People play o.sagat in japan, very few but they do. The problem with O. Sagat is that he’s too hard to play for a playstyle people don’t find rewarding at all really. No one likes the heavy reliance on fireballs, it’s boring. The truth is that O.Sagat isn’t OP, people just find him boring. For what reason would you say he is much stronger than the rest of the cast? I don’t really get it. Because he does really well against low tier characters?
As far as I know, no tournament player uses o.sagat in Japan, due to the player-encouraged soft ban on him. I would love to see proof of an o.sagat player at a major Japanese tourney if you are aware of any. Did you just say that o.sagat is too hard to play? I think very few people would agree with this statement. His boring yet effective playstyle would make it easy for people to use him and do well in a short manner of time. No one likes his heavy reliance on fireballs? What about characters like Dhalsim and Guile, who both have a reliance on fireballs? You’ve yet to logically prove to me that it makes sense to ban any character because they’re boring. If they’re boring to play, people will simply not play them, not instill a soft ban on them.
He’s strong because his fireball game is second to none. His tiger shots are very fast, have a very high recovery, and his low tiger shots lower his hurt box considerably. His fierce uppercut does 20-30% damage, his jab uppercut is safe against the majority of the cast if done at close range. His st.short and st.forward are both cancellable on the 2nd hit, which leads to damaging punish combos and safe and effective means to zone out anybody who can manage to get close to him. He has a few anti-airs which are highly effective at a variety of ranges, do good damage, and trade in his favor.
And yet despite this, he is considered to have a few bad matchups. But he’s still soft banned.
Again, I don’t agree with it, but it is what it is, and I’m trying to make sense of it until someone has conclusive proof.
I agree with you, a bit. Not that my opinion matters… since i suck.
O.Sagat isnt even the top 1 to be banned, IMO its ok for him to be allowed, but I also say that he is indeed very cheap and anyone that tries to argue against that is a moron. This game is more beautiful without him, its a fact. I dont play Sagat so i really can not tell if he is hard to play? Maybe against Chun, Rogs and Vega he is indeed a bit hard to use effectively, but against the low tier he has a easier time if compared with other tops. From all match vids I saw its always TIGER TIGER. Its not exciting. Some examples:
[media=youtube]8WbMnOo669I[/media]
[media=youtube]DxJCDJ4oSDc[/media]
As eltrouble said, its distant from the what top play should be. Its just happens that his good tools are simplistic and too abusive. Talking bout the low tiers, Rog only dominates Blanka. Claw dominates no one but does very good against hawk and almost as good against Gief. Sim does well against T.Hawk and Gief but if he does 2 consecutive mistakes the round is over, so there is hopefor the grapplers. But O.Sagat is different, he completely dominate these characters, its not fun. 3 - 7 match ups are OK IMO, I kinda like to work hard to win, but when its worse than that things start to be really annoying, and all low tier matchups against O.Sagat are like that.
So why O.Sagat is soft banned? I dont know but i think its because he destroys the low tiers too easily, its too unfair. And its better to see variety of chars. If O.Sagat were very popular in japan im sure that the quantity of low tier players would be also smaller, so i think it was a good move from the japs to keep the game more interesting. Sim has a similar advantage against the lows, but he actually is hard to use and has a very clear weak point which his opponents can abuse: no offensive reversal. Which weak points O.Sagat has that the lows can abuse? No throw softening? Shitty throw range? If they ever manage to get close… I cant even safe jump because that one eyed nigga gets up hella fast. As for the claw arguments, his dive loop is cheap too, not as cheap as TIGER TIGER, but is cheap. But he atleast does not need that to win which leaves the possibility of actually seeing him not spamming, and when that happens its nice to spectate, excluding his dive loop BS, claw is very legit IMO.
Thats first hand proof of O. Sagat soft ban, this was posted to expose Ganelon of making think to everyone that no such thing as a soft ban.
Ganelon didnt really interact with japanese to actually know what their opinion about Old Sagat were, he was just a mere spectator, n he tried to translate the players reactions.
Since its a soft ban, no one will complain about u picking O. Sagat during a tournament , even if they r burning inside to call u cheap, 1 thing is sure, u r not getting any respect of such dick move.
Good find Bastard. I had no idea Claw was also soft banned in Japan. I could see how this term and concept would have difficult being translated overseas. But now I wonder what they mean by “they’re not interesting.” Is that because they feel that they’re too strong of a character with simple and effective tactics? Or the fact that without them, the game as a whole becomes more interesting to play and/or watch?
O.Sagat is a “one dimensional” char, like this:
[media=youtube]HrhVkw9Fgl4[/media]
Wow, that second o gat video, that guy threw over 5 hundred tigers. Easily.
Sagat is one of the best caracters and he got some really bad match ups, off course you can fool new players with tiger spam, but at hi level i don`t think so
http://img818.imageshack.us/img818/3302/newdiagram.jpg
*take a look vs ryu , chun , guile , sim , dj, claw and dictator.
Afrolegends vs Hydlide
[media=youtube]8BAnYeSO534[/media]
Soto, that diagram is for New characters only, O.Sagat isnt listed in that.
I always enjoy watching Guile vs. O. Sagat, oddly enough:
[media=youtube]xidXHA8c7Ic[/media]
Which I’m sure most of you have seen. Then there’s this:
[media=youtube]5Yi7a0GqX7s[/media]
11:45, I don’t know who uses O. Sagat, but maybe he’s not that good.
I also had the pleasure of watching Mars’ O. Guile vs. Damdai’s O. Sagat this past weekend. It’s interesting to see how Kurahashi, Nakano, and Mars all have different styles in the matchup. There’s just these certain techniques that are very difficult to pull off in the matchup for relatively little reward, but they are so satisfying to see when they happen. Kurahashi, Nakano, and Mars all use these techniques but I see some use certain techniques more than others:
-forward sobat over roundhouse tiger shot or stuff attacks (Nakano)
-neutral jump fierce to hit even low tiger shot arms (Kurahashi)
-knee bazooka just spaced correctly to hit after a cancelled fireball but still go unpunished and leave time for boom charge (Mars)
Right after Mars took a break, I tried to do what he was doing and got my ass perfected. That shit is hard as hell. If anyone sees me in GGPO and likes to use O. Sagat, I won’t bitch at all, I want to learn this one.
[media=youtube]5Yi7a0GqX7s[/media]
Someone care to explain that 5 hit combo at 7:20? I have never seen that before.
Looks like a link combo:
j. roundhouse, close fierce xx fierce SB, crouch short, back (or forward) + short for knee bazooka
Pretty crazy shit, I think I’ve seen Kikai do that or a variation in his kumite.
zass posted the quote -TheBastard- listed above to clarify what his original definition of a “soft ban” was at the time he was in Japan 10 years ago. Since zass coined the term, I’ll defer to him for the meaning. However, I disagreed that the principle applies to the modern JP tourney scene since I didn’t see any behavior to indicate that when I was there 1 year ago.
Muneo uses o.Sagat and there has been an o.Sagat in just about every X-Mania. My natural response to o.Sagat’s rarity would be: how many n.Sagats do you recall in JP tourneys besides yaya? Regardless, that says nothing about the original meaning of a “soft ban.” New folks looking for some perspective on the term and multiple viewpoints on this issue can—and probably should—read the last discussion from a year ago: Super Street Fighter 2 Turbo Player Interview with David Boudreau aka XSPR from Japan
I never actually thought to ask about character discouragement while in Japan because I saw quite a few o.Sagat and claw players during my 2010 trip. And with the exception of a single claw player (who was interestingly shunned at times), they weren’t overtly treated any differently by other JP players. There were no refusals to play, no muttered curses, no frowning, and no eye rolling. Playing claw, I experienced no glares either, and even received a few “good games” bows. If I had experienced what zass did where players would either refuse to play against him or frown after seeing claw picked, then I would think differently. But I never saw any of that.
So my support for the anything-goes attitude isn’t directly from a JP player’s mouth but rather from my firsthand account of what the situation is in Tokyo today. Note though that I mostly played in a 10 yen (~10 cent) machine and at freeplay sessions. I’m not sure how differently someone would feel playing against o.Sagat or claw at 50 yen (or 100 yen, ~$1, the JP arcade standard) a pop for a casual match though. I recall NKI or zass mentioning back in the day that even Kurahashi would at times be left alone fighting the AI at More while intermediate players occupied the other ST machine where they had more of a fighting chance.
Its just corner boom into cr lk, bazooka knee, the cr mp didnt combo. Cr. short into bazooka isnt hard at all.
Ah, I see now. I thought he did cr mk to Knee. Stupid Iphone, lol. Still a cool 5 hit combo for sure.
Well i only play new :o
There’s a match of yaya’s N.sagat on youtube where he faces off against 3 players, and they have a “Tiger Counter” to keep track of how many he threw, lol. He ended up with 164 tiger shots after just 3 matches, lol.
That tier list only shows new characters. N.sagat isn’t nearly as powerful as o.sagat, so you can’t just it based on his matchup odds.
They’re fun to watch, and often fun to play. It’s a highly tactical match that can be difficult to execute, and really tests how well you know the matchup. Sagat’s plan is to zone guile out all long, whereas Guile is basically just trying to find ways to attack his extended limbs.
Thanks for sharing your side of the story, and for posting a link to the last discussion. I wonder if the Japanese community’s attitudes have simply changed over the ten-year period, or if it just happens that the people you and Zass played with simply acted differently towards Claw and o.gat.
I’ve never seen that shit before, it’s pretty awesome. I’m always surprised to see something new in ST. Is this combo supremely difficult to perform? Does it work with O.guile as well?
Whoever thought of it, I’m sure it was harder to think of than to actually execute. Like Pasky says, the link from cr. short to knee bazooka isn’t hard, and I don’t see why it wouldn’t work with O. Guile. Only difference would be having to press mk instead of lk for knee bazooka.
I was playing some o gat last night. After about 4 rounds I was curious myself how many tiger shots I was throwing so I started keeping count. I averaged about 20 shots per round. I played over 50 rounds that set, so in 1 sitting, I throw out roughly 1000 tiger shots. Pretty amazing huh? Against top players, you would probably throw about 30 tigers per round. Because top players would be better at dodging tigers, making you throw more.