Kano has one of the fastest moves in the game, and the EX version is safe on block. Kano's knives in Cybernetic are amazing and decent outside that variation. He has an air gap closer for them pesky zoners.
Nrs has equipped Kano with a lot of great tools that none of the cast has. Where Kano falls short a lot of the time is the amount of meter he has to use in order to be effective.
Cybernetic of couse has the laser to extend combos, but I kinda find it hard to actually use it sometimes due to the relatively small window you have to continue the combo as well as the gap the laser creates. I find it somewhat hard to run and succesfully do my attacks in the advantage window, but thats probably just me sucking ass. Cybernetic also comes with a EX launcher during certain strings of his which is great. Aside from these things Kano's midscreen dmg is not too scary. Sure people talk about zoning, but Kano does not win games by spamming knives (or actually I do, but players with brains can work around it). Kano does not get combos off anti air projectiles like certain other characters does.'
Cutthroat is for the combo lovers but even this one is also kinda meter hungry. He does have one excellent launcher in this variation (thank you NRS) that lauches people for easily executed combos. However this string is somewhat unsafe which leads to the other string he has, b121 which is neutral on block and can be canceled into a special of your choice (usually the EX laucher)
Commando is probably my favourite variation that kano has. I just love poking into throws and chokes n stuff as well as those nice anti wakeups with the parries. This variation is also one of the most difficult to master, and very knowledge dependant. You always wanna be more than a few steps ahead or you can be punished VERY hard.
I've been playing Kano the most among the cast and I think NRS actually did a decent job with kano. I would like a somewhat smoother Eye Laser for extended combos. I think that Kano is very demanding in execution, right now people may laugh at this, due to the usual online knife spammers, but seriously, Kano is sort of difficult to use. Kano just needs some tweaks tbh - not buffs. I dont want him to have a ton of + strings n shit, I just want to be able to reliably hit my strings like the Cutthroat B121 when you're just a step away from the opponent.
Aside from that, Kano is a very good design. Very balanced but has some inconsistencies. #Kanoforever