Street Fighter EX2 Plus - Ryu Playthrough, Level 8 Difficulty (Shadow Geist, Kairi, Vega II)
8I ended up studying the special fights and... irritatingly, the AI has this problem dealing with Ryu's (and Kairi by extension) tatsu. I leveraged that in the Kairi playthrough, but I'm really irritated at this style of manipulation. I'm not against using manipulations to better my odds, but this one still relies a bit on luck and getting the enemy in position to basically take the maneuver without interrupting you. You're like a bootleg Mizoguchi from Fighter's History.
My big problem with it is that the manipulations I enjoy using resemble strategies or situations you'd find yourself in against actual opponents. Don't mistake that for wanting the CPU to be like a human, but rather I think that's the beauty in SF2 compared to other games. There's a satisfying feedback loop and, frankly, just a lot of control and active play you can engage in. EX2 Plus isn't bad, but on hardest it can feel incredibly inconsistent. Not something I'd just boot up if I wanted to do a full run.
On max difficulty, enemies do shift from passive to active at whim, but manipulation is nothing nearly as fun as Fighting Layer or Street Fighter 2 WW/CE. I found myself really wanting some sort of way to coax jumps, but I do think this game is trying to get the player to use Excel. The problem I have with the run is that you have to land Meteor combos and I definitely have come to dislike parameters involving the use of my meter.
I also just stopped being lazy and looked up the conditions by which to fight Kairi and Shadowgeist and there's something I think is left out. You need to score like... 3-4 First Attacks. Given the game is based around using meter as a resource, I don't actually mind this but it was something that without knowing I was failing to encounter both Kairi AND Shadowgeist both.
There's a lot I want to say about EX2 Plus and Akira Nishitani's arcade modes... but for now, I'm poor/disabled so I'll just celebrate with this achievement of finally doing a full clear.
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