Before I get into this, be advised that my play time in the Steam version of Skullgirls is not an indication of how much I've played this game in total. I have all versions of this game starting from it's original release on the Xbox 360 & PS3. Since then, I've bought this game on PS4, Xbox Series X, & Nintendo Switch.....all of which to show my support for the game and its developers. I played (yeah....I don't play anymore now because of the ESG update and was on and off before then) mostly on consoles so I'll be going through this from my experience from that along with my short time on the Steam version.

Let it be said, Skullgirls - at its core - is such a wonder fighting game with it allows players to play the game the way they want. Be it 3 vs 3, 3 vs. 2, 3 vs. 1, 1 vs. 1, or whatever, Skullgirls is one the very rare games that allow for complete player expression of how they want to play. If you played Marvel vs. Capcom 2 or 3, you pretty much know how the game flow is like for Skullgirls (just minus the "X-Factor" mechanic from UMVC3).

I'm not here to talk about the game mechanics because the game isn't new......this is a decade old game that was a love letter to the Marvel series. One of it's main selling points besides its gameplay was its use of an very 1940-ish (I think around that time frame) but with some modern aesthetics art style for it's world and characters. Sure, there are some lewd undertones for the game but because of this, it's what garnered its fanbase for the decade it's been out. The series has had its fair share of ups and downs, even to the point of getting support from fans via the famous successful Indiegogo campaign (which I took part of in to support also). In this campaign, all of supporters helped the Skullgirls game with our donations to keep the game alive and was given various rewards because of it from new characters (Squigly, Eliza, Big Band, Fukua, Robo-Fortune, & Beowulf) and a slew of extras from new character color palettes, announcer pack, soundtrack, and an artbook (both physical & digital). All was good since then.....sure, the game had a few minor changes but nothing too drastic (like changing Valentine's cross color from Red to Magenta due to issues with the United Red Cross and their trademark).

Well, that has changed with the latest major update the devs dropped on to the fanbase. Keep in mind, NO ONE ASKED FOR THIS UPDATE BUT WAS INSTEAD FORCED UPON THE FANBASE AND CONSUMERS. What this update does is sanitizes a lot of the game art assets to from its original version. Keep in mind, a lot of the lewd aspects of this game was one of its main draws and what helped the game gain its current fanbase and supporters. The developers "Future Club" consists of developers from Lab Zero who ended up making their own studio after either leaving Lab Zero or ousted by its owner Mike "MikeZ" Zaimont. I won't get into details so look it up on google if you want the whole story. Future Club would later team up with "Hidden Variable" to help with further development of Skullgirls. I don't know what happened within these 10 years but all of a sudden the devs decided they wanted to GO WOKE and change a lot of the things art wise in Skullgirls - even though they had NO ISSUE with this before now.

Maybe they want that good 'ol ESG money or maybe they think they need to censor their own game and think people will flock to it because they're back at EVO (EVO - short for Evolution - is the largest fighting game tournament in the world held in Las Vegas) and think that because they have so many eyes on their game, they need to censor a lot of things that are "problematic". Keep in mind that a lot of the things they censored is in the SINGLE PLAYER EXPERIENCE which means NO ONE will see these things during gameplay at EVO. The only thing they will see are the game character sprites during the matches. I don't care what you may think of me and why I don't support this change but I hate having my S#!T altered from its original form or completely taken away from me from the time I bought it. This is exactly what Future Club, Hidden Variable, & Reverge Games (the publisher) has done to its fanbase......altering the game in a way that it changes it from its original form and from its original intent in which the players purchased it.

Now we have an issue....Drunken Russian announcer pack that was removed was a reward from the Indiegogo campaign. The developers have stolen that from its fanbase who supported the game back then. My main gripe now is that they altered artwork in the digital artbook. THIS DID NOT NEEDED TO BE F#CKED WITH AND NOW WE HAVE TWO VERSIONS OF THE ARTBOOK!!! THE REAL VERSION IS NOW LOCKED BEHIND THE PHYSICAL ARTBOOK WHICH THOSE WHO DONATED TO GET THE PHYSICAL BOOK ONLY HAVE!! THOSE OF US WHO GOT THE DIGITAL ARTBOOK NOW HAVE A COMPLETELY DIFFERENT VERSION FROM THOSE WITH THE PHYSICAL VERSION!!! WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH YOU DEVS!?!?

These devs already got my money but if you're on the wall about buying this game, I recommend that you don't. If the devs have gone this WOKE to change the vision of the game so much and now they feel like their embarrassed because of it that they have to sanitize their work, who knows what else they'll change going down the line. If you're comfortable with having your crap changed on a fly from its original intent, go ahead and support these devs. In all honesty, I kinda wished MikeZ was still at the helm of this game and maybe then, we wouldn't have gotten to this point.

SCREW YOU FUTURE CLUB!
SCREW YOU HIDDEN VARIABLE!
SCREW YOU REVERGE GAMES!