well with their opponent's options while using their own strengths and players fight for an opening to start their offence by being in places where their opponent has difficulty attacking them. Each character's attacks control a portion of the screen and players try to optimize how they control their opponent's options while exploiting their own.

The first step to understanding the neutral game is to understand the attacks and movement of your own character and what parts of the screen you can threaten with your attacks. Beyond that though your opponent's character is just as important as your own. A good place to attack from in one matchup may be horrible in another and which assists your opponent has access to and what parts of the screen those assists cover adds another dimension to the neutral game.

The only real way to learn good spacing is to practice against real people. Even if you don't consciously acknowledge that "This is a good position for me in this matchup" you'll gradually get a feeling for where you're supposed to be standing and places on the screen that you need to avoid by putting in the time against quality opponents.

The Corner

The corners of the stage present a special hazard when you consider Spacing. In the above example, Squigly retreated in order to get herself into a more advantageous range but what if her back was already to the wall?

She'd have no where to go. She can't back up to a range where her j.HP is powerful and if she tries to move forward to get back into her cr.HP range again Filia has plenty of room to retreat until she finds her ideal Air Dash j.HP range again.

With your back to the corner, your opponent has nearly complete control of the Spacing between you and gets to dictate the pace of the match.

Keepaway

Keepaway is a strategy that revolves around controlling space at very long range while chipping away at your opponent's health with projectiles.

In this picture, you can see how a good Peacock player can control almost the entire screen with her variety of long-ranged special moves. Boxcar George covers the ground while George at the Air Show fills the space above Peacock's head. At the same time, the Heavy version of Shadow of Impending Doom controls the air-space at long range. This can be extremely frustrating to deal with, even for experienced players.

However, there are gaps in this wall of garbage. Shadow of Impending Doom has to be at least partially charged up before its fast enough to catch speedy air-dashing characters and there's plenty of open space in the top of the screen above Peacock's head that Double-Jumping characters can get into while they try to approach. Every character has their own unique tools to deal with Keepaway too, so make sure you're exploiting your character's entire moveset.

In addition, the tried and true method of simply patiently blocking and approaching slowly, while forcing Peacock into the corner, is always an option. Once she's in the corner, she'll no longer be able to back up to regain her distance, just keep an eye out for those sneaky teleports!

Now that you've read about how certain moves can help a player maintain their momentum and how your opponent can open himself up to offensive pressure by doing unsafe attacks. Once we've realized that this is a good time to attack how do we exploit these openings?

Hit Confirm

Most combos involve punishable heavy attacks that could leave you wide open for counter attack if you combo is blocked.

That's why its important that most of your combos start with quick, safe, light and medium attacks that will allow you to 'confirm', visually or by the change in hit-sounds, if your opponent is blocking or not. This gives you time to abort the combo before you reach the risky heavy attacks.

If the first part of the combo connects, then you can safely continue into the heavy attacks to do maximum damage to your opponent. Good hit confirms are the difference between a newbie blindly attempting the combos he was doing in training mode with no regard for what his opponent is doing and an experienced player who attacks safely while he tries to crack open his opponent's defences.

The Tutorial Chapter 2, part 3 covers hit-confirms for Filia. Alternatively, you can switch the training dummy to block Randomly, allowing you to pratice your hit-confirms in a safe environment. If my opening attacks hit, I can 'confirm' my hit by doing a combo and getting big damage, great! What if they block it?

Blockstrings

The Blockstring is the other side of the coin to Hit Confirms. Its a series of attacks designed to keep pressure on your opponent when they block, so that you can continue your offence. They also have the beneficial side-effect of pushing your opponent towards the corner and building super meter for you. A good block string lets you maintain your momentum and forces your opponent to keep blocking. If your opponent gets impatient and tries to attack you in the middle of your blockstring? Well you just smacked him in the face for not defending properly and possibly got yourself a combo starter.

So what makes up a block string? Its basically just a chain of attacks, much like a combo, that ends with something safe. The best ones end with a move that leaves you at Advantage when blocked but in a pinch, any attack that's not Punishable when blocked will do.

It doesn't really matter if the moves in the middle of the string are safe or not, provided they are chained into something else that’s safe. Only the last move in the chain really matters.

A good blockstring will let you Hit-Confirm into a combo if it connects and will keep you safe if its blocked, leading to a stable offensive game that's looking a lot less like just trying random moves and hoping they work which new players are prone to.

A Safe Way Out

Here's a quick list of moves that you can end your chain with to make your block-string or hit-confirm safe.

Squigly - QCF+LK
Miss Fortune - QCF+LP (First hit only)
Peacock - QCF+LK
Painwheel - F+HKx4 or QCB+K* (Flight Mode) > j.MK
Filia - s.HP*
Cerebella - cr.HK or QCF+P* (Unsafe at close range)
Valentine - s.HP* or QCF+LP* (Unsafe at close range)
Parasoul - B, F+LP
Double - s.HP* or QCF+MP* (Unsafe at close range)

(* Note: Because Filia's Fenrir Drive Super Move is faster then any other move in the game, the above moves marked with a * are not totally safe against a Filia player who has Meter available.)

"Alright" you say "Blockstrings are handy but I'd really rather be hitting my opponent and doing real damage. How do I stop him from blocking?"

Basic Mixups

In case you skimmed the blocking tutorial and didn't quite understand what was going on, aerial attacks must be blocked while standing up, while Low attacks must be blocked crouching. A few characters, like Parasoul, have grounded attacks that must be blocked high.

This is called a mixup, it forces you to react or guess what is going on in order to block properly and the high/low guessing game is the simplest way that the player who is on the offense can open up their opponent and start a combo.

If you want to know which of your own moves hit high or low, set the training dummy to low block or high block and see what works. Now try mixing your jumping attacks, standing overheads and low attacks together with your Blockstrings and Hitconfirming into a combo when the dummy fails to block. Of course, this is kind of cheating, you told the dummy which type of move not to block so you'll know exactly when to hit-confirm but a little rehearsal in the training room will help when you're doing this against human opponents later.

Throws

The third option in the mixup-triangle is the Throw. Throws don't care if your opponent is blocking high or low, they ignore blocking entirely. "That's really cheep!" you say. Well, yes and no.

Unlike normla attacks a grounded throw doesn’t work against airborne opponents. Even somebody who is on the ground and holding up to attempt to jump is immune to a ground throw. Likewise grounded opponents are totally immune to air-throws. Normal throws can also be broken out of if your opponent is paying careful attention and presses LP+LK at the right time. Finally, a combo that starts from a throw does significantly less damage then one that starts from a normal attack (for most characters).

These strengths and limitations make throws some of the most powerful and most situational of all mixup tools.

To make things a little more complicated, throws do not work against an opponent who is currently stuck in Blockstun or Hitstun and they don't have a lot of range. To get around this limitation of throws, a simple mixup called the "Tic-Throw" was created.

A Tic-Throw starts with a move with a very short hitstun, blockstun and fast recovery, like a Light Punch or Light Kick. First lets set our training dummy to Always block everything. Now 'Tic' your opponent with a light attack, wait for a brief moment (you can walk slightly forward during this time if you want) and then throw. Its as simple as that!

By throwing your opponent immediately when they leave blockstun from your Light Attack, you give them the smallest possible window attack you while you attempt a throw. The sooner you throw them after the Tic the better, but if you do it too fast they'll still be stuck in Blockstun and the throw won't work. Experiment with your timing against the training dummy and find the correct timing for your own character's tic-throw.


Left-Right Mixups

In addition to the standard high/low/throw triangle there's something odd that happens when your opponent jumps over your head (Cross-Up) or dashes under you while you're in the air (Cross-Under). Because of the fact that you always have to hold the direction away from your opponent to block, if your opponent changes sides it immediately switches the direction that you need to press in order to block! If you're not sure which side you're being attacked from, it can be very difficult to defend this kind of mixup.

Experiment with your own character's moves to see which ones you can use to attack while jumping over somebody's head and the specific distance that you need to jump or air-dash from to make it work. Cross-ups can be devastating in the right hands but keep in mind that its very difficult or impossible to crossup somebody who has their back to the corner of the stage.

The typical beginner mentality is usually 'Attack Attack Attack!' if he's not pressing buttons, he's not playing right!

Learning to Block

If you read the guide up to this point you already have an idea of how blockstrings can force you to keep blocking. You also know that blocking an unsafe attack is a great way to get yourself some easy damage. That's the beginning of learning how simply blocking correctly can win you a match against a new player but its not the end.

A Blockstring is specifically designed to force you to keep blocking. When a good player attacks newbies who don't understand this, its fairly simple to just smother them with Blockstrings that bait them into attacking at the wrong time (called a Frame Trap). A red flash called a "Counter Hit Spark" shows you that the beginning of one of your moves got hit, probably because you were trying to attack at the wrong time.

Good players use hit-confirms. They'll use safe blockstrings. They'll do mixups. They'll keep themselves safe while forcing you on the defensive or commit to some Hail Marry style setup designed to crack open your defences. Blocking is not only essential, its also hard So what can you do about it?

Block Low, React High

In most 2D fighting games, most attacks can be blocked while crouching. Attacks that you have to block while standing are slower and more obvious then low attacks. Hence the general wisdom of 'Block Low, React High'.

Typically you'll be blocking standing while your opponent is in the air and blocking low when your opponent is on the ground, since most low attacks are done while crouching and most high attacks are performed from the air. As mentioned before some characters have high attacks that can be done while standing on the ground.

However, high-low mixups in Skullgirls are still pretty fast. There's no way you'll be able to react to every single one, otherwise, how would you ever stop somebody from blocking the whole match? Sometimes you'll just have to guess what you're opponent will do next, this is where recognizing patterns in your opponent's offence comes in handy.

Throws

Throws are fast, nearly impossible to break on reaction and can't be blocked. Throws are dangerous. So how do you deal with them?

Typically, throws have relatively short range and must be performed while standing up, which gives you some extra information on when your opponent is likely to attempt a throw so you can break it. When you see somebody suddenly abort their block string and stand up next to you, that's probably your cue to attempt a throw-break by pressing LP+LK. Note that you cannot throw-break while crouching.

Another thing about throws is that grounded throws can't hurt you if you're jumping. If you spot somebody trying to throw and hold Up to jump, their throw will fail and you'll be able to punish the attempt on the way back down from your jump for a free combo! This is the 'high-risk, high-reward' method of dealing with a throw.

Additionally, a few characters have a unique 'Command Throw' that is performed as a special move. These sorts of throws (mostly) can't be broken by pressing LP+LK so if you suspect somebody is trying to do a command-throw on you, your first option is to jump out. Command Throws have very long recovery animations when they don't connect, so you're even more likely to get yourself a hefty combo if you successfully jump out of one!

Crossups

We touched on this before but blocking crossups is an important skill, even more so then executing your own.

Most characters have at least one aerial attack that hits behind their body far enough that they can hit you in mid-air while jumping over you, forcing you to guess if you have to block left or right. If you see your opponent jumping over your head at an angle where they will fall on the other side of you or airdashing above your head, that's a key signal to look out for a cross-up and switch which direction you are blocking.

This requires knowledge of your opponent's jump-arc, air-dash distances, etc. but over time you'll gain a sense for how close your opponent needs to be in order for there to be a risk of it being a crossup. Look for that range and understand that when you're in that range you may need to switch blocking directions at a moment's notice.

Pushblock

All of these mixups can be pretty intimidating! You're being smothered with blockstrings and you know trying to mash buttons is just going to result in a Counterhit. You're blocking things but you can't seem to move. Your opponent's offence is so safe that there's no openings for you to regain momentum. Mixups are extremely powerful and varied in Skullgirls so its only a matter of time before you block wrong and get hit. How do you get out before that happens?

Well think back to that tutorial about pushblocking (Also called "Reaction Shot" by the tutorial). By pressing any two punch buttons at once while you're stuck in blockstun, you'll push your opponent away, giving you some room to breath and returning to a more neutral position. Sounds easy right? Sort of...

A pushblock only gives you its full push-back when its done at the right time. If a multi-hitting move or very tight block string puts you back into blockstun before you finish the pushblock animation, the pushback will be cut short and they'll still be on top of you. The best times to push block are immediately on the very first attack is blocked or in the small gaps between a medium and a heavy attack or the gap between a heavy attack and a special move where your pushblock will have the most effect (usually).

Furthermore, the input for pushblocking is the same as the shortcut for a Dash... meaning that attempting to pushblock too late or too early when you're not in blockstun results in you Dashing face first into your opponent's fist. Not nice.

Finally, pushblocking a Punishable attack can accidentally shove your opponent out of a situation where you should have gotten yourself a free combo! Very disappointing.

I cannot stress enough how important good pushblocking is to your defensive game. Blocking is great but if you just sit there doing nothing you'll eventually crack under the pressure. Pushblock. Use it, love it, practice it, try not to mess it up.

Invincibility and Super Armor

The last line of defence against being mauled by an opponent's offensive pressure is to throw out a move that has temporary Invincibility or Super Armor to try and interrupt somebody's blockstring or beat a jump-in.

Most moves that have these properties are very punishable special moves, like Filia's Updo, or powerful super moves that cost meter. These attacks are risky, and are best saved for when you have a good idea of what your opponent is doing. They're an excellent threat to keep your opponent cautious about how they attack you, but they're extremely easy to punish when they fail. Used sparingly, moves like these keep your opponent from getting too reckless with his offence but become too predictable with doing them and you'll open yourself for a free combo from your opponent.

One of the first things new players want to learn is how to do a combo.

This is somewhat misguided. Combos have one primary purpose - To maximize the amount of damage you can get from confirming a hit. Learning a combo won't give you the ability to get that critical first-hit that you need to start the combo, nor will it help keep you from making the mistakes that cause your opponent to hit you with a combo.

A combo cannot create opportunities for you. It can only help you exploit openings.

To complicate the situation, learning a combo in training mode is only the first step. Learning how to execute that combo in a real match is a much more difficult skill that can only be learned in the heat of battle.

What is a Combo, really?

A combo is a series of attacks that keep your opponent stunned while you do damage to them. Attacks have a thing called "Hitstun" that happens when somebody gets hit, and combos basically boil down to repeatedly hitting a 'hitstunned' opponent and over again so they can't stop you from doing damage to them. They can't block or move until you complete the combo (or mess it up).

There are two ways in which we can combo two moves together, Chains which are rapid sequences of moves that follow each other in a specific order and Links which are carefully timed attacks that take advantage of long hitstuns.

Just like with learning to do your special moves, combos should be practised over and over until they can be done on-demand without messing them up. For beginner players a short, easy, reliable combo is infinitely more useful then a long complicated one that you can barely execute. Find something you can do consistently and gradually improve your combo knowledge with time.

Chains

A chain is a series of attacks that are designed to combo into each other by skipping the recovery animation of one move and going directly into the next. Just because a chain works doesn't necessarily mean that it will form a combo, but it usually does.

Skullgirls has a universal chain system for every character that determines which moves can be chained into each other.

Normals Any Normal can be chained into a higher strength normal. So Light attacks chain into Mediums and Heavies and Medium Attacks chain into Heavies (but not into lights). Heavy Normals don't chain backwards but some characters can chain their heavy punch into heavy kick.

Some characters are allowed more freedom with how they chain their normals, like Peacock being able to chain her punch attacks into the same strength kicks but the above works for all characters.

Special Moves - All Normal attacks can be chained into any special move.

Super Moves - All Normal and Special Moves can be Chained into a Super Move

Throw - The end of any character's throw can be chained into a Special or Super Move.

Launcher

Every character has at least one Launcher, that's designed to enable Air Combos.

A launcher can be cancelled into a Jump if it hits, but not if its blocked.

Off the Ground

Abbreviated OTG, Off the Ground is a term that means any attack that hits your opponent while they're on the floor. There are all sorts of ways that you can use OTG attacks to extend your combos but most of them involve picking your opponent up off the floor and launching them into the air.

In Skullgirls, any attack that hits close to the floor can OTG. If it looks like it could hit somebody lying on the ground it probably can.

During a combo, you can identify an opportunity to OTG by a Pinkish-Red spark that appears under the character as they bounce on the floor. A light-blue coloured bounce is a knockdown that can be tech-rolled (aka Ground Recovery) and can't be used to extend your combo unless your opponent gets sloppy and doesn't do a ground recovery (Very important! Go re-do tutorial Ch.3, Lesson 5 if you forgot about them).

You are limited to a maximum of one OTG per combo, subsequent knockdowns will always be blue, techable, knockdowns.

Links

A Link is basically anything that lets you extend a combo that's not a chain. It includes extending a combo from a launcher, wall-bounces, ground bounces, and anything else that lets you "Link" one Chain into the next one.

Since they're very character specific, there's no way to cover them here, even in general.

Cancels

A Cancel is functionally identical to a Chain and, depending on which game you're playing, are interchangeable terminology but in Skullgirls, there are a few types of cancels that aren't counted as part of a chain by the Infinite Prevention System (See Tutorial 4, Chapter 4 for more info on Infinite combos).

Airdash Cancel Is canceling the recovery of an airborn move with your air-dash. Since an air-dash can be cancelled into any normal attack they're very useful for air-combos and maintaining pressure.

Jump Cancel is cancelling the recovery of a grounded move by jumping, the key property that makes a Launcher work.

Baby's First Combo

Most characters in the game can do a simple combo, just by doing a sequence of normals from light, to heavy, then a special move and then a super move.

Cerebella - s.LP > s.MP > s.HP > DP+HP > QCF+PP
Peacock - cr.LP > cr.MP > cr.HP > QCF+HPx3 > QCF+PP
Miss Fortune - cr.LP > s.MP > s.HP > QCF+LPx3 > QCF+PP
Filia - cr.LK > cr.MK > cr.HP > QCB+HK > QCB+KK
Squigly - cr.LK > cr.MK > cr.HP > QCF+MK > QCB+LP+LK
Painwheel - cr.LK > cr.MP > s.HP > QCF+LP > QCF+PP
Valentine - cr.LK > cr.MK > s.HKx3 > QCF+HK > QCF+KK
Parasoul - s.LK > s.MP > s.HPx2 > B, F+HP > QCF+PP
Double - cr.LK > cr.MK > cr.HP > DP+HK > QCF+PP

That should be enough to get you started. There are plenty of combo videos and other guides you can use to find combos online or you can just try out things and see what works to make your own combos!

Execution

In fighting game terms, Execution is the ability to make your character do what you want it to without fumbling your inputs and getting some unwanted move that gets you in trouble.

Besides just being important for not messing up your combos and special moves, Execution is important because it lets you pay attention what your opponent is doing, and trust that your character will do what you want it to.

Going head-first into a match without at least practising your special moves, movement and normal attacks is a lot like running full speed ahead while looking at the ground. It may help you make sure that you won't trip over your own feet but ultimately, if you want to be able to see where you're going, you have to be able to trust that your character will move and attack in the way that you want it to.

That's why training mode is so important but try not to burn yourself out. Play some matches, have some fun with the game and come back to Training Mode regularly to smooth out the bumps as you run into problems during matches.

Skullgirls places various limits on how long a combo can be and how much damage it can do, so at some point somebody realized that if they intentionally stopped their combo and did another mixup instead, they could 'Reset' the damage scaling and combo limitations and start a new combo! The combo is broken, the combo-counter starts over and an immediate mixup results in the start of an entirely new combo. This has the potential for massive amounts of damage without your opponent being able to do much of anything at all.

That is, of course, provided the start of your new combo connects. If they blocked it you're out of luck.

A Reset is a risk. You give up the guaranteed damage from the longer combo in order to gamble that your opponent won't block the mixup. The reward for a successful reset is a whole lot more damage then you could have gotten by just finishing the combo.

Defending Against the Reset

Right now, you're just a newbie so doing resets is probably not your best option for getting damage but for future reference its important for you to know about it because people will be doing it to you, a lot.

The first, and most important step to defending yourself against Resets is to realize that they exist. Most new players don't recognize this and, as they are bussy mashing buttons for no reason, assume they were caught in some kind of infinite combo that seems to go on forever. They have no idea that what actually happened was three or more individual combos, put together in a very smart way to make it look seamless and catch the defending player off guard.

The next step is to identify key points at which your opponent has the option of doing a reset. This is different for every character and requires getting hit by a lot of the same reset over and over until you recognize it. This is a lot of trial and error and even the best players have problems with recognizing when a reset is happening.

The last step is to realize that a Reset is just a very smart way to create a mixup that your opponent is not expecting. It can be blocked like any other mixup in the game... with great difficulty or a lot of guessing.

Thanks for reading this guide! I hope it helped you understand fighting games a little better and that I put you on the path to improvement.

I'd just like to take this moment to say Fighting Games are hard.

Nobody gets good at fighting games by only fighting people they can beat. Every attack that you realized was unsafe, every mixup you didn't block, every blockstring you thought you could mash you way out of and got counterhit, its all a learning process.

Start every match with the intention to learn and the desire to win and grow as a player and you'll do well, no matter how much of this guide flew over your head.

Most importantly, have fun. If you take your losses in stride and enjoy yourself you're much more likely to come back the next day for more. Nobody likes to lose, but knowing why you lost is the best path to improvement.