Isometric beat ’em up Midnight Fight Express puts players in the shoes of Babyface, a former criminal lured back to his old life by a mysterious drone. It’s hard enough to successfully fight one’s way across the city and prevent the underworld from taking power; trying to achieve S ranks on each stage is even tougher, as it will demand the very best from the player. Here are some essential tips for how to get S rank in Midnight Fight Express.
Study The Stage
Preparation is everything in Midnight Fight Express. While this may seem counterintuitive, given that the gameplay is a beat ’em up about taking down a swarm of goons as quickly and aggressively as possible, the best players know that having intel on enemies and stages is key for earning S ranks. Though it’s possible to stumble one’s way to an S rank, there’s only one way to reliably earn such a ranking.
Before the player even thinks of going for S, they should play through their desired stage, repeatedly if necessary. Despite its isometric perspective, Midnight Fight Express borrows heavily from sidescrolling beat ’em ups, so the player should pursue S rank here with the same mentality they would use for those games. With goons, traps, and level layouts to contend with, knowing what is coming next is vital if the player is going to finish each stage quickly and efficiently. Foreknowledge allows the player to have a plan (and combo) in place to deal with whatever the game has to throw at them. Learn the levels to make the climb to S rank much easier.
Combos, Survival, And Other Factors
Perhaps the biggest factor in determining one’s ranking is combos, a feature vital to all the best fighting games. The longer the combo chain the player can pull off, the better their ranking is going to be when they are graded. On the player’s first run through the game, this is a major problem, because Babyface doesn’t begin the game with every move unlocked.
As it is in many underrated fighting games, the player will need to build not only their own skill but also their character’s move set over time. Because the player won’t be able to fluidly switch between different moves, they won’t be able to extend their combos for as long or introduce as much variety, which means S rank will lurk just out of reach. A player who has completed all 40 stages in the game will not only have fully unlocked their Skill Tree and thus have access to every move, they will also have familiarized themselves with the layout, pacing, and challenges of every level.
Combo length and variety are the keys to S rank. While spamming low-kick may win players matches in some fighting games, it won’t get them any closer to S rank in Midnight Fight Express. Mixing grabs, slams, parries, counters, different attacks, and even thrown items will maximize one’s combos and elevate one’s grade.
Death carries a stiff penalty, so repeated deaths will ensure that the player doesn’t get an S rank. Combo length, finish time, and attack variety all carry more weight during scoring, however, so just because the player has died once doesn’t mean the run is over. Don’t give up after a single death. There might still be an S waiting on just the other side.
Midnight Fight Express is available now for PC.
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