The King of Fighters XV Cheats and Tips
Your Best Offense Is A Strong Defense
The King Of Fighters 15 stands out from other new releases in the genre, such as Guilty Gear Strive, by making defense tactics a central focus in its fighting system. This focus comes with the Shatter Strike, a counterattack that stuns opponents.
Shatter Strikes require at least one power bar and gets activated with this command: ⬇️↘️➡️+ [Heavy Punch][Heavy Kick]. While you can perform a Shatter Strike at any time, its intended use is to break your character out of a guard stance. In turn, it’s a highly effective maneuver under pressure.
Shatter Strikes turn KOF15 into a game of cat and mouse when the reward of landing a solid combo gets measured against the risk of punishment from counters. In turn, you’ll see this strategy utilized a lot by the more challenging AIs in single-player modes.
Therefore, if you find yourself hurling combo after combo against an enemy with no success, then it might be time to switch up your approach. Sometimes, the best way to nail a killer combo is to wait for your opponent to attack, counter with a Shatter Strike, and then follow up with a rush for additional damage.
Practice Your Canceling To Rack Up Major Damage
Canceling moves is the bread and butter of KOF15’s fighting system. In short, cancels allow you to cut the animation of one attack short by interrupting it with a higher-level move.
There are plenty of benefits to canceling. First, canceling is a great way to work in more powerful moves without your enemy catching on. Furthermore, successfully canceling a chain of moves can create a devastatingly powerful combo!
So, how can you improve your canceling abilities? The short answer is to practice, practice, practice. First, however, we mean that you should study your fighters’ attacks inside and out. One of the more common stumbling blocks to learning cancels is missing an input window for your next move because of a brain fart.
Furthermore, you need to understand which moves to cancel into each other. For instance, some Super Special moves don’t offer much time to cancel into a MAX Super Special move. Or, suppose you have a MAX Super Special move that launches an opponent into the air. In that case, Climax canceling at the wrong time can cause your character to whiff the Climax Super Special move.
The training and mission modes are the best places to learn move canceling combos. Training mode is excellent for developing strategies that suit your play style. Mission mode will teach you combos that are tough to master but highly damaging when successful.
Build A Strong Team Of Familiar Fighters
The King Of Fighters is a unique fighting game due to its three-on-three battle system. On the one hand, you’ll need to master three fighters before you can compete well. Yet, on the other hand, there’s no tag system to bail you out if a member of your team is struggling. Instead, part of your strategy will depend on the orders that you and your opponent choose to roll out fighters.
So, how can you navigate these nuances? Unfortunately, there is no simple answer. However, as you play the game, you’ll find that different characters meet different needs. For instance, a character with powerful normal attacks might work as an opener since they are effective without juice in the power gauge.
Also, consider what characters suit you best. For instance, if agility and movement matter a lot to you, you may gravitate more toward a character like Mai. However, if zoning and defensive measures fit better, you’ll want to have Delores on your team. So, ask yourself what characters you main in other fighting games and who parallels them in the KOF universe.
