I guess you didn’t read that thing that you quoted. Gimmicky. Game. Mechanics.
IE: Parry and Focus Attacks/Armor. Street Fighter 2 had no such game mechanics beyond “This guy VS That guy”. The farthest extent of a “mechanic” acting in the game is canceling and stun meter, which all SF games from then on shared.
In terms of game design, yes, SF4 is far more similar to SF3 than SF2, for all the reasons I outlined. If your best evidence that SF4 is more like SF2 because fireballs are more effective, then that’s not really making your case. How can you even try to say SF4 plays -anything- like SF2 when some of the largest complaints IN THIS VERY THREAD are that Guile and many other returning SF2 characters play very little like and/or are weaker than their original counterparts.
Could you FADC shoryuken’s to make them safe in SF2? How about absorb fireballs? Super jump cancel? Juggles? Not to mention, as far as I know you couldn’t actually cancel from a special into a super, could you?
But you’re right, the fact that a fireball (which can still be walked through in this game) is more effective than it was in a previous game, this is the defining factor of making SF2 and SF4 alike.
Even though SF4 has elements of and similarities to 3S, the fact that you can pick SF4 up and play it like SF2 if you so choose is the only defining factor necessary in the discussion. You can’t play SF3 like SF2. The whole concept of SF4’s design was to get back the SF2 players that SF3 lost. I think they succeeded and that’s why 4 was a success and we’re getting a new game here soon.
Yeah you can do most of the basic non technical things from SF2 in SFIV pretty easily. Though doing anything technical that was good in SF2 basically does not work or requires incredible risk in SFIV outside of footsies and fireball zoning. Which of course that is the EPITOMY of SF right? :rolleyes:
SFIV’s success IMO has more so to do with just bringing back the historic characters and sprucing up the graphics than anything else. It’s pretty easy to make Blanka or Dictator play like Blanka or Dictator if all you’re trying to do is make sure they can throw their special moves with any kind of regularity. That’s basically all Joe Shmoe SF player cares about any ways. Though do Dictator and Blanka play like their SF2 counter parts on a highly competitive level? Mostly not.
That’s not really an argument or a point–you could play Third Strike exactly like you play SF2 as well, what’s stopping you? Your implying that SF3, because of parrying (or something), can’t be played exactly like SF2. If that’s the case, why can you play SF4 just like you can play SF2 despite people being able to focus and dash through fireballs, crouch tech your throws, etc.?
Just going under the premise “zoning works as well as it did in SF2…sort of” doesn’t make it incredibly similar. Zoning and footsies are still important in both games, go browse youtube, watch any match that involves Remy–the Guile counter-part of SF3–and note that despite parrying he is still able to control a good portion of the screen with high and low sonic booms and mixing up EX’s that have to be awkwardly parried to not get hit by. Pierrot isn’t a terrible person to examine. Projectiles worked just fine in that game–it’s just that most people’s sucked and they did balls damage.
SF2 does not have anything SF4 has beyond 14 characters many of whom have been drastically altered in playstyle and performance.
SF4 was based on SF2. Period. Of course they added more depth, otherwise it would have been a remake. But it goes way deeper than just the characters. If that’s not already clear, there’s nothing I can tell you.
Saying SF4 was based on SF2 is like saying a movie is based on a true story–yeah, it happened, but it’s really just to slap a title on it and give it some kind of context. I don’t see where you feel SF4 and 2 play anything alike however. When you can crouch tech, focus, dash, EX, use jabs to link into harder hitting specials, land jump-in combos without pressing the button -wicked- deep, etc…
“There’s nothing I can tell you”, is a laughably untrue statement: in the given context you’re implying that there’s something about the two games that is so deep and obvious to you that I’m missing–clearly, you could tell me something that would link them.
What? Is it that the mind-games are similar, that old tactics still work? Couldn’t be, you’ve already ruled out that the characters have virtually nothing to do with what you’re referring to and it would obviously follow that if you have characters who are meant to be designed based on previous versions of themselves that many strategies they used to employ–shock horror–still work.
I mean on a fundamental level that’s where Guile went astray right there–he was designed in a game (and then ported to several others) with no avoidance mechanic like parries or focus attacks. He is well suited to those kinds of games due to the simplicity in his design. I mean even the Alpha series, Charlie, a guile-esque character. Correct me if I’m wrong (truly, feel free to as I don’t know much about the Alpha series) but Charlie wasn’t even that prominent in that genre was he? And all that had was air-blocking, air recovery, and alpha-counters.
In a game with a lot of gimmicky mechanics, Guile (especially a toned down one) falters–he’s the quintessential fundamentalist character–and that runs into issues when inherent game mechanics willingly let players throw that shit out the window (the FADC). Guile would be kickass if (and this will sound stupid) Capcom just made him kickass. They’ve spoken about making his normals better, and honestly, if they make them “betterer” enough, then I think he’ll be fine in Super with the addition of Sonic Hurricane.
I mean really, think about it, if SF4 didn’t have Focus Attacks, Guile would wreck face. His zoning game would just fucking dominate. Obviously that’s not how it is, so he doesn’t, but here’s to hoping capcom pushes his normals hard enough to make him a very serious contender.
OK, right there you’re talking about options you have to fully explore the possibilities of the engine. But dude, I got to G1 without hardly ever using my Ultra or Super, and NEVER using a Focus Attack. And it didn’t take that long. So you don’t need those things to even win, let alone play.
SF3 was an excellent set of games, and 3S is regarded as one of the finest 2D fighters ever. But it was still a niche game in the grand scheme of things. The whole thing was designed around the concept of parrying and that alone sets it apart from 4. But the selectable Super Arts, and the unique properties of many of them, added a whole other level of strategy; you might pick one just for the amount of meter it would give you. The taunts even had properties of their own. All this could be daunting for casual players. You could maybe make the argument that 3S was so deep, it alienated enough people to almost kill the franchise.
Honestly, Kich, I don’t disagree that 4 is like 3S. I just think it’s more like 2 than 3…or better yet, it feels like the missing link between 2 and 3. And perhaps not coincidentally, that is the chronological setting for the story events in the game.
People liked Charlie in the Alpha Series, probably because he was the Guile in it (until Guile showed up, and sucked). Some even like him better than Guile. And for the record, Alpha also had Guard Break, different levels of Super, -ISMs, and whatever else I’m forgetting.
g1 means nothing in the grand sceeme of things it’s a grind with no real conciquences for losing matches, you can’t win an actual national level tournament with guile without useing all the tools in the engine do you see dagger g not useing focus attacks? no in fact ive seen him focus to ultra though firballs as far as playing guile at a high level this stuff is required.
is it a lot like 2? yes it has effective firball zoneing and almost all the sf2 cast, i would argue that it has a lot more features that come from 3, ex moves, super canceling, kara moves, dash, focas is sort of like parry just no where neer as good you can still use it to go through firebals and stuff pokes,
people like charlie because he plays like a better version of guile. and he also looks cool imo
G1 does mean nothing, and it is a grind, but there are a lot of good players on there. I beat them with my old school fundamentals and not a bunch of FADC fanciness, with a minimum of grinding. And as for the amount of players in “national level” tournaments, it’s less than 1% probably. So who cares about that?
i just want guile to be a viable character that can win tournaments on par with characters like ryu, rog, akuma etc and having him stuck in super turbo doesn’t achieve that.
also learning flashkick fadc will do nothing buy strengthen your game it adds a mixup if you go on the offensive and makes the flashkick actually safe it has saved me from certain death in the corner so many times agains hardcore rushdown. and focas back dash on wakeup is very useful to specialy vs fuete as it beats most of his options with the exeption of the jump throw and gets you back on the outside where you want to be.
Kich is taking really superficial indicators and saying that SFIV is nothing like SF2. Really?
In either case, SFIV bares little to no resembalance to SF3 whatsoever. There is an entirely different mindset and metagame involved. For example in SF2, if you don’t know footsies you die. In SFIV, if you don’t know footsies you die. In SF2, if you can’t get around a good zoning game, you die. In SFIV if you can’t get around a good zoning game you die. In SFIV if you can’t jump in correctly you die. Same as in SF2.
In 3s, you don’t need to worry much about footsies, zoning, spacing, or your opponent’s anti-air. It can just pretty much all be parried. Outside of combos, frame data is useless. 3s at high levels is all about option selecting, and that’s the entire metagame. That’s the main reason Japan dominates us, they know far more option selects in far more situations. I can’t see how anyone who has played 3s at a remotely competitive level can dare compare the two games.
Now, I wasn’t great in my 3s competitive career. As a matter of fact I sucked when I had to fight players at a certain level. I’ve also (albeit scarcely) played competitive ST, and I also play competitive SFIV (which goes without saying). I’m going to tell you, there are way more fundamentals from ST that apply to SFIV than ANYTHING in 3s. Spacing is important in SFIV, footises are important, the ability to stay grounded is important, and avoiding mixups and shenanigans is very important. SFIV also gives you no “universal” way to escape lockdown situations. Lockdown was scare in 3s, and really only Chun can legitimately lock you down. almost every character in ST had some type of lockdown, and the same is true in SFIV (though some lockdowns are better than others). Why can you lock someone down in SFIV and in ST but not in 3s? Because in ST and in SFIV you have to use certain judgements to escape situations or really good calculated guesses. Where in 3s parrying is always going to be your goto options.
The gameplay mechanics has little barring about the core gameplay overall. At it’s core SFIV is much more akin to ST than any other SF game. The metagames are very similar, and the emphasis on matchups are just as important. The only thing SFIV lacks that ST has is counterpicking, which I think is a good thing.
So based on how this all started (a silly suggestion to make Guile’s j.mp jugglable), you can’t draw comparisons between SFIV and 3s. Two totally different games. Remy needed tools like that because zoning was only SO effective in 3s. Remy is the type of character who really needed gimmicks to do anything in that game. Guile doesn’t need it, because while focus attacks exist, it’s not the “preferred” way to get around zoning.
The little nitty gritty features in sf4 are closer to sf3 such as EX moves, selectable super arts etc etc but how the overall game plays is entirely different, in 3s zoning tools like fireballs were completely redundant, so the emphasis on zoning wasn’t as great in 3S in comparison to the other 2 games due to the universal parry system, it was way too easy for any character to close the gap from good fireball zoning.
In fact the universal parry system alone changed the entire face of SF, parrying made stuff like pokes, meaties, AAs not as predominate, sometimes completely redundant, knowing frame data and block adv etc wasn’t really necessary. In 3S a big part of the game was being able to execute parries well, it was fairly safe to do, input was easy enough and the payoff was massive if you parried something.
Hell I even think the Alpha series (excluding A3) came closer to playing like SF4 than SF3.
If FK didn’t suck so much anus, you wouldn’t have to use FADC. Outside of a combo ender, FK is pretty much useless. The fact that you have to use meter to make it on par with any other non-ex DP style move says a lot.
This being said, Guile is actually very close to perfection in this game. Too many tweaks and he would be broken (but not in a sagat powerhouse way, more in a tactical form), but he needs a couple here and there to make him bang on perfect.
I’ve been studying Guile matches lately and the common link in most cases (of why he loses) is damage output - you can beast your opponent with Guile’s combos but as soon as your combo ends, eat a (reversal) combo’d ultra and die. 10-15% more dmg and he’d kill his opponents with his combos, instead of letting them live with a maxed-out ultra. He’d still be a thinking man’s fighter, his metagame would still be the same, he’d just hit that little bit harder - that’s how close he is to perfection. I guess another way of looking at it is without ultras in this game, Guile would win every match.
From what I have read, he’s getting SH ultra and a dmg boost in Super, so he should be spot on imo. Even if they keep his FK crappy, those two buffs would help him so much.
yeah sonic hurricane helps even if it has just about the same combo ability as somersault explosion, at least it is pretty certain that if it connects, it will most of the time fully connect rather than this nonsense whiffing business we get with somersault explosion.