Okay. So we’re almost six months into the life of the console release of SF4. After a session tonight, I feel like I haven’t made any progress whatsoever since February. I’ve done everything I can think to do to get better, and I just don’t seem to be making any positive gains. I read what I can, I watch what I can, I find good players to play against. I mean, I play against some really good players. But nothing seems to help. I feel like an idiot, because everyone keeps telling me this game is EZ-mode, and I can’t seem to play it.
How long did it take you to get to the point where you felt, “Okay, I get this shit, and I’m getting good at it?” Because this game has me seriously wondering if I have a fucking learning disorder.
you probrablly could use a good honest sparring partner to train with regularlly. someone who not only can expose your weak spots, but can tell you about them. ask questions, and learn to take critcism. one of my problems is being stubborn. i could easily ask my sparring partner what he sees, but most of the time, i want to find the way on my own
At the point you’re at, a point that most people that play skill oriented games get to, you need to put away the guide and start really analyzing every encounter. What do you do that works for you, what seems to get punished over and over again, what is happening to you when you lose, why do you think you lose to that, what goes wrong.
Might want to pick up Fraps or some other recording software and record your fights.
Once you’ve read what there is to read, the next logical step (to me at least) would be self-examination, you have to know what is hurting you as a player, you sound like you know your character in and out already, but how do you play him and what are the holes of your playstyle you need to plug up.
Ask for advice on the forums about that specific topic and see if anyone can help you out.
lol this game is easy mode??? yeah it is as far as execution and shit… but this game is more about mind games and fakeouts-baits etc…
nothing is inherently easy about mindgames, if your smarter than your opponent then they are easy, if your not then they arent…
theres nothing easy about sf4 when you play against folks like daigo, combofiend,wong… insert strong player… etc.
so getting better in this game is tantamount to getting more intelligent… which is near impossible, or the old fashioned way of just playing a HELLUVALOT so that things EVENTUALLY make an impact on you… ie through mad experience.
Every move has recovery on block/whiff, some more than others. During recovery you are vulnerable.
Some moves grant you invincibility to throws for a short period of time. (Learn them all)
Some moves grant you invincibility to attacks/projectiles for a short period of time. (Learn them all)
Basic combos are pretty important for punishing blocked/whiff attacks during your opponent’s recovery.
Dashing out of focus attacks leaves one airborne and thus vulnerable for a short period of time. (Train yourself to each characters patterns)
Knowing this, all it takes is patience and composure to excel, you don’t need to be an execution powerhouse to excel at the game, you just need to make as few mistakes as possible. That is, make educated guesses on your opponent’s train of thought. Know his habits, thing’s he is likely to do.
Also, everything just takes practice, but practice is meaningless if you’re not learning anything from the experience so you really need to ask yourself what it is in your gameplay that makes you lose. For me, it is making uneducated guesses sometimes … Like I might for a grab on the first knockdown when I know nothing about his wake up patterns.
It took me no time but I was playing it in the arcades for a while in Seattle. I seriously cant believe somebody who has had the game for 6 months hasnt got any better, you must have a severe learning disorder lol.
youll soon get pissed at yourself for falling for the same trick over and over again, and never fall for it again.
when you play sf4, judge your self by how much health you have at the end of rounds.
if you are just barely surviving thats no good, so you gotta work on what you can do to preserve all that health.
What pisses me off is the inputs in this game, so far I’ve put only 10.1 hours into sfiv but I’m still having trouble with pulling off 100% execution for some moves. In 3rd strike everything was so smooth and simple, is it the 3D aspect of SFiv that’s throwing everything out of wack?
If its the first fighting game you are trying to get competitive with its going to take awhile. Trying focusing on learning all that is possible about your character the matchups.
been playing since it came out… not many hours though as i dont have a console but i’m barely starting to execute the rog b&b combo. only played on stick about 3 times and ultra comes out 10x easier than with a ps3 d-pad.
if i can’t play i just watch vids after vids. learn the matchups, punish moves, shenanigans, zoning. even now as i watch vids i see combos ive never seen before, and try them on my next sf4 match.
If Doc Brown came to you with the DeLorean and took you back in time 6 months to play against yourself, your present self would win.
You will have improved by alot since February, but you probably don’t realize because everyone else is improving aswell, I was thinking about this the other day actually, and HNIC Mike is right, you probably do need a sparring partner, my sparring partner defected to the darkside (Xbox) so I don’t have one anymore
I feel exactly like the original poster. I have about 1000 XBox Live battles and a win rate of 25%. I always lose the same way and it took me weeks to get started on what Dizz said.
What I clearly made wrong in the beginning, is to leave out the basics and tried to do stuff like dash cancels, Tier 4 comboc, etc. And in game I get killed by attack combinations like J.mk, c.lk. This is one simple move evry beginner has, but I tried the comboc Daigo does, and that’s stupid.
Now I’m at the point, where I try to keep it simple, and do one step after another. If you’re Shoryuken always gets blocked, and punished by a throw or worse by a combo, just stop doing it.
There is no problem in being a bad player and getting ass kicked. Everyone has to start sometimes, but analyze the situations, when you get ass kicked and try to find out why. And don’t overwhelm yourself.
I play Akuma and tried his combos, and mostly failed. Now I try a simple 3 move combo now and then, and it works. Even if I fail at one point, I slowly get the right reflex trained. And that’s my last point: Training!
SF4 is mostly about practice, so practice and analyze will always bring you effort here.
I was going to write a lengthy reply, but it would pretty much just be a reiteration of what I said in the newbie thread back when I was (more of) a newbie myself: you need knowledge of your character’s BnB combos, the ability to execute them consistently, and a decent understanding of when your X beats another player’s Y (frame data you can mostly memorize, but its interaction with hitboxes you probably need to intuit through play); these are enough to make you a pretty competent player. Practice in the training room and practice in the game are equally important.
It’s helpful not only to play against good players, but good players who are knowledgeable in general about the game and can point out when you make mistakes. If that’s not possible, try to be aware of your own mistakes–ideally by reviewing videos of your games after you play, but also by trying to be aware of what works and what doesn’t during the game itself.
(Disclaimer: this advice comes from someone who is too lazy to be anything more than a mediocre online player.)
Umm… not even remotely funny to joke about. You’re not witty, you’re not clever, you’re not helping the topic and you’re just being a dick.
For me, I play a lot but I feel like I make my progress when I travel back to LA and get a long training session with my best friend. We get in 10-15 hours of SF4 in a weekend and I feel like we both get better each time.
