Rivals of Aether II

Goated! Best platform fighter of all time, and the future is looking bright for it! That said, the fact that it's targeting a niche can leave new players scratching their heads as to how to get started. If this is you, I'd highly recommend going to the Dragdown wiki (the official wiki for Rivals of Aether 2), and reading their "Getting Started" guide. It'll give you some super helpful information on how you can interact with the community to improve your experience. As long as you treat this like a social game and remember that there is a community of peers out there who can help guide you forward and who you can socialize with, you'll have a great time!

this game is fine if you like the mechanics of melee there's alot of sweats but hopefully with the new update there will be alot more of casual players

Never played the original, but this is the closest to "Smash greatness" I've seen in a platform fighter. The transition is smooth and the online is infinitely better. A great place for fans who are between Melee and Ultimate.

I've gone back and forth on whether to recommend this game or not a lot, and had neutral reviews been a thing I'd definitely have gone for that, because it is a well crafted game. It looks pretty, plays smoothly and so on. But it is a game for a very particular audience, and while adjacent, I am not part of that audience. I love Smash bros and other platform fighters, including Rivals of Aether 1, but RoA2 just has too many mechanics that are fully intentional and aimed at a particular crowd, that are frustrating to anyone outside of it. There's a lot of moves that are unsafe on hit, augmented by the newly added "floor hugging" mechanic. I think this is meant to promote the new grab mechanic but mostly feels like an unnecessary limiter on what moves you can use in neutral. Many moves have a low knockback angle, leading to a very high incidence of tech chasing. Definitely a thing that sounds good on the surface, but RoA2 takes it far enough that it becomes annoying. Most of the cast have insanely good recoveries so offstage situations are limiting and a definite disadvantage but ultimately not much more deadly than being on stage. I've had recurring issues with the game getting locked on the game results screen, reacting to no inputs and forcing an alt+f4. I also had some issues with stuttering which seemed to be caused an old USB I had connected to my computer, which isn't RoA2's fault, but it is weird that it's the only game I've played where that caused an issue. For those who aren't put off by this, or even think it sounds interesting, this is a gorgeous and seemingly well-balanced game with some really interesting character designs.

its horrible the only grappler in the game makes no since u cant throw the chair or nun without a big ass wind up

Good platformer

Genuinely the best plat fighter I've ever seen. All the skill expression from melee, with the fun and the funny shenanigans from each individual character in the cast. Each character has a well defined moveset making each of them unique in their own way, despite the small cast compared to say ssbu there is most certainly a character for every playstyle. Yeah there are cosmetics to buy but when is there not? And they are genuinely at bear minimum A tier skins, And unlike smash you get FREE CHARACTERS you will never have to buy dlc to get the newest fighter that you think you will like. Not only but each character has their own level unlocking rewards based on said level ranging from pallettes to full on skins. With that and the seasonal events there is plenty of opportunities to get the skins you want most. ---this was fact checked by real Rockwall enthusiasts

not ♥♥♥♥.

I played Melee on the gamecube, watched the smash doc and picked up Project M with my friends. It created an inseparable bond to the platform fighter genre. This game has been the closest of them all to tap to that same fluid style. I believe in the dev team and the publishers and I wish i could convince other folks to give this a try. Disregard the sweats and the haters too deadsest on the mechanics. When you start schmooving it hits just like the old smash titles did