The reason Reimi starts out on Defense is because it builds the Rush gauge faster, which is much more useful for her than having an improved Blindside (which you will almost never use with her) whereas Edge is quite the opposite, and you can blindside like a motherfucker as him. The stat boosts are nice, but once you level the styles up a bit, you get the extra abilities (increased rush and improved blindsiding are the ones I have so far) that really make them worth it. Still, they level up pretty quick, so you might as well trade back and forth every once in a while rather than sticking to one. That way you can also use the neutral style effectively.
Speaking of SO4... they gave me something BETTER than a .45 auto, they gave me a kickass giant cyborg with a mega man gun arm to make up for the stupid little girl they put in the game when they were busy forgetting the lessons that Wesley Crusher and Anakin Skywalker taught us about children and outer space.
I'm at the part where Edge is busy angsting. I don't really LIKE that it's happening, but at least the reason is good this time. It's not every day you fuck up the Back to the Future scenario that badly.
In general, still pretty happy with the game. It's fun to play and it doesn't take itself all super-serious and melodramatically like SO3 did for much of the game. It is... a loving homage to sci-fi through the fucked-up lens that is Japan. We've already hit the planet with talking dinosaurs, the Crapsack World, and travelled through time. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that I get to visit two Gangster planets and a Cowboy world at some point.
Also, Edge has a move called Stampede Slash. I use that fucking thing religiously.