Yeah execution barrier is an interesting question. Things could be constructed so that the more damaging moves have greater startup, less range, longer recovery if wiffed or whatnot if you wanted to keep inputs simple. Input mechanism is interesting too. Would depend heavily on particular game. Now that we are seeing neural links and whatnot selecting SPD could be just to choose it or you could implement a sequence to go through before the move is activated. But by that stage I’d think having 3d VR fighting game would make more sense
This is more of an issue on Sony platforms honestly. The Playstation control, and I am not a pad fighter by any stretch of the imagination, was terrible for traditional fighters. This is why Tekken was designed to use cardinal directions found on the Playstation broken cross game pad.
We saw insanely adept pad players in the '09 rush of SF4. Snake Eyez is one I recall, but I believe there were other strong pad’Giefs out there.
Arcade stick is optional, especially since arcades have been dead in the West for well over a decade now. Sure, retro, vintage, and eugh “Barcades” are a thing - but they are no longer the primary means of game delivery and experience for modern players.
I still use an arcade stick because it’s what I’m comfortable with, but it’s not required.
There’s only so much a fighting game developer can do to appeal to players, and at a certain point it’s just excuses. If Brolylegs can manage to perform the inputs with his mouth and cheeks on a gamepad, it just demonstrates it’s about a lack of passion for others. I’m nowhere near that level, but back in the heyday of SF2 when I was “at the height of my power” I would troll my friends by playing with my feet on a SNES pad, using fundamentals and beat them.
You have to want it.
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Dude. We’re not talking about an Olympic triathlon here. We’re talking about playing a videogame. If a videogame is demanding that I muster up an exhausting amount of effort just to play it at a basic level, then it’s either designed for an audience with that kind of time or it’s designed poorly.
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Going back to Street Fighter 2, it’s not an “exhausting amount of effort” to learn the fundamentals.
It’s also important to recognize when a genre of games is not for you.
I dislike the JRPG, FPS, and Battle Royale genres - but I accept that these genres are not for me and do not demand developers alter what the audience enjoys to cater to me. There are no shortage of other games for me to enjoy.
As the Delphic Maxims state:
Know thyself.
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In his defense, fighting games are emulators of real one-on-one combat. FGs transcend video gaming, and are, at the very least, a hobby. It is you versus your opponent, with only your techniques, investment, mental strength, practice, and reactions. With this in mind, the investment of time makes sense. So, as an emulator of martial arts (which notoriously destroy your ego), it makes sense that the more practiced player will have an advantage.
I have never heard, in real life, of a person walking into a dojo or gym and hanging with people that have devoted their lives. Since the game is technical at its foundation, like martial arts, the ceiling is infinite (an aspect almost every other genre cannot claim.) Fighting games become conceptual at the upper-intermediate and top level.
I think Core-A-Gaming does the best videos in defense of execution. (A sidenote, the creator trains Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and I as well) Nothing would be hype if it were easy. The Daigo parry would have been 200 views instead of in the millions. Similarly, the excitement of playing at an arcade or tournament wouldn’t have the same explosive reactions that live on in the annuls of the FGC.
Another development to consider is that fighting game developers have already bent over backwards to make fighting games accessible.
I will quote my earlier post:
SFV: I think there are almost no 1-frame links. At worst there are 2-framers. Most of the offense is safe enough where you don’t need to know as much frame Data. Lastly, ever character in the game has a target combo.
UMvC3/MvC3 went from a 6 button game to a 4 button game. 3 button macros, too. Also, X-factor
SFIV: Also Street Fighter 4 had huge damage combos without links. One could be very competitive without 1-frame links. Also, there were huge reversal input windows, input leniency shortcuts, and very traditional bnb combos. The devs bent over backwards to make this game execution lenient. Only a few characters live or die by the 1 frame link. Also Ultra Combos
In all of those games above, fundamentals are incredibly competitive. The idea that you need one frame links, fly-unfly combos, run stop fierces, and SJCs ultras is false.
Fighting game fundamental execution is not hard. Kids / elderly people / tamagotchis were doing hadoukens, DPs, supers, buffered inputs etc. If you can’t do those simple inputs, then you are simply playing the wrong genre of gaming. If those are what people are claiming to be an entry barrier, then that speaks of a cultural problem and not a game design problem. I think video games are becoming much more, “pop in this game and boost my ego then go to sleep” or "I watch pros play and expect to be on their level without their hundreds/thousands of hours of practice. (Please see my noob in the dojo analogy above.) If you aren’t competitive enough to put in my work (e.g. frame research, labbing match-up problems, execution practice) then you are not hungry enough to be good.
Core-A-Gaming Videos:
Hard Reads: Why Fighting Games Are Worth It
One of Care-A-Gaming’s best videos celebrating the depth of fighting games and the journey.
Analysis: Why Fighting Games Are Hard
Analysis: The Consequences of Reducing the Skill Gap
In this video, he talks about how simplification won’t make people that lose win more. The good players would still dominate bad players with simplification to one-button hadoukens. In this video, he talks about how simplification won’t make people that lose win more. The good players would still dominate with one button hadoukens.
Why Motion Inputs Still Exist
Here he explains why the motion inputs exist to help the player and also create gameplay balance.
tl;dr
** Fighting games aren’t meant to stroke your ego. Motion inputs are one of the easiest things to do in gaming. Basic execution can take you far**
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Came across this and had to share. It is a hilarious skit.
Like I said before, I have a lot of questions and very few answers. I know my hands are brittle and can’t do what a lot of fighters ask of me, but I just accept that and don’t play those.
The barrier to entry isn’t stopping people from getting into the genre. Fighting games might be more popular now than they’ve ever been. Maybe that’s why execution is such an issue to people now: more people who wouldn’t have played fighting games in their arcade heyday are getting a hold on them now. Maybe a ton of them are getting into the genre through stuff like Smash, then seeing your Street Fighter and your Tekken and noting that at a basic level and an advanced one, those games are way harder. Fighting games definitely are a different beast than a lot of other genres are. Maybe what’s going on is just that more people are realizing that.
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IMO ease of access to modern fighters is way overstated. SF4 is not easier to play than ST or SF3:TS. Daigo was top dawg in all 3 games. My first time playing SF3:TS I played a guy who had a little bit of experience with the game–I used one of Remy’s super arts as oki and this random guy parried it just like Daigo did to Wong. Sure Chun’s super may be more difficult to parry than Remy’s, but IMO a pro player better be able to do it.
As far as SFV goes 3 frame links are the ‘hardest’ in the game, but that doesn’t mean scrubs are winning anything. IMO 1 frame links are prohibitive to fun. I think having them is ok for pros to show their skills and squeeze a minimal amount of extra damage. Just because Tokido was finally winning Evo wasn’t because Capcom made SFV marginally easier to play. He just hit his stride with his character who was probably top tier.
Easy to play fighters go back to DOA in the PS1 era or even Ranma 1/2 on SNES. MK had/has the same normal moves on all characters which gives some level of accessability. SamSho has never been execution heavy. Tekken 7 is still about the same hard execution level it always has been, but with an easier to understand combo system.
BBTag is easier execution wise, but the best players all put in crazy work to get the most out of the assists and tag combos.
Nobody with 200-300 hours play time is going to touch the pros in any of these “easier to play” fighting games. May be the best example of a “noob” being competitive is Lil Joe in Evo 2016, who I bet has a lot of fighting game experience.
To me all this talk is just like grand pa saying “Oh you whipper snappers think you have it rough? In my day we walked 10 miles to school in knee deep snow.”
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Not be contrarian, but SF4 was notoriously criticized for how “noob friendly” it was. There were so many aspects of the game that were dramatically simplified for new players to have instant success.
Nobody with 200-300 hours play time is going to touch the pros in any of these “easier to play” fighting games.
Well, I would certainly hope not considering the huge chasm of time investment between 200-300 and a professional player. Consider how much of a time difference there is between an NFL/MLB/NBA player compared to 200-300 hours. In my own sport, sport BJJ, the “price of poker” for advancement is usually in the thousands of hours and that isn’t even considering professionals that have sponsors, own their own gyms, sell dvds, go to the pan ams, mundials, all-nations etc.
200-300 hour players should play against other 200-300 hour players. Perhaps, this is the problem. Matchmaking needs to be improved; maybe by basing skill level on online playtime instead of arbitrary points. Heck, there was just a post on Reddit from a guy discussing his 3500+ hours in Counter Strike.
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Why is it bad that people who invest more into being better, are better at the combos? Is it not a given that they would be the best players?
So my main point is that making fighting games a little easier to play execution wise is not hurting the genre at top levels of play. The people who put in the work still dominate and that is a good thing.
-BBTag–new players can do a lot of the cool stuff with out too much imvestment, but top level play still has incredible depth. So the easier execution IMO is an asset to the game. Same holds true for SFV IMO. These 2 games biggest problem was predatory pricing on initial release.
-on SF4-- The main valid complaints from what I remember were about Ultra combos being “easy” to do comeback mechanics and input short cuts. Still the game has an incredible high skill ceiling. I guess the number of dive kicks were an issue too–so much so that “Dive Kick” became its own game.
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I dunno, I don’t think we had it “better” back in the day.
Things were just new to us, and as the genre has grown - games have evolved, and become unquestionably more complex.
That said - fighting games as a genre is a pretty wide net, so it’s boggling to me that someone interested in the genre couldn’t find a game they enjoy playing and want to invest the time in.
This however requires a degree of objective observation about what you the player want. e.g. I’m not going to get mad at Tekken 7 because I haven’t invested the time learning to play Master Raven well, that’s on me. I can’t get mad at Guilty Gear Xrd, because I haven’t put in the lab time.
More important than making games “more accessible” is finding the fighting game you want to be good at, and enjoying it.
At low levels, all games can be enjoyed; and that may be the challenge. Finding friends and peers with similar skill levels to enjoy games with. I do have more fun playing Street Fighter 5 against my core group of friends than I do getting styled on by lab beasts; but that’s just it - I am not a lab beast. That’s not the game’s fault.
At worse - a particular fighting game could just not be your cup of tea. e.g. Ed Boon will never helm a game worth a good god damn in my opinion. I can ignore Mortal Kombat, but it pains me that that imbecile is misrepresenting DC comic characters as well.
No real loss. I have plenty of other fighting games to play and enjoy.
In addtion to all that nonsense, I’ve been really pondering on the value of including older titles as a bonus / extra with new games. If only as a training tool to learn the ropes of a title.
Barring the system additions and changes to various Street Fighter entries post SF2, if you can master the controls and thought processes to play a Street Fighter 2 or Street Fighter Alpha 2 - you will have a solid foundation to launch off into further entries.
For people who do not enjoy fighting games, the juice isn’t worth the squeeze. Again, I defer to the Battle Royale genre. Try as I might, I simply do not find the YOLO SO RANDUMB design of the games at all appealing, on top of the amount of time it takes to get into a game, etc.
Meanwhile, I can lose matches in fighting games I enjoy for years, and still cope. Some days I win, some days I lose - at the end of the day, I enjoy the genre and characters of certain titles too much. Although that may also be difficult for some as a coherent, or sensible narrative in fighting games is pretty impossible. Just view the characters as evergreen archetypes, and you’re off to the races.
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I hear some people say that developers are dumbing down fighting games and that it is bad for the genre. So I was pushing back on that. You better explained much of what I agree with.
Many of the changes being implemented are because the default input device, at least in many countries, are control pads in stead of arcade joysticks. As an example, try performing Zangief’s lariat on a dual shock 4 on SF 30th which doesn’t allow macros. I can make a control scheme that I am able to do the lariat, but it is far more challenging than on a stick which is easy as pie. Another example is IAD in GG series. I could do it consistently on the Controller S, but I mess it up on Dual Shocks all the time.
As a side note how does Injustice misrepresent DC characters? I personally think Injustice 2 is a great game and is Boon’s best game and also the best fighting game to come out of the USA which I realize isn’t saying too much. Japanese developers seem to be the only people who fully understand the fighting game genre. I appreciate that Boon does his own thing and his games don’t play like other games.
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I honestly can’t comment on pads outside of referring to tournament players that use grapplers and pads. They exist, but I have never been a pad player given the choice. So much so, that if I cannot play a fighting game with an arcade stick; I refrain from playing. It’s simply not comfortable to me, and I’m unwilling to twist my aging fingers into pretzels to play competitively.
Injustice is just aesthetically unpleasing, and in terms of “nailing” a character’s abilities, utter dogshXt. Total CHUD brain design. As a life long comic book reader, it’s nothing but a disappointment. I could compose tracts of text; but the A.B.I. series on Youtube pretty well articulates my distaste for Boon-crap.
Another little thing that irked me, similar to Michael Bayformers, was needlessly adding lips to Atrocitus.
I wish more developers “got” their licensed materials as brilliantly as Arc System Works did with DragonBall FighterZ. Yeah, it may not be the best fighter on the planet; but visually - the game nails what an audience expects of Dragonball.
Their Hokuto no Ken fighter was also in the same lane. So much so, that it’s hilarious game play imbalances inadvertently represents the insanity of the source material, and it looks gorgeous as well.
Apologies, this is diverging into aesthetics over execution.
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I respectfully disagree. Injustice 2 is a beautiful game, the animation could use tweeking, but the amount of work and effort the development team put into the game is obvious when I played it. Many of the characters feel enough like the source material to me. And the videos actually use Tekken as a good example of proper animation? Really? Many of the older characters animate like marionettes, very stiff. Oh the irony. The author is full of himself–what has he made? Lets see his work and criticize it, which is very easy to do.
I could personally nit pick SFV like how Ryu’s face is down right ugly, but I still have fun playing the game. ArcSys has nailed a beautiful look with DBFZ and GGXrd, but GG has so many things going on you can’t tell what is happening unless you slow it down or have seen it 20x. And Sol “Badguy?” --Yup , Sol “Badguy.” (BTW I think these games are amazing, but criticism is easy)
But hey, to each his own.
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Pardon the incoming wall of text, I had some down time. . .
I’ll spoiler non execution content, because I’m rambling and don’t want to bother anybody - nor do I think this is critical enough to engage in private conversation.
Injustice series are very visually literal games. If you only want high resolution polygon models, that’s fine. I’m not into that, and again - as a comic book reader, my preference is for gesture and panache over real world fidelity. For example, I find comic artists that rely heavily on photo reference boring to the point of avoiding their work, e.g. Tim Bradstreet, Greg Land, Alex Maleev, etc.
Despite not enjoying how the game play evolved; I always enjoyed the CPS2 Marvel games from Capcom, because they benefited from Capcom’s stable of influential visual artists, and had a strong 2D animation feel.
All of that was absent from MvC3 when it transitioned to polygons, and robbed me of what little joy I could find when Capcom would sprite-up an old comic book favorite. Pity I’ll never get to see a peak Capcom artistry sprite Black Cat or Ghost Rider. 
Can’t comment on Tekken as I’ve never been a fan. I understand they use motion capture, but somehow manage to make it super goofy in the final games (That damned Law toe-flip-kick). In terms of aesthetics Tekken strikes me as Harada attempting to make every flavor of Monster Energy Drink can into a playable character.
At least Tekken existing resulted in us receiving this delightful summary:
Agree on Ryu. '09 era and current Capcom fighters leave me cold. The closest they came to any sort of visual hype for me in this era was Tatsunoko Vs. Capcom (Import, pre-Udon inserts - such disrespect going from a legendary animation studio ((Original Intro and Original Endings)) to the Canadian fanfic purveyor). That however is a stretch, and not anything I’d hold up as remarkable; just the least worst visually of everything Capcom has produced in the past decade for fighting games. I understand game play is key, but I’ve always been aesthetics first - so if a game doesn’t grip me visually, I’m not going to stick around.
What boggles my mind the most is how Capcom had such a strong visual aesthetic and stable of artists who have inspired so many other artists, and they just. . . Produce these wildly uninspired games?
The eternal question for me is would anybody really be mad if Capcom devoted the time and energy to creating a game engine that replicated the artwork of Akiman, Bengus/Gouda Cheese, Kinu Nishimura, Edayan or Shinkiro? Pick one and make it happen. I suspect long time fans would be nothing but overjoyed. What we’ve got now has some of the DNA in terms of proportion, but that’s where it ends. It really feels like Capcom doesn’t know, or care about the visual aesthetic of Street Fighter. Down to the versus screens, where characters aren’t even looking at each other anymore and are cropped at goofy inconsistent sizes.
Arc System Works really appear to be the only developer holding the line and attempting to make fighting games that people will stand up and take note of. When I went to pick up my Gran Blue Fantasy Versus pre-order at the beginning of the pandemic, the girl at the store couldn’t stop praising the visuals. Going on and on about how she had never seen anything like it, and I’m over here thinking - “Guilty Gear Xrd, Dragonball FighterZ - they’ve been raising the bar since 2013.”
Which is pretty remarkable considering I previously viewed ASW fighters as the higher resolution, lower animation frames fighters. It didn’t help that Guilty Gear had a mid-90’s anime aesthetic that I found obnoxious. There was something Liefeld-ian about that era of anime design in terms of how “extra” everything was visually.
Fortunately times change, and madmen like Mori and Ishiwatari do what they can to keep fighting games looking the best they can. Granted, the 90’s grind of running their game engine aground (like Capcom and SNK would recycle sprites to produce additional games to the point Morrigan became a laughing stock in later games) feels somewhat imminent. I am curious to see how this Dungeon Fighter game turns out, mostly because 8ing is involved and I’ve enjoyed their work since Bloody Roar (what a fun surprise that was coming from Hudsonsoft back in the day).
Character naming quips is some low hanging fruit. Characters you may like are only special to you because you enjoy the series. I had this with a friend years ago who would trash talk King of Fighters character names, while ignoring generic to goofy names like Ryu, Ken, and EDMOND. I’ll just ignore the “please don’t sue us Mike Bison”, and cribbing OG young Tyson appearance. Yeah, Guilty Gear has some goofy names, and if you delve into what a music nerd Ishiwatari is - that goofy stuff makes some mad sense.
Well, that’s drifted well afield of the original conversation.
I say this as someone who was never comfortable performing an FADC, but as mentioned - being less than thrilled by the visuals of the game, wasn’t particularly inclined to invest much time in SF4 despite it being Street Fighter. I was busy playing BlazBlue with it’s froufrou characters - though as a Tager main, I didn’t need to tolerate much in the way of lace and belts on him.
Or I’d be weeping over the wreckage of KoF12/13, wherein a handful of staffers attempted to reinvigorate a beloved franchise; but the poor online play doomed it.
Now I’m wondering why I’m eternally perplexed by the SSF2T Guile “pretzel motion”. I wonder if it’s the charge requirement, as I can generally perform more complex inputs for other characters. The variable being those inputs don’t require a charge period. Perhaps that pregnant pause is what causes me to eternally trip over my shoelace in clutch situations?
Despite my inability to fully adapt to the pace and mechanics of BlazBlue, I mostly had fun - even when damned mU players were projectile spamming me to death, or getting caught in some wicked combo loops of other skilled players. An affinity for the genre and cool visuals probably kept me coming back rather than being discouraged.
Once more, I defer to knowing what you’re getting into, and sticking to genres you enjoy. The lane of anime fighters (Marvel, BlazBlue) has a heavy focus on. . . outright aggression that comes at you so fast, and relentlessly, that it can be discouraging. I can see how to the uninitiated getting stuck in a high number aerial combo loop is discouraging. Even if damage scaling is present, there’s a psychological aspect to fighting games as well - separate from winning. That when you’re just getting mugged in a back alley in terms of game mechanics, is just not all that welcoming.
I wonder if better incorporation of metrics and stat tracking could facilitate better online player sorting. This used to bug me in fighting games where score was tied to rankings, and using more “advanced” or “high level” techniques, like say an instant block to prevent a combo rather than a burst to escape a combo in BlazBlue would merit more points distributed to players when scores are tallied. So that even if you’re left holding an L, your ability to incorporate techniques into your game is recognized.
Metric tracking like match length, number of combos during match, highest average combo count, highest damage combo, use of game systems (instant blocks), not using game systems (bursts ((similar to how some game shows will allow you to call for a support answer with a penalty to your earnings))), and if you are matched against a lower skilled player how “easy” you go on them weighted against your rank (conversely, lower rank players should be rewarded more generously for felling higher ranked foes) could potentially create a more well balanced player pool system.
Add to that a smarter game ecosystem, where you could have the fighting game equivalent of Clippy (that little paper clip from old Office editions) that could assist you in lobbies, e.g. Suggest to players time frames where there’s a higher concentration of players in their region, or higher concentration of similarly ranked players online). This assistant could also possibly prompt a player of a higher skill level/ranking, before accepting a match against a lower level player - so that we don’t have lab monsters and enthusiasts mercilessly seeking out easy targets. Have it go the same way for the lower skilled player, “It looks like this opponent is pretty tough - are you sure you want to accept this match? Y/N”
Possibly even penalizing high rank players that abuse too many new players by demotion, should the matchmaking make bad pairings.
The online experience ought to be focused on to provide all players a better time. I’d even suggest something completely mad at low levels, such as bots (unknown to the players) to help lower ranked players become acclimated to the game systems. Mister Miyagi it, and use the fence painting to teach defense as it were. This isn’t to negate, or suggest doing away with well made training modes, but in addition to because we don’t want mastery of the fighting genre to be reduced to pure homework.
As an old fart, I was irked by the mandatory hoop jumping in Gran Blue Fantasy Versus to get a lobby up and running with my friends. I rarely play single player modes in fighting games. I buy them to play against friends, and other people. While I appreciate the effort for new players, perhaps rather than forcing us into a training mode from the jump - you’re thrown into a trial fight that observes your inputs, and then sorts where you need to go? This would be tough to pull off, but the metric tracking mentioned above could be used to determine a players familiarity with a genre before forcing everybody to run through mandatory tutorials.
This is also where we the community come in. If someone expresses interest in fighting games to you, choose not just your favorite game ever - choose the safest introductory option for them. For instance, I have an associate who isn’t into fighting games, so SamSho and Under Night were total non-factors when I tried to show them to him; but he knows Dragonball - so we were able to enjoy some Dragonball FighterZ.
That’s also where cool visuals help a lot. The cooler a game looks, the easier it will be to hold a players interest and keep them coming back for more.
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Good suggestions IMO. Trying to get new people into fighting games and playing them online is a challenge that all of us fans want solved.
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