I put 2 hours into Battle Royale tonight. As was said earlier, reading the manual is a must! All of the times I had played before this, I never really understood how to pick up someone and throw them out. Also, I didn't realize Select was used to perform so many moves.
When I started tonight I used Spitfire Spike. I only made it to the 3rd stage my first try.
Then I used Maneater. I was roughly equally successful, making it to about the 3rd stage.
I switched then to Sumo. I was able to make it to the 5th stage, where you fight 2 people. After two trys, I only was able to make it to the 6th stage once with Sumo.
Next I tried out Executioner. It wasn't long before I realized the Select + I + II attack (back-scratcher) was the best move in the game. I was able to win the first 4 matches in 11-13 seconds each using this move.
Where the game is tricky for a novice is the 2 vs. 1 matches, until you come up with a strategy. For the 2 vs 1 matches, the best strategy is to run away and try to get only one person next to you at a time. You CANNOT win a fight with two people in close proximity. If you run around the ring too much, your guy seems to slow down. To make him fast again either use the Up + Select move, or stand still a little bit. These matches are EASY if Sumo is one of the characters, because he is a lot slower than everyone else, so you can get separation really easily.
The 3 vs. 1 matches and the 4 vs 1 match are essentially the same principal, get separation and fight only one guy at a time. This is trickier with more guys, but you will see the computer opponents accidentally fight each other more often in 3 vs. 1 and 4 vs. 1, which is when you can make your move to take someone out. I do note, the 4 vs. 1 fight suffered TERRIBLE slowdown, as the TG16 couldn't handle everything going on.
At the end of the day, I was able to pretty much breeze through the Amateur fights. After an hour of playing, I don't think I would pick this difficulty level again, it was WAAAAY too easy. Thankfully, you go straight into the intermediate level after beating beginner and your score carries into the next fights.
Intermediate 1 vs 1 is still really easy, I made it through these fights no problem using the back-scratcher move with Executioner. Once I made it to the 2 vs 1, then it got a bit harder. The opponents on intermediate use their healing power more often. Also, what makes intermediate much more difficult is once the opponents get low on health, they have a tendency to run away.
I was able to make it to the 13th stage, out of 15, before I finally was taken out. I am fairly certain I could beat intermediate tournament next time I tried, but my hand was very tired after 2 hours of play. I found rapidly trying to mash Select + I + II was getting harder, and I wasn't hitting all the buttons simultaneously with ease anymore. So instead of back-scratcher, I was doing shitty punches and kicks. I was a bit pissed, because I would like to have beat intermediate... and I was only 2 stages away. I wish I had an Avenue 3 pad, or that when I tried my Avenue 6 pad it would've worked.
In the end, I think this game is quite a bit better than I thought it was before. The game gets a bad reputation because it looks incredibly simple, but that is because I don't think many people know there are so many moves available. Unfortunately all of the best moves use the Select button, which makes controls awkward, but what else could they have done with a 2 button pad? I actually think if you had 5 people playing that knew what they were doing, it could make the game quite a bit of fun. Perhaps this is one to pull out at the next gaming festival, if there are 5 guys that want to put in a little practice beforehand.
On a 100 point scale, I'd give this game a 42. I think my preconceived notion was a 15 or so, so I am glad I played a little more... though it still is definitely not a great game by any means.
Now, can anyone beat my score of 17,330?
