➤ Guilty Gear XX Accent Core, review 🎮

Needless to go around it, fighting game fans hold the Guilty Gear franchise in high regard, and why is soon said: Arc System Works has created a surprisingly solid product, full of strategic implications, with a distinctly hardcore approach and therefore with in mind a certain type of user, the most savvy one, who grew up untangling himself between a Hadouken and a Power Wave.

There are no particular tutorials that introduce novices to the game mechanics, and in fact from this point of view the entry is a bit difficult and the learning curve not particularly accessible; however, once familiar with some basic concepts, it is possible to deepen the knowledge with the various characters and find the square of the peculiar "tactical" gameplay of this fighting game, which relies heavily on calculated risk and on the construction of combos, as well as on of an effective but careful use of the ultra. Well, we were able to get our hands on the PC version of Guilty Gear XX Accent Core Plus R, which landed on Steam after a portable reduction for PlayStation Vita in 2013 (but never released in Europe), in turn based on an episode originally released in 2006, revised and enriched during the editions. A nice experience? Let's find out together.

Despite the outdated graphics, Guilty Gear XX Accent Core Plus R remains a solid fighting game

Nine years and not hear them

Let's start with the positive aspects of production, starting with the aforementioned gameplay, which seems not to feel the weight of the years and immediately involves thanks to the solidity of the system. At our disposal we find a roster composed of twenty-five characters, and if there is one thing to say about Guilty Gear it is certainly that each of the fighters has been designed with great imagination, sometimes inspired by the collective imagination, and boasts a fighting style unique, the deepening of which actually constitutes the bulk of the experience.

There are the classic heroes, such as Sol Badguy and Ky Kiske, whose repertoire derives from that of the most famous protagonists of the beat'em-up genre, with also the inevitable alternative versions; but then the cast opens up to daring experiments, such as the mysterious Faust (a tall guy with a paper bag on his head), the witch / guitarist I-no, the possessed warrior Zappa, the vampire Testament and so on. The basic notions see the presence of four attacks (punch, kick, fast or slow slash) and various special moves obtainable with the traditional crescents, but there is also the interesting maneuver of the Roman Cancel (which allows you to reset an animation for speed up the insertion of further shots) and the two additional bars, which regulate the Tension and Burst, respectively useful for performing a very powerful ultra and breaking the opponent's defense. Putting all these elements together becomes essential to get to the bottom of the single player modes, but also and above all to be able to be at least competitive in online multiplayer, which debuts on PC (it was not present in the PlayStation Vita version) and boasts a decent netcode. invoice, which suffers a bit in the early stages of the games but then "settles down" and guarantees good responsiveness of the commands.

Cross and delight

In addition to the large roster and solid and challenging gameplay, Guilty Gear XX Accent Core also boasts a fair number of modes. We have already talked about online multiplayer, but there are also a nice Story Mode with dialogues and paths at crossroads (so that you have to complete the path of each character twice to see everything), the classic Arcade Mode (which is rather long), the Survival (in which you have to face an infinite number of opponents using a single energy bar), a mission mode with specific objectives to be achieved in each encounter and a gallery where you can admire the unlocked artwork.

The Steam edition also includes the game's soundtrack in digital format, which is undoubtedly one of its greatest strengths: the songs are of excellent quality, between guitar solos and slap bass, and accompany the action as best it could be, increasing tension and involvement. The sound effects, on the other hand, are decidedly less brilliant, which bring to mind the samples of the era of 16-bit platforms, and are paired with graphics that in the first place have not been adapted to the wide format (there are in fact two large bands on the sides of the screen), but above all it suffers from a very evident aliasing despite the adjustable resolution. Those who know Guilty Gear know well that this is a characteristic aspect of the first episodes, born to run on hardware that is decidedly inferior to the current one, but the problem remains and the poor performance of some scenarios does not help to raise a technical sector inevitably to the below average.

PC System Requirements

Test Setup

Processor: Intel Core i7 4500U
Video card: AMD Radeon R7 M260
Memory: 8 GB of RAM
Operating system: Windows 8.1

Minimum requirements

Processor: Intel Core 2 Duo
Video card: NVIDIA GeForce 7900 GT, AMD Radeon X1900
Memory: 2 GB of RAM
Operating system: Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows 8.1

Recommended Requirements

Processor: Intel Core i5 or i7
Scheda video: NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GT, AMD Radeon HD 3700
Memory: 4 GB of RAM
Operating system: Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows 8.1

Comment

Digital Delivery Steam Price 14,99 € Resources4Gaming.com

6.5

Readers (4)

8.7

Your vote

Although basically a product of nine years ago, Guilty Gear XX Accent Core Plus R defends itself well and manages to involve from the very beginning, thanks to the solidity of a system that has been refined over time and that in this particular incarnation boasts some of the most interesting elements ever seen within the series. The full-bodied and differentiated roster, the fair number of modes (including an essential but well-implemented online multiplayer), the hardcore approach and the extraordinary soundtrack are the strengths of the game, which however must also deal with some edges of too much, with a decidedly obsolete graphics and with a competition that even on PC is now ruthless and leaves little room for nostalgia operations.