Lets be serious here, Samurai stopped being a competitive game the seconds they changed the mechanic from SSII to SSIII and beyond.



Samurai 2 was the perfect 2D sword fighting game, and it was my first introduction to what Footsies and zoning was, many people may have not played this game back then, so allow me to give you a breakdown on what was one of the most competitive fighters considered Triple A games in Angola along side with Mortal Kombat, Street Fighter and King of Fighters.





Samurai 2 had every returning char from the first series, and as its precedent, the game was based around what the title stands for, SWORDS!



You read right, the most dominant aspect of the game were your swords, every character had a light, medium and strong sword moves, light, medium and strong Kick moves, and special moves were all affected by strength on how you did them.



The slash mechanic:



Light slash were fast but short range aside from very few, safe on block very fast recovery on whiff, but very small damage.

Although light swords (A) were considered safe on whiff, you timed your slash in anticipation of them recovering from a fast slash you could still catch them on recovery.



medium slash, were most of the time thrust by some, but as any slash, they were safe long reaching in some cases longer than strong slash, and did 3 times the damage a light slash would do, they took more time to come out, but still safe on block.



Strong Slash were scary, they took longer on startup, but in many cases once its out it goes fast in animation, it used to cover a much bigger range and as any other basic slash it was safe on block, however very unsafe if whiffs, they did 4 times the damage a medium slash would do, and with the power meter at max 1 slash could double the damage output immediately and put character right into the stun depending of the character as well.



No basic slash did chip damage either so you swing around your swords as primary tools.



Rage meter: Samurai 2 had a power meter, which would fill as the character took damage making the character turn red as it fills, when filled, a special command would appear on the power meter indicating that the character power move was ready to be used, it was a comeback factor mechanic, with some perks.



When filled it would trigger an animation of the character manifesting his rage (japanese words) which had invincibility frames, any hit done by the character would double in damage, and of course the access to the power move, which could be used until the meter depletes itself after a while, or if the power move connects breaking the opponent's sword.



You could also save rage triggering invincibility frames by canceling the animation with running, giving you only an invincible throw attempt against your opponent.



Aditional basic mechanics

You could prone avoiding mid traveling projectiles or swords by pressing Down, hold Down really fast

You could roll with invincibility frames either forward or backwards, by bressing df twice or db twice.

you could hop over low attacks and projectiles by pressing BC (2+3) either backwards or fowards.



Special moves

Special moves did chip in the game, they were projectiles which were slower in startup mostly in general aside from some zoning characters, DPs and teleports as well.

The game also had some character with super secret OP moves.



Sword deflect (just guard mechanic)

You could deflect swords by timing your guard 1f exactly at the time of impact with the opponent's sword, looks stupid right? It wasn't that easy to do, specially on a game where a strong slash deals nearly 50% damage would you risk your life trying to deflect a very fast slash? lol.



Sword break/ Sword Disarm

You can break your opponent's sword by landing a power on them, the sword breaks into small pieces and they become swordless for a while, the refree a few seconds later will throw another sword at some random place on screen where the opponent can pick it up.



You can disarm your opponent's sword during slash trades, when two slashes trade in hit, the game goes into a sword clash and both character starts to measure their strength and a mini-game is triggered, who ever presses more buttons in less time keeps his sword, sometimes when the number is the same, both character can keep their sword or both are disarmed.



Swordless mechanic

When you're swordless you lose all your sword based moves (you don't say "doge") in some cases you can't even use projectiles, but you gain a aikido move which can grab swords, this is way too OP tho, so ppl let the opponent pick the swords if disarmed.



Those made the game pretty great, although there were zoning characters, grapplers, the game was all about footsies which was pretty fun to those who never tried i would advice to try it out, here is some of my favorite chars from this SS2 game.



Haohmaru

A perfectly balanced Samurai character, he is practially Ryu in SF he is also the main protagonist, he has a short range light, a mid range mid slash, and one of the best strong slashes in the game either standing or airbone, a projectile which can't be used for zoning constantly, very strong DP, a special move that is safe and does chip and can be abused, can deflect projectiles and has a 80% damage secret move, however Haomaru has some flaws, his AA is very weak against some characters and he relies strongly on fundamentals, being this balanced he loses to the most broken chars in the game easily on the tier list he is very high tier. Power move covers his entire body while doing a strong slash, can be used for chip or AA



Galford

A ninja who is aided by a female dog (poppy), galford has horrible sword normals, being his best one his strong jump slash or his medium slash on the ground, but in compensation, he has projectiles with fast recovery, very fast running and a SPD which can come out while he is running, galford also has air throws, can escape stun with substituiton technique, however it sucks, and his secret move makes him full invincible, however you can see him because the dog follows him around.



Galford can use poppy as projectiles in two ways: with punch buttons poppy goes out for a tackle once you press the button, the distance is defined by the strength of it, and the kick version, the dog would only go running to bite you after galford is done giving the order coming out a few frames later, the D version was an anti-air, since the dog would disappear and track with a stomp hitting people trying to jump him over. Power move sucks, its pretty slow



Galford also can throw electric Kunais and can teleport to confuse his opponents, his kawarimi always comes from above which is easily seable due the wood he leaves on screen.



Hanzo Hattori

A perfect version of galford and a more serious one, Hanzo is Galford on crack, athough he doesn't share the same projectiles, Hanzo can fire shurikens while in air, and bouncing bombs while on ground which are harder to avoid due its speed, he also has SPDs which does more damage than galford's, the same horrible normals, but doesn't have a dog to give off his position, so when he goes invisible, its on, his kawarimi move will always come from the ground, he also can come from the air without the wood. His power move is one of the scariest in the game due being very dificult to see, besides Hanzo doesn't manifest himself while using, it just appears on screen and anti-airs



Genjuro Kibagami

Practically the counterpart of Haohmaru, but more vicious and violent, Genjuro also plays very different from Haomaru, being their only similarity that Genjuro also has a DP but its much garbo, he has Rekkas which can cross-up if blocked incorrectly, decent sword normals, although his stronger slash is much slower, it covers more range and does far more damage than any strong slash, genjuro with rage can be compared paul with rage in Tekken, a slash and a dream. Genjuro can zone, he has very fast recovery and fast traveling projectiles. Power move is a safe DP.



Jubei Yiagyu

The mid tier of the game and far easy to use, he has almost everything, a command reflect to prevent people to constantly use swords on him, as result he doesn't have a dp, he has very good sword normals ground or air, but his strong slash has very short range although it hits twice due the animation he doesn't do traditional damage as most of them, a projectile that hits low and force people to jump on him, has a sort of lightining slashes just as chun lightning legs, his dp motion is a tackle that his grounded, and his power move is an anti-air geyser projectile so he can't be jumped when his power is active.



Ukyo Tachibana

It wouldn't be a fighting game without the broken guy, Ukyo uses a chokutó (straight sword) and he is a strong footsie character, his medium slash hits very fast as a light sword, and whiff recovery is super good, and occupies a good space, very hard to hit him out of anything due this single move Ukyo is broken making a very dificult to space and hit character he can mash his mid with practically no repercussions, his strong slash isn't good unless he is crouching, because his strong slash hits low and is lighting fast, luckly its not safe. Ukyo also has a fast traveling sword move which puts him close for a throw, since throws in SSII can't be teched he can throw you almost anytime he does it when you block it, the throw button its also the mid slash button.



And Ukyo can zone, he has one of the best projectiles of the game, because it travels in arc, and its adjustable with the height performance and button strengths making different arcs and just not one to 3 patterns, his power move can crossup if you aren't expecting. all other his normals are bad except for the mid standing, crouch strong slash and Neutral jump strong slash which AAs practially anything. Needles to say, Top tier S+



Gen-An Shiranui

Among the broken chars of the game this is one of the most brokens, i can't even tell in between him and Ukyo who is worse, Gen-An has a very slow projectile, slow traveling but very big hitbox, has DP that are all unsafe since it travels weirdly as jubei's tackle, has a spear like scorpion which grants a free hit based on button strength, but what really broke the char are 2 things his normals and his crouch stance.

His light slash has a the same range as a medium so its safe and hard to hit him out, his neutral jump medium anti-airs when he frustrates you by poking you out with light slashes, and his crouching light kick its a slide that is just as the same as Johnny Cage's F3 on MK9 lol.



While in crouch stance Gen-An hides his hitbox, so he can't be grabbed out of it or opened, since there is no overheads in the game, greatests Ukyo players met their demise to this ugly mofo.



There are more characters, like charlotte who is also broke sealing the top 3 broke chars, nicotine, nakoruru who is on KOF 14 sieger, earthquake, cham cham and Kyoshiro to name a few.



When the sequel came out they switched everything that made Samurai a competitive game and it was never the same again, this mechanic was pretty good and needed some tweaking sadly SNK overlooked and completely changed the game, the SSIII system is the one that they maintained for the future game onward, but it sucked.



However, the sequel brought some interesting characters in to the series, sadly they have never experienced the SSII system, characters like, Kazuki, Sogetsu, Shizumaru, Rasetsumaru, Zankuro, Yoshitora, Rimururo, Suija, Enja and Yumeji Kurokochi would fit right into the SSII system which was more about cutting making it a true samurai game.