My thoughts on the current state of fighting games

Is basically what you are saying for half of that post. Of course it's my opinion, I say as much in the thread title. Why you continue to harp on this is beyond me. I am not passing opinion off as fact, I am basing my opinion on facts and observations.

Even other people here have been able to distinguish that much, so I don't know why you're acting like this.

What you've been saying is that I've been citing Seth Killian as a way of appealing to authority, when that is not the case at all. It could have very well been some random dude on the internet who wrote those articles and I would have still cited them for my own. Take Seth's name away from it if you have to, because I'm not trying to use his name for leverage, he just happened to be the one who wrote those articles.

What I originally said re: DOA:

I was agreeing that stun was not a range dependent mechanic because that's what I was originally saying, anyways. By giving basically every move in the game some sort of stun on hit (in other words, making the reward at range similar or identical to the reward you get up close), you give people more incentive to play at range because there's less risk to do so and roughly equal reward.

But again, this is not the right way to get people to play the range game for a number of reasons.

You are really missing the point dude. Yes it's a bad situation, but you are not always facing imminent death for making a mistake at neutral vs a move like 3K like you are in DOA. It's one of the biggest problems I have with that game, actually: there's way too much emphasis on triangle and not enough on creating frame advantage. It basically throws a wrench into the VF system and the game suffers for it.

That being said, it is somewhat brilliant how that game encourages disrespectful play. It's not VF and it's not trying to be. While it isn't nearly as good overall, I do give the game some credit for trying something no other 3D fighter will, even if it's not the best idea to begin with.

I already hinted at a number of these things, but I'll give you a quick and dirty rundown if you absolutely must have it now.

Games that are easier to conceptualize are easier for people to get in to. Someone else here even said it, but conceptualizing time, especially as a beginner, is not as easy as conceptualizing space. A little bit of critical thinking will tell you why you're getting hit by anti-airs, but it takes a bit of system knowledge and a bit more cognizance to understand why you're getting punished at -6.

As such, the games that are easy to conceptualize will always have a place, which is getting people into the genre. These are games like SF for "traditional" 2D fighters, BlazBlue for airdash games, etc.

There are people who graduate from these games, so to speak, to more complex fighters. For them, they're looking for a more complete overall experience, which is what a lot of modern airdash games are trying to create right now (and games like Guilty Gear have already done).

What 3D fighters like Tekken and VF lack is that more complete experience. They're mostly great at what they do, but what they do is only part of what makes a fighting game these days. Thus, they are both slowly dying, albeit Tekken has more staying power for a few reasons such as aesthetic appeal (which I'm not going to go into detail on right now), a less obtuse approach to the midscreen game, etc.

There's your quick and dirty. I will elaborate more on this when I have the time and it will not be done in a forum post.

 

Keep in mind that I am talking about an arcade environment here. Those of you that aren't lucky enough to live over here (particularly those of you in the US) are doomed to forever be surrounded by mediocre games because that is what most people outside of this environment are comfortable playing.

I am also writing an article on the differences in attitude between Japanese and American players, and why our approach to fighting games is generally pretty backwards. Expect that one in the near future.

 

I had a look through that article and went back over some of the first posts. You mention VFs popularity and speculate as why it's currently so low in Japan. Everything I've gathered from the players and rankings there is that it started to drop off from VF5 because of a combination of them not liking the changes in the new game and Sega's business decisions. It apparently dropped off a whole lot more because a lot of the VF players hated VF5FS's changes. I haven't seen anything to suggest it's because it lacked evolution or innovation. Tekken 5 and 6 became incredibly popular over there as VF went down and they didn't do anything particularly different neither did SF4.

You mention Guilty Gear a lot in your comparison. I can't form my own opinion on that as I haven't played much of that series, however it seems like personal preferences on game design and what you prioritize. I don't necessarily see a consensus on those things. I have my own reasons for liking VF over Tekken and KOF over SF but others wouldn't necessarily agree. VF does what it does extremely well and I don't feel it's lacking vs 2d fighters due not having a long range game since it more than makes up in other ways. You don't agree as you prioritize other elements. The dashing game is something you don't care for but is personally one of my favourite aspects of both VF and Tekken. I posted a few vids a couple of pages back of some demonstrations both in and out of matchplay. Being capable of doing those things opens up new options and creativity. I love that sort of thing but haven't yet seen that it in other games.

I am looking forward to see how Tekken x SF turns out and how it tries to combine the 2 in a 3d fighter.

 

And the hole just keeps getting dug deeper.

 

Okay, then why haven't you explained why? I'm waiting. Don't say he's not a 3D player either because that's already established. I'm going to need examples, and lots of them.

The majority of responses in this thread have been along the lines of "VF has nothing wrong with it, I'm not listening, lalala". Where are these facts you speak of? Please, enlighten me.

I responded to this:

And said yeah, absolutely, I agree.

I'm saying the reward is similar or the same in many cases. Obviously the amount of stun is not the same on longer range moves, but it is still enough to play the stun game and do some serious damage.

That free guess is exactly it. That free guess is a guessing game rigged pretty heavily in your favor that can lead to insane damage. Not even talking about landing a Critical Burst, either. You can pretty easily bait holds/staggers at that point in the stun game for sometimes even more damage than you'd be able to get than if you landed a CB. And getting towards the end of the stun threshold in DOA is not that hard even against good players as long as you aren't autopiloting, so don't give me that bull.

Except that you can get damage from pokes in DOA that's comparable to what you can get up close. Giving every move stun on counter hit will do that.

I already said that when I say triangle in reference to DOA I am referring explicitly to stun game. You know, what makes the game unique from everything else. Obviously it has VF's triangle too, but that is not the crux of the game like it is in VF.

Frame advantage matters less in DOA than it does in VF because the game has a universal mechanic that allows you to disrespect it called holding. This is part of the guessing game in DOA of course, but it subverts what I guess you'd call the more "pure" guessing game in VF. Could you imagine VF with DOA holds?

Nevermind my countless examples that prove that they are, you say they aren't. Go ahead, enlighten me. I'm waiting.

I am not talking about using anti-airs, I am talking about getting hit by them. You can intuitively figure out that maybe you should stop jumping and maybe you should start trying to work your way in by using other movement options. Compared to doing a move that to the layman would appear to be "safe" but actually isn't, not to mention the guessing game that goes along with it, it is relatively easy to figure out on your own, or even to explain to someone else.

Of course I know this dude, I used to play BlazBlue. I had the mook for CS1 translated back in 2010, for fuck's sake. And actually, it is visible to the player. If you get hit by attribute invulnerable moves it creates a circular hit effect (or at least it did back then). If BlazBlue can be accused of anything, it's not withholding information from the player.

So you can get away with gross oversimplifications because we presuppose you know the game. I guess home field advantage will do that to people.

Again, I'm waiting. Tell me why I'm wrong, don't just say that I am.

You know what? This is just you stating your opinion as if it were fact, therefore it's wrong.

I get that you disagree with me, but for the life of me I have not seen much reason as to why. At least the other guys here are making an effort to present some kind of counterargument instead of just saying I'm wrong.

 

I changed the subject because you asked me to, lol.

I am not being elitist about anything. I would love nothing more than to fly everyone in this thread out to Japan for a paid vacation. This place is fucking nerd Valhalla.

(I actually plan to do something like that around this time next year)

 

My favorite character from my favorite action game. You shouldn't have.

Also, how are you enjoying dat Marvel? Prepare for another five years at the least.

 

Is Cricket inherently a better game than Baseball because it better utilizes the space between the bowler/pitcher and the batsman?

 

I don't understand the argument.

The fighting genre has (sometimes severe) highs and lows in popularity, but isn't that a big leap to attribute 3D's decline to a lack of innovation? If anything, contemporary successes in the medium--CoD, Halo, Assassin's Creed, reboots of Thief, Tomb Raider, the upcoming Ratchet & Clank--would suggest that innovation is not at the top of the list for what defines a success.
Besides that, it's not as though 2D fighters were outstripping 3D among audiences or critics for a long time, either. The gap from 2000-2009 was mostly filled by 3D games like SoulCalibur, Tekken, and even Virtua Fighter itself (could you fill me in on some popular 2D ones from this period? I can only think of Guilty Gear at the moment). The decline of 3D seems more like a byproduct of the declining interest in the genre, not how much new ground is broken in its subgenre.

I'll leave that on the bench and just ask: do 3D fighters need a ranged game to be considered an improvement? SoulCalibur's weapons make for respectable long-range engagements. Same with Bushido Blade, Last Bronx, and Star Wars: Masters of Teras Kasi, to wildly varying degrees of "respectable long-range engagements".
Wanting to adopt the best elements of both dimensions is noble in concept, but unnecessary. Why shouldn't games be different from one another? Some 3D fighters offer their take on ranged attacks, others don't. Virtua Fighter prefers avoiding long range and flashy attacks, but that's part of its strengths. There's a myriad of reasons VF's in decline, but I don't think 'integrity' or a 'lack of innovation' are among them. For whatever reason, lots of 3D games cut themselves from the same cloth as VF's "simulation" approach, and people seem to enjoy that.

From a more practical point of view, Dhalsim limbs or fireballs in a game allowing sidestepping aren't fun to use. Remember Spawn's 4A+B?

 

Pffft, fighting games. Everyone knows Worms Armageddon is the greatest game ever. I only base my opinion, er... this fact on the hundreds of hours poured into it over the last 15 years.

 

I read most of this thread, and I have one thing to say that seems like it wasn't used as an argument yet.

Consider @masterpo 's argument of the monitor size, in SF you are using 60cm long and 30cm high (or, two layers of jumping height, although you can't really access only the first layer without going to the second one like you can in KoF), and 0cm in VF you have 60cm long, 15 cm high (one layer of jumping, which makes it impossible to go through a standing opponent) and 30 cm deep (in other words, 3 layers of side step, which are not step at all, step to the left, and step to the right), so although you have less options on the Y axis, the options on the Z axis than the ones on the Z axis in SF (a.k.a non-existant on that game. Even if you consider older KoF's dodges that still is only one direction and can only evade one move at a time), so on that regard you can easily argue that 3D fighting spacing is more complex than 2D's, because even though you have less options if both players are at each sides of the screen (which... are still not that much, since the options at that distance are usually only projectiles or Stands or Personas), once they are about 50% of the screen away from each other they have much more options to use in 3D, specially if you consider that the crushing game of 3D is much more deeper (in 2D you have an invincible/super-armor move that wins it out, in 3D you need to guess if it was a high or a low).

Now the argument that no one used yet, is the arenas. In most 2D games, you start at the center of the arena, having that same equal size to both left and right. Let's take into consideration another spacing paramenter for that, let's think that SF4 arena has 24 meters overall, and you can jump 5 meters height. That would make a total of 120 square meters to move around, and you only have to care about the corners. Now let's take VF5FS arenas, the 16x16 one (or so I think, I'm not sure of the size), and the jumping height of 2,5 meters (I'm incluing the height of juggles as well here). That's 640 cubic meters to move around and you have to care about the size of the arena (that is different from one another, unlike any 2D fighter that is not from NRS), about the walls, about the end of the ring, about the type of wall, and about the angle you are facing the wall or the end of the ring, since that influences combos and ring outs. All-in-all, even though VF doesn't have any sort of projectlie at long ranges, it's spacing game STILL has MUCH more options than 2D games (and much more space to care about), and if you wanna play it at a high level you need to properly know how to use them all.

 

Going back over this thread is really quite funny. It's only natural that most of the attention would be on me since I made the thread, but I think some of you could use a moment to step back and look at something that perhaps not all of you caught on to yet.

The counterarguments in this thread have varied wildly.

"Space and time are the same thing" to "space and time are not directly related". "VF has a range game" to "VF doesn't have a range game but that's okay". "VF was the most popular game because it was the best" to "VF is still the best but isn't popular because people got mad at the changes".

Could it be that, perhaps, even amongst yourselves, you guys don't really have a consistent perception of what is going on in these games? How can people of (let's assume) roughly equal experience look at the same game and draw such wildly different conclusions?

Maybe some of us have though about this a littler harder and longer than others? I've certainly seen evidence to support that in this thread. Some of you are able to see where my observations are coming from, even if you don't necessarily agree with the opinion I have about them, while others can't even grasp what I am saying in the most basic of terms.

I'm not saying this as a way of being condescending, but I have honestly never seen any one group of players have so many downright contradictory opinions on how a game works.

 

For those of you who are still doubting my abilities as a player and absolutely require that anyone with an opinion has to have placed well in a tournament, here's me in grand finals twice in the same month in GGXrd: http://www.twitch.tv/sandiegofgc/b/609236623 (02:02) and http://www.twitch.tv/sandiegofgc/b/618413656 (02:38).

You can even watch my first Japanese +R tournament if you have a Nico account: http://www.nicovideo.jp/watch/sm21017215. If any of you know who En Slayer is, that is who I was fighting.

Not that any of this really matters, but some people just won't be satisfied unless I've "achieved something" lol. I'm not trying to inflate my ego, either, because I remember being a scrub like it was yesterday. You can ask @Sebo about that.

 

LMAO!
@Stl_Tim WRU!?

 

I'm on holiday away from this petty bs.

 

My dick is bigger than yours.

 

YOLO!