Interesting stuff! I have a few questions:
1.) Does Urien have any of his unblockables? I tried some of them, but his Knee Drop seems to be too slow to cross-over. Are there different setups in this game?
2.) Does anyone know the Denjin trap mentioned earlier?
3.) I remember reading somewhere about Tony Cannon’s “Tengu Stone Oro”. Anyone know what thats all about?
I’ll answer questions 2 and 3, especially since I have personal experience with them
Denjin trap - corner opponent, knock them down by any means and activate Denjin. Now the opponent doesn’t know what to do at this point and it becomes a guessing game. Since you’re right in the opponent’s face with a half-charged to fully-charged Denjin, a lot of people will freeze up. If they try to parry, you wait a second and release the Denjin after they try and parry and they eat it and get stunned. If they try to jump, you release the Denjin and they eat it and get stunned. If they block, they eat it and get stunned. See the pattern? It’s very difficult to parry the Denjin simply because you don’t know when it’s going to hit you. Valle was the first person I ever saw that used this effectively, and all of the Denjin clones crawled out of the woodwork after they saw him do it. The easiest setup is some type of DP since you can super-cancel into it.
Tengu Oro - you’re probably thinking of the SSOD, or the Standing Shorts of Doom. Get your opponent cornered and activate Tengu, then proceed to mash the shit out of short while walking forward to have the objects do crazy chip damage. In New Generation this was super gay and did close to 30% chip damage depending on the machine, even if the opponent blocked. In 2I it was toned down a bit, but you could still mix up the shorts with c.short, UOH, and fierce for good chip damage.
Ha, that’s some of the lamest crap ever.
As far as I know the aegis unblockables do not work in 2i. Urien sucks here except for his cFP EX Headbutt combo.
I went back and here’s some more stuff I noticed.
Hugo can combo his standing jab five times in a row. He is supposed to have a jab x 4 Gigas Breaker combo but I couldn’t get the computer to cooperate.
Shootdown Backbreaker does a lot more damage.
Palm Bombers take 3 hours to come out.
Extended taunt seems to take longer than in 3rd.
Urien’s Violent Knee Drop is extremely slow and doesn’t knock down standing opponents.
Jupiter Thunder is a total waste, sometimes hitting only once up close then missing the rest of the hits.
Metallic Spheres are a waste of time- you cannot stall them and the opponent isn’t frozen by them if they get hit in midair.
I have no idea what Aegis reflector is good for in this game.
Dudley’s Rolling Thunder does a lot more damage. No one uses it in 3rd strike.
He has an attack where he turns upside down and hits you from above, but it’s almost as bad as Urien’s Knee Drop.
Oro does a lot more damage and stun.
Does anyone know exactly what Hugo’s corner infinite is?
Some random notes of my own…
Dear lord does Oro suck. Seriously, he has to be by FAR the most improved character in 3s. No double-jump, weaker chicken combos, no unblockables, and no EX Tengu Stone (useful for both combos and blocked strings). Also no EX versions of his other supers, but those suck anyway (I know EX SA1 isn’t “bad”, just there’s no reason to use it over his other options).
As for Urien, I’m not sure whether Aegis or Tyrant Punish is better. See, even in DC 3s, Aegis is still easily Urien’s best super because you can use it to force high/lows; the setups are mostly the same as in the arcade, except you get a 50% chance of damage instead of 100%. In this game, though, there are no unblockables and the usual midscreen setups don’t seem to work…it’s still very good IF you can get them in the corner.
As for Tyrant, it’s mostly the same as 3s but he has better hit-confirm combos into it; the EX tackle link is much easier, and standing strong (or the jab-strong chain) into super is just as easy. I think low forward actually links into it as well, but I don’t remember exactly…
Add Necro to the list of characters who got noticeably better in 3s. In this game Magnetic Storm does VERY little damage (and still has just the one tiny bar), and Electric Snake does somewhere between jack and shit for stun (at least compared to 3s). His juggles and anti-air are also slightly weaker, as it doesn’t seem like you can combo anything after electricity.
About Hugo… the infinite combo is as follows: Get opponent in corner, land the wall throw, then proceed to do fierce clap until they die or you get bored.
This doesn’t work on DC version, nor does the rapid-fire jabs (most he can get is 3).
The only way he can combo into Gigas in this game or 3s is after a dizzy. You might be thinking of SvC when you were talking about that combo, as it works in that game.
Dudley, again, I think he’s better in 3s. He has some better hit-confirms in this game, but that wasn’t a problem of his in 3s anyway. His f+RH link into super actually seems harder, EX Machine Gun Blow combos very inconsistently from what I’ve tried, his juggles seem weaker, and he has that lame upside-down uppercut instead of the VERY useful swing back blow.
Why is Ken not ranked highly in this game? As far as I can tell he’s basically 3s Ken minus the double-DP combo (minor) and easy hit-confirmed low forward into super (admittedly important). On the plus side, his super has even more range and close fierce (and the strong-fierce chain) give you about a year to link the super. So really, he seems to pretty much be Sean with less damage but more meter and better EX moves. Definitely up there with Ryu, I would think…
Alex…not sure which version is better. He doesn’t have the awesome f+fierce in this game, nor the 3s j.forward (it has the same animation as j.RH in this game). He’s also missing the DDT, but then that move sucks anyway. =P
However, a couple huge advantages he has in 2i…he can link low short into SA2 fairly easily (it’s still in 3s but only a 1-frame link IIRC), and he can also link the super from JAB FLASH CHOP. Yes, you can do his B&B combo from j.fierce or whatever, and just tack on a super at the end.
And some things I’m not sure of…his EX dashing elbow doesn’t knock down (bad because it doesn’t really give you initiative, good because you can easily combo super from the 2nd hit). And his bar for SA2 is like half the 3s length (you still get 2 stocks; bad because it doesn’t give as much EX meter, good because you always have a super ready basically).
-Josh
More stuff.
Hugo’s Jab goes up to six times on some people.
Still working on the infinite timing, the second fierce clap always misses.
Gouki’s uppercut can still hit the maximum number of times after a hurricane if you wait long enough, but only on some people.
Lukesballs was right, Hashin Sho is way too fast.
After toying with Ken, I’m curious too. I’d say that his competition is worse (everything Ken can do Sean can do better) for one thing.
For Urien, I’d go Tyrant Punish. It does more damage than in third strike. Aegis can’t be used for unblockables and since spheres are garbage, you can forget about corner combos unless you catch someone very high with a fierce sphere.
If you wanted to rely on EX moves only though, I’d use Aegis over Tyrant.
I keep hearing that 3rd strike Alex is better than this one. I just picked up Alex so I don’t know the specifics, but at least 3rd Strike Alex doesn’t sound like Michael Jackson.
Yeah, that’s the conclusion I’ve come to. There are just a lot more broken characters in this game, so Ken doesn’t stand out as much. I still think he’s competitive…
As for Alex, 2i and 3s versions seem to be very close. He’s just better ranking-wise in 3s because they gave Sean the BIGGEST RAPE EVER and added a bunch of crappy new characters.
More notes:
Elena, again, is probably weaker than in 3s. As far as I’ve been able to figure out, her combos after EX Spin Scythe are far more limited. And more importantly, it’s extremely difficult to hit-confirm low strong into Brave Dance and probably impossible to do so from low short.
Denjin trap is sexy (especially when combined with SEXXXY! Pink Ryu). I have nothing much to add here…one random thing, he can combo close fierce into roundhouse sidekick. This is impossible in 3s.
Yun is extremely good, right up there with Sean IMO. Genei-Jin is still the super of choice I think, it’s less damaging (due to his lacking some of his 3s moves) but otherwise similar. Another neat thing is that in this game, the jab-short-strong chain works from a farther range than in 3s. You can link it from his low strong, or use it to combo into Genei-Jin from a command grab on EVERY CHARACTER. Genei also seems to take a bit less time to come out, as you can EASILY combo into it from low forward and such. Overall I’d say that, much like Ken, this version and the 3s one are pretty close, and he’s just lower ranking-wise in this game because of the presence of even more broken characters. Oh yeah, and he has a pink color in this game too. This is very important, just ask Fujiwara. =P
That’s all,
Josh.
HCB+Kick throw in corner, medium patty-cakes until dizzy; repeat. You can also throw in some EX patty-cakes to stun them more quickly. Use mediums instead of fierce because they come out more quickly and the second fierce patty-cake has a tendency to miss. After the first 2 it’s all timing…
fuck, this game was all about Ibuki, best combo
cross-up mk, lp, mp, hp, lk, (her kick specisl, i think its a huricane kick(((two hits), then cancel into combo super, close hk, back strong, fierce, comand dash, resest. SIICCCKK
Ibuki doesn’t have a command dash in 2I. 
Here’s one for you:
Jump in short, forward air chain, land, jab, strong, fierce, s.forward canceled into ES uppercut kick, jab, fierce air chain on the way down, land, s.roundhouse cancel into ES spin kick (Superjump cancel the roundhouse), cancel into Hashin-Sho, close s.roundhouse, back+strong, fierce, ES uppercut kick (or the reset of your choice).
Fun! Die Hugo and Urien! DIE!