story is good at first for single play and to get used to the charcaters.
then it doesnt matter in the long run.
I think a story makes fighting games better. Much more for character development, rather than an actual story, though.
Without it, then:
Ryu is a generic karate guy who throws fireballs.
Ken is generic karate guy’s friend from the US.
Guile is generic pro-USA military man.
Zangief is generic Russian pro-wrestler.
Chun-li is generic Chinese girl, with legs.
Blanka is generic monster in a fighting game.
Dhalsim is generic, skinny Indian man.
Honda is generic sumo wrestler.
With a storyline and character development, we get to know who they are and why they are fighting, why should we care about them, etc.
This post is win.
why is honda fighting? lol
A storyline is definitely needed in a fighting game, well in any game it actually makes things much more interesting. like for me i prefer to play games with an interesting storyline and character development. as for storyline in fighting games, yes i think that would give it a big boost in interest for some gamers, but overall, it is short lived for fighting games. like street fighter, im sure most of us play it not just for the storyline =] that was more of a plus side to it xD
No it doesn’t but the personality of the character and where that comes from sometimes (maybe even most of the time) is the thing that gets them started with that main for a long time. After that, once you know your favorite character’s deal even a little bit from win quotes, taunts, clothing, moves, etc it doesn’t matter and you just keep playing them without caring much because you know the deal with them already.
A storyline is always a nice touch that can be done in fighting game to give to the characters more personality and more interesting point of view to the franchise of said game in general, this also adds others possibilities for the games such as have comics or mangas and other medias based mostly on the storyline or Characters’s story of said game (see KoF or SF) which isn’t something obligatory or demanded by the players, but is always a nice bonus of content.
Of course not all players care about story, and this isn’t something bad, after all, most people play FG just the beat the shit out everyone else, but those who care get something else to care about aside of mechanics, strategies, etc.
That being said, I cared about Shaq fu’s storyline, so deep and extremely confusing.
I like Rival Schools’ and Project Justice’s story.
The problem with stories in fighting games is continuity. If a character dies or is injured and you omit him/her in the next game, fans will get upset. I don’t know how many Raizo fans there were, but I’m sure they weren’t happy that he’s not in Project Justice for story reasons.
ahahha not a chance
Stories don’t matter as much in the sequels, but they did in the beginning. When the characters are being established, you want to know why is it that everybody is fighting each other. Otherwise its just a random cluster fuck or generic skeletons as was mentioned earlier. We don’t need a lot, just enough to make the characters pop.
If the games devolved to a bunch of drawn hit boxes and nothing else fighting each other, just that bare skeleton, I would stop playing; unless of course that game was extra hype. Believe or not, Dhalsim saying yoga fire and yoga flame makes a difference; if necro didn’t have the operatic falsetto, oro his arm on a sling holding it back, balrog fighting for the fight money, and bison living in a perpetual tuesday while everybody’s day is just the shittiest ever, the characters would not be as hype. Dan becomes just that much more awesome once you learn that he is out for revenge against Sagat who killed his father for having taken his eye. Doesn’t matter that much when you learn the Saikyo beatdown, but it makes it that much sweeter when you wreck a sagat.
You can like a character for non storyline reasons. Julia has silly juggles that consist of the same move done over and over. Thanos has a hilarious infinite that kills you in 7 or 8 cycles, despite being one of the worst characters in the game. Hakumen makes you feel like a million bucks because when he does finally hit his opponent, it’s 20% off the first hit alone and leads to another 40% if they don’t barrier burst.
I’m sorry but Tekken’s ending suck [I just saw T6’s endings and they really suck] Most of the characters are a joke now. The Mishima saga is a dead horse that’s still being kicked. The Anna/Nina feud hasn’t been interesting since 2 and Paul Phoenix seems to get shit on anymore [he went from being Kazuya’s rival in 1 to just there for the sake of being there]
Maybe if you posted an example of a good fighting game storyline we would see where you’re coming from.
no, they dont.
I guess it depends on what constitutes a story. I welcome and encourage games to have well characters designed in an appealing way, but I’m not interested in cutscenes between fights or what blood type each character is.
Storylines definately make a fighting game better. Sure, it’s not as important as in… RPGs. But it certainly doesn’t make a fighter ‘worse’ by having one. It gives the characters motivation, and helps make the gamer care about them.
I’ve observed that a good amount of fighting game fans really care about and appreciate the storylines, as miniscule as fighter stories may be. So even though the story is a completely unnecessary ingredient for a game of strategy and execution, including some kind of background story can only enhance the imaginary world that the game is trying to portray.
Even a well thought-out story and interesting characters in marital arts movies helps to create a better overall film. The only thing for me where the story actually doesn’t matter whatsoever, would be in skinerama…
I love storylines in games. It makes the characters themselves and their interactions with each other more interesting.
Tekken- Most of the storylines don’t have much relevance anymore. Also, most endings are just a joke now. The only thing I like is the rivalry between Asuka and Lili. Even if it is similar to Sakura and Karin.
Virtua Fighter- Story is almost non-exsistent. They do give a little background in the booklet though. I don’t care much for it anyway cuz VF doesn’t need a big story to be awesome.
Guilty Gear- I really like how much time and effort goes into the story and character bios. To me, it’s very interesting. GG just has an interesting world. I just wish they would explain more of the important stuff in detail…Unfortunately, I’m afraid that nobody will ever see another new GG game again.
Blazblue- I haven’t gone through storymode because I’ve only played this at arcades but I hear the story is more complicated and convoluted than GG.
King Of Fighters- The story has always been everywhere and hard to follow for some newcomers. I gotta say though, I do kinda like the current saga it’s on right now.
Street Fighter- Never had much of a story like VF but it’s characters are so iconic now, it doesn’t even matter.
Soul Calibur- To me SC has one the best fighting game stories on the market. All the characters are really likable and have such a deep background. I love how so much interconnects with each other. I actually like the series’ complicated story unlike Tekken. I haven’t gone through SC IV’s story though.
Arcana Heart- This series story is great because it has just enough story/character bios to establish a reason but not so much that it becomes overwhelming.
This post is almost proof that a story does a disservice to a fighting game.
Fact: no one who is familiar with the storylines of 8 different fight franchises is good at any of them.
Soul Edge storyline was pretty good for what it was. Then it devolved into the whole Soul Edge/ Soul calibur rivalry nonsense; shit is just the Mishimas with swords.
Just because I know the storylines from different FGs makes me a bad player at all of them? That doesn’t make sense.