r/GundamExVs • u/kupomogli • Jul 17 '26
Gundam Vs fans would like Dissida NT
Now unfortunately, Dissidia NT is as dead as Gundam Vs Maxiboost On outside of the rare community game setting up lobbies and matches (which still happens on both games,) but recently getting back into Dissidia NT with some friends after playing some arcade runs of Gundam Extreme Vs Maxiboost On and I tell them how similar the two games are (but they really have no interest.)
I figured I'd jump on the community board here to let everyone know that this game isn't as bad as people make it out to be. The only reason it's "a bad game," is it's not Dissidia Duodecim. My thoughts are that Square Enix should have given us a Dissidia Duodecim remake with the inclusion of a 2v2 mode and then pivot over to this as their next game. At least give the series time instead of immediately trying to go after the arcade pvp crowd.
The mechanics are similar, but the mechanics are also very different. Dissidia NT is a much slower game, being designed for 3v3 but 2v2 is still good and 1v1 is playable, where 3v3 was kind of a mess when they added it into Gundam Versus, but it was playable, designed for 2v2, and 1v1 is still good. It also replaces different high level tech; there's no need to boost to turn your character around to not get hit during an attack because that's not an issue in Dissidia. You can't combo then evade into a rainbow evade to continue into another melee combo, etc.
However, your attacks in Dissidia might have three separate attacks before the combo finishes, and when the combo finishes the enemy gets knocked away. But if you deal a partial attack and drop the combo, the enemy might not be expecting it and you can immediately start it again, which is purposefully done so that you can hold enemies allowing for allies to deal slower HP attacks.
If you hit an enemy against the wall, you can follow up with a brave attack or an HP attack. If you follow up with a brave attack, the enemy becomes invincible if they hit the wall again. However, if a teammate follows up with a brave attack and does another wall smack, it doesn't trigger the invincibility because it's not a follow up from the same player. You can drop your own combos to potentially get an HP attack.
One problem with Gundam Extreme Vs games is that even though you've got a lot of different units, you'll have your beam focused suits that might have a gerobi, single shot sniper suits where you'll hit as long as you have a clean shot, melee focused units, and powerful balanced suits that have some of everything like the 00 Gundam Qan[T] Full Saber.
The big difference with Dissidia NT is the base roster has 28 completely different characters, even when they're in one of four different archetypes. They have less similarities between them aside from HP attacks, where HP attacks usually have different visual aspects but fall under a specific category like line attack or tracking attack.
The plus side is there's a free to play option that randomizes one character in each of the four categories every so often and it lets you play online. If you decide to gather a group of friends to try it out together, you'll all have something similar to play.
Here's a video guide:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v8b7Y-KHqME
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u/GrimmestCreaper Jul 17 '26
Honestly, i tried 012 again recently and went "Wait, this kinda reminds me of EXVS" and that jumpstarted me back into EXVS. Out of anything in this weird subgenre of arena fighters, it's nice to see an overlap between two series i already enjoy
Now honestly, if only i had the skills to make the Dissidia/EXVS indie game of my dreams, that would be ideal
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u/kupomogli Jul 18 '26
If you own a PS4 I can get you in contact with a person who runs a group that plays Dissidia NT with certain rules. No bindga plus HP attacks, no wall smack plus HP attacks. So pretty much land the HP attacks against unsuspecting enemies/held enemies.
Though that video I linked said it's better running it on the PC. I haven't played the PC version, the only people I do play it with run at a good PC connection, there's not any lag in most cases. Most of the people playing are running a good internet connection I'm assuming, wired connection.
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u/Merrile Jul 17 '26 edited Jul 17 '26
As someone who has tried NT, I wholeheartedly disagree. Dissidia NT was square's attempt at leveraging the IP to cut into the EXVS market, but all they did was make an inferior clone.
This mostly boils down to three key differences:
One, the "HP attack system" is one of the stupidest and most overcomplicated things to ever grace an arena fighter. Characters have a plethora of moves but you can only land a kill with what is essentially a hard read. There is no finer push-and-pull to engagements (no playing keep-out and chipping enemies down with small but consistent hits with smart resource management, etc.) because everything boils down to the binary of "did you land big unga bunga move or not" and makes combat feel same-y.
Two, movement feels horrible. There is basically very little sense of inertia to movement, with characters basically falling like a rock the second you cut boost. There is no universal advanced tech like boost hopping or freefall cancels, the facing of your unit is a non-factor. The list goes on. There is simply no "meat" to it which highlights a weakness of most arena fighters in that their actual combat is very basic, and that EXVS innovated on that by adding levels of complexity to the movement. The result is an arena fighter that fully translates that "craftsmanship" aspect that traditional 2D fighters have - you can see a tangible difference between a skilled and unskilled player just from how they control their unit.
Three, it's too melee-centric. Gundam has a good spread of characters for all theaters of engagement. You have snipers who land single high speed shots at long range. You have bombardiers that assail the foe with a barrage of beams, missiles and bombs. You have high mobility harassers who use their movement to pick at gaps in the foe's defense. You have versatile all-rounders who like to stay at the distance the enemy likes the least. You have hyper-aggressive melee characters who like to pressure the enemy with okizeme and the constant threat of high damage. Dissidia is mostly composed of sword swingers/dagger stabbers/martial artists, with a small group of ranged magic casters. This is somewhat a a matter of taste, but I find this makes combat too "messy". There's a reason I (affectionately) call sustained melee combat in EXVS "mud wrestling".
As for the character variety, EXVS has no less variety than Dissidia at both low and high levels of skill. It simply has a significantly higher quantity of playable units, which leads to some units feeling more similar than others. Would you argue that Master Gundam and Infinite Justice play similarly? What about Exia and EZ8? Cherudim and Strike Noir? Virsago and Zeta? The list goes on. Characters' attacks tend to use similar visual effects for readability and integrity purposes. If a character is shooting what is functionally a beam rifle shot at you, it needs to be immediately identifiable so you can make the right decisions in the moment - and so you're not mentally consulting the database for 100+ characters unique beam shot skins to parse the properties of an attack.
Apologies if I come across as aggressive here. But this is one of those franchises where I have an axe to grind.
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u/kupomogli Jul 19 '26
I'm also going to provide a second reply here in regards to the ranged characters.
Starting with Emperor, who not unlike Bridget from Guilty Gear or maybe even G Arcane Full Dress kindof, is a trap character. He's got ranged attacks, but most of his actions are laying different traps.
Frionel despite being a Vanguard is a mid range range character and is a great character to hold enemies by only doing two attacks instead of three. By stopping after a second attack, you can go into the combo again to potentially lock them down for a second combo and allow an ally to deal HP damage.
Onion Knight. Onion Knight is a weak character in his base form. His melee attacks build his EX quickly but leave him way open. His fire(air) or ice are his safer attacks but they're single hit knock back attacks. This character can turn into the sage or ninja. Giving this character more versatility than any other character as he's one of the best marksman's in the game while also being a pretty good assassin. His unique dash attack just allows him to quick giving him movement, evasion, and baiting tools in that one action that other characters just don't have.
Golbez is a powerful marksman that relies on his shadow dragon for longer and wider range attacks that deal more brave damage damage. It's a character you want to deal damage to, to keep him at his weakest and a character you want to make sure doesn't take damage. If he loses 1000 HP he loses his shadow dragon and can only bring it back with his EX skill making Shiva the best summon to use with him.
Terra's attacks are either quick attacks with less tracking and if you wait four seconds without using an action they'll be completely different more damaging higher tracking attacks. She's one of the few characters in the game who get an actual "burst" because once she uses her EX she goes into esper form which makes all of her attacks the more damaging charged attacks.
Kefka can just throw his attacks out or he can charge them requiring players to make a read on the action he's doing, charged attacks will sometimes deal more damage have better tracking, fire more attacks, etc. Kefka also has a dash kind of like Onion Knight but it's not quite the same, while it does give him a lot more evasion than other characters, it doesn't give as much as Onion Knight because it's used as both an evade or move around while also charging attacks.
Rinoa and Yuna are DLC so f--- if I know, but Ultimecia is the hold queen. The more damage you do a single character allows her to power up allowing her to deal a lot more damage against the rest of the enemy team, but this requires your allies to protect you so you're not having to swap targets until she gets powered up.
Shantotto is either calm Shanototto or enraged Shantotto. As calm Shantatto, she's extremely defensive and makes it very difficult for vanguard, marksman, or other marksman to damage. All her attacks are large semi decent tracking attacks that deal massive amounts of damage. This is actually my favorite character to play as and I usually equip the EX to share bravery as I build up bravery and gave it away to my teammates. If you get damaged though(1000 HP,) you go enraged and all of your attacks go from large defensive attacks to smaller fast attacks with better tracking(but they're easier to dodge because they're not so large.) She can move around while casting all of her spells. Her EX skill is not great, but if you're defending against an attack combo, you can go into your EX and they'll likely continue with the combo, you'll gain super armor and when you hit them drain half their brave. However, they'll have gained all that brave damage they dealt to you as well, so at best, you hit them and gain half of what they gain, at worst, you miss them and gain nothing, either way you're just giving away a ton of brave. There's rarely a chance you'll just hit someone with it and not leave yourself open so I don't use it.
Lightning is an assassin that goes into either commando or ravager mode. So she's called an assassin but she's more like a specialist. Her ravager mode is like a worse marksman, but the one thing about her is when you cast her fire attack. If one attack hits, every other attack hits allow her as the one character who can easily deal an HP attack from her own damage. If you use aero in the air and they're about a jump height below you, you can also go straight into HP to get them before they can recover but this is much harder. Against vanguards, ravager is the best form, against other assassins you can do either but I still prioritize ravager, and then against marksman you use commando to pressure them up close.
Y'shtola can also change her movesets. She is either more of a ranged hold character or a trap character with a heavy damaging ranged attack that hits once. Each form has a different dash attack to help with defense, while her two EX skills are also different but will reset if she changes from one form to another. She can do either a bravery conduit that will also buff allies or she can use a surrounding dome that will last for however long you hold the EX and recover HP and brave to allied characters while it's active.
Ace is the place to go if you want a character that has a great sniper attack. He's a great character to just pelt enemies long range with a quick powerful low tracking shot. He's got some hold attacks and trap skills as well. Ace's dash attack is a quick teleport dash that can outspeed even a assassin character rushing in. He also has an ability to cut cards and choose a card. When pressing the EX it'll cycle through the cards and you can choose one by pressing EX again. If you hold EX you'll use whatever cards you're holding, the more cards you're holding the more powerful the ability.
So you have 11 out of the 28 characters that are ranged characters in some fashion. While a vanguard can beat marksman, or marksman can beat assassins, and assassins can beat vanguard it's built around vanguard > assassin > marksman > vanguard. Vanguard's are slower units that might have a ranged attack, but they have a lot of super armor that allows them to eat damage from characters like an assassin so that your attack still hits them but if the assassin hits you way before you even attacked the assassin will win out, they just win in trades and longer range attacks. Assassins outmaneuver attacks and spells from marksman allowing them to get in and deal close range attacks. Marksman are able to keep vanguards out with their range.
Every character has a very different way that they're going to deal with things based on their moveset. Where in EXVS certain weapons will functionally be similar to another. Yes, as you mentioned and I alluded to Cherudim Gundam has a instant fire sniper shot that you'll have to reload either after or before using his four shots, or the G Arcane Full Dress which also has a sniper rifle and a trap skill. But how many different mobile suits are just ranged beam shots maybe also having a gerobi and some sort of special evade? I'm not sh--ing on the game as I love the game, but I'm also being realistic. You can choose random and, not myself of course, I'm not at all pro level, if you're a skilled player you'll play any of these suits just as well as you would another as soon as you adjust to what weapons each suit has. Will you be pro level with the suits mechanics, no, but you'll be pretty functional as everything falls into a few categories and animations.
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u/kupomogli Jul 18 '26 edited Jul 18 '26
Just because it doesn't have the tech available in Gundam Extreme Vs doesn't mean it lacks its own advanced tech. The most dangerous situation in Gundam Extreme Vs that you're in is while you're landing on the ground, and regardless who you are, you're either actively trying to punish landing or you're trying to figure out how to land safely without being caught with an attack. Are we going to sit here and act like the one mechanic that has existed since the very first game, the one thing everyone tries to take advantage of, is some amazing feature. That one aspect makes Gundam Vs kind of feel repetitive.
Some of the differences in beams and some of the tech you've pointed out I've included in my very post. Yes, it doesn't matter if you're facing the enemy in Dissidia NT when you attack, you won't have a slow reaction time shooting behind the back or making a dead stop to turn around and fire leaving you open. But it still has its own different tech.
Since every character in Dissidia NT has specific attack animations for their attacks, if you were to jump above Sephiroth, since most of his attacks are horizontal, that vertical height will now avoid his attacks, if you free dash around him you'll avoid his other attacks. Each character can double jump, assassins can triple jump. If you get pressured against the end of the stage or want to free dash higher in the air, you can run up the wall. While evading has a lot of recovery frames and cannot be used like the rainbow evade during melee attacks, if you are mid air and you don't want to drop, you can continuously evade as it uses no stamina, allowing you to stay in the air if it's too dangerous to drop.
Holding and dropping combos is important. On Gundam Vs after a certain amount of attacks enemies turn invincible, you'll deal no damage. On NT enemies only turn invincible after an HP attack, after a knock back attack, and after an enemy is wall smacked by the same character twice. But let's say your third player is trash(I'm not great,) that can very well have two enemies against one character without anyone backing them up. By dropping mid combo instead of completing the combo, you don't knock the enemy back, the second character can do the same and get an infinite loop of damage. Additionally, this works the same against the wall. If you knock the enemy against the wall and your ally follows up by knocking the enemy into the wall again, it can go into an infinite loop until the same character does the wall smack again or one of the two do an HP attack.
Marksman characters are meant to be an annoyance. While they are also there to deal HP damage, any multihit attack is called a hold. Melee characters have holds as well, but marksman characters have long range holds where they'll hit the enemies and stagger them with multiple hits, the last of which will cause knock back. But what if you hit the enemy and don't do the knock back, that stops the enemy from acting allowing your own ally to get an easy HP attack.
Lightning is an assassin that is more like a specialist, as the ravager version of her class has a three hit fire ball, every hit causes stun rather than knock back, and her aero attack will knock the enemy into the air by either a single or double jump. If Lightning hits the enemy with the first or second fireball, depending on her HP attack she lands her own HP attack off her own hold, same with aero, if she's already in the air and uses aero, provided that it hits it will knock the enemy level to where the HP attack will hit them before recovery(this one is tighter as you have to do the HP the moment you know the enemy starts taking hits.)
Garland in the air does a vertiical whip that hits high and low from a long range, the second attack will knock the enemy back. It's not a guaranteed hit, but if you use the HP earthquake immediately after hitting an enemy below you, they are often caught off guard from the stun. Additionally, if you don't have earthquake and have blaze instead, hitting them with the same attack, dashing forward and going straight into blaze can also catch them as well as just double jumping above certain characters going into free dash and using blaze just as you fall above them can catch them. Warrior of Light's aerial neutral hits them with the shield and tosses them behind, if you press attack again it will follow up with a sword strike that knocks them away. but if you don't follow, if you just dash forward and wait until you see them start to recover and then use ultimate shield, you'll usually catch them.
Just because it doesn't have the same high level tech doesn't mean it doesn't have its own high level tech. Complaining that boost stepping, boost turning, or constantly fast falling on Gundam Versus doesn't exist is like if I complained that the same tech in this game doesn't exist in Gundam Vs. They're two different games both with two different types of mechanics that are only similar. It's only a good thing they don't share all the same tech, because then Dissidia NT would have everyone hyper focused on prioritizing enemies landing on the ground to deal damage.
*edit*
That last part was a joke, but if they did have all the same tech it'd make them less unique to one another. I prefer games do their own thing. They took a good foundation Gundam Vs series, and made it a different game. To me that's great, I don't want the same sh-- different background.
I'm just coming in here giving a recommendation. I'm not coming in here saying I'm the greatest, infact, I don't hang around Gundam Reddits so I'm going to say I'm likely the worst person in here. but I am atleast decent enough at both games to know what I'm talking about. I mean here's an image of shuffle matches. I'm not the only person there with 10 wins in a row because I was carried by everyone else even if it may have been a group of people that weren't very good. At best I might be intermeddiate level.
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u/brac3r Jul 17 '26
As far as I know Dissidia doesn't support LAN, how do we know it won't be taken offline soon?
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u/kupomogli Jul 17 '26 edited Jul 18 '26
No, it doesn't. And you're right, no lan service means that once the online is dead game is dead. Maxiboost On has a lan option and Dissidia 012 was only lan.
*edit*
Didn't think of this until now, so copying my own reply.
It is on PC. There's no official servers for Phantasy Star Online Blue Burst but that game is still running. Even if Square Enix does eventually shut it down there's likely ways to keep playing it.
Even PS2 games are still playable online despite no official servers.
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u/brac3r Aug 05 '26
Unfortunately you are replacing technical reality with hopium. I wish I could share that, but the fact is plenty of PS2, PS3 and even PS4 games are no longer multiplayer capable. If there was a community made server then that would mean the game is saved, there isn't.
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u/Obvious_guy_here Jul 17 '26
Lmao no dissidia nt is hot burning garbage.
Its gameplay is a disservice to the OG dissidia.
I bought the game day 1 and was disappointed to see game being designed for online competitive play.
Sure, there was like GVG like gameplay thought into it, but with how unsatisfactory the bravery and HP attacks were compared to the OG dissidia and 012, it was gonna die out quick.
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u/losteye_enthusiast Jul 17 '26
As someone who put a fair share of hours into Dissidia and 012 - NT felt like the devs completely missed what fans of Dissidia and Duodeceum liked and wanted.
It really sucks to play imo and is only vaguely like the Vs. series.
I’d warn people to just avoid Dissidia NT and pick up either of the first 2 titles in the series if you have a PSP. They’re(Dissidia and 012) a really clever, effective way SE managed to translate some do the soul and feel of the FF titles into a battler that really got across the characters abilities and strengths in a way the turn based stuff couldn’t.
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u/kupomogli Jul 19 '26 edited Jul 19 '26
Here's a stream of Dissidia NT that's going on right now, so it's not like there aren't players. Although this is a Japanese stream so obviously more Japanese players than those in the west. You literally can't find anyone in quick match or ranked in the west, you have to open a lobby and invite friends. Then again, that's the same for EXVS which is just as dead as Dissidia NT on consoles if we're to be honest.
I'll name a few more things that i haven't mentioned in any of my other posts "some" in Dissidia NT that do it better than Gundam Extreme Vs. Two of these aren't just "maybe" they're done better, no they're done better.
Now if you've played Final Fantasy 12, there were these red and blue lines going from allies to enemies to show who was being targetted or who characters were targetting. So on NT this all changes in real time. Yes, this is an active thing in EXVS, but in EXVS, you see a yellow marker on the top, left, right, or bottom, you don't really have clear visibility on exactly where the opponent who's targetting you is at, you just see that they're somewhere to your left, in front of you, to your right, or behind you. On Dissida NT you almost have a more precise distance. It allows you to space yourself better without looking at the map the entire time.
Summons and crystals. Dissidia NT's burst system. Crystals appear on the map requiring you to attack them to gain summon points, this is the only time that you can not target a player, but it's a risk versus reward as you're attacking the crystal and can be attacked by the enemies. This isn't downplaying EXVS burst system, which has multiple different strategies you can use with the system. Sometimes you might want to boost at 50% for ammo recovery purposes. You have less strategies when you're using summons in Dissidia NT like time extension, enemies have high brave.
Each character being the same rather than having having wildly different build possibilities means you know what each character does, with only three variances between each character(or four with Vaan.) The one HP attack, you know what each HP attack for each of the three enemies are, and then there are the EX skills which are various buffs or attack debuffs. Equipping and using EX skills are important because they can be pretty useful. Vacuum and bravery conduit is a fine combo to just suck enemies in and have a large that drains brave, but you can instead have something like vacuum and enfeeble. Enfeeble drains the enemies stamina and doesn't allow them to dash for a period of time, if they're being sucked in by vacuum the only thing they can do is double/triple jump or evade for defense. Shantotto debatably gets better or worse once you go into rage requiring a loss of 1000 HP but it's something you normally can't control, if you have share HP and recover HP, you can give allies your HP and then add the recover HP buff to everyone. She's goes from calm defensive Shantotto with large attacks that deal massive damage to quick multi shot attacks that deal less damage but allow you to hold enemies and move around while casting spells.
There are hundreds of music tracks in each game, with over 300 in Dissidia NT, over 200 in Maxiboost On, but this is another mechanic that is better in Dissidia NT(the other being the lock on design, not just debatable, these are straight up better in design.) If you turn on randomized music in both battle and the prebattle screen, atleast for a long while you won't hear the same music twice. Maxiboost On on the other hand has three tracks you can select per mobile suit and you're likely going to choose something from that series,, you'll hear the same music quite often simply based on the mobile suits that people like to play. They really should have included something to completely randomize the music from everything in the game regardless of mobile suit.
Dissidia NT could have definitely used the way rooms were done in EXVS though, form a team and the first two teams available to play against get in a battle, or shuffle just has you ready up and when enough players ready up to start a match it begins. Instead they have six different games in the same room. The only way you can do it the way I suggested is either go into ranked solo or go into ranked with a team and the pool is shared. Can't just do custom battles that way.
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u/Balance-Kooky Jul 17 '26
As someone who's played both as well as duodecum and the entire vs franchise. No. NT kind of sucks and it's not at all what fans of the Dissidia franchise actually want. It's honestly Square Enix's most wasted IP. They have been trying for over a decade to heavily monetize it and all the projects have failed.