DNF Duel (2022)

• Playtime: ~7 minutes + 20 minutes of cutscenes.

• Played: 2026

• Context: I liked fighting games back in the days (SF2T, OMWF 2097, etc).

Review

The tutorial made me feel like i showed up to my final exam while having missed the entire school year. I basically never use my controller so i struggled with some basic moves. One time the game wanted me to crouch and do a sort of z move (??) and i legit have no idea how to do that.

Anyway, i decided to start the solo story, just to see if i could manage anyway. It starts with a long unskippable cutscene. Then there's unskippable dialogue. And then, right when i thought i was going to play a freaking fighting game, yup, another unskippable cutscene. No tnx. DNF.

Imma quick review this one because it's not worth spending too much time on

Visuals: 5/5, the usual incredible flair that as of right now, only arcsys is able to deliver on everytime

Music: 4/5, nowhere near as catchy as granblue fantasy versus' ost (and obviously nowhere near guilty gear), but it has some good songs, like the moonlight tavern, the ruins, and the main menu theme, the rest is somewhat forgettable

Mechanics: 4/5, it wasn't until I played it with my friends that I realized how polished the mechanics were, my friends were able to get good pretty quickly, but obviously nowhere near mastering it, the mechanics are just fun enough as to not distract you from the last aspect

Roster: 4/5, mixed bag, I like the character designs, my favorites being ranger, striker, trouble shooter and dragon knight, oh and also my boy, jesus boi, also known as crusader. The variety is incredible, they're all so unique and enjoyable to play as and they feel different but not to a point where you're learning a whole new game every time (say hi to blazblue for me). But again, small roster...maybe 16 characters, which is actually more than I expected, but still rather small.

Content: 3/5, it's just enough to keep me coming back everyday, the survival mode is as always appreciated, the story mode is alright, and the gallery is decently packed, but unlike how I felt with guilty gear xrd back in the day, the amount of content here is underwhelming.

Online: 5/5, yes, just like guilty gear strive, the online is extremely efficient and genuinely great, the rollback helps the game keep up with all the stuff going on, Nintendo could learn something from arcsys to be honest here, especially with smash bros...

Overall: 25/30, 8.5/10, it's a fun game that needed a bit more on launch day, but it is still a wildly enjoyable time if you just care about the spending time with friends or going online, good luck on ranked tho