Here in Oregon, the only competition for fighting game is a two hour drive away. Think about that. Two hours just to have a few matches and then two hours back home. That’s four hours of travel for 30 minutes of play time. Does that sound fun?
Think about the aspects of a fighting game like…3rd Strike. What’s the point of single player other than to practice to fight other people? With 1 character unlockable, there’s not much depth to a single player fest on a fighting game. Beat 'em ups have never been for single player experience. They’re for player vs. player fighting.
Without competition, fighting games pail in comparison with other games that have a deep single player to keep people who either: don’t have friends, or don’t have friends who like/are good at games.
So I’m putting a warning out to anyone thinking of getting into fighting games seriously:
There’s the same problem with playing certain games.
I love Last Blade 2 to death, but it’s hard to keep my interest when no one really plays, and the people who do aren’t very good.
Thats because the scene started to die out with the collaspe of arcades. Before home conversions, arcades were the melting pot of entertainment and you normally met new people and formed rivallaries. With the rise of online gaming and better home conversions, arcades lost money til most closed down. Sure there are arcades around, but some are either filled with people who don’t have time to help the noob in learning the game, or people who don’t give a rat’s ass, and then there are the arcades that have games from 1988!!!
Hell, I worked at an arcade for 3 years before it closed down, and it was always full from open to close and the people there were very helpful on working on strats, to general competition. Now look at it, its more hardcore than friendly, and its not a good start point for those entering the scene now.
Is the scene dying, no. But it really needs to evolve to make it more open to those would like to jump in, rather than “You suck noob, go play Doa” or something along those lines.
Here in Portland, Oregon, I can play many games of CvS2/3s/etc, but say I want to play high level guilty gear or SNK… 3 hours to Seattle. ohnoes!!!11 (still worth it)
What have I done to try and counter this? Advertise the fuck out of fighting games, start a gaming club at PSU, schedule meetings at my house just to keep the people who cant make the other meetings stay fresh in the game. Don’t forget to watch plenty of high level vids and make sure you know whats going on, and explain it to the others in your area that are interested in your game the how/why of what makes it high level.
Youre pretty screwed if youre in the middle of BFE, but theres still plenty of chances to at least recruit some people to play, or at least push them to get better.
If not, just be a lot more efficient with that 30minutes you play (or heres an idea, PLAY MORE STAY LONGER)
Edit : oh yeah, or just do what I did at first and play online. Kaillera since late '99, wooh.
I think better advice would to be get into online gaming through MAME or grab up a Xbox while you can. The Xbox 360 might be the next big thing, but the original Xbox still has a pretty massive libary of very worthwhile fighting games with online play, and it’ll be awhile before the 360 supports them all anyways (not to mention, more units get shipped).
If ya havent picked up a Xbox yet, now is a good time to do so with its price dropping. It’ll save ya gas money too, not to mention social humiliation. Ok, maybe save the humiliation part… >_>
Heh I made business cards for my competition group, actually the idea was rooted from a former player in my area that just moved away. I got like 3-6 players now because of that.
Since I’m lucky enough to have a arcade (good games in it but empty most of the time, mostly kids, people coming in to play redemption games). I thought about putting in a sign and a stack of cards “Looking for competition in these following games? Take a card”. It’s kinda like fishing.
some of us are spoiled. it depends on where you live. here in nor cal there’s like 3 arcades and a couple of universities that has people packing almost every night near where i live.
Amen Kyokuji, I play an average of 50+ games on a competitive level(fighting) mainly SNK and for the most part in the US of A in general competition in SNK is lacking, many that even know what Rage of The Dragons is scarce…
This I recall was a factor in some other thread-"Should Justin Wong be banned because of his exposure?? " or something like that. Bc like SNKNut said-some people are spoiled to have constant high level competition like Justin Wong that can affect them in tournies in comparison to some guy that may be the best in Boondocks, Oklahoma but has never seen Yuns Genei Jin before bc no one in Boondocks, Oklahoma plays it.
Seems like a disadvantage but I know people who come from nowhere(not strong communities) and make names for themselves…they tend to sandbag more because they are by themselves…
Well, I have an arcade that’s around 5-10 minutes away from my house. Too bad the only fighters with a good scene are MVC2 and T5.1. I still ask myself to this day, “Why the hell do they have SVC Chaos, and why are people playing it?” Damn. My fighters in my arade suck other than those two. Let’s see…
MSHvSF
MVC1
SVC Chaos
TTT
T4
MK4
SF3: Double Impact
Rage of the Dragons
etc.
In my city, we tried to get a scene together, but it never really lasted. When everyone works and cant get a reasonable time to play, plus only have a handful of people who actually want to play is what killed us. I like to get our scene started agian. Just hard finding new people who want to play often. Good thing is we’re and hour and half from both Austin and DFW. But even then its hard to find the time to travel and play nowadays. So when and if we go out of town, we generally get demolished because of the lack of competition.
Actually, the way I see it, elitism is what kills the scene. There are plenty who play games, it’s just that majority is not as skilled as some. I suggested some people in this particular game scene, since they always complain about not having anyone to play, to spread the game via gamefaqs, 4chans etc boards and nearly everyone was like, “nah, those people won’t learn shit.”
Which kills me. Everyone was a scrub at one point, but I guess it’s hard to see(or have balls to admit) so.
Sometimes you just can’t get over the initial learning curve.
Living up in NH, the closest place that would possibly have an arcade is two hours away. All my friends are tied up with shit like WoW, so I’ve got a grand total of two friends to play any sort of fighting game with, and one of them will only play GGXX. I can play by myself all I want, but I can only get so far, as I found out when I tried to play 3S at AWA and got my ass promptly stuffed by everyone else.
While I’m at school, there’s an arcade within reasonable distance. I saw some guys playing T5 and said “What the hell, why not?” I got my ass handed to me in less than twenty seconds. Was I surprised? Of course not, I expect a first-time player to get beaten down by somebody who plays. The question is, do I have the money and time to invest in climbing that learning curve from scratch? I wish I did, but a $7 round trip with fifty cents a play isn’t easy on the pockets.
Sure, these are some of the typical excuses from scrub-dom, but my point is that sometimes the barriers are there.
Hell, even why I try to get my friends into it, they throw out the excuses of not wanting to “learn how to play a hard game,” or they’re just afraid of getting their asses kicked by me (which is something a moot point, since I knock them all flat in SC2, the only game they’ll play).
Yeah I guess. Too bad nobody plays those games here, which is why I think they are wasting space that could possibly hold GGX2#R, 3s, ST, CVS2, etc. Also, T4, MK4, and some other games get zero play at all, and it makes me wonder why they are there. What’s worse is that the guy who was going to get us 3s got fired before he got it. He was the guy who got us T5 and MVC2, so that really screwed things up.
What about in Japan? Don’t arcades have a much better social appeal over there? Business men, teens, and all manner of people go to arcades over there. So we should all just move to Japan… yep.
theres no competition close to me other than soul calibur 2 players that mash or play conquest mode for THOUSANDS of matches (top guy has about 7000 wins, and 3000 losses). there’s a tekken 5.1 cabinet at a further away mall, and then about 20 miles up theres the wyoming valley mall with marvel vs capcom 2, but the best player there still thinks that i’m cheap and that wolverine is good…
closest shit to me WITH competition
university pinball = 2 hours away
eight on the break = 2 hours away
chinatown fair / port authority = 2 hours away
state college = 2.5 hours…