Has Udon lost the plot?

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41

I can assure you I have a much better grasp of this kind of thing than you do. I have talked with several writers. 1 of them who worked for Lucas Arts writing Star Wars comics. There are plenty of reasonable and unreasonable limitations placed on licensed properties. A little common sense can go a long way.

nortlee and rob_keys: neither of you have contributed ANYTHING worthwhile to this thread. Stop whining. One person’s opinion can always just remain that, you know. No one forced him to post it in a message board. Certainly he couldn’t have expected no one to have a difference of opinion with him. Why post something you don’t want to discuss?

I don’t see any fanboyism coming from anyone but the person who thinks Ryu should have more attention.
Everyone has their favorite and not everyone can be 100% pleased with everything.
No one has suggested any alternatives and “do it better” doesn’t help.

At any rate, this isn’t a flamefest, there are plenty of points being made and argued. The both of you crying not-withstanding.

42

What do you mean there’s no fanboyism here other than the Ryu fan stuff? You’re the one that bashes any sign of any criticism along with a couple of others which is what happened in this thread. TAS is another example.

What exactly is contributing to a thread? Stating an opinion. Did I do that? Yes. Have I actually personally bashed anybody’s opinions unlike the rest of you claiming to be constructive? No. you lot don’t state your opinions you just pick arguments so er…Yeah nice try :rolleyes: Really contrbuting to a thread there.

So what could help improve the comics right now? Some actual direction with the plot would help and that’s being nice. There you got my contribution, it sucks but hey you insisted on more than the opinion. You lot just take whatever is fed to you without question :rolleyes:

Less emphasis on “pwning”, more emphasis on intelligent discussion please.

43

You stated your opinion about people stating their opinion. You’ve contributed nothing on topic prior to this post. Nothing.
Instead you bitched and moaned because you don’t like that people are disagreeing with him.
Boo whoo.

The fanboyism mentioned applied to this thread, that’s what we’re discussing.
I don’t bash any sign of criticism as long as it IS CONSTRUCTIVE.
This forum is rampant with “the art sucks” or “the story sucks”.
I ask them to ELABORATE, which none seem to be able to do.
Way to take us completely off topic.

And don’t give me that “you’re all sheep” routine. Is the concept that someone actually LIKES the comic so mindnumbing you have to assume we can’t think for ourselves? Don’t be such an elitest prick. You’re not as “enlightened” as you think you are.

It never ends. The same people that piss and moan about the quality are the same people that cry twin waterfalls when it’s they take extra time to improve it.

I disagree with his opinion on the quality of the story and the direction it’s taking and I have said why.

Build a bridge, man.

44

It’s not that you disagree, it’s how you post your disageements, no respect whatsoever, though you are not the reason that I brought that up in the first place. I have said why I feel the story has gone off here and that was constructive whether you agree or not:
http://www.shoryuken.com/forums/showthread.php?t=87198&page=2&pp=15

What exactly needs to be elaborated on?

45

Bottom line is,UDON is doing a terrific job with the comics and i never want it to end.I LOVE the stories coming together,the art,the characters ,the fighting.Its brillant.No one could do better in a five year period and cover over so much ground.
as long as I get through the end of what happens in third strike in the comics WITH A FINAL ISSUE OF STREET FIGHTER,I will be satisified,if the comics were to end before they should(and I mean for darkstalkers as well)I would be very upset.I buy one of each cover including foil,and one extra of whatever issue of my choosing to read.I see both dark stalkers and street fighter as collector series and I DO NOT wantto see them not finish.Having a halfass series of these comics would be horrible.We should ALL be thankful we are getting these.If I make it big,I will give Udon all sorts of cash to make sure these issues have finals and resolved stories,but i dont think I will have to do that,because Udon is a fantastic company that will FINISH what they started.

46

To Apathy-Inc and nortlee, that’s enough from BOTH of you. You’re both trying to justify your disgust towards bashers by bashing each other, and that creates a loop. Can’t you see that if this continues, it WILL drag on to an all-out ‘flamefest’? Now I don’t want to hear either of you taking any more shots at each other or you’ll both be sent to your rooms.

47

If my “harsh” statements make you feel bad I’m going to simply direct you to the above mentioned “building of a bridge”. I don’t feel like pussyfooting around issues.

Right, you’ve posted your “I want more Ryu” statements, which is what I was also refering to when I made MY points earlier.

I don’t care if you think Thug #14 should have more focus, I’m simply telling you the obvious reasons behind why they don’t, repeating what Erik has already said, and asking people to use an ounce of common sense when they’re posting.

Apparently, I’m asking a lot.

48

A couple of things.

The only time Ryu ever went to look for someone in the canon was when he found Gouki in SFZ2 after he killed Gouken. Aside from that, he’s pretty much wandering around aimlessly in the non tournament games (SFZ2, SFZ3, SF3 Third Strike) and there for the tourneys in the tourney games (SF1, SF2 and SF3 New Generation.) There does exist the possibility that he went after Gouki in SF2 dropping out of the tourney so Guile or Chun-Li could win, but there’s no hard evidence of this other than conjecture. So in the comic, they only stopped him finding Gouki, but he didn’t even realize it was him that killed Gouken, where in the canon he followed his ki to his island.

I don’t pretend to know the ins and outs of Udon’s contract other than Udoneko saying Capcom closely monitors what they can and can not do. In the first issue, Udoneko said they changed the location of Ryu and Sagat’s fight in SF1 because they wanted people to witness the battle, and Capcom okayed this. It seems like even something small like this (don’t kill me SF1 purists but this seems small in the grand scheme of things) does appear to look like Capcom has to approve everything if altering something like this has to be OKed.

Then there’s that terrible Street Fighter Malibu comic book. The writers really had no problem telling you when the book ended in issue three that Capcom was the one who shut the book down as they didn’t like the direction the book was taking.

If you check out the OVA of the Street Fighter Alpha Anime and watch the director’s interview, he says he wanted Chun-Li to be a more ‘sexy’ character. Which if you know your Anime means she would be flirting with everybody. And the director said Capcom said “no.”

The impression I get is that Capcom cares more about if the characters are acting the way they are supposed to, if they are true to themselves, gathering from things that Udoneko has said and the other non comic book examples I gave. For an idiotic example if Guile were to suddenly say ‘screw this Air Force crap, Shadowloo is where it’s at where can I sign up’ Capcom wouldn’t allow it, much like they didn’t allow that other SF Malibu comic. I don’t pretend to know anything about using licensed characters and such, just know things about Capcom’s past being the fanboy that I am, and you can check issue 3 of the SF Malibu comic or the SF Alpha Anime DVD for proof of sone of the examples I laid out.

Anyway, it was stated either on this thread or in a Play Magazine interview by Ken Siu-Chong (the one regarding SF), I forget which that the next arc will feature Ryu traveling around the world before the SF2 tourney starts, so you will get to see the wandering warrior, just be patient.

I’m pretty neutral in this whole thing, I’m not taking sides I don’t think just putting down what I think/know.

49

Good points,Sano.The more i think about it,the next arc will feature Ryu and sakura traveling the world as alpha plays out all together.By the end of the alpha arc,ryu,Ken,etc. will face off against Bison,dolls,shadowloo,etc. and then we can move into street fighter 2.

50

…

There ya go, put your money where your mouth is Glitcher.

Some of us here have actually written SF related stories, so lets see how yours stacks up against those or UDONs. Then if its good youll be able to back up all that crap you talk, but until you do you dont really have any room to talk.

Let me ask you something, how the hell do you think any of us know about this stuff with the situation of the comic and how involved Capcom is with the comic and what UDON’s limitations are with the comic?

Its beacause…

UDONEKO HAS ALREADY TOLD US ALL THIS STUFF!!!

Maybe if you’d been here longer then a few months then you’d know all that stuff too.

Uhm yes we can, because Udoneko has told us what they can and cant do.

You’re acting like Udon has ALOT of freedom, and they DONT, they have to approve basicly EVERYthing, example Udon needed a last name for Charlie, but did they make one up or suggest a few to Capcom? No, Capcom told them to make his last name Nash. Another example Udon asked Capcom what Chun Li’s father should look like, and they said just use his SF2V appearence, and there are quite a few other examples like this.

I dont know about you but that dosnt sound like alotta freedom to me.

Because we do know the extent of the restrictions given everything we’ve been told.

Given the amount of stuff Udoneko has told us, we kinda do.

Maybe because, other people have already said the same stuff before and people around here are tired of it, and Udoneko has already disscussed what limitations they have and why the comic is the way it is like a dozen times now.

Thats because this comic is basicly the way Capcom would retell the SF storyline if they had to.

51

I think you’ll find Erik was more likely talking about when people were posting stuff like “The comic fucking sucks” and all of those kind of comments or of course the stupidity from Bucket of Truth or whatever his name was. People are still backing themselves atm so it is a constructive sensible argument, just because you don’t think so doesn’t make it so. What I actually said was not that I want more Ryu exactly, I actually said “why is the focus on Cammy lately?” Because it seems random, there are plenty of character’s to choose from so what makes her so important? The Alpha character’s have had little or no chance to shine really atm. And I said the comic needs more focus plotwise, I didn’t ask for more Ryu I asked for more focus, Ryu is the main character like it or not and his plot is getting lost, this second arc hasn’t really focused on anything that important until the climax. Whether you agree or not that is a fully justified comment.

Glitcher you was doing the same with TAS. But very well my argument is crystal clear now I’ll let it drop.

52

Hey Crash26 the Living room games CAPCOM World Tournament should be come out soon so you might want to check it out.

The main characters of Street fighter Alpha

1 Ryu

2 Cammy

http://kattuggla.oru.se/dmd01/dm0103/test/faqs/SFplotguide40.txt

SF2 main characters

1 Guile and Chun-Li

street fighter 3 main characters

1 Alex, Yun and Yang

53

You’re probably right, so I’ll try and finish him off right now. :devil:

Look, I’m not trying to surpress anyone and I’m certainly not going to accept any challenges to write an acclaimed fan fic for four very good reasons:

1 - I have neither the desire nor the obligation to prove myself to any of you.
2 - It will only propagate this argument.
3 - Writing the best SF fan fic in the world may increase my credibility, but it won’t give me inside knowledge on the extent of Udon’s story liberties.
4 - A comparison with Udon can only be made justifiably if I were to draw a comic instead of writing a fan fic (which I probably could, since I am a comic artist).

I don’t pretend to know exactly what Udon can and cannot do, and neither should any of you regardless of how many scraps of information you claim to posess, because - I have to remind you - none of you work for Udon. Furthermore, I never EVER said that Udon should deviate from the SF canon in the first place. All I’m doing is suggesting that Udon revises its storyline to establish a clearer goal for its protagonists, pursue that goal to its conclusion, and avoid introcuding extra characters or events that might upset the balance of the story. Keep Ryu on track of finding his master’s killer. Stop bouncing between characters all the time in the DS issues. Is Capcom going to stop Udon from doing THAT? Unless you take a flight to Japan and put forth the question to Capcom themselves, I don’t think you have any right to shoot this down. Period.

54

I’m actually enjoyin the comic more with it not having a single main character who drives the plot forward. It has characters who are doing their own thing, sometimes even barely related to each others events.

If you look at the previous Street Fighter comics and anime, Ryu is almost always the central character whose story is unfolded as we read/watch him. Udon’s comic is the change to the normal way of doing things like this and I welcome them for it.

Not that I don’t like Ryu, I do. But we already know his story without it being told again by Udon. Characters such as Cammy have little backstory previously and her relationship to Delta Red has been largely ignored in the past. And Delta Red is a part of the Street Fighter mythos, they just serve to reinforce Cammy’s role of a believable character. She’s part of a team and not a solo member.

I think some peoples concerns lie with the fact that Udon are taking their time with the storyline and introducing characters slowly. I don’t know exactly how many issues Udon have left of the comic and I wish I knew. Then I could gauge some sort of reaction on whether they are doing the comic too slowly or not. But for now, I’m just going to take each comic as it comes and enjoy it.

55

This may be slightly off topic, but I’ve never understood why people here seem to believe that Guile or Chun-Li were the main characters of SFII, simply because their endings involve Bison. There has never been anything else that would suggest that. Guile as far as I know has never been in a game opening, and EVERY piece of japanese media, albeit non-cannon, has shown Ryu to be the central character of Street Fighter. In fact, that’s how I LEARNED that Ryu was the central character in the first place instead of Guile, since like many other impressionable youths back in the day, I originally thought the SFMovie was canon. Guile, aside from his introduction in SFIIV has always gotten his ass handed to him, and in the Tokuma comics, he never even got to Bison. It’s always been Ryu’s show. Hell, even that shitty Malibu comic had Ryu as the central character. Now, on the other hand, Chun-Li makes a little more sense with Urien’s quote, and since she’s often featured as the prominent character in a lot of Street Fighter artwork, but I really think she’s just more of a poster child. Can anyone provide more evidence that would suggest that Ryu isn’t the main character of SFII?

56

No, because, you/we are talking about the writting here. This has nothing to do with the art.

Let me lay something out for you.

I imagine UDON (or one of the obligations UDON) has to introduce EVERY SF and DS char in the comics, and thats IMPOSSIBLE to do with what you’re suggesting. SF and DS are NOT one character shows like Spider-Man, Batman, etc, etc. Maybe if this comic was called “The Adventures of Ryu” you’d have a point, but since its not, you dont.

So now try and explain to me how the comic could possibly work with what you’re suggesting if…

  1. You have to introduce EVERY char from the SF series (except from SF1)
  2. You have cover all of SF’s story arcs (except SF1)
  3. You only have 5 years to do it (which originaly started off as 3)

So, given all that, would your ideas work? No. Could you do it better? No.

So Im failing to see what the problem is here, given none of your problems can actually be delt with, and its a little late to start dealing with them now specialy since the whole first part of the story just ended, ie we’re 14 issues in, and itll be a few months before the SF2 comic starts.

Ryu isnt the main char of SFII, its Guile (from what I heard)

But here’s your proof anyway though. You see every SF sequel has an all new Main Character and all new Villian, and the hero has some connection with the villian, ie…

Game - Hero/Villian

SF1 - Ryu/Sagat
SF2 - Guile/Bison
SF3 - Alex/Gill

(SFA series dosnt count since they are prequels, not sequels)

You see with each game its diffrient and obviously the main char and final boss never repeat (with the sequels)

57

I think TAS and I are talking at cross-purposes here. I’m not trying to turn the comics into a “one character show” and I’m not trying to undermine the character appearences in favour of the plot. I’m merely saying that Udon ought to tighten the existing plot that Capcom gave them to work with.

Your whole argument is based on the notion that ‘solid plot’ and ‘Udon’s obligations’ are two incompatible ideas. But why should they be? I’ve tried offering suggestions on what to fix and all I hear are horror stories on Capcom’s oppression. That’s hardly a productive attitude, is it? Furthermore, if you say that Udon is obligated to introduce every character from the SF series (except SF1, which sounds like a highly dubious claim), then where are Guy, Cody and Sodom? Did Capcom knock on Udon’s door and say, “Sorry boys, but we can’t have you integrating the Mad Gear plot into the comics”? If the decision came from Udon, then they DO have liberties over the plot in their own comics.

I’ve heard nothing but negativity from you, TAS. You can only “imagine” what Udon’s obligations are and that’s as far as it goes, which brings me back to my point that no one here can know the extent of Udon’s obligations and therefore shouldn’t quell ideas from fans with indeterminate restrictions.

58

Well, that isn’t necessarily proof. And as I said before, if he is the star, why isn’t he ever portrayed as the star in the games and outside? Why is it Ryu at the beginning of SSFII, and Ryu and Ken at the beginning of SSFIIT and not Guile?

59

YOUR suggestions dont help and/or arent possible. Offering suggestions that will help out the comic and can be done are good, but offering pointless suggestions like you’ve done is pointless.

Oh you mean aside from the fact Udoneko told us the SF1 chars wouldnt show up, and explained this to us when everyone was asking why werent they on Cover B of issue 1 with every other SF char. Is that why its such a dubious claim huh?

You KEEP FAILING to relize that Udoneko has told us ALOT of stuff since this forum opened, and AGAIN since you havent been here long and havent read any of it you dont have any clue as to what you’re talking about, and when someone says something related to what we’ve already heard stated from UDON you shrug it off as “nope thats not possible, no way, cause it dosnt work with my opinions/suggestions and/or totaly destryos them”

Wheres this, this, and this char. You’re acting like they are the only ones that havent been introduced yet. UDON still has ALOT of chars to introduce and they arent going to be able to introduce them during what people think will be the appropriate times.

OMG HOW MANY TIMES DO YOU HAVE TO HEAR THIS!?

UDON HAS STATED MANY OF THEIR RESTRICTIONS, WHAT THEY CAN AND CANT DO, WHAT THEY WANT TO DO, WHERE THEY ARE GOING WITH THE COMIC, ETC, ETC

If ANYone here is stating what UDON can and cant do then its probaly TRUE since it was STATED already by UDON sometime ago.

You’re getting all upset and passing off what UDON has said as false, just because it dosnt fit with what you want.

Yes it is, as its one of Capcom’s guidelines for the series, ie Street Fighter 4 will have a new Main Character and new Final Boss (and mostly an all new cast) because thats how they’ve set up the structure of the series.

Since when has ANY main character in a fighting game been actually portrayed as the main char? You forget that all fighting games deal with the chars the sameway, ie they dont really make it a point to establish who the main character is (unless they really want to and care about the storyline)

For instance how could you possibly tell who the main char of SF2 is just by playing the game? There isnt anyway to establish one is there, because there is praticaly no story (within the playing of the game)

And what exactly is “outside” ? Do you mean outside the games, like animes and mangas? Then thats because he’s not as popular or intresting, or easy to portray as Ryu is, plus since Ryu was the main character in the first game, he’s always going to be precieved as the main character in each game (as long as he’s there)

Because they are more popular, fan favorites, and its nice to see familar faces from SF1 appear in SF2 before showing up someone you dont know.

60

This is the way I see it. Remember how “Nausicaa” was butchered when it came to the States, and Miyazaki was so pissed that he banned a US release of his awesome films for years after that? We missed out on alot, and only after Disney did a decent job on Mononoke did Miyazaki give the ok for the floodgates to open.

The SF franchise was pooch screwed before under Malibu comics. You can’t blame Capcom for being cautious this time around. But I believe they think Udon has done a cracking job with this series, to the point that Udon was even trusted to become involved in the making of the games themselves (or at least the ending comics in Capcom Fighting Jam/Evolution).

If Capcom trusts them, and we are using Capcom lore to back up our opinions of how Udon is doing, I’m willing to give them the benefit of the doubt (not that I have any doubt at this point honestly.)