Well after having the game for two days, that’s how I saw it. If you’ve had nine months to play, I’d be happy to hear your thoughts on other characters. No need to be a jerk.
Not my intention to be a jerk. Sorry if thats how i came off as but, after almost everyone incorrectly describing the character you play. It can get on your nerves a bit.
Anyway hears my Heihachi explanation.
Heihachi:
The defintion of an anchor character.
His offense is SO good with his high/low game that i sometimes waste meter to get him the KD and start his offense. The range of Eisho mon is very good making it the ideal thing to do on their wake up(Whether they roll or not.Not too much to the point of getting predictable since it can be raw launched and that hurts in this game.) His over head Hammer punch is SO ridiculous.It moves his hurtbox back making thows/highs whiff and they eat another full combo. It eats cross arts and supers like scooby snacks, sometimes it trades but seriously its amazing. You can link Muso Tettsui from hammer punch for a bound and some good damage. You can go into Muso Kageki. Which is basically gaurunteed damage to people who don’t don’t know there is a window between the f, lp and the hp. But likewise against a person with a brain never do that. Lightning crush is so good in this pressure also because it moves him REALLY close. Throw range close. So that in itself gives him different options. In his offense. Just the possibility of this puts the average wary opponent into MANY decision making circumstances. But don’t go thinking you can just spam high lows all day. These high lows and lightning crush have quite a bit of statup frames so if you against a rapid fire jabber, your best friend is lp demon breath for a good frame trap. Cr.mp , cr.mp works but pushes them back a little for limiting Heihachis options.
In neutral game Heihachi has a hard time. He has so little options to get in that a wary opponent can punish you for trying to get in. St.lk outranges all of his other normals but also a bit slow for a lk. For AA he can get about 300 dmg of it. Its b.mp xx lp rising uppercut, cl. Hp xx dragon uppercut. Replace the last Dragon upper with rising and after that Cross art is possible. Super on the cl.hp.
He also has cr.hp which isn’t too bad for when b.mp won’t work do to range or other factors. His footsie game is pretty non-existent. To be honest he should never even be in that situation in the first place. Yes hhis offense is THAT good.
Also in terms of reversals he has Heavens wrath and it counters ANY grounded move. If it was a high you get a juggle count of two. A low gets a bit more damage and pushes them full screen. But again dont mash it out every chance you get a whiffed one is about 50 frames altogether and lands them a free jump in combo. So be careful with it. You can go into cross art, super or tag cancel with it.
So that Heavens wrath with meter is useful, very useful. Ither than that he doesn’t have a good invincible move. So he doesn’t do too great under good pressure
All in all he is a great character with an understandable amount of weaknesses.
Akuma
Point/Anchor
On Point:
- Builds a good amount of meter
- Good mix of rush-down and keep-away
- Good approaches via Regular Dive Kick and Demon Flip
- Can ‘Fake’ and Charge his Demon Flip
- Strong Set-ups ( :hp: SRK & :f: + :mp: )
- 2 Super Arts
- Fast walk-speed
- Good/Decent pokes
- Good AAs ( cr.:hp: , SRKs)
- Has the fastest start-up Alpha Counter in the game?
- Crap Health. Dies WAY too quickly in a game like this.
- Reliant on the corner for good damage
- Misogi is EFFORT to combo into mid-screen. (For now)
- Quite reliant on his partner for damage mid-screen. Don’t get me wrong, his solo damage is good…for a Street Fighter character but when stacked up against the Tekken guys, it looks pretty minuscule.
On Anchor
- High corner damage
- Has good ways of getting out when he needs to.
- Same strengths as being on Point
- Pretty dangerous with meter
- Unless you corner someone, he lacks the ‘killing power’ that most anchor based characters have.
- Same weaknesses as being on Point
Personally I use him on point because of his good set-up potential and ease of tagging out when necessary. Although I will say that he will need a strong anchor based character; someone who can take advantage of his two key set-ups: :hp: SRK and :f: + :mp:. Someone who either has strong aerial juggles or strong ground combos makes a good asset to have with Akuma especially if these combos do a healthy amount of damage on switch.
Then again, the above is just personal preference since he is pretty open ended in terms of what partner you can choose for him. I just choose damage being my priority just because it makes the opponent ‘fear’ your pressure more which could lead to them making terrible mistakes into death.
If you want to play keep-away pick a keep-away based anchor character, want damage? Pick a damage based anchor character.
As an anchor he isn’t bad but he isn’t astoundingly great either in comparison to the other anchor based characters. As I said before he just lacks that ‘Killing Power’ that most anchors have. His combo into his Misogi mid-screen is pretty difficult in comparison to other ‘Super set-ups’ and does average damage at best.
He is, however, good at finishing matches and shutting down the opponents’ options especially when he has two bars. Mainly because of his Demon being a nice quick way to finish someone with low life off without having to get them into that 25% zone that some people fear.
Now then, if only that Lvl 2 Super Art Gem activated when you perform his Demon, then you’d be able to kill every character in the game whilst they’re at 30% (bar any defense gems are equipped on them.)
In v.2013, he should also be stronger in the point and anchor slot due to some of his buffs.
Which reminds me I gotta go update that change-log on the Akuma forums…I’ll put the link to the buffs and some possible set-ups for them soon. 