Alright folks, no more excuses, there is nothing wrong with the controls of this game, I’ve proved it. My friend, who has never owned or had access to a videogame system in her life, can beat me at VOOT. She can dash in any direction, jump/cancel just fine, jump dash, and do any of the regular or super attacks on command. All she just needs is more experience to develop a more solid strategy/battle style.

I taught her how to play this morning, in less than 30 mins. This is what I did, and you can do it too, either for yourself, or for someone you know that thinks it's a hard game. Turn on the in fight option in the option screen, so all you can do fight close in, and set both controllers to setting A, unless you think some other setting is easier to teach, I don't.

Now, go into verses mode, and stick with the same two characters, just pick the ones you like. Start with dashes, explain how both the X and B button are dash, and all you have to do is press one of them and the direction on the digital pad (instruct them to stay completely away from the analogue stick). Then explain that you press the dash button again to cancel the dash, and that you can change directions of the dash by pressing a different angle and dash again immediately.

This is key, instruct them to not press dash to cancel a dash if they are not going to change direction again, instead, instruct them to jump/cancel in the middle of the dash to cancel the dash. That's Y then A immediately after, show them how to do it if they can't figure it out, and make sure that they barely leave the ground for this exercise, you don't want to be floating in the air to jump/cancel, at least not until you get better at the game. Practice this until you both have it down, it is really simple, and completely eliminates the confusion of trying to find the opponent, making the game much easier.

Now, practice close in fighting. Start with guard, get in close enough to get the double lock on, have your friend guard and attack them once. Then explain that the right trigger is the right arm, and the left trigger is the left, and that both of them are the center/special weapon. Explain that when guarding, right after being hit, if you press one or both of the triggers you will do an immediate, almost unblockable counter attack. Practice this until you both get good at it.

Next, you should both be fairly comfortable with close range attacks now, so try dashing around and tagging each other. If you're better than your friend, go easy on him/her until they get better with it. Also, this would be a good point to explain that if you hold X or B and then press L, R, or L&R you will get a myriad of different results. Learn what each does in close combat before moving on.

When the matches start feeling a little dry without full weapons, it's time to turn off in fighting and go into full combat. Start all over again, explaining jump attacks, dash attacks, and the dash supers. Practice them, and you'll find that you are both better players, and that the matches will be very intense, even while you're learning the long range weapons. Learning close range combat first is instrumental to you being an effective VOOT player.

My friend took as long or longer to learn how to play Ecco the Dolphin, as she took to become a good enough VOOT player to create very exciting matches with me. She's almost better at close range attacking than I am, and she does a jump/cancel like a pro. Pretty much all that she has left to learn is coordination in jump/dashing and weaving to dodge attacks and she'll have me beat, because I can't do that professionally either.