I don’t, and you’re missing the point. If you use some trick the other guy has never heard of, neither player had to make any strategic decisions there. If a mechanic only creates gameplay if the victim already studied up, it’s destructive to skilled play, which can happen at all levels. This isn’t necessarily a serious problem with any of the things that you listed, but in general do you see a benefit to making things be obscure tricks, instead of implementing identical gameplay in a more straightforward way?
You are complaining about stuff that is akin to knowing how it affects the trajectory of the white ball in pool, anyone is able to hit the ball with the cue, but only those who take the time to learn would be able to do more advanced stuff.
Option selects, kara cancels, etc are the result of how the basic mechanics work and interact, there are stuff that appear later in the life time of a game due the players discovering new stuff based on the most basic stuff, as much as i support the idea of better tutorials, there are stuff that can’t be simply added, because as i said, is not something known on the development phase.
Many of the stuff that you ask has been already implemented on the tutorials of games like BB, SG, VF and DOA, they already explain the basic stuff of them. I wouldn’t deny that there could be room for some improvement, but there are stuff that you ask for that is simply impossible or just plain stupid, you like to act like if those games are incredible hard for the common mind, when is just a case of people being lazy or just being delusional on thinking that they need to know all of that in order to enjoy the games.
I asked my brother, who is a casual gamer, if fighting games are too hard. He said no. Case closed, everyone.
Speaking of that, my little nephew who is only 10 years old has a blast playing FGs against me and his friends, you can’t be more casual than a little kid mashing, he doesn’t know shit and he and his friends still enjoy them.
They don’t care about frame data, tier placement, option selects, etc.
That’s the crux of this argument and why I think the topic question is really silly. Fighting games are really no more complex than they were many years ago on the most basic of level(IE what a casual player, at first, would be able to pick up on), just people could give no fucks anymore about working towards something. FGs are not an instant gratification type game like say call of duty where anyone with eyes should be able to get at least 1 kill. There’s really nothing you can do about that, primarily in the US. Hell this a country where people question if teaching algebra is essential to children since so many kids seem to fail it nowadays. FGs are fine.
Every time someone tries to explain to me a simpler better time in fighting games, what they are really saying is back when I had no idea any of this stuff existed. These arguments always end the same way someone brings up a game that they think was uncomplicated and therefore better, and then someone who knows what they are talking about brings up a mountain of information about that game that the first person never knew about while they were playing.
The problem isn’t a communication issue between the game and the player, its a communication issue between the player and other players. People want the game to fill in the gaps that used to and are still filled by social interaction with other players. I think I’ve posted the story on SRK before of how the AHVB got to Philly from Boston. Or how the Tron Projectile got here by some random phone call. All of these hidden techniques and features get passed through people, and what this thread comes down to in a certain sense is that some people think that the benefits on social interaction with other fighting game players, whether in person or online is an unfair advantage that should be extended to all players. Stop asking for invisible things to be made visible so that people can avoid having to make friends. Everyone talks about training mode and hours and hours put in, as if every top player discovered every piece of tech they use on their own, talking to people and having friends is a big part at becoming good in fighting games.
There is nothing wrong with most fighting games on a basic level you can just turn the game on, hit buttons and have fun, the disconnect in this thread is about people not being able to understand the deeper aspects of these games just by looking at them, at that point you aren’t talking about having fun you are talking about winning and winning requires effort. Heres how you figure out something invisible is going on, you get hit by it one or twice or more, and then you ask the person who hit you with it, “what the hell was that?” and if they won’t tell you then you can look it up or go to training mode.
You can’t learn a fighting game in full on your own, especially if the game is new, thats part of the reason sites like SRK exist, as a way for players to pool information. The “general knowledge” on SRK is the combined pooling of knowledge from thousands of players around the world. Just because its all on one forums now and one Adon player can choose to read and study all of that pooled Adon information doesn’t mean it all came from one player just because all of that information in now inside of one player. In game help is never going to get you to a level of knowledge above someone studying SRK, And studying SRK alone will usually not get you to a level above someone regularly practicing and attending gathering and tournaments in a highly competitive area. People who study all of the available resources will always have the advantage and all of the available resources will never be included in the game, because gameplay is constantly evolving and the rules that people want the game to explain are constantly being bent and broken.
Tl;dr Its unrealistic to think that someone using just the tool provided by the game, even with an improved interface will be able to keep up with someone using those same tools along with a site like SRK and social interaction with good players. And in the current age of internet play it is unrealistic to think people from those two groups won’t end up playing each other leaving the former group confused and salty.
I taught my friend VF in about 5 minutes. After another 5, she was stepping, Fuzzy Guarding and applying high/low/mid pressure just fine. People like to act they are special when it comes to games.
Agreed on the person that brought up bars and pop-ups. I don’t like having more than the health bar to look at and think its a waste of time when a game tells me what I can/can’t do and when.
“No thanks to P4A. Game has more pop-ups than a '90s porn site.” - AirThrow.
I dunno I’m sure you can kill some by lobbing grenades blindly.
^LOL (P4a popups)
anyways, virtua fighter is casual friendly. So is SF2, So is ssb. P4 tries to be. Some games are for fighting gamers who want more random fancy stuff to master. Some want to master nuances in what’s already there. I won’t make any more terrible analogies but some games just aren’t casual.
You can’t understand the deeper aspects of Go by looking at it, but that game is perfectly straightforward. You can explain the entire game in two sentences, but you can’t convey the depth of its strategy in thousands of books. You definitely can’t master it just by playing it, but nothing can ever happen that is confusing.
Tricks and techniques can sometimes add depth, but they are not the same thing as depth. Being able to see what’s going on with something is not the same thing as understanding the strategy involved in using it, even with something that isn’t confusing in the least, like the ROM infinite.
It’s impossible to make strategy easier to understand by looking without making the game less deep. It is not impossible to make the rules of the game easier to understand without changing gameplay at all.
So, do you really believe that we should prefer for something to be confusing and unclear? Like really, what the fuck is with plinking?
Anyway it isn’t really that big of a deal. Casual players seem to be fine with whatever.
Fighting games aren’t supposed to be for the average player.
For the average player you have Playstation All-Stars and Super Smash Brothers.
Fighting games… just like something like Counter Strike (and Counter Strike was such a niche that even I never played it…) are a specialty market.
Let your “average player” try to jump into a game of Battlefield 2 without knowing what they’re doing and see how long they last.
Yet they’ve somehow sold a billion copies of Battlefield 2.
The Idiots That Be decided there was no money to be made in fighting games… so there were practically NONE throughout the entire PS2 era. But in the next gen Street Fighter IV proved them wrong.
(Then of course Capcom began the long slide into trying to invent a “newb friendly” fighting game… which ultimately led to the marketing disaster that was Street Fighter x Tekken.)
So if you’re a casual player… there’s an entire sub-genre of fighters out there.
And if you’re a long-time player like myself… there’s a lot to be both angry and happy about.
Xes posts some stupid shit
Lithiuan posts some stupid shit but claims he works in the industry.
both try to argue but fail miserably.
Reruns returns posts the same stupid shit as xes.
All that is missing is limb based combat and the circle of no knowledge of fighting games will be complete.
On that, we agree.
Not speaking for others, but flattening the skill/success curve is not what I’m advocating. What I would like to see is an improvement in communication and feedback, so a new player feels as though they have all the tools necessary to learn the rules to the game. If a player is confused about move properties and interactions, and cannot answer their own questions by observing the game for a short period of time, then there is a disconnect between the presentation and gameplay.
This is not to say that a player will go from total noob to professional in a matter of months. If that was the case, there’s probably an issue with randomness in the game. What I would like to see is a player go from complete, barely interested noob to an interested and slightly informed noob within a matter of minutes, and after investing a few hours becoming a beginner who knows a few tricks.
As it stands, right or wrong, fighting games have a reputation of being difficult to learn. I believe there are ways to make learning easier, and the primary method is through consistant and natural feedback during play, and not through online resources or tutorials (which are both good things, but not as binding as play).
It’s always been my thought that the skill/success curve is just about impossible to flatten, just by the nature of the games.
edit: although I guess the way would be what Ilth said, by making it wildly random.
Sigh
You have to then see the fundamental flaw in that approach, if you agree with me on the other statement.
What will these news players use as the basis for how well this new system, whatever it is, works? The answer is WINS. and you seem to be in agreement with me that those wins won’t come.
If no matter how much information is included in the game, it is always less than the game + SRK + social interaction. Then the amount of information on the game may raise your overall skill level, but it doesn’t do anything to your relative skill level, and if the win counts don’t change the perception won’t change.
My approach is as it has been, to promote better teaching of new players in the community by other players and not rely on the game provided tutorials, trials, etc. for that information as it is an inferior learning tool in many ways.
Good post, and it clarifies what may be the crux of our disagreement.
I don’t believe that players expect to win and that difficulty = difficulty in winning. What I see are players who don’t understand why they are not successful and therefore do not know how to improve. That’s where the perception of difficulty comes from, that it’s difficult to learn because of all the esoterica and moving parts below the visible surface.
If you think new players are more turned off by losing than by confusion, than yes, your position makes perfect sense. I don’t agree with that position, but I do see that it has merit.
P-linking is an abuse of the buffer window and priority of inputs. Emergent game play, something crafted by the players.
Capcom just wanted to make sure that your moves comes out if you didn’t hit the buttons exactly at the same time. People found out how to use this in other ways.
But this is something Capcom should’ve known and added a tutorial for and is ruining the game for casuals or whatever the complaint is.
Imagine if this topic was about soccer and people were arguing the purchase of the soccer ball didn’t tell me all the possible ways to kick it and dribble it like rainbows and shit. They’re complaining that they have to go to other places [other players] to learn how to kick the ball “correctly” or how to play soccer “correctly”. Then they’re complaining that people are kicking the ball and doing stuff that’s hard to visually comprehend and it’s hurting the integrity of the game. Soccer was so much better within the first 3 years before people muddied it up with these things.
Hey playing pool with you is no fun. You’re using trick shots and shit that I don’t know and all I can do is shoot the cue ball in a straight path. My pool table booklet didn’t teach me how to do that. It should tell me how to do that instead of needing to go to other pool people or a pool forum or watch videos to do it. Pool’s developer intended this, players couldn’t have made this up themselves.
Because, y’know, plinking was totally planned at first.
Same with unblockables.
Roll Canceling in CVS1.
what boggles me is that y’all are presenting clarity as an absurd expectation.