by Amr (@siegarettes)

• Roof Rage
• Developer: Early Melon
• Publisher: Early Melon 
• Switch, PC

I was a bit cool on Roof Rage when it first released. Its original cast felt a bit disjointed, pulling primarily from East Asian martial arts with some left field additions, and its variations on the platform fighter’s directional specials made it difficult to get to grips with. Those initial criticisms still stand, but my time since the original review, alongside numerous improvements, have allowed me to appreciate the unique take Roof Rage brings to the platform fighter genre. 

Namely, Roof Rage is a platform fighter that channels the spirit of traditional 2D fighters, with big combos, fast movement and a focus on turning a good read into big damage. 

To achieve a more traditional fighting game feeling, Roof Rage removes two genre staples from the platform fighter: analog movement and percentage based damage systems. Popularized by Smash Brothers, percentage based damage gives a built in comeback factor, pushing opponents away further as they rack up damage. High damage means you can take fewer hits, but also keeps you out of range of some of the highest damage combos. Likewise, analog movement gives you more granular influence over movement and defense, letting you escape hits in more directions, but making consistent damage more difficult. 

On its face, removing these genre staples might seem to make a less dynamic, more predictable game. Instead it allows Roof Rage to move the focus elsewhere and create a more lethal dance of death. Hitsun is huge, and high knockback only applies at very low health, making combos more consistent and lethal. Health bars can melt away off a few good hits and 8-way digital movement makes it easier to read trajectories, punishing predictable moves. 

To counterbalance this, each character has a suite of safe normal attacks, a low damage, long range projectile and fast, relatively safe air dodges. Coming from other platform fighters, it can take a while to come to grips with how aggressively you can use air dodges. Air dodges are both an offensive and defensive tool, and often work as  a better recovery option that most up specials. Using these frequently helps get around and keep you safe, and results in each player dancing in and out of range, fishing for quick pokes to start combos and tossing projectiles to create openings from afar. 

These universal projectile and movement options make each stage feel viable, and alongside its diverse cast, lend a lot of variety to the game. In most platform fighters, differences between movement and recovery options often force players to fight on flat stages to keep competition fair. Here air dashes mean everyone can get back in with a few smart moves, and universal projectiles allow close range characters to open up zoners and close the distance. 

Every character feels viable, which is great since the roster has a lot to explore. Some early characters still feel out of place, but more recent additions have rounded off the roster and create interesting dynamics to play with. A lot of characters will feel…let’s just say, familiar, but translating 2D fighter archetypes to a platform fighter brings some wrinkles with it. Every wonder what a sumo wrestler could do with both the hundred hand slap AND a fireball? Or how Street Fighter III’s Elena might translate to a platform fighter? Roof Rage has answers to those questions, and they’re not always the obvious ones you might expect. 

Nawi, that aforementioned Elena style capoeirista, turned out to be one of my favorite characters. Her dancing kicks and sliding ground attacks let her threaten opponents on the ground, but what makes her real fun is her air moves, which launch her across the stage and allow you to pin down opponents as they try to escape. Likewise, Hoon, Roof Rage’s Korean analogue for Ryu, gets a little wild. Combos saw me chaining two forward kicks into a shoryuken, then following it with a skybound tatsumaki to send opponents barreling into the air. 

Seeing familiar moves and archetypes recontextualized somehow only makes Roof Rage feel even wilder. I could feel my built in assumptions crumbling as explored the cast, and the growing satisfaction as I figured out new ways to string their movesets together. It draws upon the familiar for inspiration, but makes them its own. 

Battles in Roof Rage are tense showdowns of feints and narrow misses, exploding into big damage and desperate recoveries when opponents finally connect. It translates the lethality of its martial arts inspirations, and channels the spirit of traditional fighters. Roof Rage has brought something fresh and distinct to the genre, and its refinements over the past year have created a more coherent argument for its vision. If you have any love for fighting games, Roof Rage deserves your attention.