The Problem With Patches

Patches. They seem to be the antidote to a lot of fighting games biggest problems. Techniques that used to break games are now being fixed and making the game tournament viable with a simple download. These quick and easy tools now govern the way we play fighting games, and things couldn’t be better. Or could they?

Think back to the fighting games before this console generation. Games like Super Turbo and Alpha 2 were beloved in their hay day long before patches even existed, yet these games seem to live healthy tournament lives. Of course the nay sayers always say that perhaps these games were better designed, and that these newer games (SSF4, MvC3, MK9) are just made without as much love and thought. The glitches that are found in these new games are a result of this poor design. This is simply not true.

Lets start with Super Street Fighter 2 Turbo. The game is very balanced, and of course takes the prize as one of the longest played games in FG history. However, this game is not without it’s problems. Things like Chun-li’s stored super mainly because there was no way to change the finished game. The answer to this problem? Find a way around it. Chun-li’s stored super was a viable tournament strategy.These problems were handled by the players, not by the developers, mainly because they couldn’t. There were no ways to change a finished game.

Enter present day. It is within the first month of the new Mortal Kombat coming out and already glitches (eg. storing parries) have been found (partially to the wicked fast transfer of info over the internet). The comments on the articles about these glitches? Mainly a huge outcry for patches to fix the game. Why? If it is nothing that makes one character unplayable or breaks the game completely, then what is the problem? A character gains an advantage from the use of this glitch, so it must be patched? This can only lead down to a certain path, which is the equivalent of fighting game communism.

Super Street Fighter 4 is a critically acclaimed game, and rightfully so. It’s extremely balanced, the graphics are good, and the system is crisp. The caveat that is found with the game is what? The game itself is boring. Why is this? Many people point to “poor design choices” or “fireball warz”. This isn’t the main reason. The main reason is that every character has been nerfed. Nerfed and nerfed and nerfed from previous iterations or designs that strategies have become so fixated on a single path that variation can hardly be applied to the system, which brings me back to my main point. Patches.

“But Author!” you contest “Those weren’t patches!” Weren’t they though? Although the game itself was changed dramatically, the characters inside did not. Patches, because of cry for them from the community, brought these characters down to a level equivalent to fighting game communism. Characters are similar, techniques are fixed, and eventually that creates a boring game. I believe this is the reason why Ono is creating a clear defining line between good and bad characters in A.E. SSF4.

Patches water down a game full of excitement, mainly for the public. This is ironic because the public wants an exciting game by having one that is based on player skill. The obvious answer to having a game based completely on player skill? A game that is flat as the floor. The advancement of the game years from now will show the players that are skilled enough to use these techniques, or find many countermeasures around them. This is a truly balanced game, one without patches.

So, to conclude, please leave the word patches far from your keyboards when you see a “broken” glitch in MK9, or an intense infinite in MvC3. If you truly love your game, let the game breath without a change destroying the meta game before it can even be born.

END OF RANT

What.

you have a flawed argument from the start because you claim patches are nothing but nerfs. ssf4ae can be considered a “patch” since it’s dlc and it has quite a lot of buffs (and nerfs). bbcs2 will be a patch/dlc as well and it does the same thing: buffs a few characters and weakens others.

fps, mmo, rts, and moba games have all had ladders, netplay, and patches forever. fighting games just got started a few years ago. this is the way things have to be if this genre is ever going to compete in the future, and every developer is well aware of this. the “deal with it” days of arcades are done. it’s time to get up to speed with the rest of the gaming industry. going with the old way of thinking only ensures that fighters will eventually fail once more.

your problem is not with patches but with game balance. get it straight.

hahahaha

Some of the legitimate points you do have are severely undermined when you say “when you fight for patches, you fight for communism!”

And then the other points are just kind of…not very good.

EDIT: And what you’re describing is more akin to fascism than communism, but that’s besides the point.

If Sf2 came out today, then the six versions of the game would have been patches.

It’s nothing new to be honest. Arcade games recieved patches, the only period in which games did not receive patches was the FG drought.

Patches aren’t the problem.

The company behinds the patches are the problem.

Capcom being a prime example

:rofl:

That’s not true at all, Melty Blood for example went through a handful of patches in between title updates that were 100% free, Arcana Heart went through patches (that they unfortunately charged stupid money for), and so on.

Remember, just because the FGC in large was in a drought for Capcom games doesn’t mean everyone else was stuck waiting.

OR SOMETHING

And then PongBoom was Joe MCarthy.

Capcom or Ono, who nerfed Elf for like no reason.

Yeah at this point I don’t have any faith in them with these matters, but then I haven’t had faith in that area for quite a while now.

In this day and age we can’t be sitting around playing the same game for even more then a year, the people and generation playing now have changed so much that they won’t stick around for it. That’s just how things are.

You do realize that ST was the fifth version of SF2, right?.. According to your own post, clearly we’d be better off if we’d stopped at WW and A1, not ST and A2.

Anyways, your point falls apart because you assume for some unexplained reason that the only kind of patch that can exist is the dumb patch that consists only of nerfs.

edit:

Uhh, wouldn’t that be a “poor design choice?” :coffee:

Sorry if I failed in getting my point across, when I rant I tend to get mixed up in my thoughts

i’m a little confused. are you arguing this type of balancing is something capcom started doing only recently?

alpha 2 gold was an upgraded version of alpha 2. the entire cast, with maybe one or two characters, is worse in a2g.

if i’m misunderstanding you, go ahead and correct me. otherwise, that shit ain’t new.

I think you misunderstood my position. I was referring to how ST led a tournament healthy life because of the lack of patches after the game came out. The game was the 5th iteration, but it did not suffer from the same condition of SF4->SSf4.

That was a prod at the “scrub” mentaility

Balancing is not something new, but the community being greatly outspoken over glitches or characters that don’t have to be patched IS new. Some examples of this are Sentinel being nerfed, sf4->ssf4, and the new MK9 counter glitch that people are begging to be fixed.

And I’m arguing that that’s a set of bad design choices when making SF4 , not a fault of the concept of patching. We’re much better off with ST than if we’d stopped at WW, I don’t know anyone who’d disagree with that. Similarly, there’s games like Starcraft which had fairly robust patching and enjoyed long, healthy tournament lifespans as well.

Patching isn’t the problem, stupid patching is.

SSF2 -> SSF2T is good patching
Sf4 - > SSF4 is not

Im glad we’re on the same page

You did not undersand my position exactly. Bad patches from the outcry of people who can’t get around a certain technique or thing is bad. Game balancing is good if it is not just to please XXSniperXX420XX

Your retort is flawed because nowhere in his rant does he state that all patches are nerfs. I happen to disagree with him on his point that games should not be patched. The MK parry glitch clearly needs to be fixed. If in the past game developers could have in a cost efective mannor when to the arcades and fixed Guiles handcuffs they would have. He does make the point that charature balancing can get out of hand with patching. I don’t agree. MvC3 is much more fun to play after the Sent Nerf.
If you disagree with him thats fine, but at least attack arguments that he makes.

Please, #1 understand when someone is making a joke (even if it is a bad one) #2 learn the definitions of the words you are using.
“Fascism uses State Socialism to control production, to benefit the state or a certain ethnic group.” What production is being controlled, what country or ethnic group is to benefit? An example of fascism "
"Hitler established National Healthcare for all citizens, but only allowed Aryans to be full citizens, thus only Aryans could get the socialized healthcare."
Please for the good of whatever country you live in, skip a few elections and don’t vote until you know what the words you and those around you use mean.