When starting out in Street Fighter 6, there’s a lot to learn. With tons of attack inputs, as well as new gameplay systems, SF6 players have a ton to get used to. One of the more common elements you’re going to encounter is the Drive Impact in Street Fighter 6. The first thing you need to know is how Drive Impact works. Understanding what the mechanics of the system are is vital to actually predicting when you’re opponent is going to use it, and how to respond to it.
Drive Impacts are essentially a guard-break mechanic, as they can be used to blow through defense, or as part of a very punishing combo. A Drive Impact is a move that costs one bar of Drive Gauge to use. If you’re using Street Fighter 6’s Modern Type controls, a Drive Impact is done with L1, and if you’re using Classic Type controls, it’s performed using Heavy Punch and Heavy Kick. When you trigger it, a slow-moving graffiti-like effect comes along with it. There’s also a soft sound cue that players will see. This is the window for countering and contesting the move. If a player is able to effectively counter the move, they will stop your DI.
One of the more minute mechanics is called Special Cancelling. This is essentially when a player “interrupts” their combo with another move. Combo strings also rely heavily on this mechanic. The basic idea is that you buffer the motion input for a move immediately after doing a faster move. The quirks of frames of animation mean that you can essentially skip part of the previous attack animation, forcing the next attack to come out instead. Learning how to use DIs as part of your normal combos is vital to success at higher ranks, so learn it fast.
Special Cancellable moves are vital for understanding here. You need to know what moves are fast enough to cancel a DI into. Heavier animations are genuinely too long on startup to use as a poke to transition into DI. So in short, go with faster Light and Medium moves as part of a cancel string.
With that in mind, we need to know how to respond to the attacks when you see them.
How to counter Drive Impact in Street Fighter 6
The most often used move in countering a Drive Impact is to simply use your own. By triggering your move in the small frame window before it hits, you will cancel out your opponent’s DI. This will then be turned against them, opening them up for a combo. Also, you can still take damage from a DI if you counter with your own. If you’re very low on HP, be careful trying to DI back.
Using a throw to break a DI is another option. You need to be very fast though, as the window to stop the attack with a throw is pretty narrow.
A more situational move for getting over this attack is to use a Super move. Any level of super will crush a Drive Impact, even with full Armor. You can buffer in the motion input for your super move as part of a combo string, but hold off on hitting the final buttons, and then finish the string once your opponent commits to a DI.
Attacks like Chun-Li’s Hundred Lightning Kicks or E. Honda’s Hundred Hand Slap can hit the opponent can hit more than two hits, breaking Drive Impact Armor. Any multi-hit move that hits three or more times works like this. There is one thing to keep in mind, as sometimes you can use the faster moves in a string to cancel into a Drive Impact. One example like this is Juri’s Forward Heavy Punch has two hits and cancel into DI. Jamie’s Heavy three punch move is a great choice here if you have that option. Since it has three hits, it can hard counter a Drive Impact in Street Fighter 6.
In a pinch, you can also rely on basic Blocking and Parries. These will knock you back though, opening you up to more pressure from your opponent. Keep in mind, though, that blocking while in burnout will cause you to take damage from a DI and some other attacks. Parrying is the tougher option of the two, as the timing needs to be nearly frame-perfect. Blocking is what most newer players will likely rely on to survive if they get caught out.
Note that none of these strategies will guarantee that you avoid every Drive Impact in Street Fighter 6. You will sometimes get caught out by a better player.
