Davis and I bought Super Street Fighter IV to entertain the Dtoid guests at our wedding. We spent about twenty minutes trying to play it before deciding we were both too stupid and unskilled at fighting games to wring any real degree of enjoyment out of it (to this day, I have not gotten above a C rating in defense or technique).
While it’s obvious that there is a huge market for these sorts of high-level fighting games that hold an implicit respect for the player’s skill and understanding of fighter etiquette, I have to ask: why, unlike nearly every other videogame genre I can think of, do so many fighting games not include modes or options that cater to people who suck?
Let’s say that you’ve never played an FPS before, and you pick up a relatively hardcore example from the genre — let’s say BioShock. Upon picking the game up, you find a lengthy, simple tutorial that teaches you everything you need to know, step by step, making absolutely sure that you understand one mechanic before moving onto another. Even if you’re still bad at the game after completing the tutorials and getting into the real meat of the game, one could reliably say that the game, at the very least, tried to make things easy for you (obviously many nongamers have trouble handling controllers, especially in terms of exploring three-dimensional spaces using only two analog sticks, but that’s more of a general accessibility problem).
Why is there nothing like this in most fighters? I desperately want to be good at fighters — to see the depth in the mechanics that others see, to experience the split-second combination of strategizing and reflex that make videos like this so fun to watch (also, Mango Sentinel). I find it odd that, with only one exception I can think of, fighting games seem totally uninterested in helping me achieve those ends.
Tatsunoko vs Capcom is my favorite fighting game ever, for one simple reason (two, if you count the fact that I truly adored the idea of playing a game in which half of the character roster had an established mythology and context that I would never know nor understand without a great deal of research): the “my first fighting game” control scheme. Want to do Frank West’s hyper combo? Just press A and B at the same time. Want to do any one of his special moves? Just press any direction and the B trigger. In so doing, you put yourself at a strategic disadvantage — you don’t get to choose whether you’re using the strong, medium, or weak version of the attack you just unleashed — but you don’t have to worry about fiddling with quarter-circle moves that, while old hat to fighting veterans (this IGN review of SSFIV praises the utter simplicity of the controls, which I found kind of mindblowing as someone who to this day cannot reliably pull off a decent shoryuken or feed one quarter-circle attack into another one without accidentally jumping), can be confusing and time-consuming for players like myself.
TvC’s simplified control scheme acted as my own personal gateway drug. I got straight to the awesome stuff — summoning zombie carts out of thin air, plopping servbot helmets onto my foes — without the frustration and confusion that defined my very brief time with both versions of Street Fighter IV. I wasn’t engaging with the game on its deepest, most complex levels, but the immediate gratification I got from the simplified stuff made me want to check out the more complicated moves, made me want to actually use the “real” control scheme. Though I would by no means consider myself a high-level TvC player (or even a particularly good one), I have put more time and effort into understanding the depth of TvC’s mechanics than I have any other fighting game I can think of.
I really, really wish there were a stupid-person control scheme in SSFIV — a mode where I could do cool things and learn about combo strategies, while still being able to get my ass handed to me by more experienced players using the not-nooby control scheme. I have no ego about fighting games: please, Street Fighter, call me an idiot and call me a noob, so long as it means that I can gain access to a control scheme that allows me to pull off a hyper combo the first time I attempt it.
While it’s obvious that there is a huge market for these sorts of high-level fighting games that hold an implicit respect for the player’s skill and understanding of fighter etiquette, I have to ask: why, unlike nearly every other videogame genre I can think of, do so many fighting games not include modes or options that cater to people who suck at them?
And this is why Smash Bros. has always been and will always be my favorite fighting game series. This is partially because I love more lenient movement in my games (Crackdown Keys to the City is the best of ever), but also because I don’t have to spend hours of my life trying to learn that damn combo. Combos exist if I want to learn them, not as a requirement.
Also, because of this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ucNvRsaBsU0
The audio comes from a different video but is quite fitting.
I just got SSF4 a few days ago myself and while I don’t feel like going into my in depth feelings on the game, a bit more handholding would certainly be appreciated.
YOU’RE MARRIED!?
Lol. I guess I am the only person that listens to the HAWPcast. But I’m worth it, don’t stop making them. Also, more DW commentaries. =D
I listen to the podcast every once in a while, but I guess I just missed the important parts.
I keep trying to get into fighting games despite being utterly terrible at all of them. Almost, anyway – I loved IK+ on me Atari ST, even if the game gave your opponents black belts a lot sooner than (it was based on points attained, but the ai got better as they got higher belts).
All fighting games should jave the IK+ built in revenge mechanism. Someone just beat you? Standing over your defeated body, all triumphant?
Press t and their trousers fell down. Look cool now, silly red dude.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Xkx4cIm7Ps&feature=related (ik+)
Friend of mine at a forum has been playing Super SFIV a lot, and beat a guy who was playing as Ryu. That guy has now sent him death threats. Which is kind of amusing.
No, really. He put it up on youtube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PYsEMiHCMcA
Jokes on him. I told that Ryu guy where he lives.
Er, DarthEddie is me friend, not the crazy stalker guy. Why he put the video up I don’t know, to antagonise the guy most likely.
He even put up the video where he beat the guy, if you go into his channel.
it is true a lot of fighting games thrive off of giving the rewards to the OCD player who has mastered all the combos and the little intricacies such as Tech hits (case and point http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QgSAOxwr0xE )
but there are companies like capcom that know there needs to be a “my first fighter” style control scheme since getting new players isn’t easy for a fighter. i myself still can’t play virtua fighter or DOA without getting pissed off. but other fighters like MvC2 where among my favorite games to play. and knowing they need new players for fighting games Capcom has made the risky movie of announcing the simplification of the MvC3 controls to something like what was in TvC. so that would be a game you would want to look out for.
SCOOP’S HAAGEN DAZS!!!!
I never saw that video before… one word… Hilarious
Now as for that fighting game stuff, I gotta agree with you. I had a similar experience with Street Fighter 2 years back at the arcades, my brother would kick my ass every time and not tell me how to do any moves or combos. God only knows how much money I wasted figuring that game out. Then years later it happened again with Virtua Fighter 2, if you thought learning SSFIV was bad then you should stay light years away from any version of that game.
I’m Geussing that the devs assume that if they don’t make it so that you need to get super skilled at memorizing and executing combos, you’ll quickly master the game, and never have any possibility for growth; with super hard mega combos, people like Daigo and Justin are a rarity, and being good at fighters is something to flaunt around.
Tell me about it, dude, fighting games are the only kind of video games I can’t get good at. I don’t know if a simplified control scheme (like the one in TvC) would help ease me into the genre though because, in my mind, I like playing games on harder difficulties and challenging myself but using a control scheme that is different to what the developers wants me to play with feels like I’m cutting corners or cheating to a certain extent. When my brother kicks my ass in DOA or SSBB I just pin it down to the probable fact that fighting games just aren’t my thing. But I’m still stoked for MvC3 because the last game ruined my world. In a good way…
That’s insane. You really must be new to the fighting game genre. Off the top of my head, I can already say that Capcom vs SNK 2: EO already has what you’re looking for. There was also a Street Fighter for GBA I had a while back with simple control scheme also. All games have learning curves and all fighting games have training modes with move lists to show you what to do and an option to show you what inputs you’re actually doing. So just practice more, I guess.
I honestly don’t understand how hard fighting games can be for people, a special move is just moving the directional pad and hitting a button, even super/ultra combos in SSF4 are just moving the directional pad twice and then hitting one button.
Also, Street Fighter 2 has been around since like 1991. Complaining about not knowing how to throw a hadouken is like complaining about how you don’t know how to stand on one leg. It’s simple, easy to master and your own fault for not knowing how.
What you’re saying about TvC and it’s easiness to do special moves is practically DOING a special move in SSF4. Any direction + B? Holy fuckbutter, instead of pressing it, hold it down and move from the bottom to the right or left and you have your hadouken. You might think I’m making it more simple than it is, but you’re making it seem faaar more difficult.
Dennis Hopper just died. I think you killed him in that podcast!
RIP king koopa
Oh yeah I also sold SSF4. I sucked ass at it. Where do I start, though? I can’t get good if I can’t even compete at all!
I agree with Z80. Smash Bros will be the only fighting game that I will faithfully follow for years to come. I’ve dabbled in DoA and Soul Caliber, but after mashing the same simple combo over and over without ever really learning anything, I just got bored. Why ‘study’ one game when I could ‘play’ another?
Though, to be honest, even Smash Bros has its own hardcore following, and a friend of mine was part of that a few years back. Unfortunately, it just made me not play the game with him anymore, as the lighthearted fun just became too mechanical.
Practice.
I’m not saying I want a mode that completely negates practice — I’m saying that I want some sort of control mode that doesn’t require you to practice (and practice and practice and practice) to feel like you have a strategic understanding of each fighter’s capabilities.
Even the later Civilization games — which are hellishly complex to a newcomer and require a horrifying amount of strategy to play well — craft scenarios and tutorials based solely around teaching the player new things and making absolutely sure that the player understands the things they can and should do to be successful.
That so many fighting games get away with plopping the player in a room without an enemy and pasting a move list in the corner — the virtual equivalent of saying “stop being a bitch and just learn already, because fuck you” — as some sort of a legitimate training mode is bizarre to me.
I must be some what of a masochist then. The thing I find most enjoyable about fighters is getting creamed and then learning the moves well enough to compete.
One thing SFIV has to train with (I don’t know if it is still in SSFIV) is the Challenge Modes. When I first played, I assumed they were just for, well, challenges. But, upon playing them I found that they are pretty good training because of the way they layer handicaps on you. I find that I have a comfort zone of moves and when they’re taken away I have to learn more.
I find the idea of a training control scheme to be very counter-intuitive, but I can imagine something like that as a tutorial for a fighter: a series of hand-crafted AI opponents combined with handicaps that teach you when and how to use each of the abilities of your character.
On the subject of learning difficult games, I think shmups are probably similar to fighters for most people. Even though I love Ikaruga, there isn’t much connection between the difficulty levels except in the broadest way (learn to dodge and chain in Easy, deal with return fire in Normal, deal with more enemies in Hard and learn to laser.) Mushihime-sama Futari’s Novice mode is interesting because it essentially teaches you when you should use bombs to clear the bullets.
Frank West is the BEST character in TvC. Hell, I think he’s the best character of all time! His hyper moves are awesome, and his original game (Dead Rising) has always been my favorite video game. But to comment on the post, I think fighting games should have a “noob” control scheme. Like in Mortal Kombat, for example my friend always has to check his special moves every minute or so. He would probably profit from a noob control scheme, but if they did that for some games, it would probably limit other moves you can do…
Dude, I more than agree. I had no problem picking up MvC2, because 80% of the moves are based on quarter circles, which while frustrating on the wrong kind of controller, can still be pretty simple to pull off. But then, I get to Street Fighter IV, and moves have weird boxes and priorites, and if someone with skill fights someone who isn’t, its alot easier to get them into frustrating combos. You know the ones I mean, where you tediously fall down and have to wait as the character tediously gets back up, only to have the other person knock you back down the SECOND you get up. I hate it so much. SSF4 is amazing, but goddamn, if you’re not the kind of person who deliberately gains skill instead of accruing it naturally (like you described with TvC), SSF4 is a very offputting game.
It’s because Street Fighter is the only game franchise that decides to make the (reasonable) assumption that the only people who are ever going to get good at Street Fighter have been playing it in an arcade since they were five.
Basically, being good at Street Fighter, unlike many similar games, doesn’t have so much to do with good reflexes or well-chosen attacks. It has to do with knowing the secrets that the game doesn’t tell you.
I completely agree, and you’re not alone in thinking like this. many people have actually criticized Street Fighter IV’s trial mode because it only tells you how to do combos (and hardly even that) while it *should* teach you stuff like why you shouldn’t jump on every opportunity and stuff. as it stands you have to go online to find out stuff like that.
one game that actually DID do this right though, is BlazBlue: Calamity Trigger for consoles. the Limited Edition (which wasn’t very limited) came with a strategy DVD that taught you how the engine worked on a basic level, all the bars and stuff as well as combos and in-depth tutorials for every character based on what some of America’s (and in one particular case, Japan’s) better players had to say about them.
if you’re interested in watching these to get an idea of what I’m talking about, check this guy’s channel out: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oTJEPlBP-Eo he has the entire DVD set up as a playlist under playlists -> BlazBlue Strategy.
Hey Anthony, congratulations on getting married and I wish you luck with your new job. Big fan of your rev rants.
One of my favorite pastimes is playing fighting games and I’m glad you’re showing even a slight interest in it. It sounds like you’re having the same problems I had when I was new to the genre and began to play it competitively. Though it would be nice if most fighters had the options you listed to newcomers for them to ease into it, we all pretty much had to figure out on our own how to play these games “properly”. Truthfully, I discovered that there is no “right or wrong” way to play a fighter, just as long as you are winning, who cares.
You said you were having problems pulling special moves. Motions such as the classic “fireball” and “dragon punch” have been giving you fits for a while huh? I can relate. The first fighter I ever touched was Marvel vs Capcom 2 back when the Dreamcast still mattered. I couldn’t even tag out my character, let alone do an aerial rave or hyper combo. Today, I can steamroll Super Street Fighter 4 online ranked matches with Dudley. Whats the secret?
Practice.
Just like grinding for EXP or farming for gold, you pretty much have to grind these motions and combos into muscle memory. But that’s just half of what you need to know really. Having an easier control scheme can make execution with combos and moves simpler sure, but you will still have to out think your opponent and that’s where the real fun of fighters begins. Once the execution hurdle is no longer a factor, you can work on the psychology of your opponent and force your opponent to make mistakes which you punish hard with a combo you spent 10 minutes perfecting in training mode. Its a really satisfying feeling that you get nowhere else in gaming.
Fighters take a lot of work than most competitive games, but its immensely gratifying and fun if you put in the time to step things up. Whether or not you want to put in that work is up to you. I know you’re a busy guy and may not have the time, but being awesome at another genre couldn’t hurt your gaming resume. Don’t give up!
Take care, Anthony.
P.S The way Street Fighter ranks your Attack, Defense, etc, is really arbitrary and should be ignored. It doesn’t reflect your skill at all.
Whilst I can see the logic of claiming that you have practice to master these moves, the problem that is descirbed is more that the game doesn’t show you what to do in the first place. Take SF2, for example – funnily enough, one of the first 2d beat ‘em ups a lot of people played, it had a moves list for each character in the roster. A lot of people didn’t get that it had to be one fluid motion to get Ryu to throw a fireball – I remembering sniggering when someone I knew was practicing it and would release the dpad after each movement, believing it to be like a cheat code. Up up, down down, left right left right a b DRAGON PUNCH.
You even give a fantastic example in your own reply – in MvC 2 you didn’t know how to tag out. Why didn’t it show you? Why didn’t it point it out in training? How did you practice it until you had mastered it? I would hazard a guess you looked it up, though feel free to correct me if I am wrong.
I am not saying that the response “practice” is terrible, just that I can’t practice what I have not been shown.
Descirbed? Remembering sniggering? Nice one, Petey.
A counter point to what I just said:
http://www.hiwiller.com/2010/04/29/if-mario-was-designed-in-2010/
Which made me sniggering.
TvC was not the first fighting game to bring an easy mode.
I guess the first one was Street Fighter vs. X-men.
However, the greatest game Marvel vs. Capcom brought the idea further, where you could choose Normal mode, Easy mode and super easy mode.
What does that mean? Normal is usually for veterans, Easy are for people who play but cant make the insane combos and super easy are for the one who dont even want do do any work.
Then Marvel vs. Capcom 2 came, only with two modes, but fucking insane still.
Now they are making the 3rd one, wich in my humble opinion is way better than SF4.
Even more, Tekken is the best fighting game ever, and it is much easier to play than SF4!
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Practice practice practice.
It requires a degree of twitch, but less so than an FPS. It’s more about muscle memory.
Case in point: When under mind altering substances I can play Street Fighter, but not Battlefield Bad Company 2.
Have you played the trials on Street Fighter IV? They’re hard but initially they’re a guide for newbies. In all honesty I would recommend learning your basic stuff on TvC though. You’ll find if you can play one of these games with your training wheels off you can play almost all of them.
While I love Street Fighter, it did take me a long while to get good at it (and even now, I’m not that great), and it’s also not the most noob-friendly game in that it doesn’t tll you how to pull off combos and things. Fair enough, a command list is great, but if you don’t know how to cancel or buffer moves into one another, you’re just gonna sit in a corner firing hadokens until you get destroyed by a skilful player or the computer. Having spent a lot of time on Tekken, where using special moves all the time is pretty much the way to win, getting into the Street Fighter mindset took a while.
Also, I know what you mean about jumping every time you want to do a quater-circle, and I think this is a major limitation of using the XBox 360 controller. The analog sticks make it too easy to overshoot motions and the d-pad it basically a glorified stick with a more limited range of movement. I guess a proper joystick is worth investing in, but because I have SF4 on my PC, I use the keyboard, which I got used to by playing the older SF games in an ENTIRELY legal way. It also makes charge moves and things like Chun-Li’s super combo much easier.
Speaking of Chun-Li’s super, I do not appreciate having to do the stupid ‘hold back, forwards-back-forwards’ thing. I guess they thought she was too good in SF3 and nerfed her by making her moves fricking Herculean to pull off.
But yeah, also the trials on SF4. A useful thing would be a kind of ‘demo’ button where it shows you the actual timing of the combos rather than just giving you the movelist and saying ‘do this combo, bitch’.
If you are playing for first time, dont even worry about combos. granted i actually didnt start playing competitively till SFIV. I know people say practice but going into practice mode sucks and is boring. they do have a mode where you can learn the moves and the combos and thats the challenge mode. pick the character you want to use and the basics to advance are there.
also im sure you are playing on a controller which makes things more difficult but not impossible. i wouldn’t recommend getting a fightstick because as i am sure you are not even thinking of playing on a competitive level. all i can say is just toy around with it when you play friends or stick to TVC and smash bros. i personally dont like the simplified controls of TVC but its still a fun game.
Just bought my first arcade stick so I am partially reliving the confusing nature of pulling off attacks in games.
The one system I recommend in terms of fighting game newbishness is the Easy Special system in BlazBlue. With that, you simply push the right analogue in one of four directions in order to pull off one of the character’s signature attacks. It doesn’t let you use all of their moves off the bat, so it does encourage you to try to mix in some extra movements if you want to use your full arsenal, however if your biggest frustration is not being able to use an ‘Ultra’ when it will either win or lose you the game.. having the ability to just -use- it instead of attempting to go through the motion is incredibly useful.
I guess the problem is that fighting games have a standard control layout, when it actually doesn’t benefit the genre. Virtual On is awesome because is has its own dual-stick controller, if you were to replicate that with a single stick you would either water-down the gameplay or you would increase the number of confusing inputs. There seems to be a pragmatic reason for the way that special moves in fighters work, hence why if you don’t automatically lock onto an enemy in a fighter, you have to decrease the number of attacks possible or change the control scheme.. hence Smash Bros. small number of attacks versus Guilty Gear Isuka’s much maligned direction change button which allowed you to use back-to-forward motions in a fighting game where you would be attacking enemies either side of you.
what’s with all this coddling? if you’re serious about being good at fighting games you should consider finding a stick or fightpad for cheap and put your game face on. find a character you feel comfortable with. just because they look cool doesn’t necessarily mean they’re your play style. starting out with trials so you understand how quickly the buttons should be pressed is a good start but you’re eventually going to have to look up combos as well as youtube videos to add to your arsenal. its just inevitable. a game will never teach you how to infinte combo someone into the corner with mango robocop. those are found out through people just grinding the game so they know every single detail. i started out with cammy in sf4 and now can hold my ground in ssf4 with her. seriously Anthony eye of the tiger~!
About 6 or 7 years ago Capcom made a different version of Capcom vs SNK 2 for the Gamecube and Xbox called CvS2:EO that touted Easy Operation mode. This worked by letting you flick a stick in one of eight directions allowing you to do most any special or super each character had. It obviously didn’t sell very well as, prior to Street Fighter 4, the fighting genre was a niche market. Anyone who was going to be interested in buying the game likely had already bought the PS2 version without EO mode a year or two before.
Super Street Fighter 4 has a Challenge mode for each character in which you start by being shown most or all of their special moves and as you complete each trial you gradually are faced with something harder. the later trial stages are definitely not for beginners but the first five or six for each character should give you a really good practice session and teach you the fundamentals of playing the game.
I’d like to give Anthony the benefit of the doubt and assume he’s playing the Xbox 360 version of Super Street Fighter 4 using the Dpad to attempt his characters’ special moves. I once tried to do the same and even though I’ve been playing fighters moderately well for nearly a solid decade, I was having problems controlling it in much the same way he described. Not to sound like a 360 hater, but the fault is in the design of the controller’s Dpad as Microsoft presumably did not take fighting games into account when making it. It’s just about as direction-centric towards up and down as it can be. Trying to do the simplest quarter circle motion on it was almost as though I were being monitored in some kind of sick experiment to see how much frustration I could tolerate being denied the ability to do what was, in my mind, a simple task.
Bottom line, getting the PS3 version of SSF4 fixed my problem as I vastly prefer the Dualshock controllers to the Xbox 360 ones. One could also try using the thumbstick to control the game which was very awkward for me but more playable than the 360 Dpad. Your last option is buying an arcade stick or two which is very expensive and while the top players swear by them, others who have never played in an arcade may not.
Best of luck Anthony, practice makes perfect!
Anthony it sounds like your problems are stemming from your controller and your technique. When I’m chaining two quarter turns on the d-pad I release my thumb from the controller and allow the d-pad to return to the neutral position. If you don’t its really easy for your thumb to slip and make you jump, especially on the 360 although it happens on the PS3 d-pad as well. The problem with playing a Street Fighter game on a home console is that they were designed with an arcade stick in mind when it came to the combo moves.
I don’t know how TvC works, but with EX specials and needing to build your meter to use Ultra attacks I can’t see how the simplified control scheme would work well with SSFIV. Practice is the only thing that you can do to improve. Do the challenge modes for your characters to learn some easy combos. Learn charge buffering if you’re playing a character with charge attacks. The shortcut in SSFIV for the shoryuken motion is to double tap diagonal down in the direction of your opponent. Commit the moves to muscle memory, but most important never give up.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gVmc5ZepdVs&feature=related
You make a good point, Anthony. Somehow many of nowadays’ fighters assume that you’re in “the club” and tend to proceed from there. The learning has more to do with the characters and the underlying systems presented. Undoubtedly, part of it has to do with the learning curve built into the whole arcade scheme. Before ports of SF and MvC and all that, what’s the incentive for the game to let you practice its most core elements? Learn on the fly and pour in the quarters!
I agree that fighters (at least PORTS–Come ON) should offer a rudimentary tutorial that takes into account folks who have never played fighters before. The problem is though–the developers don’t seem to be going after people who would like to START playing fighters…they tend to market to people who are familiar with fighters and want to play a slightly different flavor. Like Street Fighter 2 but didn’t like Third Strike? Try SF4! Liked Marvel vs Capcom but didn’t enjoy the tag-mechanics or the inherent cheapness? Try some Guilty Gear! Like Guilty Gear but want it to be more needlessly complicated? Try BlazBlue! With all these choices its tough to know where to begin. And frankly–none of these games are keen to come right out and just SHOW you their mechanics.
Long story short, I agree. TvC sounds like it does it right. Developers need to begin to realize that fighters aren’t JUST for the hardcore. I love my QCFs just as much as anyone else–but my endgame isn’t competitive play at the arcades, it’s just to enjoy myself. When a product can focus on both enjoyment for the casual and depth for the hardcore, you really hit a sweet spot.
-Dak
What I find most frustrating is that once you put the time into learning all the complicated moves (I spent hours and hours perfecting my technique with Sakura so I could reliably combo a regular punch, an ex move and an Ultra in one go), you never, EVER get the ability to use it in the heat of battle. So many times, you get shut down by someone who just moves too fast for those strategies to be effective.
What I find, then, is I just use Guile and repeatedly hammer with regular attacks – I almost never use the special or Ultra moves at all. It’s actually really liberating, and I find that it simplifies the game significantly without feeling like I’m sacrificing depth (even though arguably I am). Block, attack, throw, avoid, counter, nothing too fancy. And I do really well most times.
But with most fighting games, the desire to go deeper grows when you have a sparring buddy. I love Smash Bros. to death (and played competitively in college), but I would have never gotten into it if it weren’t for the long nights of battling with my roommates. Having the game teach me its secrets is ok, but only when you’re playing with strangers. With other people around, it’s more about discovery. That’s why the REAL indicator of quality in a game is the strength of its matchmaking. When you play people at your own skill level, you can learn from one another.
Melty Blood. Just sayin.
Fighting games may not have the easiest learning curve but you can really just button mash through the single player mode on it. If you try going online like that your gonna get killed fast but I’d assume the same is true for FPSs (not really sure haven’t played one since Quake III). Like others have mentioned BlazBlue does have a easy mode but most online matches ban it and its not going to really teach you the defense/offense skills you’d need not to get killed. Fighting games are just a niche genre where you really just have to sit down with moves lists and play matches until you don’t suck.
I’ve competed in SRK tournaments and events (Final Round being my biggest one). I’ve spent hours and hours practicing combos, links, teching, FADCing on reaction and just drilling the inputs into my muscle memory. I mean literally doing execution drills in practice mode.
And even after going through all that effort to put myself above my competition I would be GLAD to see the complex motions required by Street Fighter and other fighters be put to rest. Even after earning these skills I still feel they are pointless
I hang around the hardcore fighters and the stuff they get exited by most is exceptional mental game: staying cool under pressure, comebacks, baiting, footsies, awesome reads. Much more then they get exited about tough combos.
You might want to read a bit of Sirlin’s blog, he is the guy who produced SFII HD. when it come to easing up on fighting game execution I agree with him wholeheartedly.
Crap, sorry for the double post but if you want the BEST FIGHTING GAME TUTORIAL ever made. One that tells you step by step how to use the controls, what setups to use, when to use them, techniques, counters, counters to the counters, habits to avoid, mind game basics, and a bunch of other stuff get Virtua Fighter 4: Evolution. The evolution part is important.
Link so you know what to look for.
http://www.amazon.com/Virtua-Fighter-4-Evolution-Playstation-2/dp/B00009YEK6
It is not an arbitrary “do these combos.” It is a how play this game well tutorial, even come recommended by VF pros.
BlazBlue: Calamity Trigger actually did something like this; to perform your biggest special moves, there’s a mode you can activate that is active from the get go that makes it so your special moves for any character are mapped to the right thumbstick, so pushing it one way would do one special and so on. It made the game quite a bit more accessible and made these moves a lot of fun to perform, even if when playing online my friends prefer it off. It’s a fun fighting game, fast paced, pretty easy to get into, while still holding a lot of fighting game intricacies. It’s cast of characters might be a bit of a turn off though if you aren’t into anime at all.
Oh, fighting games..
I started them early, specifically Street Fighter 2 and Mortal Kombat. I hate Mortal Kombat. You have no idea.
But I love me some Street Fighter. Which is odd, because wow, I was terrible at it back then. Easiest difficulty, and I would still have to continue 5 or 10 or 20 times just to clear arcade mode (I was 5, cut me some slack)
And then I started playing Street Fighter Alpha. Auto block? Yes please. Simple Super Combos? Oh yes. (in auto block, hitting a punch and kick of cooresponding strength yielded a super combo). As I got more comfortable with movement and timing, I transitioned into normal guard, then higher difficulty levels, and then higher speed.
Long story short. Wanna get good at Street Fighter 4? Pick up a copy of Street Fighter Alpha Collection and use the noob settings to get all the basics down, and work your way up. It’s essentially the same game at the core, no matter what anyone else says.
Mavel vs. Capcom is great for noobmatches, my brother and I had no idea what the fuck was going on, pretty lights, giant combos out of nowhere, and it was a drugged out slugfest in a fireworks factory, but with Captain America and fucking Incredible Hulk.
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