I’d totally main Cashcow, dude has a serious advantage over Piggybank. Like, 9-1, man.
From what I’ve read on the matter, your mainstream audience comes from the hardcore audience. If your game is buzzworthy and people knowledgeable about shooters/fighters/RPGs/etc. start talking about your game and getting excited for it, they influence the perception of the game among more mainstream audiences. If the hardcore guys like what they see, then it’ll rate some positive coverage in publications that the less hardcore guys read. You still have to market yourself, but if the buzz about your game is already positive, people will be more willing to get the word out about your work. Once the game is out, its the hardcore players that will play your game before and after the mainstream will. Hardcore players will be the first guys to get excited about a sequel or follow-up, and that kind of enthusiasm seems to bleed over into the mainstream (to an extent). Fighting games have a bigger divide between the hardcores and mainstream than most genres do, but it is still possible for them to influence each other.
So as a fighting game fan, you probably know what you like. In a 1 on 1 fighter, no infinites. No 100% inescapable loops, you like big combos, you like the rewards of good execution, you spend time in training mode to practice things. You like a wide range of playstyles that end up being balanced. There are things you can do for hardcore players that haven’t been done yet… my idea was the “science center.” A training mode specifically for people who read and understand frame data, so instead of publishing it separately, you have it included in the game to show the serious players you are catering to them. They can quickly refer to this while in training mode so they can quickly and easily figure out all of a character’s advanced combos, making it more convenient to fully realize their character’s potential.
But then mainstream players like flashy, easy stuff. One button specials like Smash, huge cinematic combos that start with a couple buttons like the DBZ games, fast paced stuff that looks like it could be from a TV show or movie. Some of these things overlap with hardcore players’ interests, but the one button special thing seems to anathema to people on here sooo… you could maybe have a shortcut feature like Blazblue.
Mainstream players aren’t interested in training mode and are biased towards characters that give them a big safety net and have effective normals and high priority specials that don’t require mad combo skill, so you can design characters for casual players and then make characters that demand more of a time investment to realize their full potential (for instance, Ken vs. Gen in SF4). They will probably spend more time playing single player, since the serious players online will bend them over before long. These guys will get good mileage out of a well done story mode, something I think still has never really been done properly in a fighting game. Blazblue’s story mode sucked and seemed like an afterthought. They like unlockables and achievements, but hardcore players dislike unlocking characters so I’d suggest that you have a lot of alternate costumes, new stages, stuff like that for the casual players.
One thing that would fit with your game to an extent would be a little robot that flies around your character like you had in Phantasy Star Online. I forgot what they were called but you could get new parts for them and soup them up, maybe have them give players a stat boost in single player or something. You need to dangle a carrot in front of casual players to keep them going, so you always need some new grind for them to work on. Something not overly challenging, that could be solved with a 5 minute visit to GameFAQs.
so yeah… anyways. I like the look of your characters, and I really liked the one sprite I saw 
Thanks for the great advice. I’ll relay that post straight to the designer. I really agree with a lot of the stuff you said and at least for the full version, an interesting story mode should be something to really work for.
An in-depth training mode is something I’ve really been pushing for as well. Something that can allow new players to fiddle around with a character, but also allow for much more in-depth testing and technical stuff too, like hitbox desplays, dummy CPUs, frame times etc. But it would have to be presented in a way that doesn’t scare off new players. So perhaps an in-depth mode that can be accessed separately?
Also, we’re in the process of giving the cast a makeover. We’re refining their designs one more time before we start making any more sprites. Actually, that one sprite you saw, our animator said that his stance was awkward and made it difficult for him to think of realistic normals, since the character’s feet and body were turned at an angle that didn’t allow for much frontal movement, so things like jabs and quick kicks were kind of weird. We’re redrawing him to have a more frontal stance.
by the way, speaking of a training mode, a customizable practice dummy is something many training modes are missing. for instance, many training dummies have this mode where they don’t block the first hit, but will block the second one. that’s fine and dandy and all, but what if I wanted them to COUNTER the second hit?
Melty Blood AA has a great training mode that lets you record the dummy’s actions, wich is really handy. We’d definately want to encorproate something like that.
But Mortal Kombat sucked. :<
@Topic:
It’s great to see a fellow fighting game developing team. Your artist’s artwork reminds me a lot of some flash videos I’ve seen, from I think… Ryanide was his name on deviantArt? The style looks a lot like his.
I’m part of a team designing a fighting game for the PC, myself. We have taken the general rules of Smash Bros. (win through ringing out your opponent) and will add some more spice+balance to it to make it interesting for competitive players. We’ll aim to make the core game a competitive fighter, and we’ll have a system similar to MUGEN where you can create your own characters for shit and giggles for the casuals.
There are also quite a lot of Indie fighting games out there that are not played very much but still have great competitive value, such as Monster or Immaterial and Missing Power. The former is similar to your idea with monsters (like a werewolf and a demon girl) duking it out, while the latter has chibi anime lolitas from the growing Touhou-series shooting bullets all over themselves.
Now, there’s a few things that are very important to keep in mind when creating a fighting game.
First of all, make the roster interesting. Your current roster seems very interesting, based on Chinese mythology and looking very diverse, as well as different from usual rosters. Roster size is also an important aspect - aim for a diverse and decently big roster, but don’t go with only a handful of characters or with too many. I also think that the “furry bait” argument some of the people here brought are hardly relevant. Banjo-Kazooie, Conker, Star Fox (in its glory days) and many other games are played even though they contain furries. If a game is good, people will play it, and people who spit on a good game because of the style are stupid, but alas…
Looks. Unfortunately, nowadays, if it doesn’t look pretty, it’s shit to a lot of people. Chibi and cutesy style probably turns off a big part of your target audience. However, if you make it WORK, like, similar to how BlazBlue pulls it off, then you might be able to get them into the boat nevertheless. Maybe have some more grim looking characters, too, that might help quite a bit.
Game balance is incredibly relevant for indie games. IaMP and Monster are almost perfectly balanced, with every character except for the joke characters in both games being able to win against the rest of the cast. Also try to constantly update if your community finds balance problems. Fix them.
Speaking of community, extremely important is the involvement of the interested people. Our project has forums where people can post their ideas for gameplay, balance, roster, etc., and some of the ideas were actually very great. Listen to the input of your followers, and don’t think only you (or your team) are right, because maybe the one opposing your train of thought is viewing the whole thing from an angle you haven’t kept an eye on.
Updating the project a lot and putting trailers on YouTube is also very important, and it’s the only chance for you to market your game as of now. Viral marketing. Tell the communities you are active in about your project, and those people who are interested into it should tell their friends, etc.
Ryanide is our artist/designer actually, and our co-artist and director is another popular anthro artist called Extvia. Good call there. He’s gotten a lot better since that one animation he posted on Newgrounds so long ago. He also made an original character in Mugen at some point too.
We’re looking at finding mythology from India, Japan, Korea and China that can relate to everyone in the cast. So far we’ve actually stumbled across some stuff that makes a lot of sense to the storyline too. And yes, there are some darker looking characters in the cast too whom I don’t have any good concept art for just yet.
And thanks for the solid advice. That was very helpful.
You might want to include Garudas then, they’re friggin epic. 8D
I’ll ask about it, but I’m pretty sure Ryanide said he didn’t want to have any characters that were birds.
That also means no Tengu. :[
Well, still got Ganesha going for India, hah.
People always cite old games to prove how furries are viable as characters now days. The fact is, those series’ were all popular for the most part, up through the n64 era. It’s been 2 console generations now, and people are WAY more aware of and sketched out by furries (thanks, internet). Frankly, it saddens me to think of the vast spectrum of sexual deviancy I have become aware of thanks to youtube in the past couple years. In any event, most of the heroes in new games are just, people. The age of anthropomorphic game heroes is pretty much gone.
Basically yeah, some people are gonna be sketched out and not want to play it. Other people are furries and will want to play it because of furry/anthro (whatever) characters. Other people just won’t care.
I dunno, Ratchet & Clank is still pretty new for a series and still is going pretty strong.
I don’t really care, though… I play a game if it’s good, not because it has furries in it or not. Having furries in the game doesn’t make it worse or so. So… I dunno. :V
I just want to mention that the mere fact that it’s on XBLA will bar me from playing it.
I guess this is the thing I’m mostly concerned about. We just want people to play the game and like the characters, even though they might not be humans. It’s not like we’re making them animals just for the sake of it. We’re doing it because it opens up plenty of moveset possibilities and they’re fun as hell to draw and design, and more importantly because it’s something that’s rarely done in fighting games.
I’d like to think that at least with these characters, the game’s aesthetic won’t be instantly forgettable.
Also, what’s wrong with XBLA? Is there something I should know about? Remember that if it does decently, we’ll seek to get a grant and port it to PC and console with bonus content and stuff.
Nothing wrong with it, it’s just that I don’t have it. Most tourneys usually play on PS3, so that’s why I’m on that system on not XBox. Although thats good to know there might be a PC port down the pipe…someday.
Just one last bit of advice:
Don’t set your goals too high.
I’ve seen a lot of great projects go down the shitter because their developers gave up or lost their interest in them.
Try to go slow and carefully, step by step, but don’t be lax.
It becomes frustrating if you’re still so far from reaching your goal. So setting yourself and your team a small goal first (like, say “Create the physics engine.”, or “Make sprites for all moves of character X.”) is the best way to go. You have small “victories” on themselves that keep you motivated to go on.
It also allows you to throw out demo videos now and then, to show your progress in the project, and keep your community updated. That’s really important too. A lot of doujin/fan games have little updates and tend to get forgotten because of that. If your fans know what you’re doing and where you’re at in terms of development, they’ll be happy and can look forward to a release sooner. It’s also helpful for yourself if you document your progress.
lol
I’m going to guess that dude doesn’t own a 360.
Ok, It opens up moveset possibilities? I think not. If they were just animals and not “anthro” or w/e, maybe. But as it stands, they all have 2 arms, 2 legs, all of human length, human proportions, they’ve even got the same face (they all look most like foxes imo). Any special moveset options are just from your imagination (not a bad thing).
Fun as hell to draw and design? If you really want to attract a wide audience, you need to consider what’s fun for the player, not for the dev team. Like I said, this art style will attract some people and alienate others.
Something that’s rarely done? It’s been done more or less to different extents in FGs. Also keep in mind that just because something is done less does not make it a good idea to just go and do it.
Basically my advice on this subject is that you’re not going to get through to the people who get weirded out by furry stuff, so just roll with it, it’s pretty much all you can do. You’re not going to suddenly convince people there’s a difference between “furry” and “anthro” or whatever it is you people like to say. lol
That said, it does look interesting, but trying to convince people that it’s “not a game for furries” will not convince most people who dislike furry culture, and it might actually alienate some of the furry audience. Then again, I dunno. My thought would be just roll with the feelings you get from the game and try to hype up the positive feedback, not squash the negative things.
They’re anthropomorphic mechs, at some point saying “the inspiration for this character being able to move like this comes from this source and not that source” becomes pointless because what can’t they do and get away with it with that license?
I like the play ideas well enough (almost like there should be a catch somewhere lol), but I don’t think your guys should worry about having an exceptionally popular first go. Get it out there, stay out of development hell and keep the hardcores interested and it’ll be a success. :tup:
Circumstances of team poverty players getting derisive about somebody taking initiative to get a FG project well-known, however, = interesting
You’re forgetting tails, digitride legs, claws, stingers, fangs and other such traits that are not commonly associated with humans. At least on an aesthetic level, it certainly allows for a range of possibilities you don’t commonly find. This is why Darkstalkers has such interesting characters who could all attack in unusual ways. We even have a character who attacks with his ears which are also detatchable and able to break down into pieces. Granted that you could do this with a human character’s hair, but that’d just be a Mila Rage clone wouldn’t it?
also they all look like foxes? Wtf, when was the last time you saw a fox? Barely any of our characters have pointy snouts. And there is a distinction between foxes and other canines that’s pretty easilly recognisable for anyone with eyes. Out of the characters I showed, at least two of them had differentiating skull shapes. (granted that the art style does tend to ‘round’ things out a bit)
Yeh we’re aware of this, and are using a similar strategy. We’re working first on getting the ‘base’ engine down to at least allow us to move the characters around. The input reader is already done. Our animator is making character’s ‘key’ animation states in sketch first. Once we’ve got two characters fully compatible with the system (all key states are done and working) then we’ll start working on attacks and dealing with the hitbox/combo system.