Rivals of Aether

Rivals of Aether is a fighting video game developed and published by Dan Fornace. It was released on March 28, 2017, for Microsoft Windows on Steam and on August 22, 2017, for Xbox One. A Nintendo Switch version was released on September 24, 2020.

It received positive reviews from critics, who commended its deep gameplay.

You can buy it on Steam here: http://store.steampowered.com/app/383980

All development and updates on the game and its future installments have since been moved to Fornace's new studio Aether Studios since 2021.

Why It Rocks

 * 1) Probably one of the best Smash clones with unique characters who take inspiration from the characters in the Super Smash Bros. games (and to a lesser extent, a fan game). For example, Zetterburn takes some inspiration from Wolf's moves in Super Smash Bros. Brawl, and Orcane takes inspiration from Vaporeon's moveset in Super Smash Land game created by Dan Fornace, and this game's spiritual precursor.
 * 2) Good pixel art graphics and amazing artwork.
 * 3) Awesome music, courtesy of flashygoodness, whose previous work includes games like Tower of Heaven (which is represented by a stage in this game), Super Secret Service, Bean Dreams, and Super Smash Land, among others.
 * 4) Most of the attributes from Melee (air dodging, speed, etc) are implemented in the game.
 * 5) *What's even better is that you can air dodge without entering a free-fall state, unlike in Melee, giving much more options for recovering.
 * 6) Interesting story.
 * 7) Eight playable characters (excluding DLC characters) have their strengths and weaknesses.
 * 8) Tutorial mode teaches you the majority of the game's mechanics, unlike other fighting games.
 * 9) Responsive controls.
 * 10) You have the option to give characters custom palettes, allowing players to give them their flair.
 * 11) Ori and Sein from Ori and the Blind Forest are downloadable characters available for purchase as of August 23, 2017.
 * 12) In 2017, Dan Fornace made a bet with Blue Mammoth Games (the creator of Brawlhalla) to see who can get 20,000 Twitter followers first and the loser has to feature a character from the winner's game as an unlockable guest fighter. Dan lost and featured Ragnir as an alternate skin for Maypul and as part of the bet. In return and being a good sport, Blue Mammoth featured Ranno as an alternate skin for Wu Shang.
 * 13) Just like in MUGEN, you can create custom characters, and not a single copyright notice has ever been filed into one.

Bad Qualities

 * 1) Some achievements that involve getting a KO with a certain character's move don't have to be unlocked by you directly doing it, as your opponents (mostly in online mode) who don't already have such achievements can do the same to you and you will end up with the achievement as well.
 * 2) Unlike the Smash Bros. games, you cannot grab opponents or grab ledges. This may confuse players who are used to playing Smash.
 * 3) Some characters, like Zetterburn, are generally unfair to some players. Absa, Ranno, and Clairen were overpowered during their initial release, but they were fortunately nerfed in later versions.
 * 4) Unlike MUGEN, creating a custom character can be extremely hard to do unless you are a good coder.