Stock Fighter

I was a little nervous trying this game out. I don't consider myself a stock expert. I was pleased that I got to the main menu pretty quickly. A lot of games have been starting to put a lot of fan service before the main menu, locking you out of the settings until it's done. A newly launched game is never perfect. I like to always adjust some video and audio settings earlier on so I can focus more at the beginning of the game rather than having it on the back of my mind that the game is in the wrong resolution or that the audio is too loud. So I was glad I was able to adjust this early on. The start of the story of the game is familiar to me, as I am familiar with a lot of anime-like settings that revolve around a protagonist having to prove himself against different people. While I am not super familiar with stocks, there were a lot of beginning tutorials that brought me up to speed with the various mechanics of the game, as well as how different stocks react in the game. While each match has a time limit, I was able to understand roughly how things went after a match or two. I will say part of the matches being timed had me playing in a fast-paced environment that felt pretty exciting.

This game has different characters you can battle against. They all represent different personalities, so each of their play styles is different. In these fast-paced matches you can see how differently they play versus how you do. Tactics you used against a prior opponent might not necessarily work against another one. So you are always in a state of learning and observing. I played through what I believed was a once-through of this game. However, I believe that besides the "main quest," there are other special matches, different difficulties, and other elements that make it worth coming back to this game to play again and again.

One of the slight frustrations I had with the game in the beginning was the length of the matches. Coming into this for the very first time, things felt fast. However, there is no loss of progress when losing to any one NPC. You can challenge them right back immediately. This allowed me to rapidly get used to the gameplay and the different combat elements of the game. I think something I would like to see added to the game are both the opponents' and my final score on screen when the match ends. The matches are fast-paced, so most of my focus is on the game board. During the matches the scores are visible, but I usually just have time to glance at them every so often. Usually when the match is about to finish, I am locked into my final moves and might not have time to memorize the scores. So when the match is over and I can relax, I'd actually like to see the scores since I wouldn't be distracted at the end of the match.

This game was a nice change of pace for me. I'd say other games I play are usually longer format and can have a lot of time to think. This game was a nice refresher for me as it's a more fast-paced game that keeps you on your toes. This game was easy enough for me to pick up on. I am sure those who are more familiar with stocks would be able to excel at this game much faster.

This was a really fun game, and I'm glad I was able to try it when it was out for demo as well as here in its full form.