Akuma FAQs: Quick questions & answers!

Classic Fighting Games Ultra Street Fighter IV
1001

The only character’s cross-up I have difficulties landing are Sakura (her hit box must be really tiny). The timing is character specific as it depends on their jump arc, but once you have it down, it’s a great tool to use in most matchups. It doesn’t leave you hanging like a DP would if you miscalculate the trajectory of their jump. And I like how it sets them up for mind game shenanigans; are you going to follow up with a DF? Walk up throw attemp? Backdash? FB? Walk in and start a combo/block string? You can keep mixing it up after you land them to make them 2nd guess themselves.

The only danger is if you do it too late or too early, you can get countered pretty badly.

1002

Too late, your hit boxes are colliding instead of your active hit box getting to his first.

1003

how do i time akuma’s safe jump, i only know the dash x2 after fthrow

1004

After a sweep, you have to wait (or walk forward/backwards a bit depending on the range) and then just do the jump attack. It’s all manually timed so you just have to practice it.

Back throw gives very bad positioning and you cannot do a proper safe jump.

1005

To go back to the context of what I said: “cr.MP is kinda crappy, in the sense that it’s difficult to use in the way Ryu would (ie. sticking it out all day and stuffing shit).”

Yes. Akumas cr.MP is quite horrible when it comes to spacial control and counter-poking. Why would someone dispute that when it has less reach than his low short? (or Ryus crouching jab, for that matter)

1 frame can make a big difference. The difference between stuffing the opponent and being stuffed yourself, to be exact. A change of 1 frame in fireball recovery can alter the effectiveness of the fireball at several distances on the field. In vanilla SF4, Ryus focus attack had just a pixel less reach than Akumas focus; but in running gameplay, it felt to me like it was more than that. I would release focus with Akuma at distances I wouldn’t dare try with Ryu. (incidentally, for SSF4 both characters now have identical reach on their focus attacks)

It isn’t only the frames. The hitbox on Ryus cr.MP reaches further while stretching both higher and lower than Akumas cr.MP. It also covers Ryus entire arm instead of just the end of it. In all, the hitbox on Ryus cr.MP is twice the size of Akumas and lasts a frame longer.

Akumas cr.MP is the medium that holds all of his normals together, and is well complimented by his game; with a circle of options and setups surrounding it. It’s one of his main linking tools and his best weapon in close/tick range because of it. I will say it’s one of his most important tools. The move alone however; when it comes to things like protecting the space immediately in front of you from Blanka Balls, Honda Headbutts, Scissor Kicks, Rufus Dive Kicks and the various pokes used by the cast; is nothing special.

1006

True enough. But then you’re trying to compare apples to oranges, which is not really fair. I mean, I could compare Akuma’s Jab to Balrog (boxer)'s Jab and conclude that “Akuma’s jab is pretty crappy”, and I’d be right from a certain point of view. Hitboxes, frame data and damage/stun… That’s all fun and good, but what matters in the end is how you use it and within the context of his tool set, Akuma’s cr. MP is pretty great, IMO.

1007

Keep in mind what I said about it was not an assessment of the entire utility of the attack. I said what I did in response to someone who wanted advice on how to set up counter hits for cr.MP.

Ryu for example could sit in or just outside cr.MK range and fish for pokes to stuff and then get a sweep to link easily. Since this does not work so well for Akuma, I described its uses for frame/tech traps to him and offered that as my advice on using it.

1008

Have a couple of questions and there is so much information here sometimes it can be hard to find an answer to a specific question .

  1. Sometimes I catch my opponent going for a shoryuken mid air with a jumping haduken. Since I hit the floor usually before them can the be juggle/combod with anything else after?

  2. Sometimes when playing Ken while I’m going for a Demon Flip to a hk they anti air me with their shoryuken ultra and every so often I kick him out of it and sometimes my kick never even comes out. When must I time they kick to hit him and is there any better options for instance df palm?

  3. Finally this also very similar to the first question I have tried reading up on the juggle mechanics but I can’t seem to grasp it but every so often when I go for a df to hk my opponent jumps and then they crumple almost can I go into st hk, cr lk, and then bnb is that feasible /possible?

1009

1) You can juggle the opponent with two hits of the HP Shoryuken when you knock them out of the air with the air fireball. However; the first hit never connects, mostly due to the distance so you are hitting on frame 6 or something, rather than frame 3. The HP Shoryu will completely whiff if you attempt it when they are only falling from a short height. When they are rising up from a Shoryu for example would be too low to try a Shoryuken. It only really works when you hit them out of a jump; if they tried to air to air you for example.

(you can also juggle with a single hit in one of Akumas tatsus, but there’s no point)

2) Don’t challenge opponents reversal options with Demon Flip Dive Kicks unless you already know exactly what happens when opponent uses X reversal or Y reversal. To give you an idea of a good way to challenge their reversals with it: when you do a forward throw, dash twice as fast as possible and immediately MK Flip to Dive Kick from the top of the jump arch. This gives you a specific line-up and timing for the dive kick as they wake that will beat all of Kens SRKs; however if he does his ultra you will eat the whole thing. If the opponent understands this and knows to use ultra on that setup, you can fix the situation by doing palm instead of dive kick, allowing you to block the ultra as you land. You do not however have time to block from a palm if he did a regular SRK instead.

Also from a forward throw, you can instead whiff a double roundhouse as soon as the throw recovers and then immediately HK Flip and Dive Kick. This gives you a different lining and timing that beats all his SRKs as before; and if he tries ultra, it will completely whiff as you pass over to his far side. The down side to this angle is that you cannot do the flip throw to get them for blocking as it will pass over them as they block, so all you have to mix with it is palm to the far side, only you are at frame disadvantage from that.

You can replicate this timing with your general dive kicks by working on your own setups. For example: if you land a typical distance sweep (the one where you are sweeping with your foot or ankle rather than the tip of your toe or your upper thigh. Doing cr.LK cr.LP far LP to sweep would leave you about the right distance) you can do an immediate MK Demon Flip but then start the dive kick after the top of the jump, as you start falling. This gives you a positioning that allows the kick to stuff all of Kens uppercuts and make his ultra whiff. (if you don’t get it just right, his MP SRK will trade; so practice it so you know what the correct one feels like)

This is the subtlety of what players like Tokido do on their knockdowns, (while some may see it and think he’s just doing any random dive kick from the knockdown) any why opponents in vids respect it enough not to try reversing him out of everything.

3) When you hit an airborn opponent with a dive kick, you typicaly get a reset state (where they flip backward onto their feet) which is what I think you are describing. You cannot do any free follow-ups from this state, as they can reverse anything as soon as they land. Most often, it’s best to play neutral from a reset like this; but if you recovered first from their reset, how much earlier you recovered and how much advantage you have may allow you to try some sort of offensive trap like an ambiguous cross-up of some sort.

1010

Just wanted to know what do you guys usually do for punishing people who tech grabs standing? other than using HP SRK on 'em while having meter to hitconfirm, any other suggestions to punish those guys as hard as possible?

1011

If you are in range, doing conbo’s that start with cr.lk or cr.mk FADC BnB? Cr.lk , cr.lp, cr.lp to hitconfirm and follow up with tatsu if they are hit and standing, ex tatsu if they are hit and crouching, and mk hadouken if they arent hit.

1012

Thanks for replying, I’m not sure if it’s because online play or not, but I swear my low attacks were beaten by throws so many times it’s not even funny (I must start option selecting the lk with lp to avoid those damn throws), maybe it’s because I usually start my strings with cr.lk, i.e I don’t have frame advantage and cr.lk isn’t so fast, guess I should try something like cr. lp, st. lk then cr.lk xx ex tatsu if that can reach and beat them when they stand up to throw.

1013

I thought I’d ask this here instead of making a thread. Well I random a lot, and I still like playing with Akuma (He was never my main though) but I just wonder why some people stopped playing Akuma? Or aren’t really talking about him anymore. I know he got worse, but I know he’s still top 8 and can def. win some tournaments. I’ve seen some people switch over to Ken even, who is still mid mid tier. Did the few changes really affect Akuma’s that much? And why :

1014

In my opinion, both Akuma and Ken are high tier. Heck, I say about 17 characters are A-tier in this game, with Akuma and Ken being in there. It’s just that the charge characters rape low tier characters and that’s why they have better matchups and thus leading to a higher total. However, not many top players use the low tier characters, so really only the matchups against top- and mid-tier characters really matter. And for these matchups, everyone has abouttt the same total matchup points.

Yeah, the changes to Akuma affect him a lot. Half the stun on his sweep and a butt load more recovery on his demon flip throw totally change some matchups from dominating to even or worse, like especially Gief and Abel. Akuma used to rape them, and now it’s like about even.

1015

I think you are better off option selecting that cr.lk with cr.lp as you said, because you can block cr.lp while standing. Also, if your opponents throw a lot (yes, online they REALLY like that), try frame trapping them by doing cr.lp, cr.mp (delay just a bit), cr.mp. That way you can counter their throw attempts and continue with a combo, and hopefully (this is still online we’re talking about) they will stop mashing throws. Then you can finally start pressuring them with other stuff.

1016

Akuma was nerfed almost as much as Sagat; only in Akumas case, they didn’t affect his ground game the way it did with Sagat. Akuma’s ground game is still pretty high tier; all the tools work the same, only there is a bit of a difference when HP SRK goes from 190/200 to 150/150, HP Shaku goes from 150/200 to 99/105, sweep goes from 110/200 to 90/100, Demon Flip throw lags harder and does less stun, cr.MP/MK go from 70 to 60, and air fireballs get 2 more frames of landing lag.

As far as nerfs go, he got hit mainly on damage and stun output; particularly his heaviest combos.

Far HK, cr.MP, LK Tatsu, LP Shoryu, FADC, HP Shaku was worth 417/640 in vanilla and now does 346/473.

The point is emphasized when thinking about that combo when done from a jump HK (one of the biggest combos he can do). In vanilla you get 468/770, and in super you get 408/629. Imagine you did that in a match and followed up with a cross tatsu to sweep (190/250 vanilla, 170/150 super) that the opponent fell for. In vanilla it totals 658/1020, meaning they’re stunned… and you can do a jump in follow-up without much scaling. That would bring you total damage near 950; you won the round, basicly.

Super tells a different story. The total damage and stun from hitting your largest combo and the successful follow-up would be 578/779.

As monstrous as vanilla Akuma sounded on paper, he was still quite far from an easy win character.

In vanilla he had a great ground game, could punish randomness with combos that hit like a wrecking ball, and had a vortex to top it off. Now he has the same ground game albeit a little softer this time, risk:reward took a shift away from him and you basicly have to be a vortex monster. Stunning the opponent went from a matter of landing a combo and following up with 1-3 more successful mixups, to needing 4-6. He still takes stun like a bitch, mind.

This replay is a really good demonstration IMO:

[media=youtube]Zf8C0wv59Pc&fmt=22]YouTube - Tokido [Akuma] vs KEIKE DESORA [Gouken[/media]

He has the tools to be a potential top tier, although succeeding with him now demands a very high level of precision from the player.

1017

Does anyone know what the blockstring at 2:22 is for? The cr.lk, lk, cr.lp. Is it just a blockstring to mix up your blockstrings or does it have any advantages over say, cr.lp, cr.lp, cr.lp?

Also, what can you do against that ‘demon flip’ from cammy where she either hits or grabs you and against sakura’s EX dp+kick move? I don’t see these moves used by top players so i don’t know how to counter them whenever someone uses these against me.

1018

There’s an option select you can do on backdashes with it. You do cr.LK, then stand for LK+HK. If the first hit connects or is blocked, it’s a second LK; if they backdashed the first cr.LK the second becomes a roundhouse and you get a combo for it.

You’ll notice on the inputs that he wasn’t actually using that HK option select though. The second thing about it is that it positions you a certain way (standing jab would always be far, allowing sweep after for example) and the postioning makes a walk-up throw and the cr.MP tech catch mixup slightly more effective. To be honest though, if I were to put it down to anything; I would guess that it’s simply part of his personal style.

[Edit] The thing from Cammy is the Hooligan roll. It has two options from it: a low slide where she inputs nothing (it’s safe on block and gives ultra on hit) and a throw that throws you both ground and in the air if you try to jump away or backdash. Hers can’t throw crouched characters like Akumas can, so crouching nulls both options. If you just stay crouched; she can whiff the throw, recover instantly then ground throw you though. What you gotta do is a crouch based anti air, there’s no risk of trading or anything. cr.HP would be the weapon of choice, if you aren’t confident in that, even just mashing crouch jab shuts it down.

Good Cammy players will use it a certain way. There’s a property where if it’s timed correctly as the opponent wakes up, they are registered as ‘standing’ and can’t duck it; meaning you either reverse it or eat the throw. It’s done from specific knockdown setups (like her forward throw); so it’s a matter of looking for it and being ready to react. You can buffer inputs as you rise, then hit the button for the reversal if you see her start rolling. Mashing jab as you rise means you can Ultra 1 her, for example. The other use is EX Hooligan throw, where she can use it as an anti fireball tool (usually from far range). Dealing with this is a matter of avoiding them reading your fireballs and anti airing it when they try it.

Sakura’s thing is the same as EX roll. It’s like an EX Demon Flip really, you just gotta AA and not fall into the trap of fireballing at times where they could be looking for it.

1019

Allright, thanks for your answer, i know what to do now.

1020

If someone techs standing i usually just jab once or twice and then back off and roundhouse his throwhiff on reaction. free highdamaging combo.