So, I’m still here stuck without the DLC and have heard that other people have had it for a couple of hours now.
As I no doubt will be picking up Sakura first, was wondering how she is in this game. So yeah, first impressions of her?
Posted this in the main thread, just to add, her hp shouken tag cancel gives you loads of time for your partner to perform a mixup.
This is lethal to my team, Sakura/Asuka
My first impressions are pretty bad. Her damage is quite a lot lower than it was in SF4. Her cr.HP is a much weaker anti-air than it used to be, it gets stuffed all the time now, so her anti-air game suffers quite a lot. Her lk.tatsu is at least -3 on block because Ryu can just reversal DP every time, so her pressure is now much worse than I’m used to having.
Overall I think she’s not going to be even a decent character, but these are just my first impressions.
Sakura is just as I expected in SFxT’s engine. Multi-hit shouken and ex-shouken does wonders for blockstring pressure into ambiguous crossup mixups. Multi hit shouken is also great for max damage juggles from jumping attacks from anywhere on the screen. Outside the corner she seems meter dependent for heavier dmg combos, I would use her as a second character until I can find a good “back to 1st char” combo. Her links all feels different from SF4, I had to adjust a lot of timings so far, I hope that doesn’t affect me when I switch back.
I haven’t tested how safe her stuff is yet.
Her shouken and tatsus are all very unsafe on block, so you can’t use them in blockstrings.
I was messing around in casuals with a friend and he blocked my LK tatsu and did a reversal DP’d and it hit…
As soon as that happened I paused and went back to character select, not gonna even bother lol.
In my opinion, confirmed for top tier.
Sakura has everything you need to succeed in SFxT
- Good walkspeed. SO important.
- Good footsies poke which can confirm into safe-on-block cross rush chain (that’s low forward into standing roundhouse).
- Good anti-air (cr.HP)
Everything else she has, including great close normals, great links and damage into cross rush chains (cl. HP xx LK tatsu, cl. HP --> Launcher), great cross-up, good jump speed and height, easy tag-cancel combos from her Shoouken and HK Tatsu, are just gravy. 950 health is good too, puts her on balance with Guile.
Her deficiencies at the moment seem to be a lack of a good reversal, and the fact that her long range poke game is limited. Standing roundhouse is great, but crouching forward is disappointingly short range.
I’m saying it right now, people are really going to have to adjust to playing Sakura in this game because of the fact she lost a lot of her defining qualities from AE while making the trip here, namely her safe pressure and her AA game Yes, her combo potential/damage are strong and her links are better, but of course, so was nearly everyone else when they were put in this engine. I was actually shocked when I realized how little damage her Shouoken and Shunpu did as naked hits. Also, cr.LK -> cr.LP -> cr.HP doesn’t work anymore as a link (cr.LK -> cr.HP does work, but it feels rather tight, maybe a 2-frame link). That means that even with power gems, she is utterly depended on landing HP-heavy combos in order to do any sort of worthwhile damage, and capitalizing off of things like empty jumps without boost combo’ing will take a bit of time.
Cr.HP takes timing just to keep it from being stuffed as an AA, and almost every other time you do time it right it trades. If you managed to get a successful counter-hit AA midscreen, depending on how close your opponent was you can cr.MK in HP Shouo, but it’s really has to have the foe like completely on top of her head in order for the cr.MK to hit. That and cl.HP not hitting behind her head anymore means Sak players are now literally required to learn how to read and block instead of just sticking HP on every incoming jump-in/cross-up, which considering looking at Juri’s godly cr.HP, makes me a little sour. j.MP is still great for beating incoming jumps though, as well as nj.MP and MK.
Compared to earlier combo videos that showed her off, I realized all Shouokens (outside of EX I think) throw the opponent back farther than it did before, so unless you Switch Cancel, you won’t be able to juggle without use of corner. I really think Sak’s corner game is where she’s gonna be shining the most at though, she seems to have the tools to deal with pinning down someone who doesn’t have a lot of screen space to move around/roll after knockdowns with.
On good notes, I believe she’s one of the easiest and best characters to switch cancel with, since you have days to confirm hits and can set up a ton of unique combo/mix-up opportunities to accompany her partner with. As a team player (and with a bit of meter), I feel she’s very strong. If you can get an offensive rhythm constantly going (and you’re a player that uses boost gems), try putting on power/meter gain gems on her that rely on both connecting normal and special moves, since her B&Bs do both simultaneously and her combos can deal that much needed damage that she’s missing normally. But in the long run, I can’t see her being a main damage-dealing character on a team due to her loss of priority on moves. Making smart defensive reads, watching your confirms and meter management are gonna be the crucial keys to being successful with her in this game, bank on it.
Currently I’m running two teams of Chun/Sak and Sak/Lili. I personally think she’d probably be best on anchor, but at the same time I think her position on the team depends on the character you’re choosing with her. For my first team, I use Chun to set the pace and build meter for Sakura, as well as having a surefire way to tag her in off of opponent’s mistakes with Chun’s longer reach. Sakura can use the meter to work her O-game, then when the tough get’s going can get back to Chun whom can get away from pressure better and reset the situation. Sak/Lili switches Sak’s role as the pace-maker, and with switch canceling off of Shunpu/Shouo Lili can either overhead, crossup, go low… do whatever as long as the opponent doesn’t Alpha Counter. It’s a very meter dependent team in order to maximize their potential but a VERY fun team to play (esepcially since I’m biased and love the opportunity to play both my favorite characters from SF and TK on the same team, ^_^)
People just got to have the mindset, she’s not her SFIV incarnation, she’s closer to her Alpha version.
I think she’s a great point character, her walkspeed combined with cr.mk st.hk is really good, and shouken tag cancel creates great opportunities for your partner.
Her damage isn’t that great compared to the big hitters, her midscreen damage is pretty bad, she’s more of a punish character as her hitconfirms damage is weak.
DeNice, I noticed that too, her shouken pushes back more than the early videos demonstrating Sakura.
Well…still can’t get the DLC and reading this is all quite honestly depressing. >_>
On the bright side…at least it’s not just me that liked the idea of Sakura/Lili team! This game really needs more schoolgirls. (Sorry Xiao and Asuka, but you suck)
I think what is most annoying is when people hacked the game to get the DLC characters early we saw how great Sakura’s potential was. I saw someone do lp dp, c.mk xx hp dp mid screen and the entire thing comboed. All of that stuff is gone and they clearly nerfed her very heavily in the 1.06 patch. Having a gimped cr.hp and having the lk tatsu unsafe on block are deal breakers for me. I’ll just stick to playing Sakura in SF4.
If you’re trying to say that she plays more like her Alpha incarnation as opposed to her SF form then that’s fine, but I don’t see that either. Her damage output is really far below average unless you get a maximized punish combo. In a game where time outs are already a big issue that’s going to cause her a lot of problems. Her walk speed in this game definitely seems better than it is in SF4 and having cr.mk -> st.hk as a footsie tool is nice but that only does 150 damage or so and then they’re back outside of the range you want them to be in. Her lk tatsu only does 30 damage so that will even scale a good punish combo pretty fast. Her lp shouken is very weak too, only doing 50 damage. That would have been fine if she has options mid-screen to continue the combo like I mentioned before, but Capcom apparently thought that was too strong and took it away.
Overall I’m very disappointed with how Capcom handled this game and I wanted Sakura to give me a reason to come back. I’m not confident in her ability to be played effectively in this game with what they have done to her so I don’t really have an incentive to keep going. Maybe one of you will prove me wrong and I honestly hope you do because I’ve always liked Sakura and unfortunately she seems like she’s going to be a very weak character in this game.
You do the cr.mk st.hk into launcher for your tag partner.
I understand that but it if I want to keep her on point I won’t always be relying on that. Maybe I need to examine her tag options better and find her a better teammate. On her own though I think she has some problems.
I feel like if I pick her up seriously in this game that I’m going to ruin my AE game.
Desk is showing some of the potential of sakura in this game and its really getting me interested. damn it but i sold my copy like a couple of weeks ago. Guess I’ll just wait a little longer
I’m absolutely loving her in this game. I’ve been needing a new partner for Xiaoyu and I think Sakura’s just the partner she needs.
Punishable lk tatsu on block, no damage, very few confirmable big damage combos without a jump in, worse AA, better air tatsu, worse jump normals, useless overhead, no ex properties on any of her moves, crappy option select.
I want her to be good, but right now she’s really hard to use since my old team had everything I needed including a better anti air. I’ll stick with it though.
Sakura is so cute in this game, especially the pre-rendered cut-scenes and she gets a fair bit of screen time from the extra “episodes” as well <3
Sadly I’m not really feeling her yet 
Sucks that c.HP has been nerfed hard, practically unusable in combos and a half-arsed AA to boot.
EX Shunpuu seems to have lost its punch a bit and due to light > light > c.HP not working seems like it’s very hard to hit confirm into as well.
None of her far normals are special cancelable and with c.HP having practically no horizontal range it means can’t hit confirm into an easy LMH xx EX/Super. Seems like she hasn’t been given any decent hit confirms to make up for it either so it’s light > light > light xx Shou or c.MK at the end for a trickier link unless I’m missing something.
Speaking of Shou the pushback is too far to do anything with, even LP Shou, I can’t seem to do LP Shou > MP Shou anymore either. Even having trouble trying to catch up with it mid-screen after a cross-cancel.
I can’t seem to juggle after MK/HK Shunpuu either, believe they said it was possible for MK, must be really tight
The only thing they seem to have improved is Air Shunpuu and luckily Super still has the “insta-stand” properties it has in SF4.
I’m hoping I’ll start feeling her again but currently it’s not looking good Maybe I’m just spoilt by Asuka and Lili’s easy combos 
Edit: Think I’ve found a reliable hit confirm to replace the now debunked light > light > c.HP. I’m pretty sure I saw desk do something like this too. light > light > s.LK xx s.HP xx EX Shunpuu. Only seems to work with s.LK but seems to work with both s.HP and c.HP. Have to start right next to them but seems to work after jump-ins and cross-ups. Probably old news
Also wow EX Shou only does 100 damage but allows an easy MP Shou follow-up mid-screen (probably better options but they’d be much trickier.)
For you guys saying that c.lp, c.lp, c.hp xx ex tatsu doesn’t work. You guys do know that c.lk/c.lp, c.lp, c.mk xx ex tatsu works, even on crouching characters, ex tatsu has a bigger hitbox now. What are you guys doing after a mid-screen ex shou (no tag), just mp shou?
I prefer to use Sakura’s meter to tag cancel her partner in to extend her hp shouken combos, rather than using Ex tatsu, especially with my team of Sakura/Asuka, Asuka is so scary upclose.