Special Moves

LP Sonic Boom Charge ,

MP Sonic Boom Charge ,

HP Sonic Boom Charge ,

EX Sonic Boom Charge ,

Sonic Boom: The original projectile king returns with his most potent tool. Sonic Boom releases and recovers faster than any other projectile in the game. LP Sonic Boom travels very slowly, like it has since time immemorial, giving Guile a path-clearing shield to dash, jump, or walk in behind. The HP version travels fastest, the better to clash earlier with incoming projectiles (pushing your screen control forward) or to clip jumping characters just as they leave the ground. Also, a faster-traveling Sonic Boom will either leave the screen earlier or encounter the enemy/their projectile first, allowing you to throw another Sonic Boom sooner, since you can only have one Sonic Boom onscreen at once. The MP version is in between. All versions share damage and frame data, so the only consideration is travel speed. The EX version travels faster, hits twice, and knocks down on contact, although at a cost of a stock of EX gauge.

Sonic Boom is Guile’s most important and defining attack. With its infinite range, variable travel speed, and quick release and recovery, it’s more a poke for Guile at close to mid range than even his actual normal moves. When in doubt, throwing a Sonic Boom is rarely an unjustifiable error. The best, most intense Guile players often make it into a kind of mini-game for the audience, counting all the Sonic Booms per round to the extent that more casual, less serious fans often don’t even understand the intricacy of what’s going on and complain that Guile players “just throw fireballs.” Attention aspiring Guile players: ignore that and let your Sonic Boom flag fly. Sustain yourself on the tears of players complaining about fireball spam.

That said, SFV includes more built-in ways for opponents to circumvent your fireball onslaught than ever. Just like it was always paramount in previous SF games to guess when your mid-range Sonic Booms would get you jumped on, it’s now crucial to be aware of when your opponent is looking to use canned anti-fireball counters. (Obvious examples include Karin’s HP Ressenha and EX Sappo dash, F.A.N.G’s Nikankyaku “slip” dash, M. Bison’s Psycho Reflect, Dhalsim’s slide kicks and instant “tiger knee” Yoga Teleport, R. Mika’s EX Shooting Peach, Alex’s EX Slash Elbow, and Ryu and Ken’s Tatsumaki Senpukyaku, among others.) When you sense a big anti-fireball move coming, refrain from throwing a Sonic Boom and instead either preempt their attempt or be ready to counter it. Guile’s forward walk speed is also among the best in the game. When opponents are busy waiting for Sonic Booms to dodge, absorb, or counter, you can simply walk forward aggressively.

Non-EX Sonic Booms leave Guile with a frame advantage of +8 on hit, more than enough to link several things if you’re close enough. (On guard, Sonic Booms leave Guile at +1.) Close positioning to actually link after Sonic Boom on hit is most likely when hitting a cornered enemy, or when you chase them down with the cover of an LP Sonic Boom and arrive at the target at the same time. Following LP Sonic Boom and attacking alongside it or mixing up right after it is as much a part of Guile as the hairdo. It’s +1 when guarded on the first frame from blockstrings and point-blank, but when you throw LP Sonic Boom and walk/jump after it, it might as well be +∞.

You can plow in just after Sonic Boom hits with well-spaced Knee Bazooka, or rush in and tack on Reverse Spin Kick alongside it. You can go for an overhead with Straight Chop, or a low-high strike with crouching MK to Straight Chop. From up close, you can jump forward and go for cross-up LK, or (more deviously) empty jump into crouching LK upon landing. You can also wait out blockstun from LP Sonic Boom, then go for a normal throw (or Guile High Kick, if you think they’ll respond to a throw threat by jumping or backdashing). You can walk up and make Sonic Boom into the first part of a blockstring with meaty standing MP or Spinning Back Knuckle, which shifts where they must actually watch out for your mix-up slightly later, giving them a different look. Additionally, you can simply throw another Sonic Boom when one is blocked, too. When you sense your opponent will try hard to take back initiative from your Sonic Boom setups, you can temporarily shut it down and creep forward with crouch-walk, building down charge and advancing very slowly. If they did end up picking that moment to surge forward, it’s simple to react with Somersault Kick.

EX Sonic Boom is good as a sudden tempo-shifter. It can nail dashes from half the screen away, catch opponents jumping around carelessly at far distances, blow through one-hit fireballs (or neutralize two-hit ones), and crush most single-point armored moves. The chip damage it deals can also add up, although you still need an honest hit to close out a round (or a Critical Art chip victory, which you won’t get if you’re throwing EX Sonic Booms). Using EX Sonic Boom in hit-check combos also gives you combo potential in places where you’ve gathered back charge but not down-back, most notable after a close-range frame trap/hit-check of standing MP to standing LP. Sonic Hurricane and EX Somersault Kick both have plenty of valid uses too, so you should get a feel for when the surprise speed and knockdown ability of EX Sonic Boom make it worth spending the meter.

When you build your game around Sonic Boom pressure and control, you can become exhausting to fight against. Patient challengers will adjust, carefully walking forward and avoiding Sonic Booms with low-risk tactics, or just blocking them. If they’re careful, they may eventually back you into a corner where a lot of Guile’s main strength (how quickly he throws a fireball that he charges by walking backward) shrinks with nowhere to backpedal. Patient players will also look for places in your zoning that are repetitive or predictable, so they can take calculated, explosive risks that might blow you open. Stay alert, hold your ground, and throw Sonic Booms off-rhythm, or when you have heavy position or tempo advantage.

However, impatient challengers will happily (seemingly) skewer themselves on Guile if you pester them with persistent Sonic Booms. Guile is very well-equipped to counter attempts to move in from the front around his Sonic Boom wall. The more you anti-air opponents jumping in or feed Spinning Back Knuckle to someone rushing in too eagerly on the ground, the more desperate they may grow, increasing their willingness to make huge gambles to get in. Keep calm and Sonic Boom.

By throwing a Sonic Boom immediately after the recovery of Guile’s Sonic Blade V-Skill, you’ll create a special Sonic Boom called Sonic Cross. Sonic Booms are also slightly improved during V-Trigger, with two fewer recovery frames. During V-Trigger, you can also chain Sonic Boom into Sonic Break, Guile’s V-Trigger-only Sonic Boom variant. Sonic Boom. Sonic Boom. Sonic Boom.

LK Somersault Kick Charge ,

MK Somersault Kick Charge ,

HK Somersault Kick Charge ,

EX Somersault Kick Charge ,

Somersault Kick: Guile’s flipping vertical kick, often also called “Flash Kick.” (It’s sometimes called Somersault Shell also, but that’s officially the name of Charlie Nash’s Flash Kick in certain games.) Guile bursts upward, striking the air in front of and slightly above him at first, before flipping to kick at a 180 degree arc aimed upward.

Somersault Kick is a downward charge move, like F.A.N.G’s Nishikyu or M. Bison’s Head Press. You can begin to build a charge just in case in many situations. For example, you may snap to down-back immediately after starting a forward dash or jump, or just after poking up close with standing HP or Taurus Combination. In this way, you can start building charge fast enough to enable hit-check combos like standing HP crouching MP Somersault Kick, or standing LK standing MK crouching LP Somersault Kick. Holding down-back also builds up a Sonic Boom charge, and auto-blocks low- and mid-hitting moves. If you don’t care about either of those for whatever reason, you can charge with down-forward, engaging Guile’s unique crouch-walk.

Somersault Kick is an anti-frontal, anti-jump, combo-finishing attack. Somersault Kick is generally ineffective against well-timed cross-ups, a problem Guile players have had to deal with forever. Either go for LK/EX Somersault Kick as late as possible versus cross-ups, or don’t bother at all, and just block. (If you’re extremely pressured, you can block and then V-Reversal, but they can anticipate this and cross-up into immediate blocking/throwing to thwart this escape tactic.)

Each non-EX version of Somersault Kick deals the same damage and proceeds through the same general stages–the difference is that heavier versions of Somersault Kick travel farther forward, while hitting slightly slower. Non-EX Somersault Kicks have an initial period of projectile and upper-body invincibility leading to the first active hitting frame. This means that meaty strikes will snuff out Somersault Kick startup, preventing it from being used as a true reversal. Hits against his startup will also put him into grounded hitstun–he isn’t airborne until the attack is active. Starting on the first active frame, which is directed forward, Guile is completely invincible for three frames. This assures that, within that window, he’ll cleanly beat out any incoming frontal/jump-in attack, unless it has invulnerability that outlasts Somersault Kick’s.

It also means that HK/EX Somersault Kick will cleanly beat out mid-range projectiles, if the projectile thrower is within about 32 percent screen distance. HK Somersault Shell reaches farthest forward on the ninth frame after activation; EX Somersault Shell reaches farthest forward on the seventh frame after activation. You can practice getting used to the precise ranges by using Training Mode to set a dummy recording of fireballs with Ryu/Ken/Nash/Guile/Laura/Rashid/whoever. Then practice nailing their fireball release with HK/EX Somersault Kick from the max range. Do the same thing against different characters, since they have varying hurtboxes extended forward while throwing fireballs. While sniffing out mid-range fireballs as pokes, this is one place where it’s good to inch forward with Guile’s crouch-walk. Every little bit of forward movement adds up against opponents who are trying to precisely stay out of your poke/Somersault Kick range. The long horizontal reach of the heavier Somersault Kick variants also makes them great if opponents neutral jump too close. Again, get used to the right range so you don’t get baited by neutral jumps that are just too far away.

Somersault Kicks make great combo enders because they afford lots of frame advantage to Guile. End combos with LK/MK Somersault Kick and Guile ends up at +22 after landing against a quick-riser, about a dash’s length away. If you want to play it safe, you can immediately start throwing Sonic Booms as they get up. But if you want to switch gears and get aggressive, an immediate dash puts Guile at +5 against them at point-blank range, lots of time to set up any meaty okizeme on their wakeup. After HK Somersault Kick, the situation is a single frame better, at +23 without dashing, and +6 with an immediate dash. And EX Somersault Kick leads to +28 in place, +8 after immediate dash. Light attacks and standing MP are perfect meaties after non-EX versions into dash, but will actually whiff performed as soon as possible after EX Somersault Kick. The +8 after EX Somersault Kick into dash is a great place to go for counter-hit standing HP, if you’re certain they’ll go for a non-invincible attack on wakeup. Reverse Spin Kick is great after any Somersault Kick version into dash, since its throw- and low-dodging properties will kick in by the time a quick-rising foe can stick something out. (It will lose to quick, mid-hitting pokes, though, and reversals.)

The first few active frames of non-EX Somersault Kicks can be canceled into Sonic Hurricane even though Guile is airborne. Accomplish this by hit-checking while charging , then canceling using a motion of . On top of the heavy combo damage potential, this can also be good in blockstrings to chip out a low-stamina foe.