The 3 on 3 battles aren't just a gimmick to differentiate itself from other fighting games in gameplay but they also provide some charm with the rest of your team reacting to your fights and the cliché story motivations at the end of every fighting game are at least a little more bearable when it's multiple characters building on each other. The game still feels very fan servicey though (the only thing from this I'm thankful of is SNK didn't make Athena a loli again lol)