My story is similar to yours. Except I don’t suck.
I enjoyed reading your story though.
Well, I don’t agree with the xcopy either. At least not until you understand why.
Ultimately, you need to develop your own style, then xcopy elements to fit into that. You also get the advantage that way of having an unusual playstyle, which can allow you to compete with better players.
You’ll learn what your style is naturally.
Well I got to play with Nasir today. He’s pretty damn good I have to say, but he definitely exposed my weaknesses in this game.
I’m passionately in love with Chun-li, which I think is a curse because she’s someone you need to work real hard with to do well imo. Fighting him and hearing him bounce off advice exposed bad habits I’ve been doing for years. Games like Marvel vs Capcom really didn’t help me stop jumping as much as I do. I’m also impatient, I get hit by moves that I shouldn’t be getting hit with.
I feel like I’m starting all over really. Getting used to this concept of “normals” being the bread and butter over “specials” is something I need to break myself into. If I played like I’ve seen people play over live back in the day people would think I was a button mashing fool. Yet it turns out they were wrong… SF isn’t so different from Samurai Shodown after all. :3
In that game it was common sense that specials came second to just knowing when to slice and slash with regular moves. Knowing the range of your attacks and which ones work best, repel, knockback. I put so much importance to special moves in Street Fighter that I end u p getting punished more than deliver punishment. Even if I do big damage, losing with my opponent at 10% life just because I kept spamming lightning kicks isn’t much different to me than having him get a perfect. I still lost.
This isn’t going to change overnight. I honestly don’t know how I’m going to let go of jumping in and lightning kicking. It works so well, so often, but it’s entirely too predictable. It’s like I know everything I need to know about Chun-li, except the damn basics. I have nowhere to stand on! lol
Just one day here, and I get told that I have my shoes untied… but already I can feel myself take a first step. SRK is taking me back to 1996 in such a good way. 
Do you have psn? I’m a chun li player too. At least until I get off this damn gamepad.
Playing+practicing >>>>> Theory. Don’t spend time you could be playing and getting better on SRK of all places reading the advice of many who (no offense) don’t know shit. Read posts from players you respect in your downtime after a session, if you can’t figure something out ask somebody you respect… even “top players” like Gootecks admit that they ask guys like Combofiend and Ed Ma questions… why wouldn’t you? Also, don’t waste a lot of time watching videos when you don’t understand WHY they play like that. It is better to be PLAYING IN A MATCH than WATCHING ONE or, worse yet READING ABOUT ONE.
The worst is sitting around in GD with all the other failed FG players who suck ass bitching about pop culture and women. (Not talking about my Wrestling Thread crew or the Japan thread you guys are great!)
As for your style, you have to define it. Personally, I suck at doing “motion” combos and combos in general. I can barely do a dragon punch. It’s always been that way for me… so, I pick charge characters. I don’t like to get in there and RTSD so I do Aggressive Turtling. Learn a few dependable things and go with it. Being able to do the execution isn’t worth a goddamn if you can’t 1) Implement it into your style, and 2) actually hit it in a match. There are a TON of Dudley combos I could do in 3S, but because I never really got good with the game or cared I could rarely hit them.
Some people can do big combos, it’s “in their blood” a lot of Japanese also practice super hard too. Personally, I don’t like to “re-invent the wheel” and pick a character that doesn’t fit my style. I like doing a lot of damage with each single hit or poke that I use, I like having a good air defense and a couple of solid strong combos. So, I play Honda. Don’t let the tier list deceive you, you may never win a major tournament but playing who you like and being good with that character is better than playing a character you aren’t so good with that others do better. (You’ll lose the mirrors and matches you could’ve won with your “comfortable character” this is why Japanese don’t really counter pick)
Street Fighter IV is a tough adjustment. There is no fighting game that prepares you for it, the speed is slower, there is no whiffing normals for meter gain (FINALLY!), Saving, SADCs and all those other things. You really have very little incentive to do an unsafe jump in these days too, so it’s a much slower pace more similar to CE: if you do a bad jump you get HK’d, HP’d, DP’d, Headbutted etc for free. (as it should be imho)
As far as the Super Turbo computer goes, that thing is broken as fuck. Being a Honda player I still scrub out to it when it’s like Psychic Counter uppercut Ryu… don’t worry about the computer. It does things NO PLAYER ever will do. Playing against it will only make your game shittier, if you MUST play ST and NOT HDR you should get a converter or a HRAP3 and play on GGPO against real people.
You want to get better?? Stop Crying, Grow some balls, practice, realize your weakness and have fun. You sound like someone put estrogen in your drink man…
exuctuone exicution excushion execution Ecksacushion
Isn’t he a veteran?
Doesn’t make me maybe a bit too emotional over the the issue, but thanks for recognizing that.
I think the reason why I put a lot of value in this issue, this game in general, for myself because I’ve gone way too many years thinking I was in a good place skillwise, due to how long I’ve been playing and who I’ve played against… just to realize, I’m not where I thought I was.
It’s kind of jarring. For the last 7 years of me being in the Army, I have decimated my opponents in fighters. I kicked so much ass at a tournament in Germany the guys in my unit literally did not want to fight me. They weren’t like you. They weren’t dedicated fans of the genre. They thought they had skills because they played SF on the SNES and that was it. They didn’t realize I’ve been a part of something more than just their weekend pad time when they were kids.
I was treated like some kind of bug. Nobody even tried to give me a good matchup. I started letting people win, just to have company over to play some Samurai Shodown or Virtua Fighter. Dead or Alive 4 came out and I played it for a few days with a friend, never again did he try to improve with me. I lived in a tier above all my mates and even the new people I would meet in the Army on training trips or when I deployed to Iraq (Dragging my work laptop filled with roms of course and two Saitek gamepads), I could never truly find competition.
I introduced nearly all my friends to Guilty Gear and Garou. Most of them never even heard of it if not for me. Like I said, I breathed this stuff for years.
So to come home and realize I’m nothing, that I’m several tiers of play lower to everyone else to the point someone like him can tell me to “stop crying” is a shock. I should be happy, I should be thrilled I found competition and especially online, where I don’t have to travel arcade to arcade just to find them empty and alone. Trust me, deep inside, I’m happy that I finally. Finally have true competition I can learn from and become better… but it’s still a kick in the balls to realize the cake (my game lol) is a lie.
The cake is a lie! X-x
Military heads are like that. Every guy and his mom will think they’re Billy Badass until you play them, then you start hearing stuff like “That bitch Aba’s overpowered”.
Just the way things work. As long as you’re receptive and attentive to those who are actually winning and come to terms with your own flaws without ego getting in the way, I see no reason why it wouldn’t be possible to at least play at a decent level.
I can co-sign on military folks being like that. I went to kaillera to get comp for that reason.
When I was in tech school, I ran into just three people who I knew had skills. One was developing and was only there four weeks, and had a huge thing for SFEX3. I could tell he had it because I destroyed him first week, and by weak four he was winning occasionally. The second guy I was with almost the whole time, but he only liked dojin games. The third guy was some random dude I met the last weekend I was there who was real good- but I was done the following week.
With online play, you can always find comp to stomp you- unless you’re top 8 Evo level.
This.
For great motherfucking justice THIS.
I’m new to the forums (though also an old lurker) and damn, this thread is helping me out a lot too. Not in the exact situation as OP, but similar.
After playing lots of SF and other 2D fighters when I was a kid, I got in love with 3D fighters. Started playing them all the time, quit for 4 years to addicted to MMORPGs and then came back to 3D. Playing online stepped up my game and I feel pretty confident of my skills on 3D fighters, but more than that, it awoke the fighting spirit I had when I was a kid playing in the arcades, back when the arcade scene was big here. And with that… my love for SF. So I got ST and started playing it everyday. I feel that I’m improving, but probably too slow. On 3D my next step is picking up a stick to improve my inputs (though there are also other things I can improve, the stick would help them out as well). And while that is also a limitation for my 2D play, that’s not the biggest one, not by far.
I remember playing against FameDouglas (Fei Long player) one night, and he owned me and the entire room for like 12 matches. I wasn’t able to stand a chance, and I asked him if he used a stick or pad and he replied “pad”. So if there was a gap that big between us, improving my tools surely wasn’t the only thing I needed (I pre-ordered the TE SF4 stick though, and I won’t cancel it).
I’ve been reading and playing a lot, and really looking into improving my gameplay. I feel that I’m above average, but that’s not telling a lot, I want more, I’m ready to take a beat and to give out some. I like the challenge. The better the opponent the more exciting it is for me. Even if I’m beaten easily, if I did my best I know I at least learned something.
So just like the OP, I’m looking for advices, tips, or just friends and spar partners to practice with. If anyone is out there hearing my plea and sympathize with our cause (haha) please dona… er, add me on the PSN or pm me here Anything will be appreciated.
Oh yes and I have headset \o\
Execution Aid
You don’t get to say that on forums.
On forums, people aren’t playing competitive games, they are writing about ideas and while doing that, tend to think about stuff. Most of the time it’s just theory fighter (just about all of it). So there is no think-too-much-itis on forums. Think, think often and think deeply.
btw if you “focus most of your mental ability on trying to react to things” you are basically just going through the motions. At your very best, with this approach, you will still be playing your opponent’s game.
XSPR
I must admit though, I am guilty of being a GD poster. 
We all have our vices and roadblocks though, mine is The Wrestling Thread. Thanks for the quote.
I always thought it’d be really nice if SRK had a ventrilo server for this type of thing.
scrub counsiling?
I don’t want to go through the whole thread, so I’ll just start from scratch. I’ve seen people saying work on combos and links, but that’s like trying to jog, before you can crawl.
I had similar issues when SF:CE came out. I had more of an excuse then because I was a relative youngin’. The problem was that I couldn’t do a dragon punch to save my life. For some reason I could do other motion moves, but not that one. Later on when SF dropped for SNES I basically spent an hour or two in training mode dong nothing but dps… Like seriously, my fingers were worn out. I’d do jab dps over and over again getting the timing down perfect, then when I got to the other side of the screen I’d jump back and do it over and over and over. Then I’d do stuff like throw a Hadoken from one side of the screen and try to dodge it with a dp. Granted I’m talking about home vs. arcade, but it did help a bit.
The point of the story is that the easiest thing to work on is execution of your specials. Now don’t misunderstand me, one mistake that novices make is that they seem to think whoever throws out the most special moves wins, and normal moves are just there for no real reason. You still have to be able to do them when needed in a fight, but you should be able to get them to come out 95+% of the time in practice before you can say you’ve got them “down”.
Before that however you should be familiar with normal moves. The five main types of normals are standing, standing close, crouching, neutral (straight up and down) jumping, and jumping toward/back. So every character (in SF) has around 6 x 5 = 30 normal moves. Plus there are also command normals. An example of this would be Guile’s knee bazooka. Hit forward/back and LK and he does a different type of kick. You should be familiar enough with your character’s normals to know what your attack will look like before it comes out. Another point of note: You have 6 buttons for a reason. Newer players seem to love to just use the hardest Punch and Kick buttons because they do the most damage. This is a good way to lose a fight.
Only after you know what all your normals look like, and can you execute your specials 95% of the time should you even think about taking the next step with your character. The next step is to know the properties of your moves. Does it knock down? Is it an overhead? What are your anti-airs?
Ryu is a good example of a character with a lot of options. His Tatsu/Hurricane kick knocks the opponent down on contact. His f.+MP is an overhead (meaning you have to block it while standing.). Overheads are very powerful attacks, because 95+% of ground attacks can be blocked while crouching, but around 40% have to be blocked low. So the percentages are very much in your favor to always block low. Overheads are good mixup attacks that capitalize on this. His anti-air is obvious, it’s his Dragon Punch, but let’s say he didn’t have that option, cr. HP would be a good option, or (in ST/HDR standing Roundhouse is good for longer range), he’s got a few others, but you get the idea.
Only after you get all of THIS down are you ready to think about combos, links, and other things. I’m not saying combos aren’t important, but in a fight I’d bet my money on a person who’s got all of these basics down vs. a combo freak any day of the week.
First of all forget about jump in’s to start combos. New players seem to always try to score off of jump ins. Many times this is a lousy idea (Unless you’ve scored a knockdown and are going for a crossup opportunity). The next tip I’ll give you is learn how to fight while grounded. Try to see how many fights you can win without an advancing jump.
As far as combos go the easiest type is the 2 in 1. The classic example of this is Ryu’s c. MK - > Hadoken. The kick can be canceled, meaning that instead of the animation finishing where he pulls his foot back you can go right into a special. You hit down and kick finish the FB motion.
Other types of combos are chain combos (AKA Dial-a-Combo). The SF games that have these are fairly rare. The notable games that do have them are the vs. series and SFA1. Basically you’re usually able to combo lp>lk>mp>mk etc. in rapid succession without waiting for the recovery on your first attack before you go into your second attack. Other than some people being able to cancel a light attack into another light one these don’t really exist outside of these games (there are a few exceptions though.)
Then there are the link combos. These are tough. They require precise timing. You have to wait for one normal to finish before your next one will come out, and unless your timing is air tight, you end your combo. Not all attacks can be linked from or into, and every character is unique in what links into what. You’ll have to find these on your own, read some combo faqs or frame data to find these. This seems to be very prominent in SFIV.
This post is long enough so I’ll wrap it up with this. Once you’ve got ALL of this down the key is to find out at what distance your character has their maximum effectiveness and try to be within this area. Zangief is only a threat up close, Blanka is good from mid-screen in. Dhalsim likes to play keep away, but he’s got mixup options up close. Vega is a threat to attack from anywhere, but his anti air is suspect, so he only likes to be up close if he’s the one applying pressure. You have to know what attacks are good for keeping people out of your zone. How to escape when someone is at an advantage, and why you’re at an advantage at certain distances.
Get all this down and you graduate kindergarten.?
Well said. :lol:
Having spent a short bit of time in the same HDR room as you last night, I don’t think you suck. Room to improve? Absolutely. Buuuut I don’t think you suck. I was trying to mentally take notes last night, but now I’ve totally forgotten them… sorry.
At least you are acknowledging the positive in the situation. There are easy access outlets for finding great competition which will accelerate the learning process. That wasn’t possible back in the day in arcades. As a kid, after I dominated a local arcade, I had to cut school, travel to the city and play in a much larger arcade that unfortunately was frequented by gang members.
Maybe it’s not as dire as you think it is anyway. What percentage of your matches do you win, playing quick ranked matches (just because that’s my only reference)? I mean I don’t win 98% of the time like I did back in the day in the arcades, but it’s been 14 years and many people are good at this game now. The competition is better and I’m just coming back to the game. If I only win 80% of the time now I don’t take that to mean I suck, I just accept it as a logical result of the new context.