New here and have some questions

Well I was thinking of getting Virtua Fighter 5: Final Showdown, but first I'm going to rent Virtua Fighter 5 from Gamefly to see if I like it. I just wanted to open myself up to more fighting games besides Tekken, so my first question would be is their a big difference between 5 and 5: Final Showdown? Second, do a fair amount of people sill play this online? Also, is it really as hard as people make this game out to be?

 

Yes there are big differences in the mechanics.

The biggest ones are are the removal of:

Multiple Throw Escapes
OM Attacks
DM Attacks
0f Throws
Throw Clash
Stagger after a Elbow counter-hits 2P
Re-animated Bounds from Vanilla 5 allow for the all the charcters to make better use of the system

Side-turned situations are pronounced in this game and it's matured in this version than in 5, where Sega was still toying with the idea

Guard-Throw Escape is there for beginners to understand the very basic of defense in VF, and that is doing two things at once. GTE is where you have a Throw Escape buffered inside the guard.

Move sets are expanded upon for the characters. There are some removals but in the end they end up having more tools. Aoi's moves from Yin-Yang stance and El Blaze's Rocket Discharge are examples of expanded tool sets.

Stages are dynamic in this one. Some are shaped like alley/tacos. Some switch between rounds from Full Fenced to Open. So one round you need to be careful of wall combos, the next round you need to be aware of Ring Out situations.

Breakable walls on some Half-Wall stages.

The speed is faster in FS (although VF in general is fast paced).

This one has two more characters than 5.

Online, from what I hear may or may not be active. Hit up the online match making section or shout-box or status update.

The game is hard in the sense that most of the execution heavy things are in the defensive options in relation to your opponent. Being able to break stagger and doing a Crouch-Dash Fuzzy Guard when you are hit to avoid the mix-up being examples.

The speed of the game is 1 hit confirms, so you have to pay more attention than you do the other games out there due, the game still being active for both players, because guaranteed punishment doesn't start until frame -/+10, yet the majority of the game takes place in the -/+9 frame range.

In English, the majority of the game takes place in the light to heavy disadvantage situations, but not heavy enough for guaranteed punishment, until you get the opponent to make mistakes.

 

This iteration of VF is probably one of the easiest ones ever released, so if the 'hype' of VF being 'ZOMG HARD MODEZ' intimidates you at all, don't let it.

Online mode is still active - there're always people to play, and if you make the effort to connect with people from this site and start adding them to your friend list, you'll be unlikely to have a situation where there isn't at least one person online that can spar with you. It's not as popular as Tekken and SF, so don't be startled if you're looking at who's online and you only see two or three other people - that's normal, and you do only need one person to be online so that you can get games. Also, you don't get as many chaff opponents on VF as you do with the other games, since the people who stick with VF and still play will be somewhat competent, rather than the total scrubs you might find, for example, on SF, where you might get a Blanka player who literally just stands and spams the lightning thing, for better or worse (the game also doesn't have much crap like that either, and it's easily punished).

Femto covered most of the differences, and honestly, if you're looking to get into VF, I wouldn't recommend renting 5 first. The system is really quite different from FS, and all you'll be doing is forcing yourself to break previous habits and relearn everything when you transition anyway - you'll do yourself a much better service by starting with FS straight away. The lack of online competition from VF5 will also make the experience kinda dull - it's not a game where the AI can really give you much competition or offer any kind of experience close to playing another person. It reads commands and has inhuman inputs, and it also fails at dealing with certain set-ups and frame-traps, so you end up either exploiting those, or purposely conditioning yourself not to react to your opponent's weakness - neither of those are particularly desirable.

At the risk of sounding like a salesman, I would recommend buying FS if you have the money and want to play it. It's what, $20 or something? If you give it a decent chance to impress you, even if you do end up not liking it, you'll have easily gotten $20 with of entertainment out of it by the time you've finished learning your character and messing around with the costumes. You'll also find it easy to get help and advice about the game - there are active veteran players in each character's sub-forum, as well as a general gameplay area, so you'll always be able to get help on where to improve your game.

 

Regular VF5 unfortunately is pretty much a redundant game at this point, so yeah, stick with Final Showdown. Don't know what console or region you are, but Xbox Live anywhere near Europe or Eastcoast America, there's still plenty of people about. I was just playing on there solid for 4 hours on a whole new tag with hardly any friends set yet. The 3 button system is really intuitive on a nice joystick, and there's plenty of characters you can compete with that really don't require that much memorisation or reflexes against about 60% of who you meet online.

If you get the hang of it, and become semi-deadly, you may even get invited to face the inner circle 40% playing in private rooms

 

Thanks for all the replies, Femto you kinda confused me there with all the Virtua Fighter terminology lol I don't know any of those things yet.

 

I was going to explain them, but it was going to make the post that much longer. Don't be afraid to ask questions, and it's encouraged, since we could always use more discussions around here.

The is a lot of info here, but again, don't be afraid to ask about them, because even though things are explained, sometimes it doesn't sink right away, so maybe someone has a different way of explaing things so you get that "Oh, now I get it" moment.

If you want me to, I will though. I'm always down to talk about VF, even if it's stuff that's been covered multiple times in the past!

 

Sure go ahead, it would be very helpful.

 

Actually I'll just post this

http://virtuafighter.com/wiki/glossary/

Also hit up the Wiki on the front page. That will give you an idea of the game. I'll post some vids showing the stuff from previous VFs that aren't in Final Showdown.

 

Multiple Throw Escapes:



Up to the 2 minute mark explains it, even in Slow Mo.

OM and DM Attacks:



Throw Clash:

 

Also, check out the Dojo section here as it has the Tutorial vids from Sega as well as discussion in the Wiki. Everything is here, so have fun browsing!

 

Thanks

 

i got vf2 sega genesis and was thinking of playing online via ROM and emulator since the only system i really have is wii. i wonder if there was anybody that could hook me up with a sparring partner and help me get it set up

 

also, some beginner tips would be appreciated

 

You'll have better luck playing the arcade version of VF2 on PC. No one is trying to mess with the Genesis port, that I know of.

 

VF2 is on Xbox 360 Arcade, and I think is close to arcade perfect? And probably quite good netcode, but I heard it's very quiet on there, so you'll need to put out a few feelers on here really for some matches. If they ever put part 3 on there, I'm all over it...

 

I thought it was arcade.perfect? It even has the glitches from the arcade version. The graphics are arcade.perfect, which is a first on home consoles, but he mentioned he only has a Wii.

 

There is a huge difference. Final showdown is like a different game. I don't think playing vanilla will give you an accurate picture of what it's like. Also Final Showdown is way more accessible.

On PS3 there is no shortage of players online. Been playing all evening against a variety of opponents. I never struggle to find a game.