Second Draft

My main concern in this draft was to include more of me actually playing BlazBlue. Even if I went 0-2 at a tournament, it shows I'm interested in more than just playing at a friend's house. I also needed to focus on why Mu-12 bothered me specifically, instead of fanservice as a whole.

I was in a rush to send this to Richard so that I would have time to make changes, so I still had grammar errors. He also told me to cut the story down by 100 words. During this I changed the middle paragraphs to bring in other fighting-game characters as a comparison.   

I was fighting for my tournament life in a golf club 180 miles from home. I entered a BlazBlue: Continuum Shift tournament for fun, but I still didn’t want to lose in the first rounds. I spent my first match getting blown up as he exposed how little I trained for this event.(Use "my opponent" instead of "he.") Now to avoid elimination I had to win my next match. My opponent was using Tsubaki, a soldier girl wearing a body-covering uniform. My hopes rested on Mu-12, a half-naked robot girl. (This is a much better introduction than the one in the old piece.)

I did not expect to be playing as a half-naked robot girl when BlazBlue came out. Nor did I want to. But I never expected to enjoy playing BlazBlue at all either.  ("But I never expected to enjoy playing BlazBlue, either." No "at all.")

While I am a fighting game fan I never got into BlazBlue. The original game, BlazBlue: Calamity Trigger, is known for having a small but very unique roster, but none of the game’s 12 characters interested me. I only played BlazBlue when my friends wanted to, and I listened to the bonus music CD more than I played the actual game.

My hope in Continuum Shift rested in one of the game’s new characters being enjoyable. (Rested "on.") The arcade version originally came with two new characters: Tsubaki and the villainous Hazama. When Arc System Works ported the game to consoles it introduced Mu-12, a new final boss, but my excitement for her evaporated as soon as she was announced.

I’m disgusted with everything about Mu-12’s character design. I’m disgusted that Mu-12 was a sprite-swap of another character, only exposing as much flesh as ASW could get away with. (Get rid of "only.") I disgusted that she was an alternate version of another character, Noel Vermillion, essentially turning the game’s final boss into obnoxious fanservice. (Proofreading will probably fix this, but "I'm.") I’m even disgusted with what she IS wearing: What is with that tie and those shoulder pads?

To be fair, Mu-12 isn’t showing anything more than Dizzy, another ASW character from Guilty Gear, and there are alternate colors where a black leotard is “painted” over Mu’s body. There is a storytelling motif behind it: As Mu-12 Noel is a tool with no free will, so if the armor comes across as objectifying women, well at that point she is an object. (Remove the "as" after the colon. Either use an ellipsis after "objectifying women" or rephrase.)

Still, no one plays fighting games for their stories. Even then you would have to play the story motif straight, and the game doesn’t. (Comma after "Even then.") The DVD cover is Mu-12 with her back to the reader, showing her bare behind and smiling like she’s posing for a Revoltech statue. (I had to look-up Revoltech before I knew what you meant. Keep that in mind.) Fighting games at their best are about depth and self-improvement, but Mu-12’s design is the epitomie of shallowness and cynical marketing.  (Epitome is spelled wrong.)

I waited until my friends bought the game, and since  Tsubaki and Hazama didn’t grab my interest either I never got it myself. (Add a comma to each side of "either.") To play as Mu-12 you either have to buy an unlock code as DLC or complete BlazBlue’s hours-long text story mode, so I didn’t play as her until two months later. (Word order issue: "have to" should come before "either.") My friend who did unlocked her lived 40 miles away, and since isn’t every day I could play as Mu I decided to try her out. (Unlock. "Since it isn't..." Consider making this two sentences.)

While I hated Mu-12 the character, but Mu-12 the collection of attacks and hitboxes proved to be the Goldilocks I wanted. (Remove "While.") Mu-12’s main gimmick – the ability to summon little laser pods onto the field – could be used both to keep opponents away and or set up an offense. (Forward slash between "and or.") BlazBlue is very combo-heavy, and every player will eventually have to learn long attack strings to succeed. (Replace "will eventually have" with "eventually has" -- no need to complicate the tense.) However, Mu-12 had some decent normal attacks and defensive tricks so she wasn’t completely dependent on combos. (Comma after "tricks." Should this sentence be in present tense instead of past tense? (i.e. does she have that stuff independent of your experience, or was it unique to the situation?)) She reminded me of Rose, my favorite character from Street Fighter, and at least I wasn’t playing a chipmunk in a miniskirt.

After three close games the Tsubaki player defeated my purple-armored, black-leotard Mu-12. I ended up going the dreaded “two-and-out” but I thought I did well considering I had only a few days of actually liking BlazBlue. Later, I watched another Mu-12 player fight all the way to second place. The sprite design I could write a diatribe over, but the actual playing I want to commit to memory. 

As a long-time anime fan I know characters like Mu-12 come with the territory. (Comma after "fan.") In a behind-the-scenes video BlazBlue’s character designer said he did face objections to how revealing the armor is, though apparently not enough to change it. It’s easy to blame the “stupid masses” that buy into these kinds of portrayals of women, but some blame goes to the people who don’t like it but look the other way in order to play a good game. (Consider "must go" instead of "goes.")