I went from Sakura to Guy to Gen, and Gen was the only character I could pick up and be decent with despite not knowing any good punish combos, etc.
So what is it exactly that makes him so bad?
you will know to play all characters but Gen is another world 
my friend
you want some punish combos , you have to learn Mk Hands
Gen Trials is clear ?
I don’t really do trials, heh. What I do is play against good players in real matches, but thanks for the condescending reply. I have yet to really hit training mode and buckle down on everything he’s capable of, but I was doing fine against some really good players only punishing with s.fp x hands. I can learn everything I need to with Gen on my own, that’s not what this thread is about.
He has TWO great and versatile sets of pokes, a lot of neat frame traps, decent kara throws, etc, etc. I’m just wondering why people say he’s so bad when he has a larger amount of better tools than some other characters? Sure, he’s hard to play well compared to say, oh, Ryu, but since when have ANY low tier characters been easy to use?
I’d also like to streamline my learning process and just figure out some of his actual weaknesses that don’t stem from his difficulty of use.
This is from my own point of view, not counting the difficulty of use like you said.
He takes damage AND stun badly (he has 900 stamina and 900 stun, same with Dhalsim), he needs to get sorta close to deal damage while he doesn’t have a fast or a safe move to get closer to the opponents (he does have a slow and unsafe move tho), yet he cannot deal much damage/stun compared to others without super/ultra. He also cannot FADC out of his way when the opponent blocks his unsafe move (except for roll). I think he’s better than Makoto, though.
Gen has many weaknesses. He has low health, is very weak, gets stunned easily, has unreliable special moves, unreliable ultra moves, unreliable wakeup options, slow meter gain, and just about everything he does puts him at much more risk, then he puts the opponent at. The biggest problem with Gen that I see, is when people are rushing down/mixing it up on him, he can barely do anything about it because almost all of his special moves are too risky to use because of their level of vulnerability, lack of priority, lack of Hitbox range, as well as lack of decent recovery time. Because of this, Gen can’t consistantly keep pressure on or off his opponents, and this is the reason why almost everything he does puts him as so much risk. A Gen player has to depend heavily on using normals to fight, but even then most fighters have normals that are better then Gens’. Gens’ normals are good to use from a distance, but they’re terrible to use when the opponent is upclose. Don’t get me wrong though, Gen has some very good advantages too. Gen is one of the fastest characters in the game in terms of walk speed, his Super Moves are some of the best Super Moves in the game, his backdash is really good and has invincibility frames, and his crossovers are really good. But overall though, Gen has much more weaknesses then advantages, and he’s labeled as one of the worst fighters in SSF4. As of now, the only way that you’ll be able to win with Gen is if you outplay your opponent and outsmart them significantly, because almost every matchup in the game is really bad for him.
He’s the only low health character that doesn’t have either outstanding offense or really strong zoning/defence, or both. He’s fragile, he can literally be killed off of one knockdown against a strong oki character like Zangief, but at the same time he needs to work for his damage as well as getting in in the first place.
I think his main strength is ability to hitconfirm into good damage any time he has enough meter. With two bars, any landed poke can mean 300ish damage, and with a full super/ultra, a landed poke will often give you the round. He can also frametrap with normals well, though this is actually not as good as it seems on paper since in SSF4 - where you have stupidly easy reversals that can be mashed out or made safe with meter, not to mention leading into easily hitconfirmable Ultras for a lot of characters - walking forward and pressing buttons is a pretty big gamble. Especially when you don’t have the health to take it or the wakeup options to get out of mixup afterwards.
Get your fundamentals down. And don’t drop your FADC combos and super cancels. You’ll need to be a good read too if you want to get in, survive wakeup, and bait out reversals. With easy frametraps, you can actually blow up crouch tech pretty well so if you can outguess your opponent, and not drop combos in the process, you can win.
Gen has it easier than any other bottom tier character in most other fighting games. Compare him to Sean or Remy - they’d be glad to have this many 3/7 and 4/6 matchups. Still, IMO he is bottom tier. Makoto is way better. Look at her tournament win percentage - it’s actually above average. Gen’s is the lowest in the game and 1/5th of the average.
With all that said and done… he can win. You just have to work more.
Ditto to what catscratch said, but Gen is far from being the absolute bottom in this game.
Gen has a lot of tools, decent pokes, a great throw and focus, easy to setup/hit confirm big damage super combos, as well as his mix-up opportunities and great set of ultras, which you can’t really say for either Dan or Hakan. But I’ll agree with you and say that Makato is probably the queen of the lowest tier characters, with Sakura trailing closely behind her.
Are you implying he is the hardest character to learn?
I’m not convinced about Gen being better than Hakan - sure there are great japanese Gens but can you really see any one of them beat Daigos Ryu, for instance? Wildcat has really opened my eyes to Hakans potential. Hakan is arguably harder to learn than Gen too… Seth and C.Viper too, El Fuerte too maybe?
Anyways, echoing what people have said - basically, Gens offense AND defense are lacking. He’s still great fun to play. But it is an uphill battle. This video says a lot IMHO:
[media=youtube]L7MsIJn3bc4"[/media]
don’t forget a lot of people are comparing vanilla gen to super gen when they say he’s bad. He’s very different in comarison. Changes in the crane ump arc alone made me feel the immediate difference. Meter gain too made a big difference, in vanilla you gained a super bar a round, where in super you get a super bar every time you win a round. Gen’s meter management in super is a nightmare, I don’t even use ex-moves, let alone risk two bars on a FADC combo I could drop.
Gen is an uphill battle, but then again crane super is the BEST AA super in the game, 1 frame startup with full invincibility and it can punish a psychic jump full screen. Not to mention its impossible to safe jump (using the technical definition of a safe jump). There’s a reason gen builds meter so slow…a very good reason.
Crane super can be safe jumped, it’ll whiff on safe jumps that can block 4 frame startup specials. It depends on the technical definition of the safe jump however.
eg with Gen:
- Back grab -> crane forward j.MK
- Forward grab -> 2xForward Dash -> mantis neutral jump with normal
oh look, its THIS thread again!
tbh no he isnt bad, actually NO character is bad, as long as you are a way BETTER player then your opponent.
fragile
so so footsies
no fireball 
/ no crazy mixups, that DONT put you at freakin high risk (like ibuki, akuma and so on)
low damage output
low meter gain
bad reversal
crane stance normals/frame disadvantage
retarded oga crossups, that are way too risky and inconsistent
too much bad matchups (ken, zangief, guile, adon, chun li, dee jay, HONDA, boxer and so on…thats the chars i ve my problems with to win against, i dont care for tier lists)
HONDA
many normals with A LOT of different functions
many normals with A LOT of different functions
GOOD overhead
ways of comboing in to ultra ( - that are difficult to perform or risky -> kkk j hk deep ultra, gekiro ultra)
one good read (when your opponent jumps) -> kkk j hkx2 ultra and about 400 health points of him are gone
mantis normals
range (is ok)
SUPER!
and ways of comboing into that
somewhat nasty crossup
if you outsmart your oponent then its no problem to win with him…prepare to outsmart him the whole game without doing anything wrong
just my 0,00000000002 cts
All aboard…
the Troll Train…
No, seriously… Gen isn’t bad, but why the fuck are we being informed of this by a guy who can’t do mk xx hands, and hasn’t touched training mode, but apparentely plays with “really good players”? He can also learn everything from a character on his own. Fuck reading about Option Selects, punishes and matchup knowledge. Talking? Communication? Doing what even Daigo/Tokido/Justin, hell, any top player does to improve their knowledge (since they clearly don’t lurk around the forums)?
Fuck that.
He learns characters HERMIT style baby.
He’s a survivor. One-man fighting game community.
His meter gain is the biggest deal to me. That shit’s just not right.
i have to agree with my fellow texas gen, he made the point of how good gens supers are/there for nerf on bar. gen can hit confirm c.mp, super with outrageous ease so i can understand the nerf in bar. considering what he can do after that super it was a wise balancing.
gen is bad because he relies on normals so much. he can’t beat a chun at footsies without gimics or chun messing up lol (exageration). i really like using s.mp because players tend to block if im on the offensive and s.mp has a significant advantage on block. but it’s draw back is it’s lack of priority, dahlsim can back lk freely. there are other examples ofcourse.
also the huge risk in using his specials. that is why when you see a successful gen combo over 15 hits that player gets famous around these parts lol. look at the xbox pad player in the video thread 2 weeks ago. instant fame and rightfully so!
I can understand a meter gain nerf. I can’t understand such an extreme meter gain nerf.
i cant understand such an extreme meter gain nerf either. a whole bunch of characters can hitconfirm cancel into ultra leading to 450+ damage EVERY ROUND without building meter on purpose hell they could wiff some special shit and voila! or getting into trouble “hmm i could dp him and cancel, if im lucky he gets hit if not, NP cuz im safe…”.
damn i should stop whining…
i dont understand what you mean by he cant beat chun at footsies. both characters have really good normals and fast walk speeds, giving them both answers to each others whiffs. her fireball being used as a shield gives her a slight edge, but she shouldnt be killing you considering that gens normals lead to more damage, and (m) cr.mk ducks under anything she can throw out at range
i also disagree about standing mp. the hit box is pretty far in front of hittable box, it just lacks range
Chun has a faster walkspeed(unless you are in crane, then it’s about the same if not the same)
Her st.mp is + frames on hit and block.
She has more “specific” normals.
Chun’s ideal range is right outside of gen’s, so getting that hands combo fadc to damage can be difficult.
Chun was built with footsies in mind.
Idk what gen was built for but he ended up somewhere between chun and honda when it comes to footises.
i dunno, i get her strong points and all, but if im losing a footsie battle its more because of the fireball covering her approach, than the buttons themselves. if she whiffs a normal, its the same as any other character to me…