Just because there are few places where KoF players gather and play offline often, it doesn’t mean the community is growing. In order to gain popularity from various levels of players, the game needs to be easy to start with, and has depth in some level, and needs a great online environment to attract players.
Not everyone can drive to local offline scene and play offline casual / tournament on regular basis. Most people play casually online, but those people are the ones who support the game most, not the few elites from offline scenes. The casual players watch stream and spread words about the game to others.
KoF13 is definitely not a easy game to start with based on what I saw / heard on internet and at some offline scenes. People wanted to give a try on KoF13, but most of them were already spoiled by SSF4 or MvC3. In addition, online play was ass (before patch) which was not helping at all.
Ultimately, SNK needs to step up and sponsor some high level players to promote the game. After all, people show interests and become eager to try it hard when famous / high level players promote the game at various scenes. Otherwise, number of used copies of KoF13 will continue increasing at game shops. It was really depressing when I saw a stack of used KoF13 copies at local game shops recently and almost made me switch to back to SSF4 AE even though I don’t enjoy playing the game anymore. However, I doubt famous players will promote KoF13 once more fighting games will be released in the future. The only way that the game survives longer is to continue improving online play, and attract more casual players with the improved online play.
I’m not trolling, i actually just wanna play the game!
i think it is fantastic but i dont have any offline KOF player buddy to learn the game…
so WTF should I do!?!?!?!!?
of course SSF4’s netcode isn’t perfect but compared to KOF’s it is godlike
there is a reason capcom games have a bigger online community cuz KOF games fuckin suck online!
no offense but this:
"If KoF had players pool just like Capcom games, it would have easier time searching a player with a good connection"
is just total BS
I can play with my neighbor and the delay is still HUGE! there aren’t any good connections! what are you talking about?
SNK just missed the chance to keep up with capcom! the FGcommunity was dead until SF4 was released and the only reason of its huge impact was the good netcode and therefore the growing online community that becomes the offline community!
but SNK just fails everytime!!!
they release awesome games like the KOF games and Metal Slug on the marketplaces with horrible netcode AND games that nobody gives a shit about (NEO GEO BATTLE…) with good netcode…I mean…sigh…what’s the point??? it’s just…FAIL…EPIC FAIL
obviously you dont understand the importance of a good netcode…I mean…it’s a multiplayer game and YOU JUST CANT PLAY IT!!! WTF???
What makes you say this? There are communities picking up this game all over the place, where there were previously none. The issue lies in sustaining and nurturing the communities that are there, online, offline, regardless.
I couldn’t disagree more with this. Without those ‘few elites’ playing the game, there’d be no stream to spectate. At the same time the same demographic is entirely capable of spreading the word. Hell, they’re better at it.
I’m explaining current situation based on reactions from various new / old players of KoF.
Unlike Capcom FG games which have tournaments and big offline scenes at everywhere, KoF offline scenes are not big enough to attract more people.
Every KoF streams I watched only got max ~1,000 viewers, which is significantly low number of viewers compared to Capcom FG games, which constantly get ~5,000+ viewers easily almost every week.
In this case, few elites at offline scenes won’t be enough to promote the game. The notable pro players, who influence most of NA FG fans, are not playing KoF.
Few decent local players’ words won’t have as much effect as the famous pro players’ words in the community. In addition, people who have been playing SSF4, MvC3 don’t feel like to try the game because it requires higher execution, and netcode is ass (pre-patch). Since the game system cannot change, the online play has to be better. The patch did good job this time, but still more improvements are required.
~20 or ~30ish KoF players at offline or on stream are not enough to promote the game anymore. Although offline scenes gain few new members every week, future FG games will take some members away every time, and many will give up due to higher execution level. The casual players online, who watch the stream and become fans of the elite players, are the source of community’s growth. The best way to nurture the community is to have excellent online environment, and attract new players. Let them have fun time each other at beginner’s level for a while, and then a high level stream videos will be their next interests.
If SNK provides no more improvements for online, then the game won’t have more growth and the game will stay as a maniac game for very small group of people.
There are plenty of high level players. However, can the high level players influence the Capcom FG communities like other notable pro Capcom FG players do?
I should’ve said “high level Capcom FG players” in my previous reply…
I’ve been emphasizing the importance of good netcode all the time… I don’t know wtf you were reading…
I’ve been saying that this patch did pretty good job, but need more improvements in the future, so k?
C’Mon. Atlus and SNK are promoting the shit out of the game.
The community seems to really like it.
It’s supporters love it.
I see more and more players online all the time
It’s getting main stage at EVO, which means every Road to Evo tournament will be featuring it too.
Atlus/SNKP seems to care about the reception of the game. They *advertised *that they were trying to fix the game.
They drop the price of the game in celebration of it’s inclusion at Evo.
I played online for 10-12 hours yesterday, maybe had 1 game that was ass, but the experience felt vastly improved to me.
…and yet the ship is going down? Christ.
Enough with “the game is dying” shit. You know what hurts community growth?
Players soliciting that the game is dying in threads, based on fucking speculation of all things. This internet can be a very persuasive place, so stop making players think the game is dying and turn them away before they even try it. Look at the 3SO forum…one highest viewed threads in there is title “3SO Dead?”… Yeah, the online could use more improvements, but if taking big steps in the right directions doesn’t count for anything, what the hell does? The online is better than Marvel or Mortal Kombat(for me!), and I’ll gladly take the painful hit of no spectator mode in KOF13 versus SSF4 just so I don’t have to play fucking SSF4 anymore.
While I’d agree that continued effort from SNK is necessary to continue growth, I see the situation as being far less grim. Forgive my presumption, but it feels as though you’re looking too far forward. You’re right that the playerbase is minor in comparison to the obvious examples, from there is where we need to step forward and acclimatise new players and establish a strong base. Expecting pro players to endorse the game makes sense on a superficial level, however I would wager the playerbase would be fickle and easily move on the next time some ‘pro’ says something. I won’t argue that it wouldn’t help, but relying on something that simple seems shortsighted to me.
oh and I were reading this:
“Troll elsewhere… SF4 online is not perfect either. The game just has much more players online, which means more local / close region players to search for.
I’ve played bar3~4 people for hours yesterday (after patch), and the connection / input lag was not bad (but not perfect, still need more improvements).
If KoF had players pool just like Capcom games, it would have easier time searching a player with a good connection. In addition, KoF just doesn’t get support from high level players. Why? because poor SNK doesn’t have money to pay pro players to play their game and promote it.”
…which is sooo “wrong” and not saying anything:
-SF4 has more players online because KOF doesnt have a working online mode
-3~4 bar connections are still ass compared to SF4
-poor SNK doesn’t have money because they failed hard in the last couple of years. that’s why they don’t sell games and THAT’s why they are not able to sponsor shit
I don’t talk about your later posts which were right (funny that you are talking about the complete opposite from THAT post). I just talk about this one because it kinda…pissed me off
Played a 3 bar game with a guy about 600 miles away that was pretty soupy last night, but today I had a perfectly playable game with another guy who had a 3 bar connection with me. If most of my 3bar + games are like the latter game, I can definitely see myself playing this game more.
What Atlus accomplished was no small feat - historically speaking, developers hate throwing more money at games they’ve already released. It was generous of SNK to devote resources towards this patch.
Btw my first post is not wrong at all. SF4 online is not perfect. You might had perfect online matches so far in SF4, but I had some matches of SF4 lagging so bad just like pre patch KoF13 online.
Post patch online play is almost as good as SF4 in my opinion, but it lacks the lobby system. The new system successfully finds 3~4bar opponents as I set-up the filter, but it takes somewhat long time to do it. In my town, there are only 2~3 people playing this game and I’m the only one playing online. I’m not surprised that it takes long time to find someone with a decent connection.
And your last point is true, but everyone knows that already so I felt unnecessary to mention it.