Hey guys, I finished this guide last month and it’s been up on the Eventhubs’ forums for all to see, but I figured I’d post my guide to playing Akuma here for you guys as a Xmas present of sorts.
Let me know if you have any problems with the link and Merry Christmas, hehe 
https://docs.google.com/open?id=0BzCqXSZz2cs3M2YzQW9KbG5ZSjQ
EDIT: Here is a link to a Google Doc on Akuma’s Matchups. If this turns out well I’ll be sure to include it in my guide and give credit to the major contributors.
Very informative and excellent read cheers!
Nice guide. My only gripe with it is that it conforms to the more recent Marvel 2/3 terminology for the names of the normals. Until five years ago or so normals had proper names (Jab, Strong, Fierce, Short, Forward, Roundhouse). Petty I know, but I’m a purist like that.
Notes:
Akuma’s fireball has better recovery (-2f) and worse startup (+1f) than Ryu’s:
Akuma’s Gohadouken & EX Gohadouken: 14f startup, 30 recovery, 44 total
Ryu’s Hadouken: 13 startup, 32 recovery, 45 total
EX Hadouken: 12 startup, 28 recovery, 40 total
MP SRK 5f invincible
HP SRK 6f invincible
Point blank HK tatsu deals the second hit in 12 frames, I think, Ryu’s tatsus lack the knee and the first armor breaking hit happens at 11f (IIRC). So it’s about equal as an armor break, and is actually better in a cr.mk cancel for example. This all only if the knee hits of course.
The rest: too much information, brain promptly shutting down to prevent dizzy.
I’m interested to see your forthcoming notes on zoning/midscreen game (as noted at the top of page 23)
dear god how long did it take u?
1 frame faster to recover, right?
Ever since i first played sf2 in the arcade, its always been “light, medium, strong” for me personally. Or “weak medium fierce” for both P and K.
Sent from my DROID4 using Tapatalk 2
I’m well aware of the vernacular used when talking in person. When I tell someone in person I use the terms Strong, Fierce, Roundhouse etc but for the sake of consistency I decided to keep the nomenclature the same throughout (which also meant tweaking some of my own personal notes, as well as some cleaning up the formatting of several other members’ posts such as LoyalSol, VA55, Rikudou etc. Nothing wrong with how they wrote their shorthand, but I tried to use one consistent format throughout. Sorry if it bothers you haha
It took a little over a month I think. I cranked this sucker out pretty fast whenever I had the free time. About half of it was actually written on my smartphone believe it or not. The lists and such things were already kept on my Evernote app already, but the formatting is what took the longest.
@KTSmith
I’ll have a look at it after the Holidays. I just got my Hauppauge HD PVR 2 Gaming Edition Video Capture card and I’ve been too busy to even try it out yet haha. After the Holidays I’ll probably look into tweaking the guide a bit more. Probably around mid-January.
Funny enough, I actually decided to take the entire month of December off from playing SSFIV, just to make sure things stay fresh. I’m really hoping they update to a version 2013 next year, it will really inspire me to pick the game up again haha.
@Komatik
Are you sure the HP SRK has more invincibility frames than the MP SRK? I just checked the frame data and it doesn’t lie; it does appear that you’re correct - but I’m a bit puzzled since I thought one of the buffs they gave to Akuma was increased invincibility on his MP version, making it the most reliable version. Perhaps I jsut assumed this meant it had more invincibility than the HP SRK, but perhaps people at the time of the update were simply saying it was the most reliable because it is easier to get all hits when anti-air’ing compared to the HP SRK.
Anecdotal evidence from my own lab testing seems to show that MP SRK trades less often, so can someone shed some light on this? Is the frame data not current for v. 2012, am I crazy, or is MP SRK not the most consistent anti-air? Discuss.
I should also mention that I’m pretty salty that this guide lost Eventhub’s monthly guide contest to some dude’s Deejay guide. Feel free to message Catalyst, DreamKing, etc if you think this guide is dope, cuz I think that I would get more exposure if this ended up on the front page of Eventhubs…
Maybe they didn’t even notice I posted it? sigh
People argue that MP SRK is the better AA even though it has 1 less invincibility frame because:
It’s pretty difficult to get consistent 3 hits when anti airing with HP SRK, it usually gives 2 hits, in that case MP SRK would give you overall more damage, IIRC it’s 130 vs 80 or 90 damage
I think MP SRK has a slightly wider hitbox, I’m not 100% positive about this, but since all of Akuma’s SRKs have pretty weak wide hitboxes any extra pixels would help to avoid whiffing your SRK waiting for a huge punish, Specially vs empty jumps.
I really wish MP’s first hit would knockdown (leave HP SRK alone though, gotta love them grounded combos after FADCing the first hit), then it would definitely be the best AA option for Akuma.
People argue that MP SRK is the better AA even though it has 1 less invincibility frame because:
It’s pretty difficult to get consistent 3 hits when anti airing with HP SRK, it usually gives 2 hits, in that case MP SRK would give you overall more damage, IIRC it’s 130 vs 80 or 90 damage
I think MP SRK has a slightly wider hitbox, I’m not 100% positive about this, but since all of Akuma’s SRKs have pretty weak wide hitboxes any extra pixels would help to avoid whiffing your SRK waiting for a huge punish, Specially vs empty jumps.
I really wish MP’s first hit would knockdown (leave HP SRK alone though, gotta love them grounded combos after FADCing the first hit), then it would definitely be the best AA option for Akuma.
Nah, I get why the shorthand is used. More people use it than not, so many people aren’t even aware of the proper names anymore anyway. The shorthand is more well known now and it’s also faster to type, so it makes sense to use it I guess. It’s just a personal peeve I’ve had though since it started replacing the proper names.
No idea what cabinets you saw. The five machines that they had around here between 91 - 98 (including SF3) had the old school names right under the buttons. The only one that didn’t was one at a local college, which was blank. All of the instruction manuals for the games on the SNES through 3DO and Saturn/PSX had them too. The funny thing though is that in the control options in SF4 it uses the LMH notation too. So I guess it’s just Capcom’s fault in the end.
I actually had something valid to say about the guide too, instead of just this tangent nonsense. Now I can’t remember, so I’ll have to read it again.
Good stuff man, will be reading through this.
Though a note on the first page; Seth is the lowest HP character in the game. I can actually somewhat stomach Akumas HP compared to Seths.
Edit: It does seem Akumas stun is the lowest which I didnt know
Edit2: Man this is an amazinggg guide. It has pretty much everything, GJ man.
I’m officially requesting rights to redesign the entire pdf with colors and pictures (hitbox thumbs for example) and for better readability.
include a section on matchups
I’m not 100% sure I want to include a matchup section. If I did I would need some consultation from some of you guys to help cover matchups I don’t know (for example I’ve seen VA55 fight Krone in the Viper match, which I have no experience against. I know tools to deal with her pressure, but I couldn’t definitively tell others how to zone her out, etc). Once I touch up the guide with general typo corrections and formatting I will consider undertaking more sections.
Shabrout, if you want to PM me with a more detailed description of what changes you would like to make I can work with you to include more graphics into the guide.
Just pick the infos on the match up thread here for matchups tips such as punishes. For general tactics overview I’m sure a google doc “open” can be done for us to writte what we know.
There’s some mistakes like about close HP:
“You can cancel this into Ultra 2 due to the hitstun it causes, but it also alters the hitbox of the character so that some crouching characters do not combo, so be sure to test out any combos into U2 before trying them in a match.”
Close HP is only special cancellable, no Ultra II cancel possible. It’s only using a teleport cancel then a Ultra II cancel on the teleport that we can link U2 after a cl.HP and the 2012 hitbox of ultra 2 reach the ground (unlike raw U2) and catch everyone.
When I get home tonight I’ll create a Google Doc for us to comiple matchup information and post here on this thread.
If Gootecks can do it, we can too haha.
So to clarify on cl.st.HP, this was an example of me not catching some of the assumptions I made when writing. By “cancel into Ultra 2” I assumed the reader knows this means “cancel into teleport so you can link into Ultra 2”
, so my bad - I’ll update the guide.
ok but then what character or particular situation where ultra will whiff if the cancel is properly done ? Imho it’s 100% granted as far as it’s on cl.st.HP hit no matter the range.