My thoughts on the current state of fighting games

No worries, Starman, your brother is typical of many ppl who've been caught in (I must have the latest version, patch, release, etc) of anything that has software in it from iphones to video games. That's how many in the masses govern their lives. No strike against VF though.

Many of the 2D and 3D fighting games have already achieved cult status. Jin, Akira, Mitsurugi,Scorpion, Ryu, Anna, Baek, Gen Fu, Hayabusa, Kung Lao, Shund di, Wolf, Marduk, Nightmare, Sophia,AOI, and the list goes on and on are already culture icons and at some point in the future, ppl will be happy to play games with these characters in them no matter what version it is. At some point it will be the older the better. PPL will pride themselves in having a working copy of MK1 or VF4 , Soul Blade, or Tekken 3. Hell I know ppl who already do that.

Starman,., if you wait long enough you'll see what I'm posting is true.

I have in some cases multiple copies of my favorite FGs and I have multiple PS2's, PS1's and now 4 PS3's LOL I keep them all in good working order!!!!!

 

@quash You keep talking about the need to not engage with a opponent in 3d because they'll run away trying to waste the clock down. You used the desert stage vf3 example. Yet thats exactly why Wall stages and ringout stages exist PERIOD. If a person tries to back away from an opponent on the wall FS stages they'll set themselves to get ringed out or back themselves up to a wall. The wall especially in this game allows 4 insane dmg to comeback. Its a non issue. I'll show you an example of myself playing. Everyone go to the 14:27 minutes. You'll see me get blown up for jumping back foolishly WITH the life lead.Ps. i played sloppy that match.

 

Everybody keeps talking about sitting on the life lead is a big thing in 3d fighters, but isn't that a rule of thumb in SF4? Get the life lead, sit on the life lead, and punish when they get froggy on you when they feel the clock.

 

@quash Also ik what your looking for. Fireballs and laser beams as an exciting way for 3d to be appealing for 2ders. Tekken's done this to an extent with devil jin/kazuys and TR as a pretext 4 TekkenXStreet fighter. But see here's the problem with Tekken and DOA having long range moves. There movement options SUCK. Evading in Tekken and DOA doesnt give frame advantage like it does in VF. lnfact its funky as heck. In DOA you get blown up for just evading a string without pressing a button (LOL). And in Tekken you can either sidewalk or sidestep which makes you have to guess between evading a string vs a 1hit move. If you sidestep a string in Tekken, Guess what? Youve evaded wrong against a linear string! So u get blown up(LOL). Plus you cant evade dash cancel in those games so you cant get in on your opponent from long range after evading a long range move anyway. Until the fix their stagnated defense and movement in wont work. As for VF dude banannas(ei) shuriken, and jacky custom laser beams aint happenin

 

I think that pretty much sums it up. Our good man Quash covets glowing, shimmering, blazing, exploding projectiles in our 3D VF world. I think there was one MK that tried to do it the other way. They tried to bring 3D mechanics into MK. Can't remember which one though maybe it was MK vs DC

@quash as far as the current state of FG and space, and range and 3D What do you think about Soul Calibur V's projectile and range spacing?

Cervantes,Ezio, Algol,Viola, Tira, Ivy, Kilik and a couple others either have projectiles or reasonably long range attacks

Cervantes and Ezio I believe can shoot you from anywhere on the stage

Perhaps SC V is the future of 3D fight gaming you seek

 

You bring up a good question (It's worth a thread alone), but I wouldn't expect there to be too many detailed responses beyond what you just summarized. Also, lag never really factors into my questions about problems with a game system. Latency is more an issue with netcode and less about the mechanics of the game. The complains you hear about FS do not change in an offline -- lagless situation.

 

Tricky , thank you for the response, the reason I thought lag might be a culprit is because sometimes when I would here a complaint (from Tim for example) any system issue seemed to be compounded by a failed attempt to land a 16f from -5 (or some version of lag causing a problem)

And in my own experience, i can figure out what the "correct" response should be in any given situation (on paper) but it doesnt always translate online. This has certainly been the only real issue i have had with FS.

Though i do understand a thoughtful look at VF should be able to separate latency issues from core system issues. Example of possible FS system issue ... With so many low crush high crush and sabaki , advantage starts to take a back seat to a simple rock paper scissors guess regardless of situation.

 

all those options are risky though, sometimes you will end up eating 50+ damage whenever you try them instead of blocking, so I still think advantage is more important than the guessing aspects of the pressure.

 

The complaints drastically change offline imho. I yell at myself for forgetting to execute minor ch etc.

It's a refreshing change from someone who fail evaded at -7 and attacks while you buffered a mid only resulting in you getting ch.

Jami: I'm happy you like referring to me for a complaint escape goat, but we are all human and everyone's shit stinks. Don't act like you don't complain. The difference sometimes is you forget to hit the mute button and we can hear you.

 

It seems like the storm has passed and the only people left are those who still want to actually discuss things. I don't want to make it seem like I'm doing a hit and run here so I will address the good questions that have been asked.

There is a ranged game in VF, I have said as much from the beginning. My issue is that it is sorely lacking compared to the ranged game of 2D fighters. You used to be able to argue that it was irrelevant, since 3D games did have a superior close range game for a long time, but that changed with the introduction of airdash fighters. Now there's an entire subgenre that combines the superior spacing of 2D with the multi-layered up close guessing games of 3D. The best attempts at adopting 2D spacing in 3D have been Virtual On and Gundam, which are both excellent games, but not quite as fleshed out as the best of the 2D fighters.

If you would like to discuss one of the finer points, like how the poking game in VF works, I am more than willing. I've talked about that both in the article and in this post. If you think I'm missing something, I'm all ears.

As for popularity, as I've said from the beginning, I am speaking solely about Japanese arcades. It is the environment the majority of these games are made for, and it is the environment that has allowed the genre to thrive. I have been fortunate enough to be able to immerse myself in this environment for over two years now, and as such as I have observed trends in how games get popular, and more importantly, how they stay popular. Aesthetics do play a role, but mechanics are ultimately what decide which games stay and which ones go. This is going to be an entire article of its own so I do not want to get too in depth about this just yet.

The issue with Soul Calibur is that it sacrifices a lot of the strengths of 3D fighters to achieve the goal of having a better spacing game. They're not mutually exclusive. It's what makes this situation particularly frustrating to witness.

Again, I don't necessarily want to see projectiles in 3D. I do want ways to control space, even if it doesn't necessarily involve pressing a button to do so (as 2D fighters have done since the beginning). Give characters a wider variety of ranges to poke at and increase the emphasis on positioning yourself well. Is that too much to ask for?

 

For those of you still doubting my abilities as a player, I'm afraid I don't have any recent videos of me playing any 3D fighter. But Japanese people seem to think I'm really good at DOA. So there. Not that it matters, but now we can stop with the posturing about how I "don't know VF/3D".

 

This is just what I said previously about these silly 2D vs 3D debates, many seem to think the lack of long range game or other things such as footsies and spacing, does make 3D fighters indubitably inferior.
I never really understood how, what I think is the case here is that like I said, you disregard out of ignorance : how the actual game is played, the experience of those who played it and their opinions.

You seem to think nonexistent or a lack of long range game in VF is a problem? I tell you straight out that VF is better off without long range at all, the game wasn't thought for this kind of fighting, the only way they could improve VF at this point is making it impossible for some one to create a long range game without putting himself at disadvantage, anyone who has played the game for enough time knows how lame it is, especially those players who constantly run away and wait for the other player to come at them knowing his options are reduced, based on match-up alone.

This is true, probably the only good thing I read there.

I'll ignore this...

 

This Asian guy down at Rutgers University think I'm really good at scrabble. So there. I'm now an authority on checkers.

 

No, you are not paying attention to what I'm saying. I've said I don't know how many times now that it's not the lack of a long range game, it's that the space control (at all ranges) is too rigid and restricts the number of meaningful ranges to be at. Long range is just the easiest place to see this.

Based on the rest of your post, you seem to be agreeing with me. I don't think VF necessarily needs to be the game to implement a greater variety of ranges, but it does need to happen soon.

 

Well now that you've established yourself as a top player of Scrabble, I'm going to adopt your opinion of it without having ever played it myself. Why have an opinion of my own when I can just adopt yours? You're a top player, after all.

 

Long range game in vf is making your opponent whiff and catching them in a huge recovery frame or simply wanting to get to the side of your opponent which is what fs ultimately boils down too.

The idea of adding meters, so your forced to stay close i.e. guilty gear wouldn't work. Adding dhalsim like arms and legs attack techniques would be beyond ridiculous. Having double dragon knives to pick up and throw would change vf into a side scroller.

Other ranges medium/close as to being too rigid, hmm??
-1 to -9 techniques in defense situations work decent and have great flow as long as your input is on.
+1 to +9 offense techniques work fluidly, so I don't see your gripe.

Only thing I would want to make it fluid:
-Throws at 10 frames
-P counter hit +10
-Crouch staggers
-Failed evade be punishable and not instant cancel
-Lazy throws gone
-More punishable moves on block i.e. Minor counter hit.

I think these would solve the rigidness imho.

 

Those are all changes I can get behind, especially staggers (probably my favorite mechanic in all of fighting games). But that would just make VF better at what it already does well, not adding an aspect to the game that is basically absent.

When I was saying it's too rigid, I was referring to how you control space, not advantage. I agree that aspect of the game works pretty well. What's missing is the element of having multiple, distinct ranges to control the match from. Not even necessarily long ranges, though I think that is the obvious place to start implementing better ideas.

 

These would create an defensive and incredibly boring game since all anybody would ever do is just stand and block because of the fear of getting CH'd by an 11f move into a guaranteed throw to which you don't have to guess the escape anymore or getting punished for attempting just basic movement, something no fighting game should ever have and is stupid in VF too. I also don't miss half of Jeffry's moves being punishable on block for no reason at all.

 

I don't really think it's a missing element, though. This element does exist in VF, it's just less pronounced, and less obvious/character specific. Depending on character matchups or player preferances, certain characters/players will prefer to try and be in your face for throws or quick pokes, mid range to try to bait and punish whiffs, or side-turned. Worrying about ring outs and wall damage also plays into this as well. Controlling space, choosing a range, these things are still very important in competative play.

The thing VF doesn't have is strict, distinct, character specific ranges to control a match from, but I don't think that's a problem. In 2D games, there are fewer movement options, and less space total to control, so this makes controlling the small amount of space an easier thing to achieve, and thus much more important. Players can really only move towards, back, and jump. This is why a lot of 2D games needed to add things like teleport, or other movement options. Add in fireballs for full screen strategy, and it creates a fantastic 2D chess match, one that works wonderfully.

But these same things that make 2D fighters so fun do not automatically translate over to 3D games, simply because in 3D there are more movemant options. Simply being able to side step means most advantages a character might have at a linear range of short, medium, or long, can be avoided with the flick of the stick. 3D games, by design, do not work on a linear plane. They work in the short to mid range, and by being circular. The very nature of 3D makes controlling space different in 3D than 2D. In 3D, there is too much space to try and control, so you can't simply rely on controlling space to win a match, you must control advantage as well.

So ultimately, I think it really boils down to personal choice. Both 2D and 3D fighters present fighting games in different ways, and I think both ways can be extremely successfull.