Wednesday, I posted my hands-on with Senran Kagura: Estival Versus for the PlayStation 4. After doing so I was alerted by a reader on Twitter that my explanation of how the Shinobi Arts stripped clothing off was incorrect. Upon learning about this, I decided the only thing to do was to do some further investigating by seeing more of the game in action for… research purposes. At the booth I had one of the staff play a few missions for me so I could take notes and keep a close eye on the girls’ clothing as the fight progressed. I came to find out that not only were you all right, but I also learned of another feature the games has. First though, let’s revisit the mechanics regarding clothing damage.
In Senran Kagura: Shinovi Versus clothing damage was separated into two separate areas (tops and bottoms) and each area had to be damaged twice to remove the clothing from that area. As for damaging said clothing, there were a few ways to go about it. As I mentioned before, performing your Shinobi Arts would damage a particular area of clothing. The L and Square button would damage the girls’ bottoms, while the L and Triangle buttons would damage the girls’ tops. There was a third way however which I neglected to mention, which is through normal attacks. If you happen to land the final hit of a combo (the one that will send your opponent sailing across the battlefield) you would actually damage the top and the bottom, allowing you to quickly strip your opponent if you’re skilled enough. Though if you wanted to remove a girl’s bra and/or panties you had to land the final blow using a Shinobi Art. So how does this differ in Estival Versus then?
Estival Versus simplifies this formula greatly. Before it could take as many five attacks to fully strip down a girl, which could have you running around trying to build up your Shinobi Arts gauge in order to do so instead of fighting. Now, each Shinobi Art will damage both the top and the bottom layers of clothing, much like a regular combo would. So now it will only take three attacks to strip down your opponent and claim absolute victory. However, Estival Versus throws another wrinkle into the formula with special defeat poses based on the arena you’re fighting in.
Normally if you defeated your foe by stripping them bare they’ll lie on the ground in an embarrassed and defeated pose. While this is still possible in Estival Versus, the new addition are defeat poses based on features of the area you’re in. I was able to see two of these poses with the first taking place at Gessen Academy in the arena with the giant Sakura tree. If you happen to land the finishing blow and send your opponent into the tree with a Shinobi Art, they’ll land in it and instead lay in the branches, bare and exhausted (except for the beams of censor light of course, these girls are radiant in more ways than one.) The second defeat pose I saw took place at the new beach stage and involved sending your opponent out to sea. Upon doing so they break open a jar that’s floating in the water and upon regaining their senses they realize there’s an octopus groping their chest because…. Senran Kagura! While I tried to test out as much as I could during this visit to the XSEED booth, there were sadly some things I couldn’t check out.
I wasn’t able to confirm anything related to the Ultimate Shinobi Arts as those were not available. All the characters were at level one and hadn’t learned them yet. In addition, I am unsure as to whether or not you need to finish off your opponent with a Shinobi Art in order to trigger the special environmental defeats or if a normal combo sending them in the right direction will suffice, as all of the final blows in the matches were dealt with Shinobi Arts. Lastly, I have been told that several of the Shinobi Arts have been changed and made easier to counter. While I can confirm that some have indeed been changed (Haruka from the Crimson Squad comes to mind) I was unable to confirm the latter due to all of the missions taking place in the beginning of the game where the enemies of course don’t exactly go all out. However, you can be sure when Senran Kagura: Estival Versus launches this Winter we’ll dive into every mechanic we can and give the game a thorough look. Lastly though, I want to thank you all. Thank you for bringing these omissions to my attention and for informing about them. Oprainfall exists because of all of you and my goal as a writer and reporter is to make sure I’m as accurate and detailed as possible. Thank you all for your feedback and support, and of course for reading our articles.
