From a game design perspective, what is the purpose of combos?

[Linari]

Weren’t combos a mistake in design? Or was that special-canceling?

[98989898]

Canceling is an accidental byproduct of kara canceling, which was added to make it easier to do special moves. In SF2 the first 5 frames of a normal can be kara canceled, which means you can cancel normals during their active frames if they become active on or before the fifth frame. Hitstop of course freezes you on that active frame which means you have plenty of time to input the special move.

[Mr.X]

Canceling is an accidental byproduct of kara canceling, which was added to make it easier to do special moves. In SF2 the first 5 frames of a normal can be kara canceled, which means you can cancel normals during their active frames if they become active on or before the fifth frame. Hitstop of course freezes you on that active frame which means you have plenty of time to input the special move.

People, naturally, took advantage of this to squeeze more damage out.
This lead to people choosing which special to cancel into, if they wanted extra damage, knockdown, etc.

I’m not sure which was the first game to allow long combos but I imagine he liked long combos or he thought people liked doing long combos and that was the start of new type of fighting games that put more emphasis on performing combos.

[IceKitsune]

You know I’ve always wondered if the fighting game community would even accept a fighting game made today that didn’t have combos in it or they were minimized? Of course I’m assuming that other then combos the game is well made and not broken of course. I’m guessing probably not, it would most likely be seen as a novelty and then quickly forgotten.

[Graphf]

You know I’ve always wondered if the fighting game community would even accept a fighting game made today that didn’t have combos in it or they were minimized? Of course I’m assuming that other then combos the game is well made and not broken of course. I’m guessing probably not, it would most likely be seen as a novelty and then quickly forgotten.

I would love a FG that had less/smaller combos in it. I am not a fan of marvel style combos.

[PKSkyler]

Hit confirms

[tataa8P]

I would love a FG that had less/smaller combos in it. I am not a fan of marvel style combos.

Pre-ST SF versions like CE, HF and Super SF and Samurai Shodown 1 off the top of my head

8P

[Coren]

Because combos are fun.

[Hecatom]

I would love a FG that had less/smaller combos in it. I am not a fan of marvel style combos.

play battle fantasia

[Saotome_Kaneda]

Samurai Shodown 1

I’d play SS2 over SS1 any day

[Mightfo]

Highly dependent on the game and character, but combos can add:
1)Choice between wakeup game and damage.
2)Choice between saving a resource and spending it on extra damage.(Meter, gold bursts, or some sort of character specific resource…in some cases, you can sacrifice damage for an opportunity to gain more of a character specific resource)
3)Reset opportunities.
4)Combos add more of a risk for being cornered.
5)Combos add more possible weaknesses/strengths to characters, like being too small for certain combos to work, or being so large that they can do more damage to you, or having longer combos in certain situations that generate a lot of meter, or strong corner push, etc.
6)Burst baiting.
7)More reward for “setups” of projectiles etc, as well as more capacity to do varied setups.
8)The risk of certain combos that you cant hit confirm.
9)Adds more meaning to a counterhit.

and other little things. some of this was brought up by previous posters, but they posted paragraphs which some people wont read, lol.

Combos are merely a means to get more damage out of a single attack. It’s that fucking simple.

Even the most unwashed of heathens should know this when it comes to fighting games.

And not just for fighting games, but for any game that uses a “combo” system.

lmao stay silly

[yomipower]

I would love a FG that had less/smaller combos in it. I am not a fan of marvel style combos.

3rd Strike

[tataki]

**

but from a game design perspective, what is their point?

**

More decision making to be done.
damage/oki/resets/meter build/meter use/corner carry/setups/burst baiting etc.
If there is one best combo that gives you everything you could hope for, only then it becomes a mindless automatic aspect.

[tataa8P]

@Saotome Kaneda
agreed. SS2 is by far the one installment in the series that had nailed the whole thing. aside from the fact that not a lot of fighting games were weapon-based at the time, it had set the standard back then. and well, he did ask for a game with small combos…

8P

[Coren]

SS5S is the highpoint of the samsho series.

[xes]

there’s 2 things, I think

[LIST=1]
[]They’re easy flash, they make for really nice promo videos. (Yes I think people are shallow)
[]They specifically reward practice. People like the feeling that they can get a hand up and do things that other people can’t do. Extended combo systems give that feeling in spades, and mean that in general the person who has put in more practice time will always win.
[/LIST]

[Kalyx_triaD]

A sorta blog I wrote on the matter years ago (posted in another forum, and even here, before I actually had a blog):

Are fighting games too reliant on multi-hit combo systems? Before we go on, a little history is in order.

The idea of combos began as a bug in Street Fighter 2 (like many of it’s common systems, actually). Essentially, the recovery of an attack is shorter than a target’s hitstun, giving you a series of uninterrupted attacks. Along with an early form of buffering, combos became examples of top level play in the early fighter communities. Capcom allowed these bugs and embraced them in later versions of Street Fighter 2 (including the first Combo Counter appearing in Super 2). Combos were welcomed into fighting game development, and expanded to include juggles and dial-a-combo structures. Killer Instinct’s entire engine focused on combos of (then) crazy length. Even 3D fighters came out embracing combos, with Virtua Fighter introducing preset strings of attacks that defined 3D fighters indefinitely.

So where did combos in fighters take us? Well it revealed that certain bastards aren’t above discovering, and exploiting, infinites. It also separated the regulars from the timing experts of the fighting community. Just about every fighting game worth it’s salt has a Combo Counter to let you know how many hits you landed after your last attack package. It’s just a normal facet of fighting games.

But is it required? And is it even an indicator of skill anymore?

I remember me and my buds getting better at Tekken 3 and Soul Calibur in the late 90s. We got good at our chosen characters and developed a kind of play that varied from what the general fighting community adopted. We had a tit-for-tat ‘where will I attack’ format where we took the Namco fighter’s style of high/mid/low hit areas and made it a guessing game. We’d try to trick out each other with various stances and patterns of the characters. For all we knew that’s how Namco intended.

Then we finally met up with other gamers outside of our own living rooms, some great players, and… exchanged philosophies. We learned that the Namco fighting game landscape was rife with combo strings and technical traps in both Tekken and Soul Calibur series. For a time we thought we were playing it wrong the whole time! Then we noticed that these players were not used to blocking low. A small detail that evened up the landscape just a bit. We were mystified at how clueless they were regarding rather simplistic attack patterns that weren’t dependent on long juggles and tech traps. Still, their style was superior and we needed to play to win. We adopted this style of into our own and became better for it. We never really did abandon our philosophy, however.

I bring this up because I’ve noticed Soul Calibur and Tekken crept slowly toward being combo-centric games. For me this was an acceptable yet annoying change of climate. I looked at Tekken videos showcasing ridiculous strings of juggles that just didn’t speak to me a fight - but a game of launchers to get your opponent on some inescapable intake of damage. I imagine Tekken 6 will still allow our kind of gameplay, but new videos confirm even more reliance on juggles. Soul Calibur 4 features a Combo Counter, a first for the series. Street Fighter 4 features a rather open combo system, with Sakura loving every moment of it.

You know what I see when I watch these so-called ‘tournament videos’? Endless strings of combos and jockeying for opportunities for more combos. I mean this is great for something like 3rd Strike, where big combos are limited to training mode set-ups and you need to think on your feet. Killer Instinct of course is a concept fighter for combos. But I’m not impressed with 10+ hit strings in Tekken and impossible juggles in Soul Calibur. To me that does not present a fight, but a contest of dialing in buttons without fear of reprisal. I had silent disagreements with this convention for years, keeping it in until now.

I think new fighting games should lessen the need for combos and increase other forms of offensive strategy.

Now this isn’t me whining about bringing fighting games to adjust to our methods, oh no, that’s not my intention. I like a good combo, I just don’t like a game being defined by it’s combos. My friends can attest that I am an agent of gameplay balance and competitive structure. I personally believe both opponents of similar skill should have nothing but their own minds and characters in a fair engine that did not bow to a specific player’s style. In short, a character for a player’s style is fine, but not an entire gameplay engine. And most of these engines are combo-centric.

So how do you guys feel about combos and how fighting games use them? Do you think they should flourish or succumb to more open systems that celebrates a broader range of player’s styles?

Some of my feelings changed since this piece but I mostly feel the same.

[d3v]

If you want to see how a game without combos would work, look no further than DOA4. This is the game where Itagaki got so fed up with losing that he nerfed juggles and made nearly every move counterable. Ask any of the DOA players here ( Wah, Rikuto, etc.) and they’ll tell you the same thing - the game became a defensive mess that was frustrating since every move resulted in guesswork and the safest option was to get hit and counter out of the “combo”.

[xes]

If you want to see how a game without combos would work, look no further than DOA4. This is the game where Itagaki got so fed up with losing that he nerfed juggles and made nearly every move counterable. Ask any of the DOA players here ( Wah, Rikuto, etc.) and they’ll tell you the same thing - the game became a defensive mess that was frustrating since every move resulted in guesswork and the safest option was to get hit and counter out of the “combo”.

A number of games with short or basically non-existent combos were mentioned up above though, and they’re nothing like DOA4

[NickRocks]

combos happen in real life too, OP. get in a fight sometime