In-Depth Character Discussion: Max

*Original post by Don Vecta.

As promised, I'd try to write a guide for Max since I was hearing some comments that he sucks or he is awesome, etc. so i decided to Encyclopedia-Brown this bitch and well, here's some of the things I found. I'll be posting movelist, overview, abusable moves, weaknesses and maybe some enemy strategies. Also feel free to contribute and put your thoughts, especially if I'm posting something wrong.

So, first of all, MOVELIST. Copied from the movelist thread.

Max Thunder.

Normal attacks.

Rush combo - B B B B (Chop, Chop, Hook Punch, Hammer Smash) Hook punch has up to 4 hits depending on enemy hit box and range. Hammer Smash only combos on SOR3 Pause Delay)
Back attack - B + C (Mule Kick)
Special - A (Lariat) Invincible
Special 2 - forward + A (Dashing Tackle)

Jumping attacks.

Vertical jump attack - C then B (Aerial Hammer Smash)
Jump attack - forward + C then B (Drop Kick)
Diving attack - C then down + B (Flying Elbow).

Running attacks.

Blitz (0 - 1 star) - forward forward + B (Slide Kick) Knocks down early in animation, leaves standing if it hits later. Doing the late hit into an enemy getting up usually leads to a free grab or combo afterwards.
Blitz 2 (2 stars) - forward forward + B (Diving Tackle) Max is INVINCIBLE during this move. It can grab an enemy, which bypasses blocking characters. Depending where it hits, or if an enemy was already grabbed, it will just knock down an enemy for much less damage.
Blitz 3 (3 stars) - forward forward + B (Rushing Diving Tackle) Max does a multi-hit dash attack before doing a Diving Tackle. Max is NOT invincible during the dash, only once he is in the air.

Grab attacks (get close to an enemy).

Neutral Grab - Grab, B (Headlock) Max crushes the enemy for up to five hits, the last one knocking them down. He is vulnerable during this, however you can cancel with his lariat between hits.
Rush attack - Grab, hold forward + B B B (Knee, Knee, Headbutt)
Backwards throw - Grab, hold backwards B (Backdrop)
Jump throw - Grab, C then B (Air Throw) Max cannot vault, instead he can jump with and throw characters.
Backgrab throw - Grab from behind, B (German Suplex)
Backgrab jump throw - Grab from behind, C then B (Backbreaker)
Special Grab - Grab, X (Powerbomb) Uses meter.

Weapon special attacks.

Pipe/2x4 (NOT BAT) - forward forward + B (Jumping Smash) Has two hit frames, first does not knockdown and it's even possible to get both hits with the right spacing on some characters.
Sword/Katana - forward forward + B (Horizontal Slash)


Overview.

Max is certainly the slowest character of the whole roster and as implied as a trope, the strongest of them all. Now, the "slow" part it's only in walking and running movement, but even his running it's quite decent (picture CVS's Zangief with the running animation and you got it), he still can move quite fast all over the screen thanx to his pretty awesome blitz moves. His slide would make him cover 3/4 off the screen easily in less than a second, his cross chop tackle the same and his 3-star blitz runs through the whole screen.

Now, many people think Max relies *ONLY* on his power damaging grabs, which is a completely false statement, Max's whole moveset it's quite good in all senses possible and here I'll break it down why:

Rush combo: Even though it is slow, it has decent range, it is constant and few enemies can escape from the combo (compared with, for example, Adam's which is an escapeable rush combo on his last hit). Also, the damage input it's insane AND the hook punch has a huge range and hits multiple times. Come on, it's even possible to hit enemies from behind! Overall it could land from 5 to 6 hits, depending of the enemy position and placement.

Back attack. Hits twice, has decent range from behind and does good damage.

Dash Tackle. Very safe move and it's the nightmare of those block-happy enemies like the Muay Thais, the Ninjos, the Goldies and some bosses like Barbon, Shiva or Rudra, since even if it's blocked, the chip damage it's quite solid and sometimes in the attempt of countering attack you, they get hit by the shoulder. It is also a good running movement but of course you'll waste stock or life.

Flying drop kick. Great range and damage, good to dispose of some enemies from a mid distance to knock them down.

Diving flying elbow. While it's not as abusable as it was in SOR2, it's still a great move to land in enemies and grab them since it has decent range and even as a dive attack has good damage.

Blitz 1 Slide. Great start up move. Good to move fast over the screen. Safe from high attacks (can avoid Abadede's rushing clothesline) and has good priority. Excellent to reach enemies and grab them or rush combo them. Damage it's average but it's a very useful move.

Blitz 2 Cross chop tackle. IMO, the best move of his whole arsenal. Abusable to death, has invincibility frames, and the damage input it's insane. Can dispose of close enemies and grab a poor sap from an extra chunk of pain. Might be slightly vulnerable while standing up but timing it well and you could avoid being hit (probly doing a special afterwards if someone's reaching from behind?). Some usually tough bosses become sissy bitches with this move.

Blitz 3 Charging cross chop tackle. Honestly, not as hot as the second one. While it's a great move to move over the screen, it's precisely this feature that it's its biggest weakness. The charge hits the enemies but don't push them back enough to get the whole combo of charge/cross chop/grab tackle and at most the enemies would be left behind after the first or second hit of the cross chop, leaving Max whiffing the tackling dive. Now, while he's still on the tackling move he is invincible but, as mentioned above, he is tad vulnerable while standing up and the odds of getting an idiot retaliating from behind are a lot bigger than the Blitz 2 so tread with caution, it's not as abusable as the blitz 2 and it's a lot unsafer.

*update note for v5.0a: His Blitz-3 got improved a lot since the charge motion advance got slowed thus it's a lot more reliable and easier to make an enemy eat the whole set of attacks, including the grab tackle. Of course, don't make it too close or his tackle grab would whiff.


Why Max's grabs are so dangerous? Cuz he's a fucking wrestler! (Grabs overview and techniques).

Now definitely Max's damage party comes with his set of grabs. As mentioned above, it's not his only strong feature but definitely the most damaging of all of them (of course, if you wanna rely only in the grabs then you are fucked, considering his movement it's slow in walking and running, if you try to apply a Rudra's run and grab chances are you'd be busted up in the mug before u even get 3 feet from the enemy).

So with that in mind, you DO want to grab an enemy with huge energy bars.

But how to approach, considering his normal movement speed being so slow?

1) Blitz 1 slide. Do it calculating the position of your character and your enemy so you must hit the enemy AND standing up at two or three frames and then grab them. Positioning it's important, going too early and you won't reach the enemy to grab (you still can do a rush combo if you must, but you'll have some frames at disadvantage and the enemy might move or counter attack so be careful) or in the least worse case, knock him down with the last hit of the slide. Going too late and you might hit the enemy with the slide but then they might retaliate while u stand up.

2) Jump dive attack. Not as reliable as in SOR2 but still quite good. Big advantage is that if you run prior to the jump the range gets bigger and you can grab them easily. Big disadvantage is that enemies now move like if they had rockets up their asses so sometimes they'll move out of your way.

3) If Muhammad won't go to the mountain... Seriously, though, then let the enemies come to you. By backfiring the now hyperactivity of some enemies, some of them are in such a rush to move move move move move that in plenty of cases they'll end up asking you for a hug and then you can be happy to oblige. Try also to be on the move to, this works well if you are moving up and down and since they'll try to round you up to outflank you, odds are that you grab them while they're trying to pass over you.


Now, which grabs to use?

Backdrop Suplex. (grab, back + B or grab from behind + B) Good to knock other enemies around, invincible while performing, rather quick recovery. If there's no immediate enemies around, land two knees if you can.

Air throw. (grab, C then B in mid-air) This is useful when there's few enemies around but you are not surrounded by them yet. Good to throw the mook to other bunch and do a bigger damage than the Backdrop. Same, before enemies surround you, do the two knees if you can. Avoid using it while surrounded cuz you might be stopped mid-air by an unwanted jab.

Neck choker. (grab then B neutrally) The most damaging grab of Max's arsenal, hands down. However, vulnerable while performing it, thus it's highly advisable to do it when you are one-on-one with an enemy with huge lifebar... like a boss or sub-boss. Needless, to say, land two knees before going for the choke so you can drain easily a x1 bar to the enemy.

Atomic Drop. (grab from behind, c then B in mid-air) This is the single hit grab with the highest damage input (the choker hits 5 times to get its full damage done). However, since Max can't vault enemies, it's a bit hard to get on an enemy's back (unless you are with an AI companion, which it's a lot easier to sneak behind an enemy's back). But if you THEN DO IT! It's gonna have the end of his spine whacked like if you have stuck a phone pole all over its ass! Now careful, avoid to use it while surrounded cuz you'd be stopped mid-air by a silly jab (same as the air throw).


OMFG! He has a plank! Run for your life! (Weapons overview).

Seriously, Max's not only heavily dangerous unarmed, but he's also quite capable and mean with a weapon... especially bats/pipes/planks/swords. The other weapons he's okay but the swinging type it's certainly his forte and considering that it's quite easy to find enemies bringing pipes and bats to the fray then you are up for a groove!

Why is he so awesome with a swinging weapon?

1) CUZ HE CAN HIT MOOKS FROM BEHIND WITH IT! If that's not awesome enough then I dunno what else is. Now if you got a sword the damage it's huge and you can get rid of pesky, sneaky bastards who want to hit you from behind like the SOR1 Galsias or the dam troll ninjas. You can go swing happy and you'd be almost invulnerable!

2) Reach and speed. The reach of the weapon it's quite good and the swing speed it's also pretty good. Now add the hit from behind property and you get an almost invincible move.

3) Planks/pipes special move. Might not be as safe as the normal swing but the damage it's horrible, especially if u hit twice with it.

I seriously had no idea that Max had a powerbomb until I read this a few weeks ago. It's not quite as effective as it should be, but man, is it ever satisfying to pull off. Looks awesome haha. Max is a beast.

Must be my favourite move in the game. So satisfying.

I agree with Zarzak though, It should have been more powerful.

It's still quite strong, actually. It's not Atomic Drop level painful but it's still quite damaging alright. Drops a quite handsome chunk of energy if you front grabbed someone. If you don't have stock then the air throw is still good in terms of damage, but the suplex it's better to clear out enemies surrounding you.

Not sure it's worth the price. It's good to have a full bar to f+A through enemies just after a suplex or neutral A after a drop. I mostly use it as a boss finisher, just for the looks of it.

Emthree wrote:Not sure it's worth the price. It's good to have a full bar to f+A through enemies just after a suplex or neutral A after a drop. I mostly use it as a boss finisher, just for the looks of it.

And this is priceless against Abadede.

Don Vecta wrote:

Emthree wrote:Not sure it's worth the price. It's good to have a full bar to f+A through enemies just after a suplex or neutral A after a drop. I mostly use it as a boss finisher, just for the looks of it.

And this is priceless against Abadede.

"- No, gwaaaaargh YOU, you son of a ... !"

When I started Streets of Raging in the 90s, I tried out Adam, because he had cool cowboy boots. He was slow however, so I decided to pick Axel after a few plays. Which 9 years old boy would pick the girl anyway? Girls are girly! They're for GIRLS!

Growing up, I of course looked past by pre-pubescent sexism, and found out Blaze, as many other characters from other games, was great to play as, but I digress.

I enjoyed playing as Axel. He was strong and fast, and I didnt mind his low jumping height. I played him exclusively for years. Then SOR 2 came along. I of course picked Axel again. His Grand Uppercut fucked shit up, and he was easy to play as. I was reluctant to try Max. I read he was slow and hard to use, and I initially moved away from Adam due to his walking speed. I tried anyways.

Holy shit. Who cares if he walks slow? Max is awesome. He destroys anything in his path, or BEHIND his path, and he can slide across the screen like crazy. SORR only made him better, as he can now run, and his 2 Stars Blitz is the best move in the entire game.

Nowadays, I can get comfortable with any kind of characters in most games. Quicksters, bruisers, magic users, males, females, transvestites... you name it.

But if I'm playing Streets of Rage, you better believe I'm kicking butts with the Hulking wrestler, and I'm never getting sick of it.

I mentioned this before in the old forums but i'll mention it again:

Remember those annoying drunk drivers that keep regenerating over and over again with their fucking bottle? The only way known to make them get rid of it it's by being in a long distance with them and hoping they'd throw it at you... until now.

Max's Blitz 2 and 3 attack can make those fuckers drop the bottle and put them in a sober state until you put them in a corpse state afterwards! Obviously you must catch them with the grab to make them lose their bottle.

Also, regarding the goodness of Blitz-2, I love to use it to dodge not only bullets, but freight events (they fall but won't crush you), train events (pass through them), explosions and fire!

Okay, on other notes, we all know (or at least the people who play Max deeply) that his slide it's the best offensive and defensive maneuver, defensive cuz also allows us to evade several dangers such as incoming carts, explosions, etc. Among these dangers besides the listed, are the typical flying attacks suck as Haku's, Nora's and Electra's flying kicks, Ninjo's sword attack, Galsia-3 elbow drop, the works.

Passing below them also allow you to punish them with either a blitz-2, an Thunder Tackle or run and grab for an Atomic Drop, you usually recover faster than then but check your distance and the recovery time of the enemy attack. For instance, a Nora's flying kick takes a lot longer to recover to it's easy to quickly run, grab her from behind and mark your knee in her arse while a Ninja sword attack recovers faster so a Blitz-2 it's lot more feasible and still damaging enough to punish them.

Another note of his Atomic Drop. While his hitbox it's not that big when you're performing one, the damage you inflict to some bystander around it (or below it) it's as big as the one you're doing to the one you're grabbing. Which means, time this against those pesky Signals who go slide happy and end right below you while you're shoving your knee to someone else's ass. Both will get a huge chunk of damage.

Most damaging combo of his? Elbow -> Chop -> Chop -> Close Right Hand ->Grab -> Knee -> Knee -> Bear Choke (until 4th hit) -> cancel into Thunder Tackle = Mr. X (watching the action on his monitors): "F*** THAT! No city is worth it, I quit." Extremely painful if you use SOR3 pause delay.

Okay, did I say he's ungodly powerful with a Pipe/Plank? Well, as ungodly as his two-hit combo of his f f B can be: perform f f B on a wake up enemy that doesn't have invincibility wake up as you cross him up, time it correctly that the upper swing gets the mook almost in the same position as you are and then the downward slam will finish him off. 60% off from a full lifebar guaranteed!

Glad to see another Max enthusiast. I was only a lurker in the other forum, and I never saw that one post.

Besides being invincible for the duration of it, his Blitz 2 is also the best looking move to dramatically jump away from explosions. Or ON explosions without suffering any damage, just for the hell of it.

^ Heh, indeed!
Oh, another note of the plank special: the shockwave on the ground last like 3 frames after the plank slam and still inflicts serious damage. This is great for enemies on the wake or when they approach carelessly from the front.

While his hitbox it's not that big when you're performing one, the damage you inflict to some bystander around it (or below it) it's as big as the one you're doing to the one you're grabbing

Did not know that, awesome.

I like how if you preform his slide for a far away it doesn't knowck down and you can connect it into a combo or a grab. Also the tackle is just damn fun to use.

In my opinion, the second best character would be either SOR 1's Axel or Blaze, and plenty others are very good too. I only find Zan to be really boring to play as.

But Max not only has appeal, but top-tier damage imput and versatility. We should do a topic about what character is objectively the best to play as. I say Max has a decent shot to make the top 3.

Crash Dummie wrote:I only find Zan to be really boring to play as.

lol, you serious? Zan is actually rather fun to play with! Once I used to think the same but man, really, when you learn how to use him he's actually a pretty fun character if you use most of his stuff correctly. But that can be discussed in his thread instead.

Spoiler:

Check the difference. One is after back throw, one is after atomic drop.
But in versus mode they take the same damage.
v5.0a.

Two tips for Max.

Although he is my favourite, he is a big slow bastard.

First, when initiating a combo, there is a large delay from the second to the third hit. Use the time after the second hit to double tap dash forward to grab the enemy. Squidgy stains will follow.

Second, Max's standing grab that hits for five with huge damage.
As soon as the fourth as hit, start tapping forward and special. You will release the enemy and hit them for greater damage from the special.
In essence you are cancelling the last hit of the grab in favour of his forward roll.

Enjoy playing with Max, just one problem:
can't seem to utilize sloppy piledriver / powerbomb?

Using a typing keyboard, THINK I'm playing v5.0?

Definitely an order of magnitude superior to Double Dragon and such.

Marky Dissod wrote:Enjoy playing with Max, just one problem:
can't seem to utilize sloppy piledriver / powerbomb?

Using a typing keyboard, THINK I'm playing v5.0?

Definitely an order of magnitude superior to Double Dragon and such.

Press X when you've grabbed someone from their back.

Saven wrote:

Marky Dissod wrote:Enjoy playing with Max, just one problem:
can't seem to utilize sloppy piledriver / powerbomb?

Using a typing keyboard, THINK I'm playing v5.0?

Definitely an order of magnitude superior to Double Dragon and such.

Press X when you've grabbed someone from their back.

isn't it from their front?

I don't want to be an *ss but this is in the very first message:

Special Grab - Grab, X (Powerbomb) Uses meter.

Mr.Din wrote:

Saven wrote:

Marky Dissod wrote:Enjoy playing with Max, just one problem:
can't seem to utilize sloppy piledriver / powerbomb?

Using a typing keyboard, THINK I'm playing v5.0?

Definitely an order of magnitude superior to Double Dragon and such.

Press X when you've grabbed someone from their back.

isn't it from their front?

Yeah from the front. My bad.