I can add some more:
- VF brought nearly real life physics enviroment and its enterraction with fighters (water, snow, sand, wind, tree leaves, fog) at least in FG
- water effect and clothes getting wet in FG
- breakable walls in FG
- inclined surfaces affect the gameplay in VF3
- true real fighter's reflections in surfaces
- true shadow layout (on each other will change shadow)
- fighter's weight really affects on many gameplay elements
- first ever dan/kui AI classification
- fisrt ever side turned gameplay, enhancing 3D gameplay even more
etc

In some of these things Tekken was secondary and not the best even then, on most of these things Tekken is lack (no many things above in Tekken even now).
By all these innvotaions VF is pushing FG forward during all VF history... no one words about it because of lack of knowledge.

What?
1. Offensive side step > more 3D gameplay
2. Throw clash
3. Side turned situation > more 3D gameplay
4. VF5FS new throw system - it has its pros and cons but i like it because it is more balanced than VF4 old system when to make e TE you need to make ETEG after opponent's Jab> Mid/Throw mixup which is unbalanced situation.
5. New character Jean which gameplay is based on charged moves
6. Wall /half wall throws

You are wrong. EVERY VF game brought new gameplay elements and innovations.

Listen to be honest. VF is a polished jem. One of the best fighters i've ever played. But i know why people like Tekken more (and why its played more). I've played both and to be honest Tekken tends to offer more diversity and charisma with their characters. Its also much more casual friendly. Those along with the fact when a Tekken gets released it doesnt take 5 or 6 years for America to get it. It has a much bigger audiance. This is just me being honest. But if you ask which is better VF ALL DAY. To me VF yelds more rewards from counterhits, being defensive, punishing etc.. This is a game where you must know your shit or get eaten alive... How exciting!!!

I'm not saying that literally everyone was fired. But that the people who mattered were fired so that SEGA could make terrible decisions. Like a decision to rush the PS3 version of VF5 for launch with zero online modes and recycled Quest A.I. and an inability to patch in 5R or 5FS updates. SEGA cleared house of the people who mattered. We see this at all companies in gaming. You really think the same team that made PS2 VF4:EVO made PS3 VF5? AM2 is a shell. What happened to AM2's A.I. design team? The ones that did the VF4 Learning A.I. or Quest Mode? You really think that they are still there at SEGA?

You could purchase VF4FT cabinets basically immediately outside of Japan. They just didn't get online card readers. But.....you could purchase VF4FT with card readers anyways, and actually play with the cards offline in any country. But you didn't have access to VF.Net so you couldn't recharge the 500 plays on the cards (or purchase a new card). Someone had to recharge the card at a connected terminal, so basically in Japan. If an arcade operator's internet went down the VF4FT machines would still retain their core functions including card readers.

You can still play with cards right now but you can't recharge them (maybe you can recharge them with a hacked Naomi or an Emulator?).

VF5FS doesn't have locked DRM that is permanent, you can turn it off somehow, SEGA has VF5FS cabinets that work offline with no card readers. They used them in promotions for VF5FS console. They just refuse to sell them to anyone. I don't know if you can even buy a used VF5FS and get it to work without messing around with the DRM. Aren't people able to play 5R Arcade though? So I'd imagine someone knows how to make VF5FS work offline.

But you could buy a VF4FT machine today and hook it up no problem. Some Japanese arcades run VF4/EVO/FT tournaments still every couple of months. They just don't have the card readers anymore.

Damage is far higher in VF3 and VF4. VF3 had a 30 second clock even. And VF4FT was much quicker as well. I just hate the ridiculous emphasis on huge combos. Some of the VF5FS combos remind me of Marvel more than Virtua Fighter. Not even joking. Wall combos and rebounce combos are just absurd looking.

I've probably got a few thousand VF5 matches and a few hundred VF5FS matches. And far more VF4 and even VF3 matches. I also have played a lot of older Tekken titles as well. I was never impressed with VF5FS and its combo heavy gameplay. The game is also painfully slow compared to VF4FT. I know enough about 3D fighters to know that VF5FS is mediocre. SEGA blew it by not supporting VF4FT to this day. Look at 3S and ST in Japan and America. Still going strong with large tournaments. 3S just had a huge major in America and ST is getting a huge major at Canada Cup coming up shortly.

But the best VF game gets zero support. It didn't even get a console release. Who here actually owns a copy of VF4FT? Or has played more than 100 matches of it? Best VF game, maybe best FG, and no one gets to play it anymore.

1. Other 3D fighters have had similar sidesteps. Soul Calibur II came out in 2002 and it has a deep side movement system. And VF has had side turned throws and setups in VF4. Also characters in VF4 already had moves with sidesteps built into them. Lion could literally get behind people for instant uramawari in VF4FT with some of his moves. Chibita used to do it all of the time. I don't see VF5FS bringing anything new to the table.
2. Throw Clash is a terrible mechanic though. And if you've played 3S or SFIV you've seen their version of throw clash. A throw that gets broken to neutral. In VF you break it with an attack. But in SF you can crouch tech throws which is similar. Not really innovative. It's almost exactly like Crouch Tech in SFIV or 3S.
3. But again....VF4 had side turned situations. It was just more subtle. There were side throws and side low throws and side turned punishes. It's just that the attacks didn't have special animations. Evading a linear attack and punishing was a side turned situation. Evading a linear attacking and throwing could get you a side turned throw. The difference is that in VF5FS they lock your feet in place with guarding and put you at disadvantage. I prefer the older system.
4. It's pure scrub level. No execution. No thinking. No depth. All characters have the same throw directions? No more multi throw escape? Easy throw escape guard? No memorization? It's just taking VF4 and simplifying it to an extreme level. There's no substance. It's just taking VF4 and VF5 Vanilla and moving everything into Combo Fighter territory.
5. Ever heard of Guile? DeeJay? M.Bison/Boxer? SF has had charge characters since forever. If VF6 had fireball characters would that be innovation? No. Because it had been done before in other fighters. Take the fanboy glasses off please. I like Jean's design but charge characters have been around since World Warrior. And VF has had lots of charge moves in the past as well. Jean isn't the first charge character and not even the first VF character with charge attacks. He just has the most charge attacks of a VF character.
6. Again though, VF4 had wall throw animations and special wall throws. And some throws were designed for wall hits like Wolf's db.p+g which only did damage if the opponent was thrown into the wall. VF5FS just recycled stuff from other VF games and other fighting games and called it a day. Nothing really new. Just Tekken style "innovation" of taking whatever you can. Even one of the 'new' characters in VF5R was Taka.

I just don't see the "greatness" of VF5FS. I just see the mediocrity. I don't even see real innovation or brilliance. Everything in VF4 was ripped off by almost all arcade companies. Even Quest Mode has been ripped off in everything from fighters, racers, and MOBAs. But no one is taking anything from VF5FS (other than Tekken because they can't help it at this point).

VF3 had MTE. It was only two directions, Neutral and Back or Forward. That was due to the buffer system that was implemented and stayed throughout the series.

I dig Lazy TE as a beginners mechanic and think it's the best 'n00b-friendly' mechanic the genre saw last-gen, which might or might not be saying much depending on how you view those.

I wouldn't say you are doing something wrong per se if you have to use them unless it's constant issue. Then you'd have to switch to pokes and/or playing a tighter game.

In my usual stint of using as few words as possible:

Along with Lazy TE, FS presented new ways to fight standing guard outside of throws. Universally, everyone in the cast has access to OM pressure. Lazy TE is more of a last resort defensive mechanic imo. But honestly I'm not entirely concerned with how others choose to play, or what they choose to play.

On forums everywhere, it's not hard to find someone voicing an opinion comparing two different things. Quake was better than the next shooter, Michael Jordan was more skilled than the next guy, etc. Obviously you can say whatever you want, but there's little to no point in weighing the potential of two separate things that come from different eras, or were developed under different circumstances. What's efficient today may not be as promising tomorrow.

Neither Sega, Namco, or "random opinion guy" have committed any crimes in the act of them displaying their work/words. Be mad or happy about it, move on, stay here; do whatever works for you.

Also, the LARGE GAP conspiracy is the dumbest shit ever, not even a question. You can't let others create their own laws for you to abide by. If anything, why not work towards disproving that? But I'm no lawmaker myself, I'm just another random opinion guy.

It's crazy how the experience gained from someone's work can be positive for some and completely negative for others.

I am sorry to say so, but this logic is very damn flawed.
Let me explain: If you are saying that MTE was there for people who did not bother to learn the game, then what is the reason that the TOP players who knows the game in and out used MTEs 24/7? And that being able to consistently MTE was crucial part of becoming good player?

Also just as Myke say, the math you did is flawed.
Lion, for example, had 4 throw directions in 4Evo (5,4,6 and 3). Jacky, Lei, Sarah, Shun, OS Vanessa... also 4. That is 5,5 characters out of 16.
On other hand, only Jeffry had all 6 directions available. That is 1 out of 16.
So saying that MTE gave you 17% escape change is completely wrong even for case where your MTE it actually just single TE. Not to mention that MULTI part of the MTE abbreviation.

Overall, MTE was VERY prominent technique that you MUST be able to perform consistently to be competetive. With the multi being 2 as minimum, 3 as standard on high level.
And if you ever try to actually pull out 3-EMTEGs mid-match, it is definitely not anything for "people who do not bother to learn the game". Quite contrary - it is for people who learned the game. In and out...

I am not saying LazyTE is good mechanic. In fact, with the FS way of implementation is completely changed the balance of the game and put "graplers" like Jeffry on par with "strikers" like Jacky in terms of throws. Each and every of them have 3 directions available, and your opponent can (and will, if he is decent) break 1 out of this 3 permanently. This is also why you see much more successful throws in FS that you used to see in 4EVO. LazyTE made throws overall stronger, in fact.
On other hand, LTE arguably brought FS closer to original idea of triangle: as throws are strong and as even against grapling "wealings" like Jacky you can cover only 1/3 of possible directions, the attack being used as consistend throw break is much more prominent that it used to be in Evo. Because in 4evo, EMTEG was utterly strong technique that was as close to free from jail card as VF ever bother to go.

Actually this conversation brought me to (possible) realization why "old school" players prefer 4 over 5 over FS (which they consider garbage) while newcommers (I do not wanna say casuals, as many of newcommers become actually REALLY good) see it different and like FS a lot.

I think it is because of 4EVO/FT core nature. It was quite fast game, but at the same time, it was game that put huge focus on defense. I have actually hard time to think about other FG that put as much emphasis on defense as VF4. And it was NOT a static defense, but actually very fast-paced and active defense.
Overall in 4/evo/ft, superior defense won games.

And this is/was the problem. For multiple reasons.
a) unless you really know the game, it is hard to realize what is going on. There were so many layers and techniques taking place on basically each moment that for casual viewer, it was just a mess.
Please mind most high level techniques were completely invisible for any spectacor. There is no way to see if someone is doing plain evade-guard ot ETEG or E4MTEG. Unless you are given chance to see and analyze his inputs, there is no way to tell; what is really not something that attracts casual viewers or players. They are loosing without seeing why; and when watching someone playing, there are going on things you can not see by any mean. Not a good PR, actually.
b) manual (technical) skills become very prominent. Basically (in)ability to consistently pull out some core, yet quite hard techniques (EMTEG) was the determinating factor of battle. Only if both players were on the same "technical" level, other aspects took place. This is different in FS (and most other FGs) where guessing and reads are given decent to large prominence.
I know how this sounds, but it was actually quite annoying sometimes. More that sometimes. I still remember having friend we used to play 4EVO with regularly. Our results were about 1:1. Then I spend 1 month practicing 2MTEG and E2MTEG only, while he continued to practice as we normally did. Since then, the score was about 3:1 to my favor. Single technique was the most determinating part of whole game.
I remember my friend become to hate VF for this quite a lot. It makes sense - it did not seem (visually) I am playing any better that before (unlike him) yet I was winning and he was not. This is not something people enjoy in general.
c) because of defense being so strong (and movement as well, damn that was awesome!), the triangle system was not actually working. It was much safer and reliable to do EMTEG or MTEG that to risk abare. People find comfort in this (no wonder), because among other things, it removed a lot of random (or hard guess) factors from the game.

Now FS with the Lazy, single TE escape put abare back into prominence and make throws stronger while defense weaker. I still remember ChiefGutti grumbling about one very certain player that in 4EVO and 5vanilla, he was able to escape 100% of his throws while in FS is gets thrown left'n'right. No wonder such outcome feels stupid to those used to rely upon the safety of their own skills over the wild guessing. Damn, it even sound stupid if you put it like this.

And that is basically it.
FS (5 overall, but FS MUCH more that vanilla) made defense weaker and guessing stronger. Still, defense is VERY strong in FS when compared to other FGs, but is much weaker that is used to be.
Also, techniques that at least partially avoid wild guessing become the most prominent techniques in FS, sme of them even defines the highest levels of play. I also believe that "5 family dumplings" overcoming this techniques and bringing wild guessing back to top level play is the reason they are not exactly popular among many old-school, top players in Japan.

Ok, this are my 5 cents (quite long cents, damn) to "why FS is so garbage" topic that lives in our harts since FS release

Well I really can't add more to what was written above thanks to Blackstar and Unicorn but only attempt to simplify it.
My problem with FS as oppose to it previous versions is that it strongly regulated the neutral game. In FS's attempt to make it easy(er) for newcomers ,the game's current developers took away alot of of the freeflowing back and forth ( attack phase and defensive determined by who had frame advantage as well as good reads) by ramping up the easy tech defense (not the only only defensive tool in this iteration but perhaps the most prominent). So what about offense? Guess we need to give everyone access to a decent crush game ( everyone has at least access to jump attacks which are now legit in this game). And you know what why not give a whole of characters guard breaks ( Aoi guard breaks?!). I think even the push-back for alot of attacks were ramped up too. So yes frames do take a more backseat approach in game where abare is a very legit tactic (not only vs throws attempts mind you).
Sure MTE can seems daunting to beginners however if you can see how it has shaped VF along its history its a well suited solution. By taking it away we end up in our current situation. Looking for a new version and wondering if it will be a more dumbed downed version. But then again would it really be the continuation of the legacy that is worthy of being called Virtua Fighter?

This thread has taken a very interesting turn.

When you have characters that get more damage from the same frame combo starting moves such as 14f to 17f launches, while taking less damage for being just as negative as other characters for their mistakes at -15, -18 etc, that's a clear imbalance. Then on top of that the same higher damaging characters also have higher damaging throws, along with more range, safety, and damage on their normal moves too. If that wasn't enough of and obstacle already they also have a much better and more useful array of moves to choose from, that somehow offer a higher damage reward on CH than the more limited in damage output characters options do, while often leaving them safer on block in negative situations. Thus you have "large gap" issues. Having characters just do more damage in every combo situation, while taking less damage for the same frame mistakes as their opponent is the very definition of disparity and imbalance. Getting 100 to 220 damage from say a safe 14f poke that's -2 on block, while many other characters can only muster 89damage from a 17f move that is-15 on block is a large gap of disparity. FS players just toss out whatever lie or excuse fits their mood about things like this, but at the end of the day being able to do more damage while eating less for your mistakes is an advantage and sure the player can still loose because of human error, but i'd still rather be the guy with a gun in a knife fight, even if there is a chance that you can still be disarmed having the gun.

Lazy TE does slow the game down a bit and is a step down from MTE. Personally I would always feel a great sense of accomplishment when I successfully escaped a throw using MTE because it took me so long to get proficient at three direction escapes. When I escape a throw in FS with Lazy TE I just feel disdain for the system and the opponent who used a predictable option. It does mess with the flow of the game because it offers a stationary option with a high percentage of success. Most players don't mind eating tiny damage nuetral throws and opt for 6 or 4 TE's. Some use all three, but especially for below average online warriors it's stand like an f'n statue and 6P+G all day. How much enjoyment "new" players get from playing against this isn't really up for debate as the online player base has thinned out immensely.

I'm not going to address your opinion about the raking of specific VF games which you are entitled to, and I do respect (though not completely agree with).

However, I will say that the speed of a match VF5FS can be as fast as it is in VF4FT, if not faster. Chances are if you watched a "slow pace" match in either game, then that only means the players in that match you watched played it slow. Nothing more than that.

I agree that the "large gap" character rating comparison comes from a character's give-or-take damage potential perspective, not from ability/inability to do Lazy TE.

And regarding the use of Lazy TE, this mechanic only slows the flow of the game down if one of the players allows it to. There are several ways to deal with constant use of Lazy TE rather quickly. I'm not sure why it would be frustrating for anyone who plays VF5FS if you really know how to deal with it when encountered in a competitive match.

Kruza

I'm going to try and use only my own experience of learning VF to say this but I agree with you Blackstar, LTE can hinder the VF triangle especially for those who learn VF. In 2013-2014 I was complete scrub and knew nothing about playing VF and I obviously got better I learned what to do from -1 to -5 and -6 to -9. Now before I learned and applied the techniques I literally would just hit a button and Guard LTE, good news is I would break the throws at a good rate. Now the bad thing is I would never take advantage of things, such as fuzzy guard from -5 and below, ecd -6 to -9, and if I had a read on throw I never took advantage by launching because of that I believe it affected my growth. The big reason I changed is because of people like @steelbaz, blondievf5, and you helped too. When I play ppl on PSN(I know the lag changes the game completely) I see players who all they do is attack(-5) attacks, guard without fuzzy, or (-6)no ecd, and don't try to take advantage of abare. Not going call out names but I see people do this offline. Like I said this just my experience and my observation but I think LTE does take way and from VF triangle as well hinder a players growth potentially.

As for my opinion on this video I don't really care about it because the guy seems like he doesn't play, understand, or know anything bout VF and plus he seems like a casual Tekken player also so imo he doesn't truly have a grip on either games he just going to the one he plays, but then again the casual are the majority so all well.

This video is such a click bait/ trigger bait, Fuck this video.

1. NO.
I played SC from Soul edge. SC has 8 way run walking (+VF ARM).
SC side step is defensive: 2 types successful and failed
VF has the same defensive side steps (successful and failed) and offensive side step which is totally different move.
No one fighting has offensive side step.
2. VF5 had extended Throw duration so Throw clash was needed and brought smart enough gameplay with that system.
You wrong again because you dont understand Clash role - in VF5 strike crushes Throw, but Throw clash (instead of getting hit when doing throw) allow to use Throws more safely on initial state. So Clashes buffed Throws but not strikes or button mashing.
3.It seems You dont understand what is ST situation:
- VF4 and some other fightings has Side throws, but u have only ONE option (throw, 1 direction) as attacker and (throw escape, 1 direction) as defensman.
VF5FS/R brought ST situation which allow to use ALL RANGE of moves and options while the opponent are still standing side turned to you, dramatically changing 3D gameplay.
This is a huge difference!
4. NO. About Lazy TE - MTE imho was broken because of one thing - you can not TE in place in neutral or slightly disadv state, you was forced to perform advanced technique like ETEG to solve simple primitive technique like span Jab>Mid/Trow mixup.
With Lazy TE you have always only 30% TE success, it brought balance between grapplers and strikers.
5. VF always has few charged moves for some character. I was talking about new character which is mostly based of charged moves by his entire gameplay. This is new for VF5FS/R.
6. NO. Half fence throws before VF5FS at all.
In VF4 as i remember only Wolf had 1-2 wall throws. In VF5FS almost every character has it.

VF5FS has many innovations and some of them like ST situations are evolving FG genre when at the same time other 3D FGs are not bringing any new gameplay elements which a really new and innovative!