There’s a very specific type of fighting game fan who looks at Guilty Gear -Strive- and sees perfection. They’ll talk passionately about frame data, air dashes, and things that sound less like game mechanics and more like experimental jazz techniques. For everyone else, Strive is essentially being hit round the face with a guitar solo for several hours.
And blimey, it does not stop screaming at you for even a second.
Gaming Heaven
Right, first things first: visually, this thing is ridiculous. The animation genuinely looks like a playable anime at times, with characters flying about the screen in explosions of sparks, smoke and enough particle effects to melt a small appliance. Every fighter is absurdly over-designed in the best possible way. You’ve got vampire samurai, witches with guitars, giant anchors, paper bags on heads – the lot. It’s like Camden Market after a power cut.
The soundtrack’s also excellent, assuming you enjoy heavy metal being fired directly into your spine. The presentation overall is slick, dramatic and polished to within an inch of its life.
There’s plenty of content too. Training modes, galleries, online play, arcade ladders, encyclopaedias full of lore – honestly, this game contains more reading material than some colleges.
Gaming Hell
Unfortunately, actually playing the thing can feel like revising for an exam you didn’t know you’d signed up for. The tutorials go on forever, chucking terminology at you like an angry PE teacher. Even after all that, most matches still boil down to being launched into the air and watching your health bar evaporate before you’ve remembered which button punches.
Combat is so fast and chaotic that newcomers will spend half their time wondering whether they’re fighting an opponent or being trapped inside a tumble dryer full of fireworks.
And the story mode? Calling it a “game mode” feels generous. It’s basically a very long anime cutscene where you occasionally remember you paid for a fighting game.
Final Judgement
Guilty Gear -Strive- is undeniably stylish, technically impressive, and packed with content. Shame it’s also exhausting, bewildering, and about as welcoming to casual players as a wasp in a Greggs.
