relearning a fighting game

Guilty Gear Strive recently came out with a new update that added a more proper ranked mode, so like a lot of people I decided to hop back in. It’s been years since I’ve put any serious amount of time into Strive, so I was looking forward to coming back and seeing what all was up with the game…

and one day in and I’m getting beat down like crazy.

Honestly I have very little to fall back on in terms of prior information, because not only have I missed out on learning a ton of DLC characters that have been added since I last played, but Strive was my first true fighting game and I never really understood frame data and other universal systems before I jumped ship to Street Fighter 6.

But that also makes things more exciting because I get to jump back in with all this new information I’ve learned about fighting games in general: knowing how to properly punish mistakes, better block strings, not just spamming unsafe, but highly rewarding attacks…

to continue, or start fresh

So I haven’t been cold turkey from Strive since I initially quit playing it. I’ve definitely jumped in when interesting characters are added, but mostly to try them out in training mode before inevitably returning to Street Fighter 6.

During one of these stints, I tried out A.B.A (who is a very weird and punishing character), and I really enjoyed my time with her. That is, when I wasn’t just stuck in a corner blocking and waiting for my turn for seemingly hours…

Coming back now I decided to truly learn (and suffer) with her, instead of returning to my original main of Giovanna. I didn’t want my prior, albeit old, experience with Gio to taint things and cause me to revert back to bad habits. Also suffering with a “feast or famine” character like A.B.A forces me to learn match-ups much quicker than I would with an “easier” character since she is forced to play defense so much and find opening before she can go crazy.