With each new season come some really nice additions but also some questionable changes. What stuff did you like and what did you hate about Season 3?
I’ll write down mine, which is mostly audiovisual stuff:
HITS:
- New start screen. While not as cool as the fire curtain, looks great and way better than Season 2’s.
- New color scheme. I had my doubts about green and purple, but it looks awesome!
- New character selection screen. Looks sweet and I’m loving most of the new select animations.
- New lighting on stages. For the most part, stages now look tons better than last season’s … I’m specially happy about Fulgore’s stage going back to it’s darker, more ominous look.
- New characters. I’m not digging a little detail of Kim Wu’s, but I’ll mention that below.
- New stages. Stages are always a highlight of KI’s.
- New themes. The new composers are doing a great job.
- New logo not having “season 3” written anywhere. That sucked on season 2.
MISSES:
- New versus screen. Worse than season 2’s, and still has the character positioning issue that makes it look messy. Not to mention that the screen still freezes when characters blink
- Purple hue on shadow moves. Not feeling it, just looked better before.
- New level 4 enders. They look odd and choppy… also not a fan of the dark screen.
- Kim Wu is too short. She looks like a midget next to Maya.
- Tusk’s Stage’s lighting. Makes most characters look horrible for some reason.
- New “Stage Ultra” shout.
- Tusk’s and Kim Wu’s faces look odd to me for some reason.
- IG refusing to address lame stage finishers or retros from earlier seasons. They affect presentation of an otherwise visually solid game.
That’s all I can think of right now. Write down yours!
4 Likes
I’m liking the new character select. I still think character model load times a too long.
I like the new combo breaker mechanics how it resets rather than knockdown.
Not liking China Town stage. Not sure if it’s new lighting engine but really struggled to follow my match. You just get lost way too easy.
Not a fan of l4 ender animations. Slows the match. Why would they not use that for ultras instead. IMO some s1 ultra enders are lame (hint s____wulf), why not add that effect to the ultras or ultra enders.
I’m glad I didn’t buy any edition of s3. As I’m not sure if I will continue to play or not with this season.
My only complain is the Mike scream on double ultras gone and lvl4 enders.
But its a bug, i had an official reply, they will fix it! And the lvl4 enders will have on/off function!
After the 3.1 update, ki s3 will be by far the best ki season. The new lights are terrificly beautiful… Its like that im playing a new game.
1 Like
My only complaint is the “Checking Downloadable Content” thing. It still takes really long for me sometimes. Its obviously minor and not a huge deal, but that really is the only thing I have noticed that I am not a fan of, everything else its A+ for me.
5 Likes
sooo happy with season 3!
hits:
-the new stage lighting. omg, Thunder’s level just makes me feel like its night, and it has a psychological effect on me that i feel cool and fresh, like you’re really out there in the open wilderness
-the new combo breaker mechanic. . thank you IG for doing this, it was my biggest peeve from season 2
-the new themes are solid as hell. i was doubtful that the soundtrack may dwindle in quality after mick’s departure. i think we are in great hands with celldweller and atlas plug!
-the new fighters are tons of fun to play with, love em (thought havent tried arbiter yet)
-UI looks good! not sure bout that purple and green though, i think purple and gold wouldve been better
-new fighter select screen with animations is badass
misses:
-level 4 enders need work
-still need an actual rooftop stage, not a penthouse
-stage ultra shout sounds funny to me
really cant think of much else atm. havin too much of a good time. just when i was getting over my fighting game kick…i got dragged even further in. FML, all my other games go uncompleted. plus, i think i wasted 60 bucks on SF5. FML again.
1 Like
I’m extremely happy with Season 3 right now! KI feels like an old rusty car just got an entire new paint job and it’s amazing! It feels complete.
HITS:
- I’m in the minority when I say that I love the new Shadow VFX!
- Character Selection screen is perfect! Love the animations
- New lighting engine is jaw-droppingly gorgeous!
- I’m still in love with the new logo! Ahhh, so cool!
- New fighters are tons of fun! Struggling with Tusk though.
MISSES:
- Level 4 enders are really cool but could do with a lot of work.
- Stage Ultra announcement is better, but again, needs work.
- Some parts of the UI could do with more green. Too much purple for my taste.
- Tusk and Kim’s faces still look weird to me
- Rash doesn’t have a stage…
1 Like
HITS
New select screen
Lighting in a lot of stages looks great
New characters
MISSES
Lowering detail and poly count on old stages (like Jago’s, which looks way flatter than before - look at the fabric on the ground and candles and area to the right side).
Some stages look worse in new lighting (Thunder is way, waaaay too bright, the mood is gone)
Aganos stage still looks like characters are floating on the right side, they cast no shadows
The purple and green is still cringe-worthy.
VS green and purple logo looks like someone photoshopped it randomly in there.
Loading times are never being fixed, are they?
Purple shadow effects.
Gargos face in Omen and Shago activation looks nothing like S3 Gargos (stopping changing things willy-nilly, respect the work.of previous devs!)
Omen and Shago had blue shadow effects, but they willy-nilly changed shadows purple so now those two SHADOW characters don’t even make sense in their own storylines (watch Isgreen make up a random reason just like no Keith David, Wulf arms, Tusk being immortal, TJ arms…).
Tusk and Kim faces. There are NPCs in Skyrim that look better than that. Like, seriously. Fix that. They’re awful.
It’s season 3 and we still have pixelated videos that would look bad on 360 everywhere (endings, vs screen, intro screen…). RE-RENDER THEM!
2 Likes
Ok, it seems I’m the only one not pleased at all with the new interface design.
Dislikes on design
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Interface Colors: this is KI, I don’t like all this bright new colors, no way. I did like S2 interface, it was a great choice even though it was too red (it was powerful) and I loved how I got to see a big deal of the character on the select screen. I can understand that adjusting a select screen with the new characters it’s not easy (to find space) but…
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The green smoke!: totally out of place, maybe to “cover something”? I wonder how much processing it requires, wouldn’t like it to lag the selection screen more than it is.
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VIOLET EVERYWHERE : shadow bars in blue were beautiful, the HUD was really nice and now just to have the whole coherent design everything matches this new color change which I don’t find appealing at all, specially when the colors are so vivid.
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Shadow effect: I rather the old one, too much colors everywhere guys…What are you thinking?
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VS screen: The VS logo look like they used the photoshop “dodge” tool all over it at it’s 90%. I personally don’t like the design either. and the smoke, again… u_u
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Pixelated Bgs!! : I noticed the Bgs look really pixelated in the vs screen D=
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Contrast/brightness new lighting on BGS : Nope, I’m finding the characters at almost the same level as the BGs. Loved the old style way more than this!. EVERYTHING is over exposed with the lighting!! the colors are too bright, lights are plain white over the characters and all bgs seem like being put with a dodge filter, my eyes hurt.
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Character ligthing: The all system is affecting character’s colors too. I played Kim Wu vs Orchid on Orchid’s stage, it looks pretty bad.
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jaggies? : It’s my impression or there’s a sharpen effect on everything??
That’s what I can remember right now
Dislikes on Gameplay
Haven’t played enough, but I feel my character slower, and the pace too. Some characters seemed faster. I’m having issues with matches ending with time, maybe because of the damage decrease? Also I was trying things out, so I can’t reaaally tell it happened in many matches.
OK stuff
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General balance, but I still have things to try out.
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Animated characters on select screens, some better than others, but it gives personality (Fulgore’s is amazing).
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Don’t mind the finisher animations, but I prefer the old ones.
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New logo intro, it’s ok
But to sum up, I prefer the older stuff of S2 design. However a new balance is appreciated, I mean: the hard work you have done. But I would have prefered you didn’t change the game this much. I’ll try to adjust my gameplay. Despite some broken character things in the older season, I would have liked some retouches on them rather than changing everything. Honestly I can’t tell If I’ll keep playing this “new” KI gamestyle, but surely I’m giving it a try.
Cheers
3 Likes
Character model load times is still waaaaaayyyyyyy to long. I hope for a real story mode, and really need more stage finishers season 1 needs them on not all but maybe at least 2 stages. I’ve said it before and ill keep saying it the spider has got to do something. finally ultimates something at least. Kim wu is way too short. A behind the scenes feature would be cool to see how the magic is done in making the game.
Characters
I really like the new characters. I been playing a lot of Kim Wu. I really like Rash and Tusk. I like the new maps and music.
User Interface
Some of then UI stuff is clunky. There are pauses when navigating menus. The VS screen feels cut and paste (character select is awesome though). The actual “Vs” text is odd to me, bring the S closer to the V and down a little (I’m anal). Characters still get caught blinking. Instead of a silhouette I recommend a static image of the character (not critical). I like the green smoke and new animations.
Gameplay
KI is buttery smooth as usual. Everything works well and responsive. I like the new flipout breakers. Level 4 enders are the only out of place thing.
Graphics
The new lighting is really nice. I think it has some weird effects in places. Take a look at Kim Wu in Mayas stage at sunset. She looks like metal or plastic. But there will be side effects, nothing major. Other parts look incredible.
HITS:
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New start screen. Agree completely with OP. Great animation, and love that “SEASON 3” isn’t plastered on it.
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New character selection screen. Huge step up over season’s 1 and 2. I still have one small nitpick, but I’ll post that below. Otherwise, it’s awesome. Love those walk up animations.
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New lighting on stages. Agree again with OP. They were able to keep the dark tone of many levels while making the details more visible and upping the overall quality. Very nice.
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The new characters are great. Been playing mostly with Rash and he’s insanely fun. Already have him up to level 31. 
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New stages. Kim Wu’s and Arbiter’s in particular stand out to me. Very well done.
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New themes. Agree once more with OP. The new themes are fantastic. They all have great moments in them that really appeal to me.
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The level 4 enders. IG got so much crap for these and they’re not obtrusive or disorienting. With some polishing, they could be a nice addition. As it stands, I already kinda like them.
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New combo breaker mechanic is perfect.
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The character rebalances. Most of them are perfect. Love Sadira 3.0, Jago 3.0, Thunder 3.0 and many others.
MISSES:
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New versus screen. I hate to borrow so much from OP, but I agree with most of what he said so… But yeah, this is one of the weakest parts for me. The recycled spin-in animation, the characters still being closer or further away, now there’s a large Vs stamped in the middle. I really kinda hope that they’ll scrap this entirely and go with something more stylish, like old KI arcade FMV-like sequences or even dossier page type animations from season 1.
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Sabrewulf’s rebalance. Only one I’m not that in to. I like the air slash, but his move list is still kinda sparse, even if it’s solid from a utility standpoint. Also not a fan of his instinct at all anymore. Not in to using feral cancels, so all I’m left with is chip damage.
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Purple hue on shadow moves. It doesn’t look bad at all. Had this been the animation from day 1, I’d have been fine with it. But I just prefer the previous look of this to this one.
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Sadira lighting in her own stage. Her skin looks grey-ish, like she wasn’t relit in her own stage. I just seems kind of out of place. Not sure if there are other issues like this, but I noticed it while playing last night.
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Title screen music hiccup in survival mode. For whatever reason, the title screen music starts for about a second or two, is cut off immediately, and then the select screen music starts whenever you advance to the next character in survival mode. Not sure if this is intentional or a bug.
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Tusk’s Stage. The foreground looks fantastic, but once you get past the ship and the stuff going on immediately on either side, it starts to look very sparse as you get further back. Maybe instead of a cloudy sky that kinda runs in to the ice, maybe the sky could be nearing sunset or something?
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New “Stage Ultra” shout. It doesn’t need to match Mike’s voice exactly, but right now, it sounds rather out of place.
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MS/IG refusing to address the flailing in stage finishers or the season one retro issues. I’m not lobbying for Thunder’s Mohawk or Orchid’s buttcheeks, I’m talking about Sabrewulf looking like a drowned rat, Orchid’s face and hair, etc.
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The hair in general. I’m not saying it has to look like Lara Crofts, but Orchid, Kim Wu, Tusk, Hisako and others could really use some improvement in this regard.
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The honeycomb look returns. Still not sure why this is a look for KI. It seems like it’d make sense in something like DOA perhaps, but I’d like to see something more sleek and stylish.
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The combo fonts still look like they’re from season one, which doesn’t go with the victory font, the character select name font, etc. If the combo font could look more like the victory font, that’d be awesome.
Sorry, I know it looks like I have a good deal more to complain about than praise, but I honestly love how this season has turned out so far.
1 Like
HITS:
-new characters all seem fun
-new stages are great
-new music is great
-new lighting on stages is good (but not a good enough reason to exclude the extra stages, i’d take those over the reworked lighting any day)
MISSES
-only 3 new stages, this is a HUGE miss
-level 4 enders are just awful, dont know what they were thinking when they implemented those
-new shadow move animations dont look nearly as good as in S2
-rash only having one combo opener 
-kim wu and tusk faces are really bad, I usually dont care about this kind of stuff but these 2 I cant ignore
-no new finishers
-no mention of eyedol
-no upgrading/polishing of character models on season 1 characters, Orchid really needs some sharpening up
-and again ONLY 3 STAGES!! each character having their own stage is one of the main reasons it stands out amongst other fighting games, really hope they add more stages, at least for the new KI characters like Mira, but Rash really needs one too, even if its just something retro from old battletoads for fun
Miss: Not being able to play on my main account.
Hit:Everything else.
So true!! Haven’t played against zoners yet! I forgot about that D=
HITS:
Generally speaking, really loving the gameplay, UI, and graphics changes. The new characters are also very cool, and each is unique in that awesome KI way 
HIT/MISS:
Stage relighting generally looks really good, but some stages seem to have lost some heart. Spinal’s seemed less interesting for some reason (which is weird because I liked the way it looked on-stream), and the rain effects on Thunder’s stage got a lot worse for some reason. I think it’s a bug, but water no longer flows down the characters’ bodies, not even in their outros. Just makes the whole thing look weird, with a perfectly dry character standing in the middle of a rainstorm 
Level 4’s are interesting. Some look really good (virtually all the new character level 4’s, many of the others), while some look pretty bad (Hisako level 4 damage ender). That Hisako one is just so off that it’s basically single-handedly going to make me toggle the feature off. It actually started to give me a headache. 
MISS:
I would like to smack each and every one of the people who whined incessantly about no stage ultra audio. 
Not liking the new cues at all.
1 Like
They messed up ARIA. i am so mad I right now
This! Geez don’t like them.
I played all night on the pc. Here are my impressions:
I like the new flip out mechanic and some of the balance changes. Thats about it.
I hate the new lighting. Everything is too bright and glowy. The characters dont pop anymore and just blend in with the background which makes it excruciating on the eyes and makes the match harder to follow. In a game where a million things happen at once and you have to be proactive at all times, i dont like the new bright glow effects, i find them distracting and tacky gicing fighters a silicone/plastic like appearance.
Another thing im noticing is that with more stuff being breakable and overall less damage across the board, matches are taking longer and more are leading to time outs for me against same skill opponents. This is made worse with the gimmick characters with low damage output since they now have to hit you double the amount of times now.
The only characters i found myself enjoying were thunder and jago this time around for s3. Maybe too much sfv has made me dislike alot of aspects of KI
2 Likes
Hits:
.The new lighting
.The launch Characters
.The Character select screen
.Retro costumes
.The characters after the launch ones (the 3 we know)
.The new music is just as great as Mic gordon
Misses:
.Still no ultimates
.Still no Eyedol
.No arcade mode for new characters + season 2
.New mode looks kinda stale
.STILL NO ULTIMATES
.STILL NO EYEDOL
.STILL NO ULTIMATES
.STILL NO EYEDOL
oh yeah the Stage ultra screams are pretty bad
1 Like