It feels like his EX moves and vskill don’t provide much utility (I haven’t seen an ex tatsu in weeks) in a game where fireballs are largely props and in top tournies the best Japanese Ryus (like Tokido) use neither, just saving it all up for easy confirms into super. It’s been long enough that someone should be using parries at some point somewhere, and yet it almost totally ignored except as just another way to counter fireballs. Even his VTrigger, while good, just seems to get used as a way to confirm into super.
I’m not saying Ryu is bad, he seems pretty good to me (at least at the top levels of play), but he seems like half a character relying on a way too good Crit art to make up for having half of his moves be largely ignorable.
Separately from all that, for being the ‘beginner’ character tatsus are rarely useful outside of fireball wars (so low skill Ryu mirrors) and combo extenders and every other special uses the same button and motion (so it’s difficult to get the one you want without really clean inputs that come with months of playing). For beginners his V-skill is just a way to take hits unless you know the exact mixups certain characters flowchart to which is only knowledge you get with huge amounts of practice and experience.
Is there a good way Capcom could address any of this? Part of the living game idea of SFV is that they can course correct when things are playing out in a way they didn’t intend and I can’t imagine they intended for the best Ryu’s in the world to ignore so much of his kit.
Capcom did a really good job this time around with making every move useful, and I think that really shines through in Ryu. EX Tatsu is a great combo ender against rushdown characters since it puts them fullscreen and leads to huge damage in the corner if you spend another bar for EX Shoryuken. EX Shoryuken is an incredibly good anti air and offers juggle opportunities in many situations. EX Hadoken is really fast and leads to a nice meaty setup and corner carry, and becomes nearly unreactable in V-Trigger.
V Skill is a high risk high reward thing. The amount of use you get out of it is determined by your ability to read and willingness to commit to something very risky. There are also a handful of moves in the game that can be easily parried on reaction and net you a full punish where you couldn’t get one just blocking. The advantage to just DPing in this situation is that you build a little bit of V-Gauge and get more damage.
So I disagree, I don’t think any of his moves should be ignored, they all have a purpose. I won’t dispute that players like Tokido tend to hoard their meter for an easy super confirm, but I feel like that’s more of a playstyle choice rather than it being THE best strategy. You also don’t see Tokido using parry in tournament probably because he understands the risk of messing it up and isn’t comfortable taking it when he’s playing to win. I bet you outside of tournaments parry sees a lot more use.
My main issue with Ryu is that his normals lose out to a lot of things and have hella recovery. You really have to time your attacks where as Charlie, Chun Li, Rashid, Karin, etc can just spam certain normals and beat you out easily. He also has no way of jumping in on some characters because their anti-airs beat out everything he as. I’m also kind of pissed that his EX moves can be beaten out my normals. Like his EX Tatsu. I guess they just want that as a combo ender but still. If it’s EX it should have some kind of advantage over a freaking normal.
I agree. I feel he needs a little more. I haven’t played much but from what I have seen, I feel a lot of other EX moves are safe. I THINK his EX moves have more recovery and I thought other characters had less recovery on their EX moves. All of his EX moves are punishable. I think other characters EX moves recover faster and are not punishable.
Funny thing is that I discussed the idea of a 2nd V Skill or V Trigger with other people. I couldn’t think of another good V Trigger idea, but having Donkey Kick as a V Skill was one of my ideas. My idea is that it should have two states, one where you just press the buttons and let it rip and another where you charge it like Mika’s drop kick or Karin’s V Trigger. The regular one is fast enough to combo into(but unsafe on block) and gives him a knockdown combo against crouchers while the charged version can’t be combo’d from normals but gives him wall bounce that juggles into everything.
Probably not going to happen but I can dream I suppose. As for his parry, I went from thinking it was useless because of how risky it was to thinking it’s probably the best V Skill in the game. It has to be used sparingly, but when you have a good read you can really blow up your opponent hard for it.
I think Ryu needs to be completely remade. In a game where normals don’t trade because of priority system, any character with stubby normals really have a tough time. You’re stuck in this range where you can never counter poke and the best you can do is mash DP hoping to catch something. Don’t even act like this is not a problem against most of the cast.
Alex - cr mp to poke you until you jump and eat a standing jab. he can even whiff a cr mp while you jump and still make it in time to jab you out of air.
Chun Li - f.mp s.hp cr.mp for days, you jump and eat a standing short
Ken - round house all day at safe range, you push a button to counter poke you eat a crush counter.
Cammy - 6 frame fierce, st mk.
Karin - nuff said.
Nash - EVERY BUTTON, especially f.hp(half screen range, totally safe against Ryu even though it’s -13)
Gief - cr.jab, stand jab until you ragequit
Bison - endless safe scissor kick loop against Ryu
Birdie - nearly every button.
Fang - every button will outrange you, outpoke you
Balrog - cr jab, cr mp, st hp, safe light straights.
Guile - f.hp b.mk
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currently unsure
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Ibuki - f.hk for days, it seems to beat every button Ryu has. She’s free to spam it as far as I know. You cannot even contest this with fireball as she will go through it seemingly(not sure) on frame 5.
Juri - f.hk, st.mk
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Like, as long as you don’t get greedy and try to do big combos against Ryu, you can just poke him to death until he decides to whiff DPs then you get a free crush counter.
Also, for those that disagree, go watch Tokido and Daigo, they go all out “jump fighter 5” for a reason; Ryu can’t play footsies.
You’re essentially complaining that the character can’t be played the way you want them to be played. Ryu is not gonna get a complete remake. Tokido frequently gets top 8, it’s not the character. Besides, if you think Ryu sucks so much, play someone else. I heard Chun Li isn’t terrible…
tokido is the only ryu in the world that gets results, second would be daigo who floats around here n there then after that, no other ryu so far since SFV has made any noise in any tournament. Think about it, who is a strong US/EU ryu player that makes it to even top 32? none.
Ryu is simple to play but very difficult to master. I think out of most characters you’re really playing the opponent and not so much character vs character. His v skill is by far the hardest to utilize because if you don’t get it you’ll either whiff it (lose momentum) and possibly eat a counter hit. Most of the cast out poke ryu from mid range which means you’ll be using either fireballs as a poke tool or counter poke with st lk and cr mp.
Whenever you fire a fireball at mid range you always run the risk of eating a jump in, it’s mentally taxing it self as you ask yourself “should I throw a fireball or just wait it out” I don’t think ryu needs retooling, ryu has an invincible anti air, 3 frame jab, strong throw/meaty game, high damage. It’s just up to the player to make the best of them
as a game opening ryu player, i can really stand by a lot of these comments.
Ryu has a lot of situational tools that can open up most of the cast in a big damaging way. However he may have a harder time on some moreso than others mainly due to the quick rise factor that can be used in this game.
I’m mainly speaking on many characters who can literally jab on wakeup and beat you out. them + quick raise = you’ll usually never be able to run up on them with solid wakeup pressure. Rollback raise can make this even worse in high speed matches where every opportunity counts.
Don’t get me wrong - Ryu has many options but he simply cannot keep up with that speed or he’s taking a gamble still running in and hoping that either he’ll punish first or game right to block an incoming punish opportunity which could or couldn’t put him back on the defensive.
it’s many ways to play ryu from defensive to offensive, so there’s always room to switch the plan up for when the situation allows, but i feel that ryu is a decent upper mid to top tier character.
if we wanted him to be God tier, all they’d really have to do is either give him faster or better priority on his normals.
But does Ryu REALLY have a 3 frame jab? For example, against Fang who can apply frame trap pressure against characters without a 3 frame jab, he can actually apply it on Ryu because Ryu’s 3 framer won’t reach, it’s so ridiculously short ranged that it’s almost never used outside of jump ins or wake up jab.
I think everything about Ryu is mentally taxing because he’s the one doing all the committing. Characters like Nash, Guile, Chun Li, Karin etc. never has to commit. Ryu on the other hand, -10 on block for tatsu, crush counter on whiffed parries, crush counter on whiffed/blocked DP, 32-35 frame recovery fireball, -7 on block while characters like Guile can play brain dead all day because he gets +1 on block on a point blank boom.
Ryu’s probably going to get some nerfs knowing how FG players are, even though I think 90% of the character is fine. I think he’s top 3 and you really just have to play smarter with him.
I think a small buff though if they are going to dish out nerfs would be to make his cr.mk xx fireball always connect on hit. That bothers me now now that I played the game more, it didn’t at the start.
They won’t nerf his dash, there are characters with equal or better dashes ( Chun, Cammy, Nash, Ken, etc) who have scarier offense.
Can’t see them taking the CA cancel away. I think a fair bunch of changes is to put a bigger hurt box on J.lk, maybe take his solar plexus to cr.fierce away and make his meter build slightly slower ( this would stop the bitching slightly about him always having CA.
To be honest though I see no need to nerf anyone in this game. The only broken as shit thing is Nashes Dash. I don’t even mind Chuns IALL.
I 99% agree with the sentiment that nobody us overpowered and nothing needs to be nerfed EXCEPT that I think Chun’s V-gauge should be 3 bars instead of 2.
As for Ryu, I don’t think I could’ve asked for a character that feels better to play than SF5 Ryu. If I could ask for any improvements, I’d ask for c.MK and s.LP to have just slightly longer range and his non-EX fireballs to be slightly less negative on block. Sure, I’d like to see his Joudan Kick make a return, but I’m reasonably certain that no one will be getting new specials in SF5’s lifetime. Honestly, though, all that seems incredibly greedy, because SF5 Ryu is just so damn good right now. Definitely a top-5 character and a very good case could be made for putting him in top-3.
I keep telling myself with each new character announcement that I’m going to main (whoever), and I always find myself running back to Ryu because no one else seems as good or feels remotely as much fun to play.