I recently picked up Pokkén Tournament DX on Switch, having heard great things about it, and having missed the original on WiiU. The Switch port has upgraded performance and new playable Pokemon, supports, stages and modes, like 3v3 Team Battles and Replay Theater.
However, I didn't think this game would capture my imagination the way it has. Outside of Smash Bros with its litany of fan service (and all of the resulting scenarios you can create), many fighters inherently feel "small" to me with their fixed perspectives — either side-scrolling 2D or circle-strafing 3D, all in a self-contained arena.
Now, Pokkén still plays out in self-contained arenas — each with their own atmosphere and attention to detail, including a Where's Waldo's worth of cameos in the backgrounds — but there's a feature unique to Pokkén (to the best of my knowledge) that keeps everything feeling lively and dynamic, especially compared to other fighting games.
This feature is the Phase Shift. Battles begin in the 3D Field Phase, where you run freely around an open area with 360-degree movement, circle-strafing your opponent in a way reminiscent of Naruto: Ultimate Ninja Storm. Here, you generally focus on ranged attacks, pressuring your opponent with projectile spam or playing an elaborate game of keep-away, if it suits you.
You have a huge variety of moves at your disposal, all of which are easy to perform — no more complicated than a direction + a button. Each move has both style and substance: flashy, but also functional. Some moves even auto-combo via simple button-mashing, allowing even novice players to pull off fun and effective combos.
There's nothing esoteric about it, and the execution barrier at the input level is low. And yet the depth is still staggering — something that becomes apparent when you or your opponent initiate a Phase Shift.
Phase Shift lets you to have it both ways — 3D and 2D. Many of your moves end with a hard-hitting finisher that causes the game to pause dramatically for a split-second, conveying a strong sense of IMPACT. And then the camera deftly changes from the 3D Field Phase to the 2D Duel Phase (or vice-versa).
In the 2D Duel Phase, the viewpoint is similar to a side-scrolling fighting game — your typical Street Fighter or Mortal Kombat. Here's your opportunity to close the gap and corner your opponent, crushing them in close-quarters combat with your most devastating combos. Duel Phase also introduces low-stance and high-stance attacks, while retaining all of the directional and charge attacks you had in Field Phase.
The mix-ups are amazing at high levels of play — a level I'm nowhere near at the moment, but I've been searching and downloading the replay data for other players online and saving them to the Replay Theater, and I'm floored by what I see.
There's also Bloodborne-style health regeneration, where you can regain a shaded portion of recently lost health by quickly initiating a Phase Shift, similar to how counterattacking your enemy in Bloodborne will recover a slice of HP you're about to lose. It's easy to forget this in the heat of battle, but I imagine it's essential at high levels of play.
The advantages and disadvantages of Phase Shift — and the moves you use to trigger it — are highly situational, and change fluidly with the ebb and flow of battle. You have to really think about where and when you deploy it. And the overall effect is that the battles never look or feel "same-y" because the perspective is always changing — and with it, the calculus of battle, from the gameplay mechanics to how you use them.
I keep coming back to this game because it never feels dull. It makes me wonder if other fighting games have tried similar things to keep their battles feeling dynamic?
So, what are your thoughts on Phase Shift?
However, I didn't think this game would capture my imagination the way it has. Outside of Smash Bros with its litany of fan service (and all of the resulting scenarios you can create), many fighters inherently feel "small" to me with their fixed perspectives — either side-scrolling 2D or circle-strafing 3D, all in a self-contained arena.
Now, Pokkén still plays out in self-contained arenas — each with their own atmosphere and attention to detail, including a Where's Waldo's worth of cameos in the backgrounds — but there's a feature unique to Pokkén (to the best of my knowledge) that keeps everything feeling lively and dynamic, especially compared to other fighting games.
This feature is the Phase Shift. Battles begin in the 3D Field Phase, where you run freely around an open area with 360-degree movement, circle-strafing your opponent in a way reminiscent of Naruto: Ultimate Ninja Storm. Here, you generally focus on ranged attacks, pressuring your opponent with projectile spam or playing an elaborate game of keep-away, if it suits you.
You have a huge variety of moves at your disposal, all of which are easy to perform — no more complicated than a direction + a button. Each move has both style and substance: flashy, but also functional. Some moves even auto-combo via simple button-mashing, allowing even novice players to pull off fun and effective combos.
There's nothing esoteric about it, and the execution barrier at the input level is low. And yet the depth is still staggering — something that becomes apparent when you or your opponent initiate a Phase Shift.
Phase Shift lets you to have it both ways — 3D and 2D. Many of your moves end with a hard-hitting finisher that causes the game to pause dramatically for a split-second, conveying a strong sense of IMPACT. And then the camera deftly changes from the 3D Field Phase to the 2D Duel Phase (or vice-versa).
In the 2D Duel Phase, the viewpoint is similar to a side-scrolling fighting game — your typical Street Fighter or Mortal Kombat. Here's your opportunity to close the gap and corner your opponent, crushing them in close-quarters combat with your most devastating combos. Duel Phase also introduces low-stance and high-stance attacks, while retaining all of the directional and charge attacks you had in Field Phase.
The mix-ups are amazing at high levels of play — a level I'm nowhere near at the moment, but I've been searching and downloading the replay data for other players online and saving them to the Replay Theater, and I'm floored by what I see.
There's also Bloodborne-style health regeneration, where you can regain a shaded portion of recently lost health by quickly initiating a Phase Shift, similar to how counterattacking your enemy in Bloodborne will recover a slice of HP you're about to lose. It's easy to forget this in the heat of battle, but I imagine it's essential at high levels of play.
The advantages and disadvantages of Phase Shift — and the moves you use to trigger it — are highly situational, and change fluidly with the ebb and flow of battle. You have to really think about where and when you deploy it. And the overall effect is that the battles never look or feel "same-y" because the perspective is always changing — and with it, the calculus of battle, from the gameplay mechanics to how you use them.
I keep coming back to this game because it never feels dull. It makes me wonder if other fighting games have tried similar things to keep their battles feeling dynamic?
So, what are your thoughts on Phase Shift?
But you don't like smash attacks? They have such a satisfying sense of tension and release, like firing a slingshot.
