First Step: Trying to improve information for US players.

Ok, we have a good thread started about the differences in US players and those from around the world related to VF. The best point I have seen is that we have a problem with the way information is presented to New-Casual-Intermediate-Pro/Vet players. So this means we need to start focusing our attention into making FAQS/Strat Guides to help improve ourselves and other who just discover VF.

We have a lot of information here on VFDC to help us with this, but most of it is scattered around and needs to be centralized and made readily available to every aspiring VF fan. There are many varied and knowledgeable people here who can take the information they have learned and help to instruct our next wave of competitors.

It seems that our first order of business should be to start collecting and posting our information here in a very concise manner. I would be very interested in constructing a VF4/VF4evo Lion FAQ and possibly a VF4/VF4evo Jeffrey FAQ, but I would need a lot of help from people here since I am just slightly above being a casual VF player(I would be hardcore if I had competition).

1. What we need is a set of guidelines for FAQ and Strat submissions.
2. We need the board members to discuss the necessary information that *EVERY* Faq should hit on.
3. Exact specifics on documentation conventions for combo's, damage %, hit levels, etc. to help everyone be on the same page when reading any FAQ.
4. People interested in compiling and working on FAQ's for helping other people and themselves.
5. Less vet vs newb crap and more emphasis on creating intelligent competitors and observations.

List could go on, but you see the point. I am willing to put a lot of time into this mainly for myself to improve my VF playing, but to also allow everyone else the opportunity to improve their skills as well. hope to see some others interested in those posting as well. I play a lot of Fighting Games and VF is my fave (Even if I don't play it the most). Just don't expect me to make a FAQ for Akira or Jacky since they annoy me too much. /versus/images/icons/tongue.gif

 

sup. I think you have some pretty good points.

1. What we need is a set of guidelines for FAQ and Strat submissions.

Faq submissions probably do need guidelines. Strategies can't really be "submitted", they're just posted and are either worth something or not. I think faqs should be reviewed for content though before coming onto VFDC. A regular was pointing out to me that one possible reason for the lack of strategy guides is that even when a very good player puts out information that is translated from respected japanese sources, VFDC members would rather argue to death over the validity of that information than accept it as golden... "I don't think that move is so hot, but this move is really underrated!" "she's not second best in the game, no way. And this other guy deserves to be top tier but you called him bottom!" So the player is discouraged from bothering, a lot of posters aren't going to know the difference truly useful and valid information and well-organized crap.

We have a lot of information here on VFDC to help us with this, but most of it is scattered around and needs to be centralized and made readily available to every aspiring VF fan.

I was wondering, how do we take 30 separate posts worth of useful information and make them congeal into a hardened mass of FAQ. Maybe when you post something you could check a little box that says "submit this to the official [character] strategy section"... then someone reviews that section and either accepts or rejects it. If someone doesn't check the box, it just falls into the bin of general posts that eventually get crowded off the page. A forum mod and regular reader might be able to spot posts that have potentially good information that weren't submitted and mark them for submission.

3. Exact specifics on documentation conventions for combo's, damage %, hit levels, etc. to help everyone be on the same page when reading any FAQ.

I guess this isn't a bad idea, most of us can agree a faq needs a movelist, combos, and strategies. At least 2/3 of those things already exist on VFDC and aren't hard to get to, so there's no reason a simple jacky faq shouldn't exist that has a movelist, followed by the combos in my combo post, followed by an hour's worth of typing for general jacky strategies. Maybe if it's so easy, I should sit down and do that =)

I think since since you started this thread, I'm gonna move my post in the other thread.... so that "what more can we do about NAVF" doesn't get confused with "what more can we do with VFDC". It was sort of forced in there because I wanted it off my chest.

 

note: This was moved from the north american VF thread
============
But I've always thought that the lack of interest in VF is simple a lack of a good source of information.

I disagree, there's plenty of information on this page, and it's the single most guessable url for virtua fighter... it's just that information is not accessible if you're a little lazy or slow or have a short attention span.

I'm gonna go into Hyun mode for a second (more like an hour), I'm gonna go into a lengthy rant as to what tekkenzaibatsu does that VFDC doesn't. Maybe changing these things might help this page, and by extension .. interest in VF among english speakers.

-When people go onto a site, there's some universally used keywords that everyone goes looking for and immediately wants to click on. If you spot the keyword, you know you will have what you were looking for in one or two clicks. People want to see "Movelists" and "Combos", not 'Game Information'. They want to see a search button right in the front of the site, not as submenu fo the forums. And they want to see the word "Forums" and "Gameplay Discussion", not some phrase like 'versus city' or 'junky's jungle', which amounts to an injoke among serious VF players. They want to see "gatherings" or "upcoming tournaments", not "Jamboree". Yes, I understand anyone with 5 seconds of patience can read the description of each board under that board's title...

-Coherent and Complete Content. I don't know if I can bitch at VFDC for this, I have to bitch more at the competent users who don't contribute or share. I've seen posts (and made posts) whereby some interesting information will be passed on, and some smartass will reply "oh yeah, I've known about that and how that works forever, we tested it as soon as the game was out". Some of it is pretty important and gamewide, such as are-attacks-into-throws-ever-true-combos and are-there-attacks-that-truly-beat-TR's-every-time, and some of it is pretty specific... like it takes a year before the rest of the world knows how to get out of lion's df+P+G throw followups. If you go to TZ.com, you literally get within one click every substantial faq on the site for whichever game you want. It's not buried as a sticky in a specific section of the forums. More importantly, there's a faq for every character (at a glance, I didn't count), and in many cases 2-4 faqs for the popular characters. VFDC, we've got one guide for the game's golden boy, and one for lau, the runner up...and zero for scrub favorites like jacky and shun. Needless to say that means there are zero for the more complex characters who really NEED a faq to be played well, such as Vanessa.

-Coldness to newbies. Come on, it's a common complaint, and it's easy to write it off as "Wah wah use the search not our problem if you're too dumb to figure things out on your own". But if the site were laid out like (for example) Zaibatsu, ppl wouldn't need to use the search. Or if they did need to use it, they could do so quickly and easily because a search button would be a permanent feature of the top right corner of the page. I'm not saying people should be excused for laziness or that we need to hand them every single answer on a silver platter. But if someone wants to say "RTFM" they can at least do it with a minimum of coldness and sarcasm. I've noticed this sort of amusing/alarming trend on VFDC whereby relative newbies are adapting the veteran attitudes and phrases and basically tell other newbies "if you're too stupid to use the search button you don't deserve the answer". This coming from someone who has been a site member for a week or two.
Vets should ask themselves, "what is my eventual goal?" Do you want to improve the poster's research ability and work ethic and overall character, or do you want them to actually learn how to play VF?
Let me give an example in favor of more tedious lecturing:
-I want to know how to play quake 3 demo files. It's not documented in the game's manual and only poorly documented in general. I join the #quake irc channel and ask how. In TWICE the time it could take someone to type out the command/menu sequence needed to play a demo, I get a load of "RTFM" replies and sarcastic comments and urls to pages that tell you how to do it only if you know exactly how to dig for the answer, if it's there at all.

So what's the moral of the story? That vets are assholes? That newbies should expect this kind of treatment because for-christ's-sake-this-is-the-fortieth-time-someone-has-asked-this-retarded-question?
No, the moral is the information should have been in the friggin' manual, and easily spotted within that manual.

Okay, rant's over, it's late.
These comments will come across as sort of unfair and hypocritical. I've told newbies to use the @!$*@! search 1000 times, though lately I try to put more care into my replies. I also haven't written a jacky or lau or pai faq even though I play those characters to at least a mediocre level.
It's also cheap to yell at myke, because why the fuck is myke going to sit there and make TZ style dropdown menus or redesign the site regularly and completely reorganize it? Is he getting paid..? nope. Does he have infinite free time..? nope. Is there incentive to redo the site when the regular users don't seem to have much interest in making it better? nope. So this isn't a diatribe against myke, and I hope he doesn't read stuff like this and think "I should wash my hands of this and say fuck it, because people are never satisfied."

Myke, when you read this, you should know you're the reason the site has value, I hope you don't feel I'm out of line for telling you how to do your html or organize things... I know you have better html and organizational skills than I'll ever have. I just know VFDC has issues and I think they can be fixed.

 

Here's a neat idea ~ I play plenty of Warcraft 3 and there are many sites that have replays for download with a few lines of description and sometimes even an audio commentary of the replay.

I think this idea could be used with our media board here. Maybe write a few things in a certain video along with the link or pick a video of the week and review that. As for audio commentary ~ not really sure about that, but its a cool idea nonetheless =]

(I woulda posted this in questions and feedback but we got a nice thread going here already)

 

slightly off topic.. but

This might be slightly off topic here, but I think this will help improve the north american vf4 scene greatly.

We all have had the similar situations happen to us. "vf4 is a niche game, vf4 is too hard for beginners, vf4 this and vf4 that." But I've also ran into this problem. I have met several people who would like to get into the game, but face two difficulties. Distance/time and money. So the hardcore groups will have gatherings or get togethers at arcades like let's just say on average once a week. To the people who are extremely busy, poor, or limited on resources, they might not even attend more than once a month. (this is hypothetically speaking, bare with me! ) I have met so many people who would be interested or have potential to play the game and learn and get the community bigger if only they.......... ready for this....... had a copy of the game! Many people just for some reason or another won't pick up a copy of the game even though the game is cheaper now (under 19 dollars almost everywhere in the united states) or they will always say, yeah, I gotta go and pick that game up now after you introduce the game to them. But in honesty, how many people are that determined to do everything they say to someone? A lot of people talk the talk but never walk the walk. So what happens to these potential people that you might convert to play vf4? They start out, wanting to get better, and to learn the game and find some comp. They come over to your place, and start playing. They start losing and get discouraged, they go home and don't have a copy to work on some combos, juggles, or play the computer to build some confidence. Then they stop playing and coming. I have seen this happen many times. Back in the killer instinct days and also with street fighter alpha 2 days.

So my suggestion to every hardcore vf4 player is this... if you can (the key word is can) offer to buy them a copy of the game if and only if the new person is willing to give it a shot and come to a certain amount of gatherings or whatever. Or you can offer to pay half of the price. If they agree, take them to the store immediately! All the guys who have chipped/modded ps2's, burn copies (several) to hand out to people at arcades or wherever you go. Whoever has a chipped ps2 ask them if they have this game, if they like it or is willing to give it another shot. Attach your number/email address whatever. Get the person's memory card and if you have a gameshark, add all the characters with all the clothes and colors so they (some might, not everyone) will feel less pressure to have to play kumite and earn the items. All the people who are good at compiling information together. Save that stuff on floppy disks and make several copies. (I believe floppy disks can hold about 1000 pages of text) That way, most people won't have to search as hard. Since some people are still on 56k, compile some vids and burn them on a disk for them and hand it to them. No questions asked. Triple Lei was kind enough to do that for me when I first started vf4. I learned a lot and made copies to others. Others have helped me before I got dsl to help me compile and download vids. Some people have the net, but they don't have a printer. Some people don't like to read on a monitor. So have them come over to your place and have them bring their own paper and allow them to print out as much info they can. I've bought a copy for two people already. I have played them a total of five times each. But they like the game and will come around to gatherings when they feel more comfortable and when I have time.

I might be way out of line. but maybe that will help make the vf4 community grow. Just a few suggestions. Early.

 

Re: slightly off topic.. but

All the guys who have chipped/modded ps2's, burn copies (several) to hand out to people at arcades or wherever you go. Whoever has a chipped ps2 ask them if they have this game, if they like it or is willing to give it another shot. Attach your number/email address whateve

yes. please attach your number. that way the IDSA know where to reach you.

I could be wrong but I don't think piracy of the game you 'love' is any sort of answer for creating a competitive atmosphere.

GE

 

This is similar to an idea I thought of after reading one of Ninjinsan's recent posts /versus/images/icons/smile.gif. IIRC, he said (And I rephrase) something along the lines of " Having access to Japanese match clips doesn't meen we shouldn't think of doing the same".

Why not do it for fun, or for the sake of 'trading' match clips with international players who are interested in seeing NA or EU or anyone else play. (It should not be done, though, to show off or proove that NA players, for example, can be as good as anyone else).

This idea is easier said than done, since not all players here have the means to capture matches and not all players have competetion. But what if, for example, people collaborate to get some webspace for clips, and then have willing players buy those EMS adapters to transfer save files over the internet to people who are willing (And able) to capture those replays and upload them?

Prices for webspace might be high for huge spaces, but it can be organized so that it can hold a maximum # of matches per day , Elliminating the need for high space.

This can turn out to be good since there are healthy groups here like the FL group, NY group, LA group, Canada group, and all the other players with competition that are willing to do this. Not to mention the PS2 release of Evo is around the corner, which makes the idea of transferring replay files over the net not that bad either. Just a thought... /versus/images/icons/smile.gif

Another idea is something that I wanted to do for a long time, but was lasy and busy enough not to bother about (And I don't think I am planning to do it). The idea was to make guide clips!

For example, make a clip showing several simple okizeme pressure situations. Something like showing Lion sweeping somebody, pausing the clip after that, and explaining what Lion can do here and why. Some defensive tactics can be shown the same way as well to even the situation.

The guide clip can be geared towards people who know the moves and have a decent knowledge of the games system, but are puzzled as to how offensive manuevers and defensive tactics should be performed. Maybe some potential players who heard about the game and are interested in learning it. Heck maybe all players can benefit from them as they progress.

And I am not talking about combo videos because those don't show much for all players. What I am talking about is more of a next-step to the trial training of the PS2 version. (Maybe the Evo one will have some new similar features?). Just some thoughts I had....

 

Re: slightly off topic.. but

</font><blockquote><font class="small">In reply to:</font><hr />
All the guys who have chipped/modded ps2's, burn copies (several) to hand out to people at arcades or wherever you go. Whoever has a chipped ps2 ask them if they have this game, if they like it or is willing to give it another shot. Attach your number/email address whateve r

[/ QUOTE ]

The above is a quick and dirty guide on how to destroy your arcade. Why not just go over to your local arcade operator, kick him in the nuts, and then leave a burned copy of Evo on the ground beside his writhing body. Stomp, you've had good ideas before - unfortunately, this is not one of them.

cheers,

 

</font><blockquote><font class="small">In reply to:</font><hr />
People want to see "Movelists" and "Combos", not 'Game Information'. They want to see a search button right in the front of the site, not as submenu fo the forums. And they want to see the word "Forums" and "Gameplay Discussion", not some phrase like 'versus city' or 'junky's jungle', which amounts to an injoke among serious VF players. They want to see "gatherings" or "upcoming tournaments", not "Jamboree".

[/ QUOTE ]

This is probably the very best suggestion to improve VFDC to date. Thanks, Creedlet. I couldn't agree more.

cheers,

 

Although that I also believe VFDC can be improved by some little changes. The purpose of my recent posts is not focused on how VFDC can help the scene. It's not the site's responsibility to promote this game, but yes it is true that VFDC is one of the premiere online representation of the NA scene. The real reason for my recent posts is more directed at the players. In general, VF players do not feel as enthusiastic as, let say, tekken players. Now this is not a blanket statement directed at everyone. I can be sure that some of the people that comes to this board, probably don't play VF with other people simply because others talk him down. Whenever people say to me "VF sucks, it's such a retarded fighting game." The last thing I'll ever do is to agree with them from peer pressure. Even when I am in the presence of a group of Namco/Capcom/SNK fighting game players, I proudly say that I play Virtua Fighter.
Again, I emphasize that this statement is not directed at anyone, but I feel that this is the case for alot of the players. What I am saying is that the problem here is with the players, we cannot support this 'niche game' idea ourselves. By alienating new players or not participating in scene events, you are supporting the idea of VF being a 'niche game'. I do not agree with the idea that, "I play this game and that enough, let me be." If that is the concept of your support, then you shouldn't even be part of the community, cause that kind of support is not appreciated. Don't complain about having no competitions, and don't complain about the players of the community. There shouldn't be any reason for anyone to have to come up with ideas and suggestions for other people to do to improve the community. This is something that you should the compelled to do yourself, what ever it is. I am getting a video capture card this weekend, and I am going to start putting clips up on yahoo group. (If there are other good webspaces please let me know) Giving suggestions and ideas is a good thing, but talking about it won't solve a thing. If you feel like you have a good idea, go ahead and go for it. People like me on VFDC will help you all the way we can because we are all in it for the same cause. Just let us know.

/versus/images/icons/laugh.gif

 

Re: slightly off topic.. but

Llanfair/godeater.. ok.. maybe I said it wrong. Sorry, english is my second language. But give copies to people who are interested in the game. Not randomly handing them out. And by giving them a copy, it's like at home or something. Sorry if I got you two confused. But I have done that before with roms and also people who wanted to get me into pc gaming have burned me copies. My post wasn't meant to destroy the game through piracy. But I have been to many gatherings (like nyg3) and seen some people with a chipped ps2. I don't have one, so I for one, don't need to do that. I simply bought a few of my friends copies of vf4. Thanks for helping me clear that up! /versus/images/icons/smile.gif Also, try not to focus on that one paragraph if it's a negative one. I did write others stuff didn't I? lol

 

Re: slightly off topic.. but

I've fed threads like this one my two cents so many times that I'm probably out 20 bucks.

I've been one of the most prolific 'wanting to raise interest in VF' individuals on VFDC. I have tried on numerous occasions to organize tournaments that would incorporate players from all across NA. I need not remind everyone how easy it is for things to not happen, for plans to fall through, for people to not show up, for tourneys that fizzle, for gatherings to be cancelled, etc etc. I think it's great that we all feel that *something* needs to happen to mae VF go 'boom' - even it's a very small 'boom'.

Without revisiting some of my previous comments earlier in the year (ie, when I got pissed and called everyone lazy asses) I do want to point one thing out. If we, as a community, want to promote NAVF we have to put the effort in. We have to organize tournaments, gatherings, whatever. And people have to go - especially those who are pro-spreading-of-VF. It's all about the effort. Without it, the VF scene will remain what it is.

cheers,

 

Hand out FAQS not Games

I still think its a bad idea. It wasn't the randomness of the act (hey you, want some VF) but the idea of taking a product that only thrives in a "for profit" system and undermining that system while purporting to help the community.

If everyone stood up and said, "sounds good" then VF dies. And no one has been helped. If the guy beside me can't invest $20 bucks in a game he wants to get better at (but will invest the equivilant in short order at the arcade) then I have no time for him. I don't care if it means one less guy to play against. I'd rather play against someone I didn't have to bribe.

Llanfair is right. The only way to improve the scene is...to improve the scene. Organize, promote, email, poster (nyc did this with good results). Be creative and intelligent about your motion because it is hard work and most people get excited for all of a month or two and then quietly change the subject.

GE

 

Re: slightly off topic.. but

As much as I would like a better VF scene, especially in TO. It seems like apathy overwhelms desire in most cases. Few people want to travel anymore, and even if they do usually the cost of travel is prohibitive. Unfortunately we don't have the player density that we need. I'm not sure how to increase that either, since it seems like the typical North American does not get a good first impression from VF. Without the instant attraction that SF, Tekken, and SC have I think VF in North America will always suffer.


cheers,
kbcat - build it and they will come... not bloody likely.

 

Re: slightly off topic.. but

Well maybe the next time VF is actually an arcade game (before anyone jumps all over it, I am of course talking about NA, USA in particular), it'll stand a better chance at having a following. Sure the sales of VF4 console are awesome in that they're finally comporable to Tekken's (compare their sales figures now, which are separated by less than 100,000 copies, to TK3's 2.6 million copies versus VF3tb's 96,000), but Tekken's fan following didn't start at home, it started in the arcades. No one goes to the arcades to play VF. Even at traditional tournament hot spots like California's SHGL and SVGL, where almost every fighting game becomes tourney-worthy (I've seen the most amazing Virtua On play of my life at SHGL), VF is ignored. Personally I think VF3 did alot to destroy what little arcade following that VF had, and it may be too late to ever foster such a following again.

I've heard many different opinions about lack of accessibility regarding VF, and regardless of how much you love VF, it's a pretty good argument. Visually, it's much easier to reap a gratuitous response out of Tekken, and first time players are going to appreciate that. The more first time players you get, the more long time players you develop. Frankly that's out of our hands as fans and out of this site's hands as a resource. I completely agree that the intuitiveness of this site ranks pretty low, but it doesn't matter if no new fans in any meaningful quantity are actually seeking to utilize said resource.

I know that this post doesn't exactly offer any new solutions to the problem of delineating information, and I'm sorry for that. But I guess that's because in my opinion the problem with the VF community is the game in itself; it just doesn't appeal to the type of game player that's going to create a fanatical base.

 

</font><blockquote><font class="small">In reply to:</font><hr />
Here's a neat idea ~ I play plenty of Warcraft 3 and there are many sites that have replays for download with a few lines of description and sometimes even an audio commentary of the replay.

[/ QUOTE ]

Indeed. The problem is, certainly there are more than a few people on this board who aren't with the broadband. Still a great idea though so...

Y'know, I'm thinking virtually every new visitor to this board has access to the vf4 game disk replay files on the ps2. Easy to find commentary on these matches could benefit these new players. Also, I'm reconning ps2 evo will sell pretty well on this side of the planet & generate a spike in hits to vfdc. If that disk has replays & if they end up being the same ones you get on the import disk then I'm sure we could greet this new wave of players with some helpful match analysis. Just some thoughts.

 

After reading this whole thread, I think I have an idea...

Stompoutloud talked about giving people copies of the game, several have mentioned NA videos, I really appreciated the Japanese instructional videos, and talk of Official VFDC Character Guides has gone around...

So why don't we, the NA authorites on VF4, create the Official VFDC Guide to VF4, separated into many pretty HTML-based guides and videos with English commentary? AND, we can make it so all of them fit on one CD-R, including all the necessary player software (for the less computer-savvy VF-ers, and so people who don't even have the Internet can view it).

- It'll include lots of HTML-based guides and instructional videos in English.
- We can hand it out to everyone who even shows interest in the game, since it'll be so well-organized, with an auto-run webpage revealing a pretty table of contents, so that anyone who understands English will have no trouble with it.
- It'll cover every aspect of the game, from beginner to advanced, so it'll be a truly complete reference.
- It'll cover some aspects that are truly theoretical, like methods of predicting throws and their escapes, reversal levels, intimidation tactics, player tendencies, How to Identify A Scrub (see sidenote), etc.
- It'll have some truly good foreign and domestic tournament videos, dubbed with English commentary.
- We'll have stuff covering how to spread the game to other players.
- Updates will be labeled with version numbers, and those who bring up points included in an update will be credited.
- It'll be so good that Prima Publishing will commission VFDC members to write the US Evo Strategy Guide (purely a dream, but a quality goal nonetheless)
- Thus, it'll look quite professional, like included-in-resume, commercial-level professional.

[sidenote] I have uncovered Tekken and 2D players who try to demonstrate that VF4 has 'no depth' by doing things like Lion's d+K,K over and over. Our guide should prepare everyone to easily beat this scrubbiness, so they'll have nothing on us. I'm the type who likes to turn matches vs. these types into grand displays of a superior game, which does not mean throwing the same reversal over and over or doing the same high-damage combo more than once in said match. Thus, there is a big place for solely flashy stuff in our guide. [/sidenote]

- If we can get this disc out and spread it around a lot before US Evo comes out, assuming it does, then when it does, boo-yah, we've just made NA VF go boom in a big way.

As for VFDC:
Creed's right. I'd also like to see a front-page section on upcoming events and more frequent front-page news, even if that news is an interesting thread or some statistic; the point is that people will see an active site without having to go to the boards.

P.S. While I was writing this here at school, someone came up to me, noticed Virtua Fighter, said he had the game, but thought Tekken 4 was better than VF4. I asked why, and apparently he had only done T4's Story Mode as well as VF4's arcade mode and a little bit of Kumite, saying he felt VF4 was 'too short.' People have this game, but people aren't even touching Versus Mode! Since people like this guy represent the majority of PS2-version owners, we NEED this guide. I want to be able to hand this guy a CD, or better yet reach into my pocket and pull out a mini-CD, and watch him become a member of the VF4 community.
Thus, now that I think about it, we can create a Newbie's Guide and make sure IT fits onto a Pocket CD, so if we meet Random Dude in an arcade or in cases like mine, we can be prepared.

Let's do this.

 

Well regarding Wolf I know I'm waiting for Evo to come out on ps2 to be able to compose a veriafiable FAQ & be able to synchronise info with other recognised Wolf players. I'm pretty sure this is a generally shared sentiment when it comes to char guides and ppl who've got the will, knowledge and peers to create an in-depth FAQ for their most succesful characters.

Everyone's gameplay has vastly improved since the release of VF4 a year and a half ago and I am sure we will produce high quality references for every single char in the game in the coming months.

 

For what its worth my school has a somewhat decent lab for video recording/editing and such. I'd be willing to mess around with it and see what I can come up with.

As far as videos go, I know I learned a lot from downloading videos from the web. And suppose I'm new to VF and want to go find some videos. I go to virtuafighter.com (dare I say the #1 VF site for north america?) and click on media (since I want videos after all.)
VF4fx - FTP Server Offline
VF.dyndns.org - Offline
VF Fan Art - Online, but I want movies damnit!
Daioh - Offline
TBZone - In Korean, but I can navigate the menus in English to find some goodness to download.

But think about that - I go to VFDC, click on Media, and 1 of the 5 links has movies, and that is a Korean, and it being in Korean could scare someone off.
Sure there is the "current media" on the main page, but then you have to go reading through the messages and clicking on links (some of which may not work because they are too old/arn't hosted here/etc)
Maybe this is becoming a bitch at how VFDC is organized thread. Between the wacky names (versus city/jamboree/etc), to the media links being down, to there not being enough information/etc.
Also, the latest event under the "events" section was in 2001. /versus/images/icons/frown.gif

Although I don't think just fixing up some VFDC a bit will really help things that much. I like the idea for the CD though. Like a "How to play VF" CD. Since I know a decent amount of people (well okay more like a small handful) but they'd be willing to give the CD a look at (especially if I shoved it down their throats, hhahahahaha). It would be nice though to have a nice guide with really clear cut "If I want to know this about the game, I go here."

It can be hard to just find people for competition. Kbcat I should be so fortunate to have a VF scene like toronto has where I live. I mean, first off your arcades have it. Second off, that's arcadeS, not arcade. The arcade scene in rochester is pathetic (unless, of course, you wanna go play DDR). At home the closest vf4 machine is in philly (ver b last I checked) and the closest evo is in NYC. Plus I really have no one to play besides supergolden and he tires of it so much more easily than I do it sucks. So yea... I mean, sure every city's VF scene could be better, but if you have at least 1 arcade with evo in it then that's a really good start.

You know, going to canada its so weird to walk into a random arcade and actually see fighting games and people playing them. The first time I was in Montreal I walked into some random arcade & they had 2 VF4s, 2 soul calibur 2s, a tekken 4, the latest DDR, and everything and I'm like "Wow... I must have found an awesome arcade!" and then walking back I found another arcade with just as many games. It was crazy!

That's enough rambling for now, I'm tired and lost too many team games of war3 with supergolden... /versus/images/icons/frown.gif