Man, a Steam sale, or a free weekend, would drive up the Skullgirls sales like madness.
I yeah. Also, now that I think of it, steam promotion.
It’s not my role to be the positive polly, but there could be a good number of eyeball/impulse buys at that, I was kind of assuming that everyone who knew about the game had it or didn’t want it, but steams a whole 'nother market I guess ><
impulse buys are really important on steam, many people who are mildly interested will pick it up. If just for the sake of it being an indie game
I think something that would help SG out would be a Beta channel. Like TF2 has 2 versions of itself on Steam. The actual game, and a beta version, used for testing out changes and patches not ready to be implimented for good.
If there was a SG Beta channel, that didn’t support cross-platform play, Reverge and Mike Z could test out patches left and right on the beta channel while the actual PC port, and the console port stay the same.
Essentially, they can use the community to QA shit and help gauge how strong/weak something can be, and on top of that, everyone playing would be willing since you’d have to go out of your way to actually download the Beta channel.
Well, the TF2 beta is a bad example, because nobody plays it, despite TF2 having such a massive userbase. There’d probably only be like…10 people playing beta SG ever.
If they want sales at launch, they need to release the PC version on September or early October, If they dont, a lot of people will wait to the Xmas sales, for example a lot of people are not buying nothing right now because the Summer Steam sales are coming.
Except this isn’t true at all. Truth be told, you will probably need a decent computer to run Skullgirls on PC. Just because it’s 2D, don’t assume it doesn’t need high specs. No, you’re not going to need a top of the line video card, but SG has all kinds weighty shadow and lighting tech behind it, huge resolution sprites that are scaled down on the screen, high res backgrounds, and a lot of really impressive under the hood tech. Hell, some modern fighting games - even the Taito ones you can emulate - have issues running on video cards a few years old. Anyone who’s not into PC gaming and doesn’t have a mildly decent, dedicated video card (which is a LOT of people, particularly when it comes to people dedicated to console) are going to be shit out of luck when that game his PC.
Also OS has very little to do with it as far as Windows goes, there’s still very, very few games that require Vista or later.
Anyway, on topic, I could write this whole long thing, but tl;dr the game is two months old. Any scene and community around any game is going to take time to build, whether or not it has an instant base scene built in because it’s part of a franchise. Things are going to be in flux for a while, particularly while we’re dealing with patches and DLC characters still. If you like the game, settle in for the long haul, try and grab a friend, and get talking, just like with any other new game. If not, move on and stop whining. I think the patch will do a lot for the scene, though, by killing the stupid long combos and nerfing hornet bomber.
Eh, a non-issue really. Dedicated fans will always buy it at launch and probably not many more tbh, and then they’d make money hand over fist from the people who waited until the winter steam sale (assuming it goes on sale. Not EVERYTHING goes sale for those things).
Dedicated fans will buy, but today, a game cant live only with dedicated fans.
Also if you cant run Skullgirls, your computers is very very very old, Skullgirls is running on Xbox 360, 7 years old hardware, also on PC I assume you can change settings to adjust the game to your hardware, so if they do a good port, the game will run in almost every computer.
Thats funny the reason i never got into those games is the same reason…the #z
SG is a game MADE for dedicated fans, and it’s doing just fine based on that so far. FGs in general that aren’t Street Fighter live off of dedicated fans, doubley so in the PC market. If only dedicated fans buy SG at launch on PC - many of whom will probably be double dipping - it’ll do fine.
The age of your computer to the age of a console isn’t an exact thing. Obviously SG has more leeway because it’s a smaller game, but it’s still a game using a higher tech engine with a lot of impressive tech behind it it, and particularly with recent games, people are being forced to upgrade even three year old computers to really run stuff that’s coming out on the consoles. Just because it’s on a several years old console - even for a downloadable game - doesn’t automatically mean that it’s playable on machines of the same age or even a few years later. It doesn’t work that way.
To get the game to run on almost every computer (which isn’t going to happen - they may have a wide spectrum but the game is probably never going to tun on most laptops or systems several years old), they’d have to let you turn off a ton of stuff - all the lighting, shadowing, backgrounds, shaders, and post processing. The game will look like shit when that happens, and I’ll be surprised if turning all that stuff off is an option. On top of that, iirc the base engine is pretty weighty. Again, I’m not saying you’ll need a top of the line card, but assuming it’ll run on almost every computer is flat wrong. Even Rayman Origins didn’t have that going for it, and it doesn’t have some of the crazy shader stuff that SG has - just hi-res sprites.
Excepting that the whole purpose of the thread is that people are having trouble finding matches/events.
If PS3 compatibility goes through the PC release will be huge, and there’s absolutely no reason it shouldn’t run well on any reasonable machine.
The 5 year old machine I just replaced was faster, had a better graphics card, and had 8 times as much RAM as a PS3 or 360 does. System requirements will not be a problem, unless the optimization is just terrible (which there’s absolutely no reason to believe it will be).
Seems like the way things are going now, the game’s population will settle down at about Melty Blood levels. That’s more than enough to keep the game going, and more than enough to get good play if you live in a major city, but I’m gonna feel bad for the Skullgirls fan in Duluth. The only thing I really see changing that is if it gets good steam promotion and a bunch of impulse buys (some of whom stick).
Wow 0-0 Japan **REALLY **digging Skullgirls. This is a huge Skullgirls article gushing on one of the biggest gaming blogs site in Japan. Just from glancing it apparently is explaining what these Many Many references are on the costume palettes as well as other stuff such as promoting the Official OST.
Damn it someone plug my blog on there!
I’d like to really second this sentiment, as it’s something I don’t see discussed a lot when we’re trying to take a “picture” of the scene at large.
Giant Post incoming.
The most established fighters currently are (Unless anyone would like to argue), Ultimate MvC3, and SSF4:AE(2012). One might suggest, as I am, a direct correlation with these audience numbers and brand familiarity. Let’s reflect on that fact that most EVO games /side games are in their 9th or so iteration (Street Fighter, the VS series leading up to Marvel-baby!, KoF, MK), barring /maybe/ Soul Calibur (But if you count Soul Edge/Broken Destiny, at least 7).
At the very least, all of these series have had the last several /years/ to bring people into their respective scenes, and some are still struggling with numbers not too far off from our own. As a completely new property, SG’s greatest success right now will be to bring in enough money and interest to pursue advancements in the game (New characters/content/etc).
Crazy Ranting
[details=Spoiler]The suggestion that this game /needed/ a bunch more characters is preposterous for so many reasons (Lack of time, lack of money, risk/reward of committing to 16 characters and people would complain that it needs “At least 24”. Basically, no one will ever be happy with the number of characters ever) I agree characters bring the hype and there’s never enough, but again, first iteration. Street Fighter 3: New Generation had, what, 10 characters? (Including Ryu/Ken). Street Fighter 2 had 8, Blazblue had 12, P4U is slated to have 13 though let’s not forget the Arcade-to-console port is an iteration! The point is new IPs don’t have a bunch of characters and this isn’t a new concept.
The notion that the game lacks spark / is boring is completely subjective as well, and not conducive to scene-building so I recommend we drop it as an argument. I /cannot/ bring myself to watch Marvel streams, that does not invalidate the game or make it boring, nor do I feel compelled to spit bile at the friends of mine who love Marvel.[/details]
Instead of doom and glooming more, I’d like to reflect on some of the success these more established scenes have had and perhaps copy them wherever possible.
For instance…(And everyone, by all means I invite you to contribute ideas. We stand on the shoulders of FGC /giants/. We’re already making a good pace, but if we want to go faster, why not learn from the trials of others?)
SF: Get the damn expert on the phone.
When I watch an SG stream, do you know who I want to hear talk about this? Mike Z. No disrespect to other stream commentators but I know what I like.
SKillian (Rest his Capcom Soul) was the man who for me personally, brought the hype for Street Fighter by being a combination of knowledge, excitement, and being a damn good representative of the brand. All of these things can and are represented by Reverge’s very own. I know it’s not realistic for Mike to be at every tournament, but whatever ones he’s at should be streamed/archived/preserved until someone in our community is ready to take the mantle of “Wise guru” from him.
KoF: Strength in the face of adversity.
I think (as do many) that we are getting ahead of ourselves by saying the scene is in any way “dead”. We /are/ the scene, and we are not dead. More than anything (Even the above point), I would love to see us loud and proud whenever possible. Even if there’s 2 of us. Because if we’re not loving it, then we shouldn’t expect anyone else to. I think MLG (I know I know…eSports) was a good measure for how few KoF players attend these events, and yet I would not dare suggest to Bala that his game is dead or that maybe it’d have more players if it was less boring. The people who love KoF /love/ it. That’s why we’re still hearing about it when it has a tiny fanbase compared to SF (Even though, surprise surprise, it’s been around for 20 years)
SF/Marvel, baby!: Celebrating our Superstars.
I don’t care what your personal feelings on the Cross Counter organized barfights was, that room was PACKED in like sardines to watch half a dozen guys play some Fighting Games and ham it up a bit. I know we’re not here yet, but everyone and their dog in Street Fighter/Marvel, baby!'s respective scenes know who Justin Wong is. Having these “celebrity players” is a good way to show the rest of the world (And ourselves) what high level Skullgirls looks like, and High level SG is more exciting than low level SG like every other fighter. Allow me to make some assumptions about the people in this thread, but without a “bar” to be raised, the game lacks stakes and you don’t know how high the ceiling is, far more than I’d say it’s boring. A lot of Hype comes from Dominant players with technical skill (Daigo Parry vs. Jwwwong), Underdogs/Unknowns maybe placing? (Any Canadian in a tournament ever), and the dynamic between those two things (Poongko/Fuudo in EVO2K11). We need to find our best guys, and put them in as many rooms together as possible to beat the tar out of each other and take video.
Melty Blood, and my closing point:
Who the hell cares how many people are playing it? The flowchart is as follows:
Do you enjoy playing it? (Y/N)
N - That’s unfortunate. Try it again some time
Y - Sweet! Find a buddy and keep playing.
come to the gathering tomorrow QETZL or else
Because people like having people to play.
A rising tide floats all boats, but also (insert nautical metaphor here for how if there aren’t enough players a scene collapses).
(so its worth worrying about, or at least thinking about positively. Even if you have a buddy to play, the game being more popular helps everyone a lot.)
I understand that. My point was more
"Melty Blood players have, and will continue to exist as long as there’s two of them."
More people is always better, but it’s the strength of the few people I’ve met/interacted with that I felt warranted a mention of MB’s scene, especially in an era where people are more than happy to drop SFxT like a rock.
And, I think I said it up above, but MB is the model. I can totally get wanting a consistent community and strong relations first though, for sure.
Seconded.
If anyone has other (Hopefully positive) lessons you think we can take away from other scenes to save ourselves all the grief they had to go through (ignoring of course, the natural and unavoidable growing pains of any fan-following), please contribute!