Melty Blood/Getting Started

Hello, and welcome! With how information intensive Melty Blood can be, it's intimidating to get started. There's so many ways to begin, but what's good to learn? You might even be a total beginner to the competitive aspect of fighting games. What should I focus on? Where do I fight others? The heck is a button?

Getting the Game

The current, latest, and final iteration of this game is Actress Again Current Code v.1.07. With no signs of a revision in sight and a sequel reigniting interest in the franchise, anytime is the best time to jump into this title. But how do I go about getting the game?
There's two "main" versions. The first being the Community Version, and the second being the Steam one.

The community version can requested in one of the Melty Blood Discords:

1. Main Melty Blood Discord
2. Melty Blood Community Discord
3. South American Discord
4. Melty Brasil Discord
5. Melty Blood LAN Discord

But which one do I use? What are the differences?

Community Edition:

• Is an abandonware.
• Features rollback netcode. Basically means the netcode is superior, and is so good, it may even allow in some circumstances for stable, cross-continental play.
• This makes it THE go-to choice for playing people online.
• Causes no lag from spectating due to the differences in how it works between versions.
• Features exclusive options to training mode not present in the official release.
• Features content cut from the official release of Current Code.
• Is in many ways, more friendly towards controllers.
• Is somehow less intensive in terms of hardware requirement.
• Is offline tournament standard.
• Features every bit of content present in the original release. You get everything from the base game, and more.

Steam Version:

• Actually supports the developers.
• Full official translation of arcade mode and character win-quotes.

Comparing Negatives:

• Community Edition

No in-game V-Sync option, no sidebars with move lists, and if you use an analogue controller you'll have to change your deadzone since the default is a bit too high (don't worry, it's very easy to adjust when mapping the buttons)

• Steam Version

There are reports of online being glitched, even with proper, stable connections. Players that switch Moon Styles will quite regularly/often for no reason find themselves sticking to the Moon Style they were before the switch. This is a much more prevalent and massive issue, despite being the only one.

TL;DR: The Community Edition is the standard for netplay, training mode, cost convenience, among other benefits. Use this primarily. The Steam version is for offline tournaments and supporting the developers.

Reading and Writing Notation

Melty Blood players universally refer to what's understood as "numpad notation". Numpad notation is a convenient sort of "coding" to describe character actions in-game. It makes moves simple to reference, it helps to visualize/convey combo transcripts, and it even transcends language barriers. Due to the universal, undeniable efficiency of this notation, knowing how to utilize it will be key to your improvement.

NOTE: Numpad Notation is always under the assumption your character is on the left, facing right, no matter what. NEVER the opposite.

Directionals & Buttons

Imagine the typical numberpad like so:

7	8	9
4	5	6
1	2	3

The numbers here represent all directional arrows going outwards (5 being neutral, or in other words, doing nothing.)

⬁	⇧	⬀
⇦	N	⇨
⬃	⇩	⬂

Combine the two concepts and visualize it like this:

⬁ 7	8 ⇧	9 ⬀
⇦ 4	5 N	6 ⇨
⬃ 1	2 ⇩	3 ⬂

This is the directional aspect of numpad notation. Next we'll be talking about the buttons.

In Melty Blood, you have four main buttons: A, B, C, and D. A is your Light Attack, B is your Medium Attack, and C is your Strong Attack. D is your Shield, but it also has different uses based on what directionals you input. So 2B = Crouching Medium Attack, and that 5C = Standing Strong Attack, Please note that jumping attacks are not notated with 7, 8, or 9, but with j. So a Jumping Light Attack would be j.A. Directionals may occasionally play a part in jumping notation, if absolutely mandatory to include, but are usually not for the sake of compression. Provided what you've learned, you should now know that 236A = a quarter-circle forward Special Move's Light Attack variant. And that j.22B is a jumping down-down Special Move's Medium Attack variant.

And with that, you now understand how to conveniently read and write your own Normal and Special Moves!

Combo Transcripts

See the standard combo notation here.

Terminology

See Glossary.