Ugh so after playing UMvC3 again it just reminds me of how much I’m looking forward to certain things going away in a new game. I know people are skeptical over no assists and we’ll have to see if what neutral game stuff we get with infinity stones and swap synergy (maybe there’s a pseudo assist type thing)…but here’s a list of things I’d love to see be addressed (AKA shit that ruined UMvC3)
Remove unscaling loops - Kind of a no brainer that I think is already happening, but loops drastically lose their hype once they become meta staples. As well having access to commonplace ToDs makes for a bad game. It dictates the meta as pick a mobile point that can score a random hit, then convert into a kill.
Fix the throw system - MvC3 has one of the worst throw system I’ve ever seen. While not uncommon to have a f/b+H throw option in a fighter, often these are bad as they result in unintended results. You get your slowest normal button on a slight misjudgement of distance, accidental throws when you don’t want them, and options selects make the game more about flowchart coverage than read intention. A throw input is always best. The biggest issue is simply the it boxes. Up close you have to be pixel on pixel, leading accidental H moves…but in the air character practically teleport mid range. If you’re below your opponent in super jump cam, there’s no way to see an opponent actually jump into throw range, as they are below the frame when it initiates (this can also be fixed by simply centering the camera better).
Remove ambiguous vortexes - Players should get some neutral advantage for a kill, but a free multilayered ambiguous cross up attempts is unreasonable. The game currently plays out as convert hit > ToD loop > incoming mix up > repeat…x-factor if you fuck up. This isn’t a good game. The opponent is basically flipping coins to have a chance to actually play after being hit once. And there’s a difference between a mix up…and an ambiguous mix up and that’s largely the issue. If the opponent had ways to alter where or when they came out and a few other options, we could remove the flowchart nature of the vortex incoming where you can perfectly asses where the incoming opponent will be…making it a literal guess if you time it right. If the opponent had some control or defensive systems, you would have to make reactionary adjustments and your mix ups become more flawed and fair to fight against…they become tricky mix ups, not consistently ambiguous.
Fix the hitboxes - The hit boxes are absurd. We have foot dives that hit with the head, forward attacks that can hit behind (chun kicks…wtf), and a lot of moves that simply don’t match their visual. This is especially annoying with some characters who get off really easy with directional auto correct type conversions (dante!) while others don’t get that luxury.
Remove the RNG/side specific and other odd properties of moves - Unknown to some…certain characters have actual RNG and side specific properties…the biggest being Vergil’s swords and bubbles (normal and hyper). Doing Vergil’s optimal combos are a liability, and many players even pros don’t actually do his max damage ones…because they’re risky and there’s other ways to ensure the ToD…but that aside, Vergil’s bubbles create a ton of variance and make it impossible to be 100% consistent, which leads to dropped combos on very unsafe links if they whiff. The worst properties though are the hitbox negating effects, the biggest offenders being Zero’s lvl 1 buster and Dante’s jam session. They can turn off a physical hitbox without hitting the player, leading to FAR worse punishes. EX: cap’s charging star will harmlessly push forward with no hit box, making him very vulnerable to a max damage punish. To further make dante’s more infuriating is the consistency of this happening is almost random, some times you can charging star him and sometimes he randomly turns it off and you slide in place unable to move. These properties feel like mistakes and need to be removed.
Clean up inputs - There are certain things in this game that simply need cleaning up as far as inputs to prevent unintended moves and motions. I already address throws, but things like wave dashing and down/jump canceling can be done better. Currently the best way to dash is Plink dashing, a practice that can very easily result in an accidental M or H. The other way is to wave dash, but that is no as effective and the extra down buffers an input that can betray you (accidentally getting a QCF when doing a f+M/H after wave dashing) This is simply solved by making dashing repeatable self cancellable with the 2 buttons. Another area is double jump cancels, specifically Strider where the window is tight and can easily lead into dropping his already hilariously under powered combo. Simply increase the buffer window during normals and height. It’s very hard to be consistent with his over head dashes at a convertible height. The next issue likely won’t be in the next game, but TACs being allocated to a direction+S leads to MANY cases of unwanted TACs mid combo when trying to hit S. Doom suffers from this often as you attempts to air dash cancel after j.S and can easily get an unwanted TAC.