Hey guys. So im just waiting for my new stick to arrive and then im planning to play this game. Uhm I just want advise on whats the mindset that i have to be. Iv tried this game a month ago and everything just happens too fast. When i watch match videos, i see people doing shoryukens exactly when the opp jumps. stuff like that. i mean to ask, are they doing it on reaction? Cuz it just happens too quick i dont know how people realize that and quicly input a shoryuken.
Like my title says, I’m coming from Tekken. and when i switch over and i play a match… i just freeze up.i feel like i dont have the freedom i had in tekken…cuz in tekken since its 3d and all, you can sidestep to avoid moves. And theres none of that here…So most of the time… im just eating alot of stuff…
I just want some advise from vets or especially from people that transition from tekken to sf.
Im not experienced with tekken but I had to learn most things from scratch for street fighter 4, so i can understand the feeling that things happen too fast.
Tbh the first thing to learn about street fighter is simple: Block more. most people when learning the game try and press too many buttons and take dmg when they didnt have too. Learn what moves are good for your character especially normals and anti airs.
When good players are anti-air shoryukening people there can be several things going on:
-Is the jumpin obvious? the ground player could have been throwing hadoukens to bait a jumpin so is ready
-Knowing the jump animations. if you know what characters look like when the jump animation starts
-Practice
-Buffering the input - With ryu if im expecting someone do something i can shoryuken i buffer the motion so if they do it i can hit punch straight away.
Guesswork - somepeople just throw that shoryuken out there
reactions, some pro ssf4 players have godlike reactions.
My advice is to block more, once you start getting a good defense you will feel alot better. If someone is jumping remember to block high, otherwise you will just eat jump in combos all day.
Ummm…ok right, keep believing that Tekken is 2.5D.
Tekken and SF are pretty similar in concept in some areas. The things that I can think that transfer is the footsies of tekken. The way that you have to learn how to dance around and space in order to open up the opponents defense and bait out moves through movement transfer over. In tekken and SF you have to learn your distances in order to ensure that you are in a great position that is advantageous for you and bad for the opponent. EX, playing against Ling you should move towards her weak side (Lings right). Similar to lets say Rog vs Ibuki. Rogs poke dominate most due to range and speed. Ibuki should know how to break through Rogs Jab range by just spacing and use her kunais to work around and get within range in order to do her most damage and mix up. Tekken focuses more on limiting the amount of time the person has to attack and defend while SF focuses more on what area of the screen you can control. In the rog match rog controls a certain area of the screen just off of jabs alone and other players try to fight over that spot and visa versa. The same way in tekken you read react to movement and punishment it is a similar concept in SF. Example, there is a Paul that you know will constantly throw out a DEATH FIST (Pheonix smasher) when he is a certain range. I tekken depending on the character, spacing, if in the corner some can launch this on block and in a better scenario you can side walk it, punish with a hard launcher and set them up for oki off of that one move. In SF there are similar reads. A common example of this would be the Dudley vs Shoto matchup in mid range.If Dudley is near the end of a round and is sitting on ultra I there is a good chance that he is waiting for the fire ball to come out. The Dudley has a good idea after playing the game that the Shoto is looking to chip him out with a fireball. Even before the fireball comes out the Dudley is probably buffering the movement for the Ultra and once he sees him do the move he just presses all the kicks and hits the Ultra to end the round. The reaction time that are seeming to be really high (though they are) are also things that they are already looking for. If you are playing against a Mishima then you have an idea of playing against an electric happy one. Consider jump ins like someone who is stepping and ducking against a mishima. Some can step and duck properly so that as soon as an electric comes out that they launch them. Its a bit slower to hit a jump in than it is to launch a mishima after they whiff an electric but if you can do that then you should be able to handle movement and see the jump. In order to pick the proper AA, that comes from practice and knowing your options. In Tekken you have alot more character freedom for play style, improv, but you also get different factors it takes to read your opponents. In SF most characters have to be played by the book or flow chart if you will. There are certain things you just shouldnt do almost ever though in tekken you can play from a characters weaknesses as long as you can integrate their strengths enough to make the person believe that you are baiting them out. On the topic of seeing jump ins, lets say its the same as whiff punishing. Pick someone with an EWGF and backdash till you bait out a whiffed move. If you can punish that whiff with a EWGF then you know how it is to make someone do a move and punish with a shoryu. Only difference is that the jump in gives less damage than a EWGF. For a jumpin instead you just pressed a shoryu or a hard punch or whatever. The mindset of most SF in comparison is that you play more of the character in the game. The hardest part is you have to know what options you have in each matchup. Also know that there is for the most there is almost always something that you should be looking for to comeout and punish accordingly. So that just comes with practice. I may change up this post to make it more readable in the future. Hopefully this will help.
I have alot of experience in both, so I’ll try to help.
First of all you’re right, you don’t have as much freedom in a SF match as you do in Tekken because 75% of the match is decided at the select screen. At higher levels, you have to play, say, a Ryu vs Balrog or Honda vs Dictator match a certain way or you will lose. Granted there are a few character specific things you have to be ready for in Tekken(Dealing with stance mixups, seeing holes in strings, needing to ss/sw certain ways), but mostly you can come up with your own interpretation of a character which leads you to having to deal with the player just as much as you have to deal with the character. In SF, players can have their own styles but their options are more dependent on the opponent, matchup, and situation.
With that said, your matchup plans have to be much more thought out than a Tekken match since momentum and spacing is so important in the game.
A good thing about SF is that, since each character is comparatively more diverse than the Tekken lineup, it’s easier to identify what they are good at and what their general plan is. So when you play or watch vids, pay really close attention to what they want to do, what their options are(especially factoring in the spacing), and what can they threaten with.
Besides that, Tomahawk has alot of good info. I hope it all helps.
Too fast?
Tekken players can kill off of one combo.
The game is very spacing specific, very zoning specific. Position is the key. Unlike Tekken, where you don’t really attack from far away-unless you are jinachi or can move in quickly with an attack like Yoshi, Raven, Jinpachi, or when you use kazuya’s spinning DP- in this game it’s part of footsies and strategy to attack from far away- for a lot of characters.
For example, if I am playing super street fighter 2 T, with my chun against a rog, I will throw fireballs and put out pokes like c mk, st mp, st mk, and c hp, along with the occaisional lightning legs. Balrog is vulnerable during his dash punch special move and after his jumping headbutt move. The moves I am throwing out have the potential to hurt him. So rog will be scared. This allows me to screw with him. I can semi safely stay away and build meter for chun’s super. Once I have meter, I can walk forward more safely because there is a chance that I can walk up and throw rog, or super, so rog will be confused on whether or not to block. He throws a dash punsh. I jump over him, hit him with a j hp to st hp, activate the super and finish with tenshokyaku. 75 percent health gone.
Speaking of that, in sf there are supers and super meters. Doing special moves, getting hit by the opponent, hitting the opponent usually build this meter. In some games just doing any moves regardless of hit-or-not. These would include the sf3 series. Utra meter is gained by taking damage.
Sf varies like crazy from series to series. So try em all.
If you want to play sf4 semi-tekken-like character, try Dudley. Up close all the way.
EDIT: by one combo kill I mean 100 percent. this is possible in sf and quite possible with st chun. however it is not very common.
Well, you’re going to have to invest in a butload of time in training mode. Tekken is an okay fighting game but Tekken styled fighting games won’t prepare you for any other fighting games. To me, Tekken is simply the 1st person to launch you in the air gets a free 75% damage of opponents life combo. It really doesn’t involve spacing or mind games (Unless you’re Steve Fox) imho.
Unless you’ve played SF games for a while it’s going to be a huge challenge for you because you more or less don’t know what to do or how to react in situations or how to use meter or know what footsies, kara’s, tick throws, and etc are.
I would say take a look at a lot of high level matches to get an idea of how to play SF correctly and then learn how to learn 1 character. I would recommend starting with Ryu to get the basics down. Trial mode will give you an idea about what links are and once you’ve played a couple of strong opponents, you should find your way.
You should check out the footsies handbook by maj once you have a basic understanding of the game. Don’t mash anything. You might reach average player status in a few months give or take.
Your comaprison of the two games is great!. Atleast I get somewhat of a clear idea to how i can implement my game into SF. you said people already try to look for moves ahead depending on the situation. Since im new to this game i dont what to look for. So this game is mostly mind games… Cuz if its not, I dont see how peole can react to moves that happens soooo fast. Unless im just too slow. I guess i jsut need more experience with the game to know what i have to look for.
Also I found that execution here is less strick than in tekken. for example qcf’s here are easier to do than in tekken… i dont know why but it is
Thnx for that great read.
Not to be rude, but Tekken IS a 3D fighting game. I dont understand how you think its 2.5D
I apreciate the advice, but I think there are some aspects that are similar to both games. like pokes and “footsies”
Yah thats the part im not used to. Because in tekken you have so much breathing space, even in levels with tight wall space, you can still sidestep and backdash and just turtle all day. But in here. Once I get stuck in a corner, thats basicaly the match for me. I panic and i would throw out FK’s and SJ to get out of the corner .but none will work. (I picked up C.Viper)
Yah…People keep saying how SF is really match-up heavy. And I always have to do what is good. i feel like if ur in a certain situation, you can only get out of that situation or make it better, is to exactly do what ur supposed to do… You cant be creative. Atleast thats my first take on the game anyways.
When i ment by too fast i ment like moves… i ddnt mean the whole match. And i guess your notthat experienced with tekken. I dont really know what ur talking about with jinpachi, yoshi and raven. Jinpachi wasnt even allowed in games. And in tekken death combos are inpractical and never happens.
Yah i dont mid spending alot of time in the training mode. Actually imo (without being bias) Tekken is a great fighting game. It’s been one of the top (if not the top) fighting game in Korea/Japan. Since its a 3d fighting game, the game gives you so much room for creatitivty.
And thnx for that info on the footsis handbook. ill chek it out!
Thnx for all your inpouts you guys. it was greatly apreciated. Anymore info would be also great!
If you’re a good tekken player then the #1 thing you can carry over into SF is probably the spacing/whiff punishing aspect of tekken and use it in SF. Also I think in tekken say you do a move that puts you in + frames and you go for a safe move to beat out their poke that’s sort of the same as in SF4 where you bait their crouch tech or poke and punish it.
Reacting to jump-ins just comes with time and practice.
SF4 is definitely a learning experience when coming in from tekken. I used to mash links until I realized you couldn’t do that because in tekken it’s pretty easy to mash to a button to make sure your move or combo comes out. It took me awhile to figure out how tekken and SF4 are related and the biggest relation I see is the poking and spacing aspect of both games.
When I play tekken against my brother who uses feng I always try to position myself to him to where I could not get hit by his db4 and f4,b. once I was around that position I could try to bait and punish those or else I could start my own offense but I run the risk of running into those 2 moves which I think really resembles like a ryu mirror match where both ryu’s are close range using cr.mk and punishing those whiffed cr.mk’s with cr.hk.
I’d say launchers in tekken are sort of like focus attacks in SF4. They both have roughly the same risk and reward. I think they are both really abusable in low level play but start getting more risky in the mid/high level play.
This is actually the part of the game that I love most. Once both players know what their options are, and what they “should” be doing, it is easily possible to expect that the “correct” counter or move will come, and outright shut it down. Ideally you should know what to do in every situation. You should also know what your opponent will want to do in every situation you put him in, too.
As general advice: play a lot, get a good feel of how people react in certain situations. Always go into a match with a gameplan, even a simple one. For example, with Balrog(Boxer) a decent low level gameplan would be:
“Walk forward as much as possible. Poke with standing hard kick when in range. If the opponent jumps, use crouching hard punch to anti air. If opponent is cornered(which is the goal) crouch block just outside of sweep range, and use sweeps to punish whiffed normals, crouching hard punch to anti air, and headbut if they fireball.”
That basic strategy will work against almost every character (again, all at a low level), and will leave you looking at just a few different options depending on ranges. This will have the effect of making the match seem extremely slow. Even if lots of stuff is happening, and moves are coming out super quick, there’s only so much range on each move, and moves with a lot of range or other special properties generally have an extended startup, so don’t even worry about them. Chill out. Characters are generally only dangerous at 1-2 ranges. Stay out of those ranges and you don’t have to worry about it.
I’m one of the players that learned SF, after years of playing the Tekken series…
I think some of the previous posts have been helpful… so I think this is all I need to add.
learn the normals
special moves, supers, ultras are great but the normals are important as well.
some normals are good for anti-air, some are cancelable, etc.
know the properties of your char’s normals.
know how to apply your mixups
in Tekken, generally speaking you can get a decent damage from ground position…
e.g Kazuya can WD, and do either Hellsweep or f,f+3…
but in SF, you generally don’t get much from walking up to the opponent…and mix an overhead with a low move…
so to get more damage you can do a crossup…when you opp. is getting up, then do a combo…
think of it as doing a mixup after you opp. techs in Tekken.
there are of course plenty more other ways to start a mixup in SF…but I don’t think I need to explain.
getting some damage in SF
In Tekken…you can generally launch your enemy after blocking his/her attack if your launcher is fast enough. e.g after you block Heihachi’s 1,1,2, it’s possible to launch him coz he’s still recovering. Or you can land a jab or 1,2 when you block a move and your opp is at -10…
In SF however you generally can’t jab someone after blocking his normal, even some special moves. But for a lot of the Ultra moves, you can punish you opp after blocking their Ultras. Because they take a long time to recover.
It’s like blocking Law’s d/b+4…or Feng’s b+1+2.
In general, you can get damage in SFIV from:
making your opp whiff(need to learn spacing in SF? read this then)
counter your opp moves(e.g doing Bison’s/Dictator’s EX Scissor Kick to counter fireballs)
starting a combo
Combos
There are basically just combos. Yes the combos in SF are often more technical than in Tekken. But once you learn the timing you will be able to use them.
Knowing when to use them is more important…IMO
it’s probably because you’re still new to the game…and you aren’t familiar with the options you have in the game…(e.g not knowing the weakness or how to counter certain special moves).
but as time goes, you’ll learn you have options…hence you’ll play better.
learn the basics, know your char, know your opponent’s char, know how to play in a 2d playfield, know when & how to land some damage, then I think you will be able to enjoy this game.
It did for me, very well.
It helped me learn VF & SC… probably because all of them are 3D.
But I didn’t understand the core concepts of playing 2D fighters…
That’s why I learned ST, because around 2-3 years ago…
I thought ST could get me ready for SFIV, it was very similiar to SFII, it had pretty good tutorials available at that time, I could learn the concepts of playing in a 2D playfield, etc.
I used to play Tekken(s) a lot before SSF4 but the only thing you need is to play until you get used to the new gameplay. You just need to mess up in the beginning in order to learn.
