This is a really interesting post that applies to modern games, MvC3 in particular. The forgetting curve seems to creep up on people faster in Marvel than in other games; you can really tell when somebody has been working on SFxT or has spent their week playing Skullgirls because it gets real ugly real fast. Case in point, what happened at NCR. It’s something that I’ve always understood but not in an actual scientific sense, more in a “I need to play Marvel every day or I start completely forgetting how to play characters that aren’t Wesker/Phoenix”. I’m glad this got recognized on the front page, this is actual helpful information that people can benefit from. Good work, I’m going to try setting something like this up myself.
bookmarked this. im going to read a little bit, practice then come back to it. it’d be cool if you can oversimplify it for, “certain minds” if you dont mind me asking
Seconding the Anki tip: I’ve used it to study languages (French and Japanese), chemistry, biology, and anything else I needed to remember. Even better, there’s a free version of Anki for Androids (https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.ichi2.anki&hl=en) that’s absolutely fantastic. Great to see SRS applied to things strictly outside the academic field.
well if you think about it, playing fighting games should be like a language, spoken with hand, stick and buttons. Some speak fluently, some speak with a thick accent, some are still babbling like toddlers, and a few among us are wordsmiths and poets capable of intricate wordplay, witty replies and the most devastating of insults, from which there are no comebacks.
very awesome that so many have said they want to try this. It really works - however I would like to give a little bit of a warning. Because the SRS system can space things out for long, long periods of time, if there’s something in particular that you feel you need to practice more often, the SRS algorithm might not make you review it enough. The more you get a card ‘right’ or feel comfortable with it, the longer it gets spaced out on the next review. So if it’s something you need to practice all the time, you might want to just reset your progress on that card every once in a while by intentionally getting it ‘wrong’ just so you see it more often, and also, supplementing your practice in those areas with additional non-SRS practice helps too. I hint at that in the article, but just clarifying it a bit more.
Also, something else I hint at - in Anki at least, if you fail a card too many times (you can set how many in the deck itself) it will ‘suspend’ that card as a ‘leech’ - leeches are something that you’ll want to take special care with - take note of what your leeches are, work on them significantly outside of your SRS reps so they become easier. If you just throw them back into your deck without doing so they’ll unnecessarily ‘leech’ time away from you and bog you down.
SRS is indeed gdlk. I’ve been using Anki for over a year now for Chinese. It’s made a massive difference.
The only downside is my deck has more or less taken on a life of its own. I’ve been behind on my reviews for a week or so; I have like 2000 cards due right now. Eek.
Actually, the 19th century was from 1801 up to and including 1900. See, in our calendar the year 0 doesn’t actually exist. As such we start counting at year 1 and thus the first century A.D. was from 1-100, the second century A.D. was from 101-200 and so on. That what you get from using a medieval revision of a roman calendar. As a former history student, I’m pretty much obliged to point this out wherever I can.
Yes, it really is gdlk. The thing is, as you point out, you’ve gotta stay on top of the cards. That’s why I suggested that this is more for those prepared to do it every day, and also it’s best to not add too many cards at once - considering that it takes longer to practice stuff in a fighting game than it does to say, remember a word in Chinese, if you add too much at once you could get absolutely SWAMPED with reviews before you know it. I’d do no more than a few new cards a day.
Hi LunaSlave, I read your article on SRK was a bit curious as to how this pertains and works for fighting games. Now I will be be the first to admit that I am a newb, but I am more than ready to do what it takes to learn as quickly as possible. Especially because my game of choice is Skullgirls. Now I’d like to ask since I feel that your a bit of a veteran at this, not only by the way you speak but also by your confidence in this system. Would it work for this game and me?
I don’t know whether it would work for you or not, Ghostfreak. It really depends on a number of things. Is it something you can devote a little time to every day, in addition to playing and training as usual? That’s the real question. If you can do that I really think it can help you, if you use it correctly.
Also, one thing that’s important to note is that you’ll have to figure out what the important areas for you to personally work on are, and emphasize those. If you’re just new to fighting games, often that comes with play experience more than anything. It’s a really important question, though. I don’t really think that the game you apply it to matters so much. - it could be Street Fighter or Skullgirls or any fighting game.
And it won’t help you too much with things like reading your opponent, or your ability to get in their head, these are important skills, perhaps the most important skills, in fighitng games. But it can definitely help with familiarizing yourself with a bunch of situations and knowing just what to do in those situations so you respond correctly without a second thought, like knowing what your best punishes are and being able to execute them, or whatever… It’s figuring out what those situations are that it won’t help with, per se - the most important thing for that is still play experience, and getting lots of time in with that.
I guess the short answer is, SRS will help you to level up at whatever you get it to help you to level up with, if you’re dedicated to using it. But you’ve gotta figure out what areas you need to work on for yourself, and once you do, the SRS program will help you to focus your time on those areas where you’re personally weakest to make you more well rounded.
Thus far I’ve really only begun to explore the possibilities myself. I used it for learning and memorizing thousands of Japanese characters, with great success - and now I’m using it for fighting games. Thus far my decks are very basic, primarily focused around trials in SSF4 and mastering those. Will expand to more later to try to squeeze as much as I can out of the system to make the best use of my time, but already I’ve noticed a marked improvement in my ability to nail combos and such - it’s wonderful.
Wow I read this just in time. I was actually wondering how I could get the most out of training mode for Skullgirls. I was keeping a list of things I needed to practice, but this is much better. I can use this for school too. I start college in the fall. Good find
If those of you who have decided to try this method could use this thread to share your experiences with it, constructive feedback, or the results of how it’s working for you or whatever, that’d be awesome! I’ll be doing the same in a little while, hopefully.
