BlazBlue - Fighting Game Retrospectives - Part 1 

I remember Patrick Seitz in an interview talking about how when he was brought on to do voice work for Calamity Trigger, he was handed a massive script in a 3 ring binder and he went "this is a fighting game... but there's a huge script for it."

Makoto is undoubtedly inspired by Squirrel Girl, but her outfit is also essentially a pallete swap of Tifa Lockheart.

Fun Fact: Tsubaki's Help Me Professor Kokonoe is just Julie Ann Taylor talking to herself, literally.

You mentioning Melty as a potential crossover with BBTag has me thinking of the sheer chaos that Neco Arc would bring to that title and I NEED it

The fact that you're even trying to piece together this story is worthy of praise

Quick correction: Rachel was the one who saved Ragna and gave him the Azure Grimoire, not Jubei. Then Jubei trained Ragna.

It's funny to me that when Guilty Gear got left behind because it was too complex and the non-fighting game spin-off bombed and the creator lost the rights to his game they made BlazBlue to be the reset to a simpler gameplay only for it to eventually be too complex for a Tag Fighter & the non-fighting game spin-off bombed and The creator lost the rights to his game they left it behind then Guilty Gear came back after Xrd and became the Reset to simpler gameplay

One of my favorite things about Blazblue is that in Chrono Phantasma, Ragna vs Hazama shows off that Hazama is fully Terumi against Ragna, and he and Ragna get specific voice clips only for that matchup, and it’s amazing

The english dub is absolutely stellar and it's sad they didn't bring it back for the last installment.

I am so glad you talked about the dub because I loved it SO MUCH, everyone nailed it so much that I was actually very sad when CF didn't have a dub. I'll never forget the masterful delivery of Golden Hakumen's "The END has COME!" Gag

BlazBlue's story is what people like to meme Kingdom Heart's story is.

To be fair, the producer of Blazblue Cross Tag Battle said that he wanted to have characters from Fate/Grand Order in it, and since one of them is in the newest Melty Blood and Cross Tag is set to be released on Xbox this year, maybe we still haven’t escaped from crossing fates yet

Taokaka is my favorite character. She makes me so happy. I’m so sad her english voice actor died. I really really loved her 😢

This is one of the best Christmas presents I've received in years. Time for everyone to experience of the best anime sword boys ever.

Thanks to you, I got Bleach in my mind when you got to the Hazama segment and chose to look up who Gin was voiced by. I don't know what I was expecting.

I said it once already at the end of the premiere, but I wanna make sure it's seen, this was the first Fighting Game I ever got into seriously, and I played the hell out of it. Thanks so much for the Retrospective as it made me so happy to see it walk through the history again. Will see you in the future when the next one arrives.

As someone who only knew the cliffnotes of cliffnotes of character dynamics when I first got BBTAG (ArcSys is favorite fighting game developer from having played Arena & Xrd at the time of BBTAG's reveal, Persona is favorite video games, & I fucking love RWBY & that last one hurts at the moment given recent Rooster Teeth news), god BBTAG's story had me dying at times. I still vividly remember falling over in uncontrollable laughter in my college game room's bean bag chair during the scene where Ragna runs into both Vatista & Aegis RIGHT BEFORE NU SHOWS UP! Patrick's "I'd rather be dealing with five Jins" delivery on that "oh god" was PERFECT

Thorgi in my country we don't celebrate x-mas and give each other presents on new years instead. So this is one of the best x-mas presents anyone gave to me lol

To add to the "BBTAG" section, while there wasn't any official statement given, the speculated reason why half the initial roster ended up being DLC was likely due to the fact it was rushed out to make it in time for EVO. When it was announced to be in the 2018 line-up, it wasn't even out yet and would only have been released for about 2-3 months before the event. That also probably explains why the game has so little features with various other aspects, like the character select screen, being placeholder tier stuff. Heck, there are gameplay elements in the trailer that ended up not being in the final release. Add in all the bugs and, yeah, I wouldn't be surprised if the game was shoved out the door mid-development, essentially unfinished. Not to mention, even for being an "asset dump" game, it's not like those assets didn't get reworked. Like how the sprite sizes for the "Under Night" cast were completely different and had to get changed, resulting in even their shading getting altered. Much less all the new sprite animations that had to be made for the interactions. Despite all the corner cutting, it likely ended up being more costly and timely work than expected. So yeah, I think it's safe to say the development of "BBTAG" wasn't exactly trouble-free. And sadly, this also kind of mirrors the development issues "Dark War" ended up having. Mori apparently got demoted after "BBTAG" and after "Dark War", he just straight up left ASW. Something had to be going on but with everyone being so hush about details, which itself is strange as mentioned, all we can do speculate. Part of me wonders if this was inevitable since this was also the time when "Guilty Gear" started making a return. I wouldn't say it's a reach ASW shifted focus back towards that franchise. After all, "BlazBlue" only existed to replace "Guilty Gear" when they lost rights to it. With 'Guilty Gear" back, "BlazBlue" suddenly mattered less. I guess only time will tell what, if anything, ASW does with "BlazBlue" now. EDIT: Forgot to mention this but the "X-Blaze" games are Visual Novels, not Light Novels. Light Novels are more regular books with an occasional illustration, typically as physical books but also digitally online. Visual Novels are essentially books as games made entirely of cutscenes, occasionally with some form of gameplay mixed in. There are also tons of types of Visual Novels (dating sims, kinetic novels, hybrids, etc). So, to make a joke out of this at your expense, you really don't know what a Light Novel is...

"I've seen enough Bleach to know you never trust a guy who looks like this." >Doug Erholtz is also Gin Ichimaru Ya don't say.

I admire how in-depth your retrospectives are. I know 3 things about BlazBlue: jack, shit, and it looks cool. I appreciate your hard work (and I also appreciate the SBFP references).

50:55 Mu 12 was the true boss of Continuum Shift. Unlimited Mu 12 can be fought in arcade mode after meeting conditions, but you only have one shot to be her. I have beaten her several times with Ragna

I frikin loved Blazblue but doing the combos required such pixel perfect precision that playing online was near impossible.

As someone who started off my Blazblue experience finding out about Ragna via Deathbattle and slowly diving into the game's characters, lore, and eventually gameplay; I love the appreciation of this game as a whole(not just the competitive scene). What attracted me the most to this game is the characters and aesthetic, so knowing that I am getting something good out of playing through hours and hours of story is really nice to know beforehand. Thank you Mori, Daisuke, and everyone else who took the time to put this balls-to-the-wall anime slugfest together. And thanks to the fans for keeping it alive.

As someone who started at “BB: Calamity Trigger” I didn’t feel lost with the story until “Chronophantasma” because they stopped the possibility of timeloops but had a selection test for whose the “True Successor of the Azure”🤯 which convoluted the original theory of what lies within Boundary.

2:00:43 You know, Shiki Tohno and his Nanaya personality showing up in BBTag would not be out of place with how batshit insane BB alone is. He'd frankly be the most normal person around, though I can see Nanaya Shiki constantly trying to kill Rachel and Valkenheim.

What was once meant to be a spiritual successor to a series, that at the time arc couldn't touch without many limitations, to effectively being in the back burner, now that guilty gear is in its originators hands once again and more prominent no less. The history of blazblue started high and now its future is extremely murky at best. This retrospective reminded me why I fell in love with the series, and the possibility of another entry later down the road is something I sincerely hope becomes a reality. But with mori gone and apparently on a sour note no less, who can say if the next game would feel at home with the fans. But at least I've been reminded of a series that truly has been special, and hopefully can experience again with the same love the first time around. Thanks for all your hard work thorgi!

My first BlazBlue game was cross tag battle and I LOVED IT! I had soooo much fun with my friends playing it that it caused me to go back and play old BlazBlue titles. I do really love the gameplay of this series.

funny story, the reason dark war shut down was because when they released dark kagura there was a glitch where players could collect their daily bonuses infinite times a day and the developers could not find a way to fix it so they just shut it down lol

Another certified hood classic once again Thorgi. It's crazy to know about the crazy stuff behind the series, such as the stupid good amount of single player content that I didn't even know about from previous games, to even small things like how the burst changed, your videos once again prove to be one of RU-vid's best fighting game content. I love all of your vids and wish you best of luck in 2023! Can't wait for the big lore video lol. And just as a side note for anyone who cares, I got so sad when it was mentioned that Tao's voice actor passed away. Tao is and has always been my fav BB character. She spoke to me when I first saw her, which was all the way back in like 2012/2013 when I was like 8. I never got into fighters until around early to mid 2021, but idk if I wouldn't of been interested as much if it wasn't for characters like Tao. Her voice actor is simply Tao for me and it's sad that she is sadly no longer with us. I hope she is resting peacefully and can't thank her enough for her performance of probably one of my favorite fg characters ever.

Your timing is remarkable. I watched your KOF retrospective right as I was getting into KOF, and now you have BlazBlue when I just imported Central Fiction on the Switch. Looking forward to more!

BlazBlue wasn't my first fighting game, but it definitely was the one that actually got me hooked up. I have so many fond memories of the series that I honestly can't list all of them. I adore how much love and care Mori put into the series. Especially how the first thing created was our Lord and Savior Hakumen. Also on a subject of "simplicity" I feel like BBCF got it perfectly. It's is actually really easy to pick up (proper buffering for inputs, one button supers, many macros, easy bnb's actually exist and amazing tutorial mode), but the skill ceiling is absolutely insane. Kinda best of both worlds Edit: minor spelling mistake. I win

Dude thank you so much this is my favorite fighting game of all time!

I did buy BlazBlue: Calamity Trigger Limited Edition Arcade Stick because of the story and it come with an Arcade stick for the Ps3.

Thanks for doin' this video! I'm a content creator in the vtuber space that's super into BlazBlue, and I've been producing stuff on it for a couple of years now. I heavily documented BBDW and had by far the most complete and comprehensive account of any western player of the game-- helped a lot with the wiki's documentation of it. Was super sad to see it go, but not the least bit surprised. BlazBlue is one of my favorite media franchises of all time and I'm desperate not to see it die. Really appreciate the positive coverage of it-!

Thank you for making this Thorgi. I just started playing Blaze Blue Cross Tag Battle just because I saw the Investigation Squad from Persona 4 and didn't think much of it. But to say that I didnt know most of the characters is a gross understatement.

Exciting that BlazBlue will be the next fighting game on the retrospective series! So this is Part 1? At first I was confused since there are just 4 main series games in BlazBlue. Then I realized the series is infamous for its complex and confusing lore as he pointed out multiple times, and Thorgi is going to attempt to piece together and explain its lore here! Even with just 4 games the stories in each game is probably going to a while to get all the way through. Good Luck Thorgi!

As someone who did follow BlazBlue for the plot, I'm def gonna say it's HUGE. Good luck trying to piece it all together. And good job for this video so far! And yeah, sadly Dark War *was* fun but given how much the lore was important to me, having it purely in JP was kind of less fun.

My favorite thing about the voice acting is that I think they were paid by the word, and Arakune's voice actor did the voice skips on his own

13:15 I’m also in that grey area. While people say that, it often turns out to be more of a perception issue than anything else. I say this from the standpoint that there are plenty that lower the entry barrier lower than other genres and from the standpoint that other genres have similar entry barriers and are more popular.

Ah yes, Arakune... the character that can be best described as a BAG FULL OF BEES!!!

I’d like to say, it was thanks to “Blazblue”, “Guilty Gear” and especially “Battle Fantasia” that made me a fighting game fan.

That RPG's gameplay looks just like Fate GO.

I remember playing calamity trigger with my brother. Truly a special series.

Damn dude, the amount of work you put into this is insane. It's easy to see how passionate you are about this entire franchise.

Amazing video! I love this series with all my heart and to see it presented so beautifully means the world to me. It helped me remember all the good things about the older games that made me fall in love with the series in the first place, most notably the comment about how stories feel like pieces of a puzzle that you can put together. I can't describe the hype I felt when Jin fought Hakumen and the BGM was Blood Pain, after all the hints and insinuations of how exactly they are connected. Keep up making amazing videos bro!

2022 will be over in less than 7 literal hours as I type this so I just want to say congratulations on breaking that 50k subscriber threshold you set. Videos like this are objective proof that you more than deserve it. I also love how at the end of all the fighting game retrospective episodes you've done this year, whenever the future of the series you're covering looks bleak and grim, you still find ways to pull out hope and reassure your audience that even if worst comes to worst for the series in question, what already exists for the said series in question will always be there and the fans can keep it alive. It's uplifting and a much needed perspective for many of us.

Mori-P dropped a boob tier list during an interview? Unfathomably based.

Its honestly easier to say Blaz blue is a Visual Novel with a Fighting game mechanics then a Fighting Game that leans into Visual novels

Sounds like BlazBlue Cross Tag should be next BUILD A ROOSTER

Aside from 1) calling ‘Visual Novel’ to ‘Light novel and 2) ‘Jubei’ gives Ragna Blazblue (it’s actually Rachel after the church burned in Calamity Trigger) You did a very well job not getting confused too much in swarm of details. The story of Blazblue franchise is pretty easy but detail in the lore is a bit too much (not as much as Fate franchise). In order to getting complete detail about main storyline, just Phase Shift 0-4 light novel (Dark war era) will be enough. Remix Heart, Variable Heart, and Bloodedge Experience will only detailed on Mai Natsume and Naoto Kurogane (a bit of Valkenhayn and Relius when they still immortal breaker) which really not that important in C-series. But if you want to know about characters, just go on. BB Alternative: Dark war will give you how next story would go later, but it’s not the time for that after MoriP leaves the company.

It’s funny that you really enjoyed that “Ragna on a ghost ship” ending in Continuum Shift because that was the exact ending that made me realize Story Mode wasn’t worth my time. It was the first (and, to this day, only) ending I got from that mode and I guess having to sit through a very long gag ending I didn’t find funny at all was a bad first impression because I haven’t even attempted a BlazBlue Story Mode since.

The biggest issue with Chronophantasma and Central Fiction onward, is that the games HEAVILY rely on supplemental BlazBlue material like the light novels, mangas, etc. that already weren't all that readily available in Japan, and never got translated in the west. So not only were western fans out of the loop, but BlazBlue fans who only really played the games had no idea what the fuck a Celica, Kazuma, Phase Shift, a Remix Heart, or Bloodedge Experience was.

34:36 I remember back in the day when BBCT dropped and I was playing on English Dub. I was caping so hard for people to put it in English because of how great it was but everyone was still on that Sub over Dub schtick so it wasn't until way later that people started appreciating it until we lost it in later games.

This was an amazing video and as someone who started the BB series by COMPLETE accident I fell in love with it and find it hard to find people who love the game as much as you do love the effort research and love that went into this keep up the good work🔥💯

The BB: Continuum Shift Arcade Opening, always brings me to tears, such a beautiful, Minute long Composition.

"I have waited 4-no *5,000* years for this moment!!" I was *EXTREMELY* happy to see a Thorgi retrospective of my #1 favorite FG franchise in my sub feed! I could write an essay on why I love Blazblue so much, but I'd rather not make commenters read a super long comment of mine. Can't wait for Part 2! I feel like I'm one of the 100 people that genuinely enjoys Blazblue deep, insane, rabbit hole known as the plot. Also Thorgi if you're reading this, during your XBlaze segments you kept saying "Light Novels". It's called a "visual novel" my guy.

I was ready for a good video. But I have been smiling since I pressed play. Great job dude, as a BlazBlue fan I am enjoying every second of this retrospective

Whoa! As soon as you said that this games story is more complicated then the Metal Gear Saga, I immediately got a headache lol. Great Video.

This is a fantastic video - even your brief summary of the CT story and it’s characters is extremely well done and helpful. Can’t wait for part two. 😊

1:10:14 Heads up, You can hold down the drive button for this Distortion of Makoto, just like its base form if you time it right it deals much more damage. You can see the bar on the bottom right appear

Your restrospectives are so fantastic. Thank you for all the hard work you put into these very enjoyable and informative documentaries.

Celicia's finisher is basically Josuke from JoJo All Star Battle.

This is one of my favorite long form retrospectives. I've always had a tangential interest in BlazBlue, and you made the series very captivating. Well done!

It looks like no one remembers revolution reburning

this is honestly one of the greatest RU-vid videos I've ever watched. thank you so much for making this, if you haven't done it for melty blood yet, i (and many others) would love to see it. much love mate, have a happy new year

I think something needs to be said about how arcsys lost the rights to one of the most distinct fighting games ever made and then went "lets make another one".

An epic and comedic retrospective as always. I unfortunately never really got into the BlazBlue series upon it's various releases, but your video alone does make me wanna dive in one day. And, as someone that does care about fighting game story/lore, I can't wait to watch part two.

This video made me go though all 5 stages of grief

Bullet was my first main before I discovered Terumi and Noel so she has a special place in my heart

This was a fun video to watch. I first got into BlazBlue thanks to my friend who kept talking about the game so I looked it up on RU-vid and watched a Let’s Play of Calamity Trigger. I liked what I saw, so I got Continuum Shift Extend since it had a version of the first game’s story, which is why I came to BlazBlue in the first place. But the first fight taught me a very painful yet valuable lesson. I sucked hard! Unlike my friends who played in Stylish Mode at the time, I went Technical and the controls felt super stiff to me. It only took two fights to realize that if I was going to keep playing, I needed to learn to play the game. So I did the unthinkable, I played the tutorial. I can’t remember if I actually completed it or not because at the time, I was incapable of inputting the commands for backsteping and dashing, but it taught me enough to get good at the game and play through the Story Mode. Ironically, I was the weirdo who could understand the frick that was going on with the story, but that may be because my brain is hardwired for crazy convoluted sci-fi antics especially if time travel is involved in any way, shape, or form. One time, my other friend was visiting and we were playing BlazBlue against each other. When he saw me doing moves that he couldn’t in Stylish, he switched to Technical and never went back. BlazBlue is a series near and dear to my heart and I come back every now and then for another play through. One day, I do want to make a RU-vid series where I string together various scenes from the games in chronological order, but that’s going to have to wait until I get a computer good enough to handle recording it. By the way, some notes. First of all, the Bloodedge Experience is not a manga, it’s a light novel, while the Xblaze games are visual novels. And while I understand your frustration with the TOi system in Xblaze, if you get one good ending, it shows what characters read what before selecting an article. Best way to do this is to go for the Hinata ending which can simply be unlocked by reading every article you can once you start the game. But it is very frustrating the first time. Also, a little fun fact, in the Vita Version of Chronophantasma Extend, Highlander Assualt Mode is actually unlocked straight from the get-go. This could simply be due to the fact the Story Mode is a separate download in that version, but I thought it was neat to mention. I think that’s all I have to say. I’m going over to Part 2 now. But seriously, great video. Good job on it.

BB story is actually not that hard to comprehend, especially the beginning can be summarized quite quickly, (continuum shift) it's mostly central fiction that gets confusing and even then if you read it carefully without rushing it through it's quite easy. Also I firmly believe BB has the best fighting game story ever made, hell, I'd put it up there with even some decent shows

Glad for this retrospective, love this series so much i couldnt describe it. Looking foward to the story breakdown, ive sat my friends down to explain it and after about 30 min they fully check out. Also hope you include the story of the dragon, the princess, and the knight repeating, ever since hearing that short the rest of everything just clicked for me.

Epic video Professor Thorgi!!! There were several things that I did not know, thank you very much!!! I appreciate and respect your hard work.

You have no idea how happy I am you covered not just my absolute favourite fighting game but one of my favourite videogame of all time. THIS is the game I always come back, THIS is the game I never shut the fuck about when my friends ask me what game they should play. Also good luck with episode two.

I got into BlazBlue before CF came out in the west, and I remember when the demo for it came out. It was jpn only, and I was at a CPEX tournament in my town. One of the dudes running it had an account with the demo on it and he let me and my friends try it out. That demo was fucking magical, man. I remember my friends being super hype about Jubei being confirmed for CF. That CPEX tournament was also my first one ever. I got my ass beat by an Azrael so bad I decided from that point that I was going to be an Azrael main out of spite. Been playing him ever since. I owe my love for the FGC to BlazBlue. If it weren't for this series, I don't think that I ever would have found my love for fighting games or smash bros. melee. This series brought out my competitive side. It led me to speedrunning, going to more tournaments, watching more tournament play, etc. I owe a lot to BlazBlue. This shit is so sick.

Lambda was not just a pallet swap, she had altered forms of the Nu’s attacks which encouraged a more rush down style of attack.

BlazBlue is one of my favourite franchises, so this video has been an absolute blast so far! About to go into the CP section (which is when I started playing) and so much care went into getting all the important details about these games! This video is really well made!!

The artwork on the thumbnail is amaaaaszzing

Dude thank you for making this outstanding retrospective. You are the man with the master plan.

ive always wanted to learn about blazblue, thank you thorgi for going through all the confusing fighting game lore and making it easy for us to understand! and a late merry christmas and happy new year!

I get so excited every time one of your videos drop, it's like a little state holiday, only unpredictable and lasts around two hours.

Congrats on the 50K! Also, watched the whole video and loved it. I have to say you're a big inspiration for me, keep up the great content!

Congrats for the 50k! Also... I was so excited to hear about the second part. Love your videos, every now and then I re-watch the kof ones and rival school particularly

Izanami's got such an incredibly cool unique mechanic and it's not even her drive: pressing up while in the air makes her stand in place allowing for her full suite of ground normals while airborne. The concept itself is cool, and the combos get real crazy. Incredibly surprised that after going on about most of the characters' unique mechanics, you completely skipped one of my favorite's.

Always love your work. You helped reignite my passion for fighting games.

I really want the Story part SO MUCH Thank you for your dedication

I have been wanting something likes this for years! thank you so much!

your retrospectives are very fun , exciting and encouraging me to play fighting games again. thank you ✌😁

Haven’t even gotten halfway yet but a part 2 to this? Amazing! I’m looking forward to it! It’s a doozy of a story for sure but an emotional one. I loved it

I'll have to catch this when I get off work tomorrow. Looking forward to this. Also have a Happy New Years 🙂

Cheers to a new year, a very ambitious project and reaching your sub goal! I really hope your new year is fantastic!

My god, you unbelievable bastard. You have sold me on finally trying to play a BlazBlue game. Always have stared at the franchise from a distance and been content with that, but you have made these actually sound like fun games to play (regardless of the bonkers story). I legitimately respect the effort and creativity that Arcs System Works put into making all these modes beyond just arcade and story.

I've been watching your whole retrospective playlist because I've always been curious about fighting game lore and I love how every time you mention street fighter 4 it's like the cavalry arrives moment for the genre Especially because street fighter 4 was my first fighting game

Can't wait to see a video triple this length about the story. Never touched a blazblue game but if the story is as convoluted as I've heard...we're in for it.

Tackling the BB story is a Herculean task and warrants subscribing to you

48:05 Hazama A.K.A. Terumi Back when we thought Hazama & Terumi were the same person.

Another stellar retrospective. You truly are the king of kings.

You made me love BB more than ever before. Thank you. You earned a new friend and sub. It took me a couple days but i finished your retrospective. I am off to find more!

Excellent video, having only jumped into BlazBlue relatively recently (A year or so ago) this and part 2 were nice recaps of the series as someone who basically just goes monkey mode with Azrael having some more context on the history of the series, the lore, and the relationships between the characters was very nice. Good stuff keep it up.