BlazBlue Centralfiction Special Edition

Genre: Fighting Game

Players: 1-2 Competitive (Local / Online)

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Review:

BlazBlue is a 2D Fighting game series that’s been around for over a decade now, establishing itself as one of the best modern games in the genre that continues the tradition of 2D sprites with Street Fighter-style controls. Nearly a year ago, I reviewed the other BlazBlue game on the Nintendo Switch, BlazBlue Cross Tag Battle, and at the time, I called it out for being overpriced and over-monetized. Well, in the time since then, Cross Tag Battle received a price reduction to $20 for the standard version of the game and $50 for the Special Edition with all of the DLC characters included (with it going for even less on sale), bringing the game closer in line with its sibling, BlazBlue Centralfiction. So I’m sure that many will wonder which game to get between the two. I’ll be addressing that here in a bit.

While Cross Tag Battle was a bit of a spin-off crossover game that had the Blazblue series’ characters clashing with characters in other franchises, BlazBlue Centralfiction is the full-fledged fourth game in the franchise proper, following the canon story of the series, which is about…. um… I don’t know.

Okay, let me tell you, this game has a story mode, and unlike a lot of other fighting games, they really mean that “story” bit, as these characters ramble on and on and on in-between fights, and there’s a good thirty minutes at the beginning where the characters basically go over the plot of the earlier games to catch up the player on current events (this is a regular thing for this game, by the way – in-between fights you can spend a good ten to twenty minutes reading while characters are talking, with their voice actors conversing in Japanese). Despite trying my best to follow the events here, I quickly realized that trying to understand this anime-style absurdity is impossible. There are so many characters, factions, and fantasy/sci-fi terms tossed about that it’s hard to follow any of it.

Basically, as I understand it, the series centers on the main character of Ragna the Bloodedge, who’s apparently possessed by this powerful dark force called the Blazblue, which can potentially turn him into a dangerous monster, but otherwise he’s a pretty nice guy. This game finds him suffering from amnesia after the events of the previous game, as various characters are trying to track him down for their own purposes – some think the power he has is the only thing that can save the world from a dangerous threat, others are trying to put him down because he’s a dangerous threat, and some have personal vendettas against him.

While the story is difficult to follow, the rest of the presentation here is fantastic, mixing some well-animated 2D sprites with some really imaginative and detailed 3D backgrounds, good (but not especially memorable) energetic music, nicely-drawn character art for cutscenes (albeit with creepy moving mouths despite the rest of the character remaining still). The framerate and resolution are both very good, and overall this feels like a very polished game.

When it comes to the gameplay, this is a pretty technical fighting game built around the four face buttons, which can be used in different combinations and in conjunction with directional inputs for different attacks. Players whose introduction to the series was Cross Tag Battle will find that the tag team mechanics of that game are missing here, and in their place are more in-depth fighting game systems, with multiple classes of attacks, two different kinds of blocks, game mechanics that discourage players from “turtling”. If you liked the basics of what Blazblue Cross Tag Battle had to offer but wanted a bit more depth, Blazblue Centralfiction is the game for you.

Having said that, the way players are expected to combine buttons in this game make it feel like a game that would really benefit from an arcade stick, and this is coming from someone who generally prefers standard controllers for fighting games. When there are moves that require you to press two, three, and four specific face buttons in sync, I can definitely see the value of having more than just your thumb doing the footwork on the right side of the controller. This isn’t of course to say that this game isn’t perfectly playable on a standard controller, just that some of the moves may be easier to with an arcade stick.

Of course all of this complexity is bound to come with a cost, and that is that BlazBlue Centralfiction is somewhat less accessible than Cross Tag Battle. Oh, don’t get me wrong, it’s still an excellent Fighting game with a ton of content, great mechanics, and a fantastic presentation, but newcomers may find all of this intimidating.

Finally, I should address this game’s online functionality. Right now, the servers for this game are pretty empty. I was able to get into a few fights online, and those fights played out flawlessly, but there were times I couldn’t find an opponent at all. Suffice it to say, unless you have a friend with a copy of the game, don’t expect to get too much action online.

Still, as Fighting games go, BlazBlue Centralfiction is an excellent traditional 2D Fighting game with plenty of depth to engage veteran players, a solid presentation, and a… er… lot of story. If you’re more of a fighting game newbie, you may want to start with Cross Tag Battle, but genre fans on the Nintendo Switch should definitely give this game a look.

tl;dr – BlazBlue Centralfiction is a 2D Fighting game with deeper and more complex mechanics than BlazBlue Cross Tag Battle, a great presentation, and overall a lot of quality. Be aware that the online lobbies are largely empty, the “story” mode makes zero sense and has characters talking far more than they’re fighting, and the gameplay may be a bit imposing to newcomers, but genre fans should absolutely give this game a look.

Grade: B

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