Hahahahaha. I wasn’t aware arcades still had enough life left in 'em to be dying.
SFIV PC players have this weird sense of entitlement, as if it wasn’t the first Street Fighter game that was actually playable on a PC outside of illegal emulation, but in fact part of a larger legacy of PC fighting games. “Red Herring”, IMO.
(I am all for SFIV hitting arcades, mind you. But come on, sense of perspective. There are NO classic console games anymore? Gimme a break.)
I guess I made the mistake of lumping to two together as if they were connected. That wasn’t my point. I wasn’t trying to say that the PC made fighting games what they are, although I will say that back in the day, I only had a PC and a SNES, and my PC was the only way I could play Super Turbo (and yes, it was a legitimate release and not emulation). My point was that both these gaming mediums bring players together in ways that consoles can’t.
I wasn’t saying that there are NO classic console games, but what I am saying is that when a new generation of console games comes out, the old consoles and their game libraries kinda get left in the dust. Sure, people still buy and play them on XBox Live and the like for the nostalgia factor, but few of them truly regain their followings, and next to non of them have a serious online community.
My point is, without the arcade or PCs, there will never be another Quake or Starcraft or Street Fighter game with the impact that SF2 had. It’s the community that makes a game truly stand the test of time, and you just don’t get that with modern consoles.
Was the PC release of Super Turbo any good? This is a legitimate question.
O__<
You’d be really surprised. People are using tunneling services to play LAN console games to this day, and every single thing ever seems to have some kind of obsessed following out there. There are XBand fanatics running around somewhere in this world.
I’m… not sure you know what you’re talking about. You have a PC centric POV on this, and that’s cool and all, but the sheer volume of stuff that will never even see a legit PC release would make your head fall off.
That said, Street Fighter! Pretty great, huh?
Ok, let’s use SF4 as an example:
How often in an online match do you communicate with the other player after the match and give them pointers on how they can improve their game? You just don’t. You either get some 12 year old bitching about how “cheap” you are, or you get some guy in Taiwan who dosen’t speak english. There’s no sense of community in the game because people just play a match and move on to the next one, most of them pissed off.
The arcade community levels up so quickly because they’re united. They don’t get mad when they get beaten. They take pointers from the person who beat them learn from their mistakes. You just don’t get that with a console. The online community is just so cold. I am convinced that there would be no tournament scene without the arcade scene because there would be no community at all. There would just be a bunch of faceless scrubs on the internet shouting at one another.
Edit: Ok, let’s drop the whole PC situation because my intent was never to focus on it. I regret that it’s in my sig. I wasn’t flaunting it, it’s only there because it’s hard to find PC players.
I agree, SSF4 is great and I want to see it reach as many mediums as possible, even if it means the dirty iPhone. If there was no console release, I would be complaining just as much. I just wish they would release it on the platform that made it what it is (and a PC release wouldn’t hurt).
That’s not entirely true! You’ve got voice chat in SFIV (on the 360 side at least), if you’re playing somebody who is an actual human being (with an actual headset /qualifier), you can have a conversation about technique during the course of a player match. If they’re up for it, friend 'em and play 'em again! The online community exists, it is just in a different form. You see somebody you know pop up, you can challenge and play 'em again!
As with all things, this is mostly a case of ‘who are you playing’. The angry 12 year old screaming f*g is something that exists, but you can always just drop the headphones and deal with it. The majority of players I’m fighting lately in player match have been remarkably good sports. We go ten rounds, possibly talk a bit, then part friendly-like. Maybe this is not true for everybody?
But hell, here we are on a web site talking about Street Fighter. Of course an online community exists. We’re on it. :lol:
I think you have things totally backwards.
First, let’s clear up your hasty generalizations. Not everyone online gets pissed when they lose, and not everyone in arcades keeps their cool and recognizes a loss as a learning experience. People can get pretty heated, online or off. It’s the game, not the venue.
Not every player online is just there to play casual matches for a little bit and then move on. Some players are there to get better, to play with their contacts and training partners, and improve their skills. And again, not everyone in arcades is there in some “unified” goal to level up, some (most) are just there to have some fun and waste a little time. Again, this is a matter of the game itself, NOT the venue.
So when I say you have it backwards, what I mean is this: it’s not arcades that drive improvement in skill, or push the competitive/tournament scene. It’s Street Fighter, the game itself, which just happens to be played in arcades.
If we took away arcades, the tournament scene would still live on. Competitive players would still emerge, people like Justin Wong would still be better than you, and Street Fighter games would keep coming. This might not be as true in Japan, but for the Western world, we’d do just fine.
Take a look at the overwhelming majority of competitive video games played around the world. Are most of those commonly played in arcades or PC cafes? No. Sometimes they’re available, but people typically play from home. We have the internet now, this isn’t 1998.
I played competitive Counter-Strike/CS:S on the professional level for 4 years. I’ve been to a ton of tournaments around the country, seen probably every PC Cafe in Southern California that has existed in the last 8 years, have played games on television with thousands of spectators, and so forth.
When the PC Cafe gaming craze started dying down, lots of people were like “oh shit, this pro-gaming bubble is busted”, but that never happened, and things only got bigger and bigger. Why? Because the popularity of these games, and the competitive side of them, was NEVER about where the game was played, but rather, just the game itself.
Agreed. No situation is ever black and white. There will always be legitimate players willing to further the community. SRK is proof of that. I just don’t want to see it get any smaller because Capcom is looking for a buck rather than pleasing it’s real fans.
In response to your previous question, the PC port of ST pretty much sucked balls, but it was all I had when I couldn’t afford to go to the arcade. Once you get super combos, you don’t go back.
Edit: @ Judotrip
I hope you’re right man. I guess the biggest concern comes from the fact that a Japanese company that has always made the Japanese market its focus, is slowly shifting its attention West. If they’re willing to turn their backs on the market that made them what they are, what else are they willing to do? Are they going to start catering to the casual gaming community rather than the serious gamers because that’s where the money is? I don’t want to see one of my favourite series change because they’re looking at the market rather than what the fanbase wants. I guess only time will tell. I’ll keep my fingers crossed.
Don’t think that Capcom of the past had some loyalty to Japanese consumers. They will go wherever they will get paid. If that means they cater to Western audiences, by all means, they’re going to do it. If tomorrow the population of India gets with it, and starts demanding Elephant Fighter, Capcom will probably bring it to them. Times are tough right now, but even still, Capcom is a business and that’s what businesses do.
I’m sure I’ll piss someone off for saying this, and I might be totally wrong because I’ve never been to Japan… but it seems that for as technologically forward as Japan is, they’re not really as up-to-speed as many other countries are with current gaming trends, or more importantly: online gaming. Yes, Japanese gamers all have the latest PSPs and DS handhelds, and the PS3 is doing pretty well over there now… but it just seems that they’re not all that into online play for some reason.
Maybe it’s because they have a rich arcade culture, maybe it’s just not their thing, I dunno. But in any case, online play for console games moves product off shelves. Western gamers clamor for it, and thus, Capcom will be happy to cater to us because we’re emptying our wallets for them. Japan… maybe not so much.
I’m sure arcade cabinets are expensive as all hell for both Capcom and arcade owners, and I don’t doubt that Capcom could move many units across Japan (with only a few making it over here), but it seems that they would just make way more profit over selling console-based discs, which are almost FREE to make in comparison to an arcade cabinet.
I know you’re absolutely right, it’s just too bad that’s the way it has to be.
Ah, the good old days when the gaming market wasn’t a multi-million dollar industry and the small developers willing to make games for the sake of making games were able to thrive. Oh well, what can you do?
How the hell did we get so far off-topic? Yay SSF4! Come on arcade version!
Wait, didn’t we just get Ono slapping down the possibility of an arcade release in that shacknews interview?
http://www.shacknews.com/onearticle.x/62834
It seemed pretty clear that struggle is lost?
^ No, dude everything Ono says is full of SHIT.
He has proven this over and over and over and over.
He’s probably going to pull a big April Fools joke on us and say there’s no arcade version.
I’ll bet he thinks he’s HILARIOUS.
Ono is a master troll.
Ono has zero control over the situation.
I want to see Ono vs SKill in a cage match to decide who is the biggest troll.
Ono opens with: “No SSF4 Arcade release. Oh maybe. Probably not. What did I say? Lets talk costumes!”
Skill red parries with: “No one got nerfed, Sagat got better in SSF4”
On the other hand, there’s a fair few TTX2 cabinets out there from SF4, and a simple software update to those would cost them little to nothing.
Are people still expecting an arcade release?
Whatever will be, will be I guess. I never really enjoyed an arcade scene cause I come from Greece and arcades were banned there for awhile. That led to crushing any possibility of a decent fighting game scene being developed. But now that I am in Beijing I’m having a lot of fun at the arcades so I would really like to continue enjoying this experience. Although I do not believe that the tournament scene will be ruined without an arcade scene, I do find that the whole idea of not being around other players will have an impact. You can build some really good friendships when you constantly meet people face to face.
Edit: I feel that technologically we still have ways to go before we can say that fighting games can rely on online scenes. Lag is still an issue even when you are playing with people around the same area as you. Plus that narrows down the list of potential opponents quite a bit.
I read that Ono will announce an arcade version of SSFIV on 4-4-2010, along with the special prize for us who kept our SFIV discs.
That’s the rumor, but it’s mostly speculation.
On March 16th, Makky said an arcade release was very possible, and a big announcement would be made on April 4th. So, everyone is assuming the two are connected. Meanwhile, on the exact same day, Ono basically said an arcade release was still possible in the future but nothing had materialized.
So, as usual, Capcom is feeding us conflicting information and making us wait for “big announcements” that always seem to disappoint. I’m not getting my hopes up for an arcade release, but as long as there’s a chance, I’m not giving up.