VF5 Final Showdown Console Features

OK, the way I see it:

you know the way some people complain about zelda , how Zelda is old and needs voice acting? or that the items are always the same, like the boomerang etc? and then when Zelda went cartoony they cried 'CELDA IS FOR KIDDIES' and so on?

ok, my point is: some people may not like it, but the campness of VF voices is part and parcel of the VF tradition. VF fighters dont necessarily take themselves, or the game they are in, seriously. the problem with teenagers is that they want to show that they play 'grown up' games. its when you are really 'grown up' that you appreciate the quirkyness of it.

 

Wow Blackstar nice write up.. My Lil Bro feels the same way.. He like but he never got into it because to him VF5 feels too slow and it does'nt hit hard enough... He likes Lion and after seeing Lion in FS with the overhauled system he comepletely loves it. He said Lion looks more violent than ever and thisis the game they should've came out with first. I can understand it now about how the average person my feel after being bombarded with Tekken and DOA videos on youtube. I guess FS is on the right track cause the majority of non-VF people who seen the game around me says it looks real good.

 

I notice alot of non-VFers mention the sound/voice first above anything else. The old swooshes, and other sounds don't have that "umph" that some are looking for. Then you have characters like Brad and Lion who while are appealing in movement, don't sound very appealing.

Sure, we're used to it, but if you take cats like Aris who was looking for a solid game to get into after having a bad taste from SC3 then SC4 (or any other game for that matter), and they hear and see VF, it might repel him because of its sound. Well, Aris did mention the animation and the sound in one of his podcasts. In the end, that could've been another strong player in the VF community, and he has a voice + charisma, so who knows, cats probably could've gotten into the game just because he says its good and plays it. I mean he plays MK9, and I'm pretty sure he got people to try it out and join the community.

But let's be real; regardless as to whether or not you like MK9, you gotta respect the fact that they did a complete overhaul to the game, and that's what made it successful. This was one game where it wasn't so much the name that made it sell so well, but the fact that it was heavily refined, and far from that which was UMK3, or any of the 3d MK games in the past. It was appealing to both casual and hardcore, and it was truly competitive. Sure, I'm pretty sure there's some quirkiness still retained, but its not enough to thwart the game's overall appeal. Sega needs to keep this in mind when marketing to the western gamers.

 

Don't forget that some guys feel emasculated if they play as Lion, "I'm twice the man I used to be~!"

Overfiend, did Lion look more violent in FS because of the changes in FS or was it a reaction to the livestream where I was allowed to be so aggressive against the players at PAX?

I think Lion would look far less violent when he's subdued by the likes of yourself or the other players in NY. Though he does have a bit more aggressive opportunities than in vanilla VF5.

 

Overall...I watched 1000's of FS vids and Lion himself overall hits harder and his redone animations give it that Visceral feel.. So does Akira. You did good at PAX and that was a big reason too for my brother wanting to play(Cause a real arcade machine was in the states lol.). The Faceplant animation is a breath of fresh air because my Girl watches me play VF and she actually said R and FS seems more serious when i watch the youtube vids.

@Blackstar - Mom Dukes is official. Amazingly the Tekken Voice overs are spot on and i can't front. VF characters need better voice-over material. Japan always have the rail thin white hair protagonists guys with the smooth sulky voice.. VF can use that with the americanize voice overs lol!! Not to mention giving the characters some more personality.. people tend to like characters who they can related too whether its Cockiness or shyness or just overly laid-back. I messed up though cause now my daughter actually plays Tekken when im not home. I guess she got tired of seeing VF. what i do know is she can fill up a team battle slots with a all girl team with Law as her last character... and she is 6!! i just ask her why do she ike tekken and this is exactly what she told me. She likes the fact "Laws kicks does'nt waste time" "She can do combos" "They have a lot of female characters" "After i watched enter the dragon on netflix law is like bruce lee" "She likes the stories of the characters when you finish the game, She thinks Roger's and law ending is very funny" (She watches the ending on youtube also.)
she likes the "stuff that goes on in the background of the stages" (Colorful water fountains,Trains,airplanes, meteor showers, Kicking the sheep, braking the floor.)

Damn i ready to cry cause if she can see this i know sega can. Just the cosmetic changes though.

 

I think a great feature Sega could add (if they have the time) is a VF.Terminal app on the PS Vita where you can sync your player card to the Vita and basically have VF.Terminal on your Vita to customize everything while away from your PS3. Thus, allowing you to take your player cards over to friends houses or PS3 based tournaments. I guess for the 360 version there could be a WP7 VF.Terminal app and could allow for the exact same options, but on a 360.


For the people who want new voices(English), just look at El Blaze and tell me what you think. His voice files were probably all recorded in late 2005/early 2006. If they were to change the voices from their VF2/3/4 voices it'll just be new voice actors that will probably end up sounding worse. I might be in the minority here, but I actually like the voices of Jacky/Sarah/Wolf/Jeffry/Lion/Vanessa/Blaze. Because of how goofy these voices are, they are even more memorable and it's easy to distinguish each character just by listening to their voice.

If a characters voice is enough to prevent someone from playing the game, they probably wouldn't have amounted to a VF player anyways. Even though Sega wants to sell as many copies as possible, I would rather have an unaltered FS experience at the cost of a few people who would rather have better voices and would probably never play the game after a few tries.

 

On voiceovers....

This is a tough one, because it's generally never been something that Sega was good at? I think people still reel from Shenmue's "I'm looking for some sailors?"

And in VF4's test, which I played at Sunnyvale Golfland way back in the day, some voices were changed and it was worse. The memorable one was Jacky with a Billy Idol voice going "Ohhhh yeahhh~!" after a flipkick.

That said, maybe a localization team could have new voices put in by default and then the voices could be unlocked by gameplay like SF4 allowed the unlocking and toggling of japanese/usa voices for each character.

That could be a compromise.

That said, I'm pretty sure "new voices" is nowhere on the ticket for features. But the above proposal could be a compromise ^_^

-Chanchai

P.S. Wish I was responsible enough to go dig and encode those old VF4 Location Test videos. It was such a different game from even VF4 but it was very cool.

Also... I don't think the voices thing would really affect sales at all. But I'm not discrediting people being turned off by the voices.

 

ThE idea above is really great. Say what you want about Shenmues voices, but having the whole thing with english voices really draws you into the game more. Reading Subtitles is ok, but it feels a little like a chore and you are a little disconnected from the experience:you have to focus on the bottom of the screen and miss the character's emotional facial expressions. I'm glad to see SEga is much more hungry for VF sales this time around and are looking for input to improve VF.
Now they are willing to drop some of that aloof pretentiousness they always had when presenting VF. I always said they should put subtitles under each foreign character when they say their intro or win quote. Hardcore VF fanboys would act like I just blasphemed for saying that.

 

A feature I really want for VF5:FS on consoles is to be able to view replays like the ones I see on Reno's videos--that replay view is freaking awesome!

Damage, Frame Advantage/Disadvantage, Attack Level, etc... on the replay view is just wonderful!

And of course I would like the replays to be easily transferable.

An excellent suggestion someone else brought up is a properly functioning upload to YouTube feature.

 

A good record feature for training mode (same as evo would be nice).
Also for trainning mode a random hit type, like random counter, random guard similar to 2D fighter in order to practice hit confirms.

 

I really like this idea! The app could be an iPhone or Android app as well, why limit ourselves to just handheld gaming platforms like the Vita? Mobiles are common, and are mostly smartphones now. I think many VF players in the West will have smartphones for a potential app like the one you suggest. It'd be really cool to somehow sync your console player data with your smartphone app and be able to take your customised character where ever you go. Once you locate a player to challenge, load up the game and then download your player customisations from the app.


PS, I agree on the voices issue. I happen to like (or rather, should I say, I do not dislike) the current voices. I'd rather see extra console features added like VF terminal integration, spectator lobbies, online replays and uploads and ghost data if it became a choice from the developers between that stuff OR "improved voices" - which may eat into development time for the other features and still turn out to be worse than what we already have. Consider too, that new voices are not just character intros and winning quotes, but every grunt, shout, cry, crumple hit, etc.


PPS, by all means, let's have SEGA experiment with new voices and redone sounds for VF6, but for right now, I'd just prefer subs for the Japanese speaking cast and be done with it.

 

I can see why certain folk would appreciate a sound redesign but suggesting they do so for this port seems absurd to me.

They're obviously looking to avoid making a loss with VF this time around, having to go through the entire audio design process for a port that isn't even going to be available at retail seems crazy.

I suggest that we don't suggest they re-do the voice overs, i'm sure they'll be doing a sound redesign for VF6 if it's coming.

 

I didn't mention it in my report, but during my conversation with syzygy regarding features the community would like, I talked about a hardcore training mode.

In my report I think I mentioned referencing SFIV, VF4 Evo's training modes, and some others. A detail I told him about, was visible hitboxes. He seemed to appreciate the idea but my impression is that's not gonna be in the training mode.

Again, it's widely known to them that the Evo style tutorials/drills are highly desired. And VF4 Evo's training mode as a whole.

Side Note: I remember when VF5 came out for PS3 and we had a gathering at Plague's and a lot of players were echoing the sentiment that they were disappointed with the training mode considering what we had in Evo. It's obviously been talked a lot about here on the boards, but it was probably one of the first reaction the competitive VF players had right away when they got VF5 on PS3.

 

BTW, anyone like the whole battlepacks idea they're doing with 3SO?

Granted, VF5 had high level player replays packed with the game (they just didn't tell you who it was, but a lot of people were able to figure out who was who) and we've been in the YouTube era for at least half a decade now.

And battle packs are a "hardcore" or "wannabe hardcore" form of DLC. But I'd definitely be a sucker to them myself.

 

Ok here's my little contribution:

Would like to see the frame data display on replays that shows adv/disadv on that bar, like you see in the YouTube vids.

Definitely want to be able to port my customised character around to tournaments and mates houses (I've always thought they should sell an arcade stick that integrates the memory card or arcade style card slot so your character travels with your stick)

The most valuable 'feature' however is going to be support for the game from Sega in the west. They need to hype the release with gradual info drips over the next year- take a leaf out of Capcom's book with their SFxT hype. They also need to support launch events and tournaments with merchandise, posters etc and send their PR people out to the community. If they can get the game established over here so that it stands alongside the most popular titles (which obviously it can and does in Japan) then that will be better than any feature in the long run.

By the time 6 hits, I want the dark days to be forgotten- and I'm a PS3 owner so the days have been pretty dark.

As a side request, I would like to see the iPhone app that shows all the move lists localised and made available in the west. I'd buy it!

 

I remember those, they were very entertaining to watch.

I personally really want to be able to upload replay videos to Youtube from the console. This feature, I believe, can do miracles for attracting new players while entertaining the veterans. That and VF vids will be able to dominate Youtube .

 

Wow sperg harder about character voiceovers, damn.

I really don't think mimicking Capcom's "lol now you can pay for what's been free for years" DLC model is something anyone ought to imitate. Some of the crap they pull is on par with EA, Activision and Ubisoft. I mean it's great they care enough to release a new fight man revision every 9-12 months and keep things fresh, it's just when they release $30 worth of cosmetic silly DLC for a $40 update that their cynicism shows. The line of crapola about not putting regular SSF4 on PC also kinda teed me off but w/e.

THE POINT IS doing these things with a game like VF5, which is already on thin ice with the US fight crowd in terms of longevity/general appeal isn't going to entice them. Magic orbs/panty shots/TF2 hats really only work for games with existing appeal or well-established gameplay tropes.

It's far more important to give newcomers a chance to make sense of the nuts and bolts of the game instead of providing them with an endless online stompfest courtesy of the regular players with hat collection minigame.