Sidesteps are performed by pressing the or buttons and allow the player to circle the opponent, moving in the z-axis of the game. In addition to the basic standing sidestep, starting in GNT4 and all future games, running sidesteps can be performed while in the run animation. In the GameCube GNT games, steps towards the camera and steps away. In all Wii games, steps to the character's left and steps to the right.

Usage

The exact properties of sidesteps change game to game, though in general there are about three frames of sidestep followed by the character quickly repositioning in the z-axis for a few frames, followed by a longer period of recovery. Sidesteps have utility in a number of ways:

To escape from block strings
To escape from backturned string hits
Used after the opponent jumps, a sidestep will move the player out of the line of attack of their opponent while re-aligning them if they wish to attempt a jump landing punish.
In GNT4 forward, the starting invincibility frames of sidesteps can be used to avoid an otherwise unblockable wake-up-super (WUS).

Differences between games

Naruto: Clash of Ninja! 1

Sidesteps are 20 frames total
Characters can block for the entire sidestep (DEFOK flag active)
Characters can be thrown for the entire sidestep (THROWOK flag active)

Naruto: Clash of Ninja! 2

Characters cannot block for frames 2-20 of the sidestep

Naruto: Gekitou Ninja Taisen! 3

No changes from CON2

Naruto: Gekitou Ninja Taisen! 4

Frames 1-3 now have total invincibility (TDMG flag)
Frames 2-20 are now throwable (THROWOK flag removed)
Running sidestep added: characters can now perform a running sidestep with a different animation when in the run state
- Running sidesteps have the same properties as standing sidesteps
Holding forward at the end of a sidestep now allows the player to immediately begin running forward at the end of a sidestep

Super Naruto: Clash of Ninja! 4 (fan mod)

Frames 1-3 of the sidestep can now be thrown, though they are still invincible to attacks

Sidestep

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