<font face=“Arial, Verdana” size=“2”><span style=“line-height: normal;”>Thanks to all of your responses guys! Its been almost a month since I’ve started this thread, and I’ve made some serious progress. I’ve raged hard in the beginning but now I’ve</span></font><span style=“line-height: normal; font-family: Arial, Verdana; font-size: small;”> made it to 1000pp and 2700bp on Ibuki and Im starting to understand the game much more. It took me a </span><b style=“line-height: normal; font-family: Arial, Verdana; font-size: small;”>LONG</b><span style=“line-height: normal; font-family: Arial, Verdana; font-size: small;”> time but my execution is now </span><b style=“line-height: normal; font-family: Arial, Verdana; font-size: small;”>MUCH MUCH</b><span style=“line-height: normal; font-family: Arial, Verdana; font-size: small;”> better, so much so that when I started the game i tried doing the trails on a few characters and i would only get to challenge 10 or so before i couldn’t execute them. But the other night i went back and now im getting to challenge 20+ on almost all the characters without a sweat on most of them!! it was insane how much I’ve improved and i couldn’t see how much i’ve improve little by little on a day to day basis, but seeing a significant jump on something concrete like challenges that used to make me rage quit shut off my xbox are now laughable. It feels great guys! I also came to an epiphany when i realized how much SF is about pressing the right buttons at the </span><b style=“line-height: normal; font-family: Arial, Verdana; font-size: small;”>RIGHT TIME</b><span style=“line-height: normal; font-family: Arial, Verdana; font-size: small;”> and more so important </span><b style=“line-height: normal; font-family: Arial, Verdana; font-size: small;”>NOT TO PRESS BUTTONS</b><span style=“line-height: normal; font-family: Arial, Verdana; font-size: small;”> at the right time. It seriously changed my game so much. When i began the game i would just try to rushdown my opponent so much so that it was my serious downfall and lead all of my losses. But then i started to realize that the other player isn’t just trying to physical beat me, but psychologically beat my style of play. After realizing moments when I could capitalize and punish my opponents, I started to see that I myself am very vulnerable as much as they are. The execution comes with practice, but the meta gaming comes with experience and that’s</span><span style=“line-height: normal; font-family: Arial, Verdana; font-size: small;”> just something I need to learn by playing the game more and more. Thank you all so much.</span>
Your special mention about not pressing buttons makes me happy.<br><br>Taken from Sonic Hurricane (great website) --<br><br>“In fact as players improve,<b> they spend less time attacking continuously
and more time looking for things to punish on reaction</b>. Since jumping
mainly serves as an easy counter to heavy attacks, it works great at
beginner levels and becomes progressively weaker at higher levels.”<br><br>So this says two things for me<br><br>1) You’re growing, because you’re restraining your offense and structuring it, so its less spastic, more methodical, and overall harder to read. Good.<br>2) You understand that<b> the better players get, the less room they give you to make mistakes.</b> A bad player wont even be able to punish a missed fierce shoryu. A tournament player will land the <b>most damaging</b> punish <b><i>every time</i> without fail</b>. Keep that in mind. Patience is key. Getting flustered and throwing out even a random sweep can mean the difference between victory or defeat. Remember, stick to light and medium attacks to feel your opponent out, but make sure you respect the reaction times of good players, they’ll wiff punish your light attacks too if you put them out TOO much.<br><br>Small digression, but seriously. Light and medium attacks. Safer pokes. Completely opened my game up as a new player. Just probing and feeling your opponent with them. It’s so weird how you get this sixth sense and are able to feel this game after awhile…god it freaks me out sometimes. But that’s why SF is so sick. :)<br>
Honestly… being a relatively newer member of the FGC (about 2 years-ish) I can’t say I’ve experienced everything but I can say that as time progress, things that were cloudy become FARRRR clearer; even if you feel you yourself haven’t progressed that much even with all the work you put in.
HOWEVER in lieu of your question I personally feel the particular character you start off with doesn’t mean much at all as long as you have one thing most scrubs have to learn or relearn:
- DON’T MAKE ASSUMPTIONS
- YOU’RE NOT ALWAYS RIGHT
Now I won’t be getting lengthy with this but basically, I’ve found at least for myself that when you learn a new game you strive for progression; something to signify that you are learning, applying, and getting the results you desire. In this excitement sometimes in our haste we forget to chew before we swallow and began making bad choices in the beginning of the training process maybe like:
- Assuming the “purposed” playstyle for a character that you JUST picked up
- Assuming the best moves in the wrong situations
- etc
… but this is natural and can be adjusted with relatively easy studying. When you start getting comfortable with your character/game you might start making subconscious assumptions; assumptions that take FAR longer to fix and is far more detrimental. Examples would be:
- Assuming that the FIRST explanation to a move or a character or (insert noun) researched is the be-all-end-all explanation and thereby DEFINITION of that noun.
(Example: trying to find best anti air for character and seeing Cr. H is the preferred method as it’s most reliable. Then getting upset when that Cr.H loses to a good player or a specific character and not understanding why. Well maybe against character x’s air attack, cr.H doesn’t work.
-
Assuming you know-it-all when you really don’t. Take air X for example. IT might be the preferred cross up attack but against “smallguy” the crossup doesn’t due to hit-box size or character wake speeds (I learned that sh*t existed today!!!).
-
(HUGE ONE) Knowing WHEN and IN WHAT WAY to use training room. Every one is different and allows different parameters to be altered but generally perform the same function. Knowing how to maximize TR for different uses such as player2 replay / CPU - VeryHard / etc other than go in > practice combos for 20min > Ranked matches is key.
Now I will say this in regards to picking a new character. At least for me I’ve found a few rules that I stick with when picking up a new game:
-
Establish BEFORE ANYTHING is this a game where I’m “Playing To Win” or “Playing for Fun”
(If you don’t know what that means, you are missing a very important read [http://www.sirlin.net/ptw/]) -
NEVER pick a character if you don’t like how they play. Think of it like you would a real relationship. You’re about to spend the next (x) amount of time with said character training, studying, researching, practicing, etc. Looks change and you always got makeup (DLC Costume Packs) to fix the ugly. But the important stuff like the characters speed, normals, specials, and just flow should be aligned with yours. This character should be an extension of yourself in terms of what you feel comfortable using.
I’ve come across situations (in this case Alisa in SFxT) and in this last i found that I liked the character’s aesthetics along with the length of her normals. HOWEVER, some of her combos had weird timing and some even required delayed CADC (Charge-Attack-Dash-Cancels I believe) which I found to be just too awkward and (knowing my own tendencies/deficiencies) would cause me an issue in a high-level tourney environment where mistakes cost most. So I didn’t progress more then 2 hours into playing her before I could “feel” that she wasn’t the best type of character for my current “level” of game understanding and execution. No time wasted.
- In lieu of numbers one and two think about where you’ll be playing this game the most and with whom. If tournies are your setting then playing characters that would be considered “lower -tier” are going to matter a LOT more than if Online was your main source of training/practice. Different levels of training are required for different levels of end game.
I got more but this is just an example of 3 things I think about when picking up a new game/character.
I think shotos are a good place to learn the fundamentals of fighting game theory (how to do fireballs, dragon punches, and the like) but if they’re too vanilla for you, by all means choose someone else. Just don’t be an idiot like I was when I first played Street Fighter II in 1991 and choose Zangief because he looks “big and strong.” That’s a really good way to waste a quarter.
I learned how to play fighting games from hanging out in an arcade. Players who see you struggling with a game will sometimes give you tips that will help you improve. I remember someone showing me how to low block in an arcade. It seems so obvious now, but twenty years ago, it was useful advice that made me a better player, and also made the games themselves more enjoyable. I also credit the original Fatal Fury for teaching me basic fighting game principles. Sure, it hasn’t aged well, but its simplicity and the game teaching you moves after every fight helps prepare you for meatier experiences.
If you’re sick of fireball-chucking karate champions, you might want to put down Street Fighter for a while and try a fighting game with a more eccentric cast. Darkstalkers is the first fighting game I truly loved thanks not only to its astonishing graphics, but because its characters (typically movie monsters and mythological creatures) were supremely original and just oozed charm from every pore. There’s nobody in the cast that could be described as a shoto, although Demitri the vampire and Morrigan the succubus come the closest. All the others feel altogether different from the vanilla Street Fighter cast, and you’re sure to find someone that’s a good fit for you.
This thread has been way more constructive than I than I had assumed seeing it blip on my recent threads radar. I had full intentions of just leaving a “congratulations?” and calling it a day however, I’m glad to see you’re learning as well.
Good job on achieving your online points, but the more important question is where are your fundamentals at young player? (Here goes the tired speech) Offline > Online 10/0. Find an offline gathering if possible and go there, its as close to the arcade experience as possible. If it isn’t possible (laziness is not an acceptable reason) then keep your play above the level of online play. Online, thanks in part to lag and the desire to collect points, teaches bad habits flat out.
I also started my Street Fighter saga with Ibuki, shes a fun character but to get the most out of her you’ll have to work hard (still grinding mine out errday). Even though, I did go back and learn the basics with Ryu, Guile, Zangief, Fei and Chun so that I could understand the 5 other main playstyles as well as their basic game plans. It helped my Ibuki game dramatically, I finally found her place in the world so to speak.
That would be my advice to you, you can stick with whomever you like but you will be a much more well-rounded player if you at least learn the basics of shotos/grapplers/chargers/rekkas/zoners/etc
TL;DR vers- picking a non-shoto is fine, learning the shoto (or any of the other archtypes) some day will still be beneficial though.
Ninjas are fun… Don’t like the guy with the head ban? :ar!
This statement is very misleading. It is bad advice that can mislead others to thinking it is good advice.
In case the reader can’t figure out why it’s bad advice, think about what that statement is implying through its use of dichotomous absolutes.
I actually think shotos do a mediocre job of teaching new players what they /should/ do, though they do sufficiently teach new players how the basic game is played.
People who start off with shotos generally are the ones that end up moving to non-fireball characters and not understanding how to deal with fireballs or the ones that move to characters with no vertical invincibility moves and go “people jump in on me for free”
Learning the game intuitively is pretty difficult because SFIV has a lot of implicit depth on what the “right” way to play is, I would wager that people picking up the game and playing against low-ranked players at a similar skill level would take a very long time to grasp the fundamentals of how to play a good game.
That said, being the best Ibuki you can be may also neglect certain aspects of the game that are important to other characters, because as mentioned before, Ibuki’s core playstyle revolves around her Tsumuji pressure chains, mix ups and getting the knockdown into vortex, she has a diminished emphasis on the neutral game and employing strong footsies.
If there’s one tip that I can give players who are starting out is learn your normals as well as you can learn your specials. Too many new players focus on executing special moves when the majority of the game at a high level is played with precision normals. (unless you’re like, Cammy or Rufus or something)
Been playing Sf for 20 years.
Never played Ryu or Ken. (I mean, I’ve went through arcade mode, played a few matches in each game, but never mained either for any amount of time)
In fact, I’ve always picked the most gimmicky shit in every game…
That said, let me give you a very VERY important piece of advice:
Spoiler
You can play the fanciest, most flashy character in the game, but as a newbie, you SHOULD NOT BE TRYING TO PLAY FANCY AND FLASHY. Absolutely focus on your defense and focus on how to move safely with your character. Learn to attack later, but with characters like Ibuki, Akuma, Juri, etc… You really need to learn how to move properly and keep yourself out of trouble. They’re fancy as fuck, but the reason top players can win with them is because they know how to be fancy and stay safe with them. Staying safe is embedded into players’ minds. Players like Sako, absolutely know how to be safe when they do their fancy shit. It’s just easier to learn how to be safe with a character that just walks back and forth, as opposed to one that’s in the air. Remember, an important “rule” in Street Fighter is “The first one in the air is the first one punished”. It’s not law, but it happens a lot. Keep that in mind.
Now now now, this is most certainly the toughest decision when starting out. Who to choose? Well let me start by saying “screw the peer pressure”. Honestly, any character is fine to use as long as you’re comfortable.
Personally I was so excited about playing that I learned everyone; even though I obviously didn’t main them all I still took them to an average so I would know how they play, how to play against them and how they feel. Honestly, Ken and Vega were my guys from SF2 to all others. But I really got bored of Ken: perhaps because he seemed like the fad and what “the cool kids use”. I couldn’t be arsed and used all the more abstract characters like Guy, Gen, Cody and anyone else who were deemed by my friends to be useless. Whatever. I beat their ass with Vega, I beat their ass with ninjas and I felt great. But I never stopped practising with other characters once in a while because I remember how to beat them as Vega or Guy. It works and sometimes I feel like I’ve given the game my full attention and took all it’s offers. It does feel great in player matches anyhow.
Either way, shoto characters are great but it doesn’t mean you have to use them to learn the game. Just use them if you like them. Or just be like me and use Vega ^____^ LOL I jest.
You do not have to play anyone you do not want to, but playing multiple characters at least once can be helpful. Never let the fun you have go away and always prioritize that because ultimately that is what a game is all about.
However if you wish to learn more about the game and getting better then playing more characters and if you like Ibubi stick with her but get an understanding of how her match ups work, who she is good against and who she is bad against.
If this friend of yours has anything useful to say then listen, but if they have anything to say in a rude manner then ignore them. There are kinder players out there with more knowledge of the subject that you can learn more from even if you have to do it on the internet.
Actually one reason to play shotos a little bit is to have a better understanding on how each of them work and how one differs from the other.
If you hate shotos then this is a good way to learn how to crush them and I know that would satisfy you given what you have said on them.
I mispelled Ibuki.
You can edit posts instead of wasting valuable page space. Please refrain from unneccesary posts.
Dunno what kind of Ryu you’re playing but the one I’m learning right now has bread and butter combos that involve 1-frame links wherever I look.
Cr.lk>cr.lp>st.lp>cr.hk 1-frame link
Cr. mp> cr.mp> cr.hk 1-frame link
Solar Plexus>whatever except srk 1-frame link
Those are all pretty common combos and saying fadc>ultra 1 is easy is kinda ignorant at least from a bloody beginners point of view.
Getting that shit down with a controller took me over a month and I still didn’t do it 100/100 times in a row and now that I switched to stick since 3 weeks I’m still struggling to do it consistently.
Then there’s tons of other hard shit to learn with him like comboing and hitconfirming into a neutral srk which I still can’t do.
People tell him to learn Ryu because he’s a no bullshit, no gimmicks, no shenanigans character, whose game of footsies, poking and punishment will ultimately improve your game with any character.
Guile is another example of such a character who teaches you a lot about the game.
I’m not saying that you can’t start off with any character and get great at the game, it just doesn’t hurt to learn those character archetypes and it might help you understanding the basics of this game better and give you insights that you would have trouble gaining if you wouldn’t have learned these kind of characters.
In my opinion it’s not a bad idea to learn a couple of characters to a certain extent in order to broaden your view before specializing fully on a character.
Sweep combos are 1 frame, but links to cr.hp xx hk tatsu are common with Ryu. F.hp -> cl.mk is a 2-frame links and does basically the same damage as cr.hp. Ryu doesn’t require any 1 frames to be effective, although the utility of sweep combos is useful for sure.
Link DP combos are pretty easy honestly. Just do the uppercut earlier.
Ryu has gimmicks and bullshit like any character. Corner j.lk non-crossup versus j.mk crossup, crossup j.hp, crossup ground tatsu, cl.mk movement tricks, cr.mk low-profile tricks, anti-Deejay double dash through setups, EX tatsu to catch throw tech for a corner ultra combo, etcetera.
His main draw for beginners is that his standard gameplan is strong and based on spacing, like you said. But Ryu has gimmicks just like any other character.
I agree.
Good on you for not going with ryu! I’m glad to read that the thread did not influence you to ditch the character you thought was the most fun (although there was that scare regarding the technical aspects of ibuki, which honestly shouldn’t Rome into play). I was never really one to play shotos. Everything you can learn from shoots you can learn from other characters. If not more since they may have an obvious weakness. I’ve only dabbled with sf4 but my main game is ST and really, I only started playing ryu recently now that I understand the game at a relatively high level. It was just way over my head before could not do well at all, had almost no progress. But everyone’s different. I would never discourage anyone from playing their favorite character unless I felt that that character was extremely unreflective of the rest of the game.
For me, other characters played to my strengths. And form playing a lot I got a greater understanding of the game and had to improve on my weaknesses. This is what drove me to try ryu again. After playing exclusivly one character for years I understood the game much more (even from the POV of characters I don’t play). IMO learning SF is very incremental listen to people when they tell you things related to concepts, ignore people when they say you don’t understand the game without backing it up.
If they say you won’t understand the game unless you play x character. Ask them why. Take what they say into consideration to what you CURRENTLY do. Don’t make any drastic changes. And if they can’t give you a proper reason why (simply, you’ll understand the game better, without going into specifics isn’t a proper reason) then just ignore them.
Do note while mastering my main character I went on an aside to learn another character. But that was my own choice. That character had similar pokes but the footsie game was generally weaker. Her play style was still fun for me and I could improve my footsies on with my main as well.
Remember no one who is good at the game hates it. The fun part is what keeps the motivation. If doing something takes the fun out of the game for you then don’t do it.
I’ve had many people of lesser skill say to me The way I play my game is wrong. Some people say “what you do is so boring” I am always amazed at these people especially if they are the kind spamming unsafe moves and hoping for the best. Because the whole “fun” for me is the thought process and strategy. If you find the way I play boring, then so be it. Find someone else to play against but its not for you to say how I should be enjoying my game. And there ARE games and times where I like to jump around and be an idiot and see if I can still win regardless.
That being said some people may have the drive to get better, but do not find what’s required to do so fun. (Analysis, safe play, patience, and yes “cheese”). To them I say, tough either learn to like the process (and people do “acquire the taste” or just be content at your skill level and how you play. Because there is no point in trying to improve if you end up hating the game because of it. If winning is your only motivation, then you can do it in another game which you enjoy more.
Ryu isn’t one of my main characters but he is what SF is all about. I could literally play Ryu mirror matches versus a solid player for 6 hours straight and love it.
Im still pretty bad but my first character was M.Bison. Taught me about footsies and how to apply pressure, his combos are easy, his special moves are easy to execute. One thing is that his anti-air game is virtually gone at certain ranges and you are forced to block or evade. This isn’t bad though, because it can teach players how to play defensively.