So yee, I decided to give Blade Strangers on Steam a whirl due to the ongoing Winter Sale happening at the moment, since I've been waiting for a price drop for quite some time (I even had to go out to grab a Steam gift card at a store just so I could pick it up yesterday). After buying and installing it, I started playing it (obviously) and you know what, it's pretty damn good.
The artwork is nice and full of detail, but it looks a bit too pixelated in some instances. The controls are simple, though it took me awhile to get used to (since I'm a custom to Street Fighter's 6-button layout and such), but no major problems there. As for the AI, it was pretty much a cakewalk for me (again, because I'm used to the BS Street Fighter throws at me everytime), though I did have a good challenge here or there. I've yet to play online, but I don't really know if anyone actually plays online anymore, so we'll have to see.
The story I found to be cute; the interactions were funny for the most part, and I thoroughly enjoyed them. I've only played through both Kawase and Summer Kawase's campaigns so far, so I'll have to see the other interesting interactions later on.
Overall, Blade Strangers (or Stranger Blades hehhehehehehe) is a pretty good fighting game. There's lots of fun to be had, as well as some disturbing things too (like Kawase's basic EX attack and Summer Kawase's downright creepy confrontation with her other self at the end of her campaign, calling her "depressing"), but I'd recommend it not only to Umi fans to are in desperate need of fanservice, but also to fighting game fans who might enjoy this game.
As for the issue with the sprites, I don't really know. Could be that they drew the sprites too large and downscaled them poorly (or with Microsoft Paint), or maybe it was in the name of size limitations on the sprites.