While I’ve been playing fighting games since the very beginning, I’ve always considered myself to be more of a casual fan overall. Though I’ve gravitated more to some series and titles than others, I’ve usually felt that with a little time and repetition I can at least get to play passably in almost any series. With indie fighters it has been interesting to see how many of them, even while playing quite differently from one another, have at least tapped into that same sort of space with their flow and movesets. Even doing their own thing their own way, they typically have at least felt familiar. Pocket Bravery is one of the first I’ve encountered that hasn’t quite felt that way though, and honestly it has thrown me a bit.

Starting with what it does well, while its roster of fighters may not be all that extensive, I’ll at least credit it with throwing a whole lot of modes and general content at you. There’s a Story Mode that absolutely commits to doing its best to deliver just that. Though it’s admirable that it goes for depth, the fact that none of these characters are known quantities does make it seem like too great an investment for the likely return for the average player. Then there are the modes you’d expect, including classic Arcade, Versus, and Online options (though we’ve seen the history of how indie games have fared with online play within mere weeks of release too many times to count). Then there are some value-added modes, including a Tutorial (that you’ll likely need), a Training mode that will get down to some deep elements including keyframes and advanced concepts higher-end players tend to get into, and a few other goodies for challenging yourself once you feel you’re ready.

While I don’t question the degree of effort the developers made to give the game everything they could, there are absolutely some concerns I had though. As mentioned, the Story mode feels weirdly indulgent, doesn’t do a particularly great job of preparing you to be successful trying to get through it, and honestly takes a lot of time to tell a pretty tropey tale that doesn’t feel terribly original in the end. Then there’s the oddity of the controls, at least in my mind, and the fact that as often as I’m able to get a feel for fighting games and get into a flow, that just wasn’t happening for me here. In just the Tutorial and Training modes I found myself struggling to pull off the moves it wanted me to, whether it was with the joystick or the D-Pad, and in my mind having played so many other titles without issue that was really confusing and a bit weird. Granted, I was happy with the game’s combos that you could get into pretty easily, and that worked well, but when you struggle to pull off the big moves that’s a real problem. Sure, you can opt for the simplified controls, but even with those having more success, the feel just didn’t really do it for me. Now, it’s happened for me with other very popular fighters before that other people have loved, but if we’re going with full disclosure I just couldn’t get into a groove with Pocket Bravery, no matter how hard I tried… and that’s a shame, because it’s clear that the effort was put in to make something good, it just didn’t quite work for me.