I think storylines add a lot to fighters. They at least add some reasoning for why certain things function like they do.
Without story, who the fuck would be alright with Ken, Ryu, Akuma and Dan? 4 characters with the exact same moveset and same clothes. Fuck off you lazy ass developers.
Oh, what? They all know each other and are rivals? Well that’s a different…
STORY!
I wonder if a game that just used wireframes for competitors, and a grid background like a training mode, would be successful on any level, even if it had the most technically advanced and competitively sound fighting system? Would there be strats and rankings for Fighter 4B and Fighter 7A? Would that be any fun, or would that just take competitve fighting to the next depth of geekiness?
I’ll be honest, I don’t care about storylines and I don’t normally scour character bios to check their background. On the other hand, something about me has to think there’s something bigger going on to make a bunch of fighters with various character designs compete in some ridiculous tournament. Something’s missing if there’s no story at all to any game, unless it’s a pick-up-and-play puzzle-type game.
When I first saw Tekken 6, I could tell that something big is going on story-wise, like when the space station from T5 crashed on top of some governmental monument, or Jin’s stage where you see fucking nukes go off in the background. I think the best thing to do is to let the story unfold seamlessly while you’re playing. Like if Street Fighter II’s story was about taking down Shadowloo, Guile’s stage should be in a hangar where everybody’s gearing up to attack, and Dictator’s stage should show Special Forces raiding/bombing his compound or something.
Long story short, it matters to me on some minute level, but the gameplay is the only truly important part of a fighter, and I don’t feel like going out of my way to know what the story is about.
says the VF player. :lol:
Why do you think VF is so unpopular? :lol:
You almost never see fanart of VF, but you will see it for SF, Tekken, DoA, Blazblue, Guilty Gear, etc… that tells you something!
That my game is boring. 
Does VF even have a story?
Didn’t Kages mother get experimented on and she become the boss or something? I don’t know. I dont really play VF, even though I have VF5 on PS3, I’ve played it about 2 or 3 times.
I don’t see the point in playing when I have 0 idea how to play and I don’t know a single person who plays it either, and there is no online :sad:.
DAMN YOUS SEGA!
It certainly doesn’t make it any worse. I happen to think that the better the story, the better the game no matter what genre it is. It doesn’t have to be convoluted, rather deep enough to make the characters more than conventional cut outs lacking motivation and background.
One of the faltering points of SF3 is that the game did not have the luxury of animes to support it, allowing an expansion of the character plots and design which is one of the key ingredients that propelled the SF2 cast (the shows, the toys and that godlike SF2 animated movie) into popularity.
The SF universe in the scope of fighting games actually has a very decent story and an array of interesting characters. I’m glad that Capcom have taken an interest in story with SF4 and I’m hoping they flesh out the characters even more and develop the story further.
storylines are the reason I prefer KOF97 over KOF98 when playing solo.