DNF Duel had one of the best launches in fighting game history only to be followed with a really bad post launch support. We didn't start getting big updates until after a year and everyone wondered if Arcsystems were still supporting the game. Thank you Arcsys for coming back to this and giving it support.
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Now the review:
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The Good:
-I have been playing fighting games casually for years, and only since I picked up Blazblue a few months back has the genre really got its hooks in me, and I set out to try out as many fighting games as I could. Of all the fighting games I've played, when it comes to "how the game feels", DNF is unrivaled. Between the crisp sound of a hit confirm, to the incredibly fluid and well animated attacks and combos, to the beautiful character models, with what feels like a free form combo system (until you lab optimal routes), it is the master of feels.
-Modern fighting games have tried to make their games more accessible with simple fight controls, more autocombos, removal of motion inputs, good comeback mechanics, and easy to see visual queues. I believe Granblue and DNF are the pioneers to this system, but I can honestly say, of all the games that have done it, I think DNF has done it the best. Pressing your unique button feels more like a high powered normal basic attack with a flashier animation. This is a Gatling game as well, so basic combo links typically go clockwise around your controller, like Light > Medium > Special > Unique, you can add extra button presses, but rarely does the combo go in a counter clockwise position. This almost always ensures that you are starting many of your combo routes with your fastest button for a hit confirm, making beginner combos simple, fun, and flashy.
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The Meh:
-For low skilled players, I think this game is more fun for those players. High skill players are typically looking for something more defensively, player expression (i would argue no fighting game has player expression), and more advanced combo routes. Higher level players will mash out infinites with ease and it becomes a one touch game for those players. But for us who are less skilled, combos get dropped all the time and you have an opportunity to counter, and it becomes a back and forth for you and your opponent.
-Every character is overpowered, meaning all normals are fairly massive, frame data is very quick, and everyone has some kind of overpowered tool in their toolkit that you wouldn't see in any other fighting game outside of Marvel vs Capcom or tag games. For instance, imagine the typical zoner. They usually have wide gaps in their projectiles that you can hop over. In DNF, zoners have much smaller gaps in their tools. For instance, Launcher can send insane amounts of projectiles across the screen as if she were shooting a rocket launcher machine gun. Every character in this game is overpowered in one fashion, but have huge glaring weaknesses in every toolkit that you can expose and abuse.
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The Bad:
-There are not a ton of players left playing this game. Its for sure a discord fighter, and I encourage you to sign up for a few of them. This was due to the lack of support the game received in the first year because its publisher Nexon. With the free promotion release of the game on the epic store, its player count has been picking up steam and I have noticed that I'm able to get into matches very quickly.
-Due to everyone using Arid Continent as their matchmaking region, you will often get matched up against players on the other side of the world. Even though the netcode is great, and the rollback is well implemented, once you get into the territory of 6-10 rollback frames with 150+ ping matches, it becomes nearly unplayable. This happens more frequently that I'd like. That being said, when you do get a match against someone in your country/region, the netcode feels amazing and smooth. For us West Coasters, getting Japanese players is preferable to getting European players, whereas East Coast its reversed.
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*Ahem* Final Thoughts:
-This is a really solid fighting game that Arcsystems has been putting support into to address a lot of the issues it had at launch and is actively promoting the game to bring in more players. It is the best beginner friendly fighting game in terms of how it feels, and it better sets you up for future, less accessible fighting games with its combo system, where as granblue better sets you up on fundamentals. If you are a beginner to fighting games, I would recommend picking this game up as well as granblue to work on both, combo routes and fundamentals. For now, me and my buddies have been playing this game a lot over the last 2 days and having an absolute blast, while we also play our normal fighting games (Blazblue, Tekken, Streetfighter, Strive, Meltyblood). I give this game 4 Inquisitor Wheels out of 5 Kunoichi Ninjutsu.
