nobody - what are you talking about? maxout was last week. lol.
IBUKI:
ibuki has some really good vortex mixups. she has options after every target combo. for example, if you do a target combo and it HITS, finish with her slide move. and then vortex. but if they block, you can go for mixups like tigerknee kunai into shenanigans. or you can superjump back kunai and reset spacing. or if opponent is in corner, you can superjump forward into crossup into target combo mixup/throw/tick throw/anything. she also has a move where you do dp motion backwards and kick which puts her in the air and does bicycle kicks and then jumps off and you can do kunai. so like another mixup would be to do target combo into bicycle kick thing into escape kunai.
the problem with ibuki is that she has to major setbacks. her pokes aren’t that good, and her kunai isn’t a true projectile. so if you see people escape air kunai, you can just toss a fireball at them safely
and force them into the corner. her jump angle is odd. it sets up for weird spacing. for example, if you engage in a footsie battle, distance for her jump will go past you. so i imagine that she will do 1 of 2 things. step back and try to get better spacing for air kunai battle/jump. or she will start using air kunai as a main way to jump in and start pressure.
in the end, ibuki doesn’t seem top tier to me. her mixups are some of the best in the game, she has great target combos. but she has to be played carefully. you can’t just throw out air kunai’s thinking they are good pressure tool. you’ll get rocked by fireballs and supers and ultras.
DUDLEY:
dudley is looking to be a better character than i thought. prolly the best out of the newest characters. his duckin straight/upper isn’t too good on block though. it’s mainly used as a means avoid fireball pressure. it can be used in mixups but i feel like after some time, it might not be too useful as a mixup tool. his other specials are pretty good. his normals aren’t too bad. his jumpins are very good. he has people’s elbow like sagat except it’s better.
the only problem i see with dudley is his wakeup game sucks and his pokes are average. what makes him good though is his power, easy ways to land ultra, and he’s fast. he doesn’t have much in terms of putting him in positive frame advantage. but like his f+mk is a great pressure tool. it gives him +3 on block and +5 on hit. so if you press c.lp perfectly after on block, they can’t mash out dp on you. but like most his “good” moves put him at like -2. unpunishable, but doesn’t allow for more pressure, he can use guessing games by using like ex moves after, but his ex moves are punishable.
his anti air is pretty good. he has s.mp which works GREAT. and he has dragon punches which work ok too, but his ex DP does soo much damage and is so good. i can see people using EX dp(180 DAMAGE!!) as anti air. soo fucking good.
i think dudley in the end will be a top 5 character.
SAGAT:
he’s still pretty good. but you actually need skill to play him now. LOL. you need to be hella good with sagat to be good with him. i think a lot of players who played sagat will suck with him, but the best sagat players like mago can still make them seem hella good.
GENERAL THOUGHTS ABOUT SSF4:
it’s hard to say who’s going to be like top 5 in this game because i feel like a lot of matchups are going to be like 5-5. several 6-4’s. but i can’t imagine seeing matchups like 7-3 or 8-2 anymore. i think a majority of matchups will come down to 5-5 and several 6-4’s. so basically, it’s just gonna come down to who the better player is. the the top tier characters are gonna be those with the most 6-4 matchups.
but he jumps way higher now… not sure if dat’s a good thing yet.