Marvel vs Capcom 2/Getting Started

Getting the game

[Video for setting up] both the Dreamcast versions of the game on Fightcade2. For more information, check out the Versions page.

---

this is a port of my message that's pinned in #lounge in the mvc2 discord. i think it'll (and ive gotten feedback that it has) help people get a foundation for how the game works, & help them help themselves when it comes to finding resources or videos, experimenting in the lab with movement or character synergies, and otherwise teach more than what was here before

Marvel vs Capcom 2 has seen many releases. Preppy's excellent "How to Get and Play MvC2" article explains a lot of the details, but here's a summary in order of ease of access of the many versions out there:

• Marvel Vs. Capcom Fighting Collection: The official way to play MVC2 and any other Marvel Vs. Capcom titles. It adds a number of new goodies, most notably a training mode. Available for PC, Switch, Xbox One and Playstation 4, (which should work on Switch 2, Playstation 5 and Xbox Series). Newest and primary official way to play the game. If you don't want to cough up the cash, well...
• Fightcade 2: Fightcade is a helpful front-end to a few key emulators, including Flycast. You must add in Fightcade JSON so that Fightcade knows where to download ROMs from. It is important to note that as of June 2024, Fightcade updated the Flycast build used for games, including this one, so it may perform better now than in the past.
• Flycast GGPO: A new and popular way to play is emulating the NAOMI Arcade version on Flycast Dojo's GGPO test releases for rollback netcode (or just delay-based netcode also provided by Dojo). A guide to setting up Flycast Dojo's GGPO support is on Mizuumi.
• NullDC BEAR re-implements Flycast's GGPO support & offers alternative delay-based netplay using the older, discontinued NullDC emulator.
• PSN/XBLA ports: Great ports with native GGPO and widescreen support. These were delisted in December of 2013, but the PS3 version remains accessible through unofficial means. Consult's Preppy's article for a guide.
• RPCS3: Uses RPCS3, a PS3 emulator, and RPCN, it's PSN equivalent, to run the PSN port of the game online with rollback.
• Dreamcast/NAOMI: The best way to play the original release is through the Dreamcast home port or a NAOMI arcade board.
  • If you do manage to find a NAOMI arcade board Hagure has detailed how to configure settings for the best gameplay and unlock characters.
  • If you are using a Dreamcast, it's easiest to start with a version using Jed's hack to unlock all characters. If you don't have that, you can download a fully unlocked Save file and transfer that to your VMU. If you can't do that, your best option is to simply leave your Dreamcast running all the time in Training Mode and then exit and redeem the points every few hours and overnight until you're done.
• Xbox and PS2: These are largely inferior home ports owing to hardware limitations. You can emulate or play on real hardware but they're not representative of Marvel 2's de-facto gameplay. That said, they do offer some small advantages over the arcade and Dreamcast versions, such as having an in-game move list, so if you are willing to accept the shortcomings of these versions, they're still playable- they are simply not optimal.
  • The Xbox 360 is backwards compatible with the Xbox port of the game, but it has some issues with sprites glitching out if played in this way.

GAME GUIDES:

There are a _lot_ of guides to help people get started with the game, and there will only be more and more as time goes on after release. To get everyone started out, here are a few I think communicate a lot of the essentials across different skill levels.

INTRODUCTION: Maximilian Dood's introductory video. This video does a great job of explaining how the game works in motion and the concepts that you'll be exploring as you play!

1. Justin Wong's pre-launch tutorial, which introduces key mechanics and concepts with lots of visual examples.

2. Filth Gnasty's Beginner Guides (part 2) that go more in depth with the aspects of the game, for those interested in digging deeper after Justin's video: & His channel is also home to Shorts that go over parts of top level gameplay as well, like dead body juggles and kara cancelling into raw tags.

3. G Conceptz's YouTube channel has many guides on top level aspects of the game & a few character guides:

CHARACTERS

When there's 56 characters and 3 assists for each one, there's more than a lot to choose from! Picking who you think is cool is a tried and true strategy, and in a game as sandbox-y as this one, there's definitely a way to make your ideal team work (at least to some extent. The top tier teams and pairings/shells are top tier for a reason!) so experiment! Not every assist is good, but they all have use cases even if they can be super niche. Sometimes an assist that nobody else picks is the cherry on top for your team! For those more interested in playing established teams or pairs, or interested in making one character as best they can, see the Teams page on the SuperCombo wiki: [1]

1. Malek's guide to team building.

2. Malek's guide to doing combos as any character.

3. Andor's YouTube channel. Breakdowns of teams played by the pros + a playlist of every character's movesets & assists.

4. Dj-B13's Tricks of the Trade videos that highlight lots of characters and showcase combos, sequences, and setups.

5. Khaos' YouTube channel, where he's pushed several characters past their usual limits with tons of setups, infinites, and FSD (Flying Screen Deterioration) 'limit break' combo videos.

Character-specific resources (guides, setups, players to watch, etc) will be available on each character's SuperCombo wiki 'Resources' pages (from the row of buttons at the top) with time. In the mean time, you can start by searching for characters on Romneto's channel or in YouTube's general search (filter options like upload timeframe and view count can help narrow your results!) with player/character names.

Justin Wong's personal assist ranking video:

Low Tier Legends YouTube channel (some combos).

OTHER KEY RESOURCES

Additional resources that fit better here than under the umbrella of 'guide' or 'character-specific'. These cover wide ranges of aspects of the game and can help you see things in action against other players or deepen your understanding of what makes certain things click.

1. Romneto's YouTube channel. Home to MANY matches, combos, & HIGHLIGHTs with every character in the game. This is THE place to see what characters can really do in the hands of incredible players.

2. The zachd website / MvC2: Deconstructed, the original home to a lot of the info we know about the game as it's a Massive info source of MvC2. A compilation of a ton of useful information, like frame data (albeit hard to read initially), character stats, rankings, and system mechanics of the game, all gathered by digging through the files directly. A primary reference for this wiki. A lot of general questions (What buttons do I mash for supers? Who has how much health?) can be answered by checking out the links here.

3. Supercombo Wiki - you are here! this is a slow (but active!) work in progress! Documenting 56 Characters is a MASSIVE undertaking and there have not been many of us working on it, so not every page is great (moves/combos in old-school notation, a few videos), but a good chunk of the pages have good info or advice, so look around, you might learn something! Discussion and contributions to this community project is in this channel.

4. Joo's Combo Collection. part tool-assisted montage, part incredibly detailed breakdown of MvC2's mechanics, including some you may not have known! A chunk of its contents have been translated onto the SC wiki, but it's far from complete. See also: Magnetro's YouTube channel, which houses lots of combo videos, in-depth information, and tutorials, as well as uploads of Joo's Combo Collection.

5. jmcrofts' MvC2 videos. link 2. Character overviews, popular set reviews, plus glitches and trivia.

6. SRK Forums Marvel vs Capcom 2 archive - can be a little slow to read but full of marvel discussion.

7. If you can read older notation, these guides written from the arcade days on the GameFAQs forums can offer insight!, they aren't used anymore, but serves as an archive of 10+ year old guides, discussions and tech discoveries. Not too special compared to the above options, but home to some interesting reads nonetheless.

8. Fandom wiki Incomplete, a bit awkward to read, and should become overshadowed by this wiki in a due time, but still has a lot of info written down.

Links

• Major Tournaments
• Arcade Unlock Codes
• Frame Data/Hitboxes (MvC2)- https://sf4remix.com/mvc2/ // https://www.sf4remix.com/anotaks_temp_crap/mvc2/ Compiled by Anotak, still being worked on.