Straight-up one of the most fun roguelites ever. 10/10

High quality graphics, very cool character themes, a combat system that has high skill ceiling.
What else could you even look for?

hazama

I will hit recommend because I made the push through and enjoy BlazBlue. REALLY good once you've invested time into the game. I want to lay a disclaimer that I am not some super tryhard, and I've only really cleared up to 52 (100 now!) entropy with a really OP Black Market HP Mai.

Some tips for the general experience I wish someone would've told me:

• Lightning Orb and Thunderbolt Dash have the best synergies in the game. Light Javelin and Lightwave Attack complete for one of the most broken builds. Rather, a lot of builds struggle to compare. There are better ones for Boss Rush (i.e. Skill Cold) but that isn't the majority of the game.
  
• Progress through the story and quests. The results don't matter if you only care about gameplay and extra modes.
  
• Achievements are grindy and the game's internal achievements are different from Steam ones.
  
• If you're inheriting / loading an Evotype to a new character, they can't inherit the same effects. This prevents rerolling for better Double Tactics and encourages using Tier 1 effects until you get what you want. Invest into Implants that improve RNG of a specific tactic type.
  
• Hakumen is easily the most broken character in the game. Feel free to use Jin, Ragna and Es if you're just trying to beat harder modes. Hakumen at less 1900 Evo with Black Market HP + 360 MP and mostly Potentials (rather than Tactics) can beat Boss Rush without sweating, as long as you know how to parry.
  
• Do not try Black Market until you've increased base HP enough. It is a run killer the same way Trials are (these two only exist on hard mode).
  
• Do not feel bad about making normal mode easier. That is what it is there for. No penalty for doing so and you can easily get a lot of good Evotypes even if not broken ones.

Now for the critique.

All the dialogue is cryptic and so many characters read in monotone. The Japanese was worse. I had to swap back to English dub for the first time in over 16 years!!! Guys come on lol. The ICEY narrator (despite being in Chinese) was refreshing and it really spoke to me that this game took itself too seriously despite the chibi robot lobby. Phenomena as a system is grindy and you can miss flags via the calls, a UX issue I seem to be encountering more and more in the indie scene.


Some characters got really shafted for the basic gameplay experience, like Hazama who is new and should've avoided that due to the combat being pretty intuitive. Rachel, his counterpart, is absolutely bonkers. If your character lacks invincibility frames (like my favorite character Taokaka), welcome to DPS check hell.

Many youtubers have given their input on the matter, but the fact of the matter is that bad Potentials = building for the most meta / broken Tactic Legacies. And this covers for so much that once you have the best builds, you only really struggle with "All debuff enemies" Trial and high Entropy Hard modes (we're talking 55+ and for the more skilled players, 85+). Pretty sad honestly that this suffers from the same roguelite issue of the last decade, which is that only the best builds really function and you get penalized for 80% of the other options.

This is a problem once you get to aerial mobs and to a lesser degree the Eye boss. 0read (I guess a pun on No-Read since this game is obsessed with computers) is the boss in particular I keep looking at who punishes you for lacking aerial damage, whereas the Tree punishes you in a softer way by forcing you to do his mechanic. Real "fun" in Double Boss encounters via Boss Rush. -_-

There is a metagame surrounding them which eventually forces you to admit that the devs played too safe on the majority of effects (especially Fire, Toxin and Umbra which have depreciating benefits), and were limiting themselves to the visual tree. The UI for Tactics implies that you can't mix and match everything to fill your slots. And sadly, that is the truth. Thunderbolt Dash is the single most valuable Tactic as a result.

I want to go at length but you can see the steam achievements for unlocking all tactics. It is grindy and unfun. I would suggest not playing for the achievements on Steam, especially Double Tactics. Rather, there isn't real synergy encouraging you to mix and match in the first place. Had the developers decreased the number of basic tactic upgrades and instead pushed for more Double Tactics as trade-offs rather than straight upgrades, I think the entire system would be fine. As it is, you're basically going to see everyone at higher Entropy carrying around the same builds because the mobs become outright unfair. And tactics are not even necessary for casual play, removing the purpose behind making some of these builds ineffective.

Either they should be buffing up every mediocre Double Tactic, or they should be vastly improving the Double Tactic experience. I would prefer the latter since you need to grind and make a Legacy Evotype (past character) to secure powerful Double Tac strategies anyway.


This leads to DPS check environments if you want to Perfect Clear, instead of being a skilled or mechanically intensive player. Especially the case for Boss Rush clears (not perfect) which simply do not care if your character has a hard time dodging. The developers did not make scripted fights for you to memorize; the bosses are HP-reliant to determine their phases, making them harder as the fight goes on. I don't wanna touch Reki since she's super cool, but she especially exists to screw with the player due to how difficult to READ her attacks are.

Paired with roguelite environments which prevent you from getting all the effects you could ever want or need, you're directly punished for playing your character a certain way. As said before, if your character lacks i-frames: too bad. Mr. Drill who adds lasers to the sides of the stage punishes mobile characters and mobility-based playstyles with no bait tactics to keep him consistently in the middle. If anything, his AI always places him on those sides, heavily lengthening the encounter when you have no options to answer it. Watcher has a flame gimmick doing the same exact thing. This FORCES you to bring Jin as an Evotype, which makes him an S-tier character from how much the game favors his dodge mechanic. And Hakumen turns the game to easy mode from the same idea, as long as he has mana.

But I want to particularly highlight average trash foes with "all debuffs activated" Trial, which you can get really early in. You'll have S-tiers like Hakumen turned into grated cheese without stellar builds (since he can't benefit from Jin Legacy) whereas Ragna remains consistent in performance. It's jarring and really speaks to the issue with enemy design, despite the game being so fun when you don't have to deal with it.

Sorry, no other input. I just hate getting these and admitting to myself, "Wow that would destroy my endgame versatility, why is this even here?"

Deleting ground skill, aerial skill, ground attack, etc. damage as a permanent tradeoff usually doesn't match the reward due to Tactic imbalance. I have found myself skipping Covs more often than not sadly.

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My urge to replay is low admittedly because of burnout via the Double Tactics and how underwhelming most are. Take your time with this game if you commit to it.

very good

Absolutely wonderful roguelike, even if you suck at fighting games

At last I can be good at BlazBlue

♥♥♥♥

fun

a very fun rogue like action game with very good feeling power creep. Not the blazblue I expected but I am still very happy with it!