As big of a manga series as Hunter x Hunter is, it’s surprising that it’s never had a game released internationally, until now. Hunter x Hunter: Nen x Impact is not only the first HxH game to release worldwide, but it’s also a fighting game that has had a great deal of excitement building around it ever since its initial announcement in January 2024. With beloved fighting game developer Eighting at the helm, fans had a lot of high expectations as well.
This leads us to the main question: Does this new fighter check all the essential boxes of a modern fighting game? For starters, Nen x Impact features traditional offline modes such as arcade, survival, 1v1 battles, and many others. While this all sounds pretty standard on paper, there are a couple of issues with these modes in Nen x Impact that are very jarring.
Hunter x Hunter: Nen x Impact Has Issues With Free Battle and Story Modes
In the “Free Battle” mode, there’s no option to have the computers fight against each other. This may not be a big deal for some of you, but for others, it is. In fighting games, it’s always cool to see computers fighting against each other at the highest difficulty levels. You could use this as an opportunity to learn combos for your characters, bet on who wins with your friends, and much more. Again, it might seem like a minor issue for some of you, but when other modern fighting games have this feature, there’s no reason for this game not to.
There’s also a story mode within the game. It starts as a tutorial that teaches you the control scheme, then proceeds to cover snippets of some of the Hunter x Hunter arcs from the 2011 anime. To be quite honest, it’s not an amazing experience. Not only is it essentially just screenshots with occasional fights, but the story doesn’t progress beyond where the manga is currently at. For Hunter x Hunter fans looking for a great story mode, Nen x Impact is a disappointment in this area. Even for players who’ve never touched a fighting game before, this will feel like a waste of your time. But hey, if you’re new to Hunter x Hunter, maybe this is a decent way of getting the absolute basics of the story.
Odd Combo Trials
However, one of the more mind-boggling things about this game is the combo trials. In fighting games, combo trials teach you basic combos for each character. This is a great way to learn characters’ fundamental combo structures so that you can brainstorm ways you can expand upon them in training mode. In Nen x Impact though, the combo trials take a very weird approach. They basically tell you to do a random combo for a certain amount of damage with no assistance aside from a demonstration video.
The issue I have with this is that if a new player were experiencing this for the first time, they wouldn’t have the notations that indicate how to perform the combo in the demonstration. Even then, constantly going back to the demonstration is uncomfortable, and it’s tedious to try to come up with some random combo. I don’t understand why the developers didn’t just do the combo trials in the usual way. In a game like Nen x Impact where combos are a very integral part of play, you want to adopt the best way of teaching new players how to do them.
The Training Mode Is Pretty Good, Though!
The training mode is pretty alright, though! You can record, replay, and program the dummy to perform various actions, even after blocking or getting hit by something. You can also easily switch characters during training mode rather than having to go back to character select. There’s enough here in the training mode to where you can learn the game, develop powerful setups, and do so much more. The only things this mode is missing are a hitbox and a frame data viewer. Being able to see how advantageous your moves are, where you can get hit, and where you can hit the opponent is extremely important in fighting games. Hopefully, this is something that the developers can implement later on in the game’s life.
An Almost Perfect Online Experience
You can play in online ranked matches, player matches, and lobbies. In particular, online lobbies can be filled with nine people, so you can gather a bunch of friends around and have some fun. Players can also customize settings, such as what type of opponents they want to fight against in ranked and what stages and songs they want to play. And of course, you can check out the leaderboards to see who some of the top players are and where your ranking is.
However, the online experience when playing matches can be very annoying. While the game does feature rollback netcode, some matches can still feel subpar. Thankfully, you can see the opponent’s connection quality before the match starts. The developers are currently working on more fixes for the online experience, so stay tuned for that.
Additionally, this game does not support cross-play, meaning you can’t play with others on different gaming platforms. Recent fighting games have made this a standard for the genre, so not seeing it here is disappointing. Cross-play helps players find more people for online matchmaking if their own platform has a low player count. So if any developer is reading this review, please keep this in mind.
Extremely Fun Gameplay, But It Won’t Be Everyone’s Cup of Tea
In terms of gameplay, Nen x Impact is a 3v3 fighter similar to Dragon Ball FighterZ and the Marvel vs Capcom games. You can call assists to help fight, use active tag to switch into any of your assists at any time, use lots of movement, and do crazy combos. In particular, this game has the most powerful autocombos I’ve ever seen. They do tons of damage and end with a super attack, making them pretty optimal. This seems to be intended by the developers because they want new players to just come in and quickly do effective combos, which I personally think is fine.
However, the real issue with this game lies in the control scheme. Nen x Impact is an 8-button fighter, with each button performing a unique action. A good number of fighting game players are using hitboxes or arcade sticks to play these games, and eight buttons are just way too much for them. A 6-button fighter is way easier on the hands and fingers, whereas an 8-button fighter is more for pad players, since you have more control of all the buttons on a pad. This game was definitely designed for players who use PlayStation, Xbox, and Nintendo Switch controllers, so it’s not necessarily ideal for arcade sticks and hitboxes.
This isn’t the only thing that Nen x Impact gets wrong with the gameplay, as it also has only easy-input controls. You sadly can’t do motion inputs to execute special moves in the game, and can only do easy inputs. This completely rejects players who prefer to use motion inputs to perform their special moves, and it could potentially alienate players who prefer traditional controls. It made me wonder why this game has both easy and motion inputs as selectable options. Granblue Fantasy Versus, Street Fighter 6, and Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves have these features, after all.
The Honest Truth About Hunter x Hunter: Nen x Impact
I think this game is really an unfortunate case. It’s the first Hunter x Hunter game to release worldwide, the gameplay is honestly fun, and the overall presentation isn’t bad. The music slaps and is apparently done by SuperSweep, the composers behind multiple Tetris games, the Street Fighter EX series, and the Megaman Battle Network titles. The roster could’ve used a few more characters, but I feel like characters are unique enough that it works.
However, this game fails to hit the right spots that modern fighting games require. No cross-play, a bad control scheme, no motion inputs, and lackluster offline content are significant drawbacks. On top of that, you have to pay $60-$70 for this game, which is asking for a lot. I hope the developers can continue to support this game and fix it, as there’s massive potential here. I’d hate for it to turn out like DNF Duel, which no longer receives support. In an age where fighting games are getting more popular, this genre deserves better.
Disclaimer: Arc System Works provided a PlayStation 5 copy of Hunter x Hunter: Nen x Impact for review purposes.
