So I’ve been watching a lot of rising thunder and I think it looks great.
Once again it’s another fighting game that’s trying reduce the barrier for entry for beginners and hope not to make it just a place where noobs get instantly crushed.
It seems this has also been a goal for capcom since sf4, with sfv and sfxt both trying to be more and more casual friendly.
I gotta say though, after watching rising thunder it’s still essentially got one of the same issues(for beginners) that other fighting games have .
Links.
It’s all well and good to have a button for specials. But if you ain’t got links you’re gonna get smashed pretty quick.
So what’s the solution? Target combo’s? Easier links?
Personally I’m not a fan of target combo’s in any sf iteration.
In sfxt, the launcher target combo kind of took over that game. Also, from the small time I’ve seen of Nash in sfv. He seems to revolve around his target combo’s.
Regarding making links easier. Sfv has received a lot of flak for having the extra 2 frame buffer in all links.
So what do you think is the best option? Is there even a way to resolve this issue?
What if sfv added more scaling if your link landed in the extra 2 frame buffer than dead on the link? Like music games can allow slightly off notes, but promote exact ones.
Or they could keep it how it is in sf4 now. But have a training mode that details each characters 1/2/3 frame links. So beginners can start with the easier and move onto the harder as they go?
Wait what? 90% of the time I’ve seen people praise that.
Solving the “link problem” is pretty simple though: just make sure that most/all characters have combo options that don’t require links. Allowing chained lights to be canceled into specials or having target combos available helps a lot in this regard. People can now convert hits into combos, but won’t have to spend a bunch of time in training mode up front before they start playing. Once they get better and are motivated for the more difficult stuff, they’ll have the option to go learn that.
I don’t think SFV received flak for the buffer. It’s just that assholes are gonna be more vocal about it on the internet, but I think most people like it.
Yeah, most people complaining about easier combos in V seem to be people who aren’t actually players, and are more concerned about nebulous things like “top players not having complex things to do.”
Well, I think SF4 has a really tedious and unrewarding combo system, so I’m definitely happy they’re not repeating their past mistakes.
As for solving the “link problem”, Capcom actually applied all of the solutions I mentioned. Pretty much everyone has target combos, you can cancel chained lights into specials, and you have the additional buffer window for links.
I just played Rising Thunder a couple of hours and I do not find the links difficult.
With the character I used they were even visually confirmable.
Like you see the attack hit, then hit the next button and shit links into a combo.
Makes it feel like you’re really in that character and make shit happen.
I can’t hit links if my life depended on it in SF4 but in Rising Thunder I felt proficient at it pretty quickly.
Pretty easy system, fun game as well.
Cooldowns are pretty weird though, but the game is more of a Aeon of Strife/Fighting Game hybrid anyways, so that’s cool.
Art, cause you don’t find em difficult, you’re an architect.
Now, any normal dude off the street (you know the casuals) are they landing rising thunder links. I know its “technical alpha”, but are links feeling 2 frame? more?
Plus it could be like sf4, where there are some characters who have easy links, and others where just the bnb is a 1 framer
Links being difficult should only be a problem if the characters lack other means of doing reasonably good damage without those links. I think difficult links should be present in a game. It gives anyone that wants to maximize their damage, an incentive to practice and master those links. This should be the price for wanting to maximize your damage. If you don’t want to put in the practice to do that, then you have other slightly lower damage combos at your disposal.
That’s not how links work in reality.
In USFIV you got shit like Ryu’s cr.mp, cr.mp, sweep or cr.mp, cr.mkxxhadoken which does dick for damage, then you got characters like Yun who do not have a single 1 frame link in their bread and butters and get setups up the ass from everything they do.
If combos in reality would scale up in damage correlating to their difficulty, I wouldn’t be pissed by a lot of them.
This. Target combos for all characters that deal a respectable amount of damage, while still having links that allow you to do even more damage if you have the execution for it. Casual or novice players shouldn’t be able to have access to advance tech without having to work for it.
Casual and novice players aren’t going to get to land those combos against anyone good regardless, so it doesn’t bother me much. Feel free to disagree with me on that though.
The most difficult combos are also often discovered by the players in some way, rather than being intentionally designed to work that way. Doesn’t have to be links, necessarily.
Blanka pre-Ultra, pre-Ultra Rose and any version of Vega has it even worse than that. Their only functional combos did crap damage and were 1-framers. Hell, Vega even had to spend meter.
There are pretty much only four characters in SF4 I can honestly say were interesting from a combo standpoint, though: Ryu, E.Ryu, Cody and Cammy. All of them had some really simple stuff you could start with, and some reasonably difficult and damaging combos for more advanced players. More or less everyone else was really wack, either because their entry level combos were unnecessarily tricky, or because they did jack-all for damage even with their more advanced stuff.
/rant
…why do I always end up ranting about SF4s combo system whenever I talk about combo systems? D:
Personally I find in sf4. The sf2 case are least reliant on links. Then the alphas. Then finally linksville with the sf3 cast. Yeah they got target combo’s, but all standard combo’s are like Link link link. Sf2 dudes are much more straight forward. (and I love em for it)
SF2 is almost all links. The most important stuff in 3S (aside from juggles for some cast members) were actually cancels into Super Art due to how important meter was in that game. SFIV is one of the most link heavy Street Fighter games due to the fact that alot of the combos are things that start from chained lights.