Battle High 2

Overview

A mysterious force has been causing illness within select students and stripping them of their powers. Each of the students has his or her own agenda during these times of turmoil. Some are investigating the power disruption. Some seek the source so that they can be normal again. Others have completely other scores to settle and others just want to watch the world burn.

The game's biggest change, outside of the new characters, is the presence of a second super move for each character, one that provides a unique status, such as invisibility or magnetism, or a power-up.

Gameplay

Keeping in with its theme of being simple to pick up and play, Battle High 2 does not feature too many conventions that are new to the fighting game genre. However, it has quite a bit more than the simple basics.

Health Bar

This should be the most well-known convention to those who have played fighting games, or most any other game, before. As a fighter is struck or thrown, his or her Health Bar is whittled away; defeat comes when that bar is empty.

Wins

Defeating one's opponent will fill in one of the notches located beneath the Health Bar. Two of these conclude the match.

Elemental Bar

The real tide-turner in any Battle High 2 match. Keeping an eye on one's Elemental Bar and knowing when to use it is a major key to the game. The Elemental Bar comes in sections, and can be used to activate Elemental Supers, Elemental Overdrives, Rush Cancels, and Air Dashes.

Elements

Each of the fighters represents an element; most elements have more than one character. To keep the combat more balanced, the elements do not factor in to a Pokémon-style rock/paper/scissors scheme. Each character wields their element differently, so for example, no two Wind Elementals fight the same, nor does any other Elemental wield their powers similarly to a Wind Elemental. The Elements are broken down as follows:

Earth: Jiro, Kazuo

Fire: Heavyweight, Michelle, Lucio

Water: Khai, Mai, Beat

Lightning: Bryan, Ryken, Jada

Wind: Arvid, Shinji, Klein

Psychic: Principal

Combat

In addition to standard movement and attacks, Battle High 2 offers the following to do battle with:

Elemental Specials: Special moves, bread and butter of any fighting game (along with combos). No two characters have similar moves, and they all have their advantages and disadvantages, some with situational use and some with flexible uses. Like standard moves, using them will increase the Elemental Bar.

Elemental Supers: More powerful than Elemental Specials. These use the Elemental Bar and vary from character to character. Some characters have massive projectiles, some have auto-combos, and more.

Elemental Overdrives: This sort of technique is new to Battle High 2. Each character has a move that they can use to effect the match or themselves in different ways. Some characters have a simple power-up, such as a speed, defense, or power increase, but others, such as Shinji and Ryken, are able to become invisible, or pull the opponent toward him, respectively.

Rush Cancel: Almost any attack, from standard attacks, to Elemental Specials and Supers, can be canceled out of with a dash. This saps a bit of the Elemental Bar, but is extremely handy in keeping one's opponent guessing, or to cancel out of a risky movement.

Air Dash: Like Rush Cancels, these take a bit of the Elemental Bar and enable the player additional movement whilst airborne.

New Characters

Jada's powers developed at a young age, manifesting as electricity control. However, whilst showing off to some friends, she accidentally blinded herself. Over time, she began to realize everything she took for granted and grew more humble. Now, she acts as the moral compass of San Bruno High, hoping to help her classmates find their true paths in life.

Kazuo was first mentioned in Shinji and Jiro's stories in Battle High: San Bruno. Kazuo has earth powers like his twin Jiro, unlike their parents and Shinji, who are air elementals. He was convinced that his parents favored Shinji most, and grew jealous, acting out against his brother and parents. The Ozawas sent him off to a boarding school for elementals, where he remained for over a decade. His grudge against Shinji and his parents only festered in that place, and when he was able to escape, he went straight for San Bruno High, where he knew his siblings attended.

Klein is from Germany, the grandson of a famous magician, whose top hat he wears. Despite being very fond of his kindly ancestor, Klein is undoubtedly an evil boy. He (figuratively) worships chaos and anarchy, using everything he can, including magic and wind powers, to ruin everybody's lives. In short, Klein is the very definition of a troll.

Michelle appeared in an NPC regard in Battle High: San Bruno, in Shinji, Jiro, and Arvid's story scenes. An immigrant from South Africa, Michelle started dating Shinji. During a fight between Shinji and Jiro over her, Michelle was severely injured. In order to save her life, she needed a blood transfusion, which came from a fire elemental. Michelle was granted pyrokinesis as a result, and also awoke to find her psyche shattered. Battling a menacing personality within her own mind, Michelle tries to find a way to rid herself of her powers and "other self". The dark Michelle, however, has other plans - revenge on the Ozawa brothers.

San Bruno High's newly elected Principal is secretly an ex-geneticist who was laughed out of his profession when he declared his intention to create a new "Psychic" element. He became more desperate and power-hungry, obsessing over finding this power and eventually, this grew into a desire to be the most powerful elemental in the world. After his obsession cost him not only his job, but his marriage (and many would say, his sanity), he began going under the name of Frederick Regisworth, worming his way into the world of education so that he might be able to tap into the youthful elemental powers of the students and forge his ultimate power.

DLC Characters

Technically not a DLC character at first, but introduced initially as an exclusive character to the Xbox One version (Battle High 2 A+) and added to other installments later, Lucio is an Italian-American student whose mother is gravely ill. He takes up work as a janitor at the school so that he can help pay for her medical bills, and unfortunately it causes others to assume that he dropped out - Khai tries to use him as the example. of someone who doesn't need to be in school any longer, whereas Mai is angry and thinks that Lucio is a bad influence. Lucio fights with a kickboxing style and also is a fire elemental with solar-themed moves.

The mysterious Beat is a masked wrestler who challenges other students around the school and wields water powers. They only started showing up after the illness that was taking away powers, leading some to believe Beat was responsible. Beat is a retooled version of Michael, who appeared in the now non-canon Battle High: Team-Up.

Characters