The first game in the Guilty Gear series had a number of aspects that would be changed, reworked, or even phased out in later games. Some of these also apply to Guilty Gear X, since many aspects of the series weren't codified until Guilty Gear XX, which can be considered the Franchise Codifier.
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Mechanics
- The Tension meter and Overdrives were known as the Chaos Gauge and Chaos Moves, respectively. Chaos Moves also required the Chaos Meter to be completely full, while Overdrives only cost half of the Tension meter.
- Chaos Moves could be used regardless of meter once you were on your yellow lifebar, akin to early King of Fighters games.
- In both this game and X, Bursts weren't a thing. The closest thing to a Combo Breaker was teching, which only worked in very specific kinds of combos.
- Instant Kills worked very differently from later games. In order to be able to use one, you needed to enter the Sakkai state by landing an Instant Kill Starter Attack or performing an Instant Block in neutral. After this, you needed to input a quarter-circle forward motion followed by an attack button. If you succeeded, you won the entire match.
- The opponent only has two ways to respond to this — If they input quarter-circle backward and an attack button before you input your Instant Kill, they dodge it, and the round proceeds as normal. However, if they input a quarter-circle forward motion and an attack button before you can, they use their Instant Kill on you.
- There was also no consequence for missing an Instant Kill; you simply return to neutral without spending any resources. In later games, missing an Instant Kill seals your Tension meter for the rest of the round.
- There was no Dust button. Dust attacks, as well as Sweeps, when they were introduced in X, were used by pressing both Slash and Heavy Slash simultaneously.
- They weren't even called Dust attacks until X. This game simply referred to them as Launcher Moves.
- Besides being Launcher Moves, Dust attacks also double as universal standing overheads. This wasn't true for this game's Launcher Moves. Only Chipp, Dr. Baldhead, May, Testament, and Zato-1 had Launcher Moves that were overheadsnote — most of the rest of the cast's were mids, and Justice's was a low.
- Dust aerials weren't a thing yet, either. Kliff technically had one, but it was identical to his grounded Dust.
- Presumably due to an oversight, it was possible to jump-cancel a Launcher Move without triggering the homing jump.
- Most characters had only a forward or backward throw, but not both. The sole exception to this was Potemkin, who had a backward throw bound to the standard input, as well as a forward throw performed by pressing forward + Kick.
- Taunt and Respect were assigned to separate buttons.
- In addition, both buttons had a lot of other functions besides taunting. Pressing the Taunt button in the air would cause you to turn around instantly, while the Respect button was used for Perfect Guard and charging special moves.
- Dead Angle Attacks were performed by inputting one of your character's special moves during blockstun, and didn't cost anything. From X onwards, each character was given a specific Dead Angle Attack that could be performed by inputting forward + Punch + Kick, and cost 50% of the Tension meter.
- Axl and Justice's counter attacks (Tenhou Seki and Valkyrie Arc, respectively) activated when an attack collided with their activation box. Later games would restrict them to specific attack types — typically mids and overheads.
- Barring Axl (whose charge ability was Dummied Out), Justice and Testament, characters had the ability to charge one particular special (and that special only) up to Level 3 for higher damage. Order-Sol's power-up mechanic in Slash onward seems to be in reference to that.
Characters
- The story for the game, presumably attempting to stick to fighting game conventions of the time, is centered around the Second Holy Order Selection Tournament. While this has never actually been retconned, no other tournament like this has ever emerged within in the storyline after this one.
- Almost everyone's Instant Kills were changed in later games, with the exceptions being Sol's (which cameo'd as his Order form's EX mode Instant Kill), Kliff's and Justice's.
- Sol:
- His Gun Flame was a full screen projectile here, instead of the shorter range 4-flame burst in later games. His EX forms in the XX games (both normal and Order-Sol) do feature the original full-screen Gun Flame, though.
- He could stack his Dragon Installs and as a result do enough damage to 1-hit KO an opponent, although this practically required the low-health infinite Chaos Move mechanic.
- Rather than it being a Dragon Install powerup, the enhanced Volcanic Viper was simply a result of charging up said move.
- May:
- While May had Mist Finer, rather than the famous faster-than-the-eye-can-see slash move Johnny made famous, she instead simply twirled her anchor.
- Her special moves were originally entirely motion-input-based. Her Mr. Dolphin specials, which use charge inputs, would not be introduced until X.
- Mr. Dolphin technically does exist in this game... but it's a projectile.
- May's only Chaos move in this game was May Dynamic, a massive jump upward and slamming her anchor into the ground to cause a rather sparkly explosion. Later games did bring this back as an Overdrive for her EX form, but otherwise it has not returned as part of her normal movelist.
- Millia:
- Her Chaos Move in this game was Iron Maiden, a barrage of hair projectiles that home in on the opponent. In later games, Iron Maiden is the name of her Instant Kill, which functions completely differently.
- Tandem Top only had one version, and was performed using a Shoryuken input.
- A key part of her movelist was Living Lancer, a projectile that started off as static, but could be manually aimed and fired by pressing any direction + Slash. It was removed after this game, although it did gain a spiritual successor of sorts in the form of Secret Garden.
- Zato-1:
- His Climb Darkness move disappeared after this game, it's general use subsumed by most of Eddie's tools.
- He had a normal double jump in this game. His Flight mode, which is essentially a more controllable double jump, was introduced in X.
- While his Invite Hell move is fundamentally the same, he performs it here by sinking himself halfway into the ground rather than simply raising a hand.
- Chipp:
- Tsuyoshi-Shiki Ten'i only had one variant which sent Chipp roughly halfway across the screen.
- Gamma Blade merely knocked the opponent down, with no additional effects. It wouldn't receive its now-trademark ability to freeze the opponent in place on hit until XX.
- Potemkin:
- Slide Head was originally localized as Graviton Stamp, and had a completely different inputnote
- He had two throws — the standard one, and a forward throw performed by pressing forward + Kick. This also made him the only character to have two kinds of throws until X.
- His Chaos Move was Gigantic Piston, a fullscreen Megaton Punch. It was replaced with Giganter and Heavenly Potemkin Buster in X, and hasn't appeared since.
- Testament was somewhat different in the first game.
- They originally spoke in a Creepy High-Pitched Voice with a noticeable echo. Later games would keep the echo, but would give them a much deeper voice.
- Their scythe had a metal blade. Their now-iconic blood scythe was introduced in X.
- Phantom Soul hovered in place, and had no additional effects besides lingering until an opponent collided with it. In later games, it travels in an arc, and applies a debuff that causes Testament's familiars to attack the opponent from various angles.
- Speaking of familiars, they were also completely absent in the first game.
- Two of their special moves — Panzer Centipede and Dimensional Scythe, have not made an appearance since the first game.
- Justice has remained fairly consistent throughout her appearances, but some things did change.
- They were originally referred to as male. This seems to be an issue with the original English translation, though.
- Imperial Ray was originally a special move, thus it could be spammed something rotten.
- With how damage and stun values worked, her Gamma Ray was basically a guaranteed stun should it hit.
- N.B, a staple of her moveset from X Plus onward, was absent in this game.
- Justice did not have a Respect animation at all, simply freezing in place for a short while.
- Justice had a lengthy pre-fight boss intro animation in Arcade mode, something later bosses either downplayed or lacked entirely.
- Baiken was practically unrecognizable in the first game.
- Her hair was originally blonde, although her character select portrait and sprite had different shades (Dirty blonde and strawberry blonde, respectively).
- Her trademark Guard Cancel attacks were absent. While the ability to use special moves during blockstun makes up for this somewhat, she had only three, limiting her options.
- Youzansen could be used on the ground, unlike later games, where it's restricted to the air. Both versions also had very little recovery, allowing you to stall out the timer by repeatedly spamming it.
- Tsurane Sanzu-watashi is completely unblockable, although none of the hits combo into each other. Later games would allow the individual hits to combo into each other, at the cost of making it blockable.
