The Arcade Standard

[space and time]

Alright, I've got a very serious question that I don't expect a satisfying answer to. I'm only asking so that I can say I've asked. The console versions of Guilty Gear have different versions of the characters labeled as EX. These characters are banned from tournaments. The main and most believable reason I've heard for this is because the characters aren't in the arcade versions. So my question is, why aren't the console versions the standard? I understand Japan still has an arcade scene, and that's nice for them, but seriously, why does the rest of the world have to ride Japan's dick so hard? It's not like the PS2 doesn't exist in Japan or anything.

[redsilversnake]

Because tournaments are played on arcade cabs, not on consoles.

[Hi-C]

I have never seen a console tournament before. xD

[redsilversnake]

I have never seen a console tournament before. xD

Me neither. Some were advertised at the last convention I attended, but that never came about, so everyone just played casuals.

[Digital Watches]

Well, you see this diverge a little between scenes. For example, I'm pretty sure console-exclusive content (characters and the like) was largely allowed in SFIV stuff, as I'm pretty sure I saw some Cammy matches on the big screen last Evo. But with EX characters, you have a plethora of issues to address: 1. A lot of the metagame of Guilty Gear revolves around matchup experience. Obviously with 23 characters that are for the most part viable, it's difficult to become good at fighting all of them, particularly ones who are not represented in your particular scene. 2. Not everyone wants to play through the whole damn story or mission mode or however the hell you unlock those things, and by allowing them in tournaments, you are, as per 1., allowing the tacit assumption to be that people know how to deal with these characters. Now while most people who main EX characters at the moment are pretty much scrubs, due to there not really being a reason to play them seriously (because they're banned), that's not to say that someone couldn't theoretically get good at one and win a tournament because no one had played that EX character before. Do you really want to force everyone playing competitively to take a bunch of time to unlock all the EX characters, and then FURTHER stunt the growth of players in smaller scenes by allowing 46 characters? 3. There's just no way we can know how balanced EX characters are, even within themselves. That would require a LOT of playtesting by competitively viable and experienced players. I mean, how long did it take AC's NORMAL tierlist to resolve? Is it even resolved NOW? 4. The fact that AC and AC+ are just about the same game (Barring some glitch with Robot and Zappa and maybe some other minor stuff) makes it convenient for people to run tournaments, since some people will inevitably have copies of one and some of the other. Allowing EX characters would RUIN that, as the EX characters differ between those two, further cementing, by the way, their role as non-serious extra content. 5. As per 4, do you really want to create a standard where there are 69 allowed characters, and numerous disputes about what version to play, because, for example, an AC+ EX Venom player is assigned to an vAC station? 6. For that matter, what happens when an AC+ EX Millia player is in a tournament match with an AC EX Testament player? What setup do they use? Who is forced to switch? Should they have to flip a coin? I dunno about you, but that sounds fuckin' lame. There are a lot of reasons, some of which I'm sure I haven't gotten to, why EX characters just would not make viable sense to allow in tournament play.

[Hellmonkey]

EX characters are there as extras, and aren't balanced with the rest of the cast or even with each other. It's not that they aren't viable for tournaments because they weren't included in the arcade version, but rather if they were actually balanced and meant to be played normally they likely would have been included in the arcade version. terrible thread

[space and time]

I guess I should have been more specific and asked why aren't tournaments played on consoles instead of arcade machines. That's what I want an answer to. Who decided that arcade machines were better than the console versions? They can't be more convenient, because a PS2 is easy as hell to carry around, especially compared to an arcade machine. Screw them running differently than the home versions, because a lot of people in the world are FORCED to learn the game on consoles, since the arcade scene is dead in most places, so even if they're slightly faster or something that's not a good enough reason. The only real reason I can see is that Japan has a good arcade scene going on, so they use arcade machines to play on, so everyone else in the entire world follows suit. And that's garbage.

I wasn't really looking for questions about EX characters, but since I got a good response I'll address that.

1. This sounds like crap to me. It doesn't matter how many characters there are in a game, if they're all usable and learnable, then you use them and learn them. If you're playing this game on a competitive level, you're going to spend hundreds, if not thousands of hours on this game. You'd eventually have a few matches against all the characters no matter how many there were. It should only take a few matches for you to figure out how to get around all your opponents potential moves. Executing that strategy is a different matter, but I assume that's the difference between a scrub and an expert.

2. Last time I checked, all the EX versions can be unlocked just by leaving the game on for a few hours/days. If you're really worried about having never fought a certain character before, you'll take the time to at least do that much I hope. Even though, by just practicing with and against the characters you do have, the others would probably all unlock before you even got halfway through the cast.

3. The only reason we don't know how balanced they are is because people don't use them seriously. They aren't part of the standard tournament level play. If they were, I'm sure Aksys would bother to try and balance them out just like they do with the rest of the cast that they know we use.

4. This goes back to three. The characters are allowed to change so much because they're considered extras. That wouldn't be the case if they were treated more competitively. Also, the latest version is the only one that really matters. Even though it's lucky for some people that they can still play AC without too much of a difference, AC+ has changes, and if they don't get AC+ and get used to those changes, that's no one's fault but their own.

5. Again, get with the newest version or deal with playing an obsolete copy. No one cares or minds that you still play Super Street Fighter II Hyper Championship Edition, but don't start crying about how different Super Street Fighter IV Hyper Championship Edition HD Remix is when you go to play it at a tournament. No one cares. And yes, I would and do very much enjoy fighting games with such large casts of usable characters.

6. Same as four and five, upgrade your game.

Really, all of those reasons more or less seem to be rooted in the fact that the arcade versions are used for tournaments instead of the console versions.

[M.Song]

the majority of all us tournies are run on console.... before you start talking like you know everything.... if you have ggac, the only reason you would want to get ggac+ is if you enjoy your story mode... its not the case of GGX to GGXX.... its the same game... just more stuff for you to put in gallery mode

[Nakkiel]

I'll be the first to say that most of the EX characters are fucking broken.

Second of all, "up your game" isn't a good retort. There have been MULTIPLE iterations that have EX chars in them. Don't you think if ArcSys wanted them to be competitive they would have put them in the arcades? ALL chars in SSF4 will be DEFAULT. Their inclusion is intended for competitive play.

Why follow Japan's rules? Well let's see, where is the largest, most important tournament for GG held? At SBO, in JAPAN. What if someone wants to go compete there? Are they going to take their EX SKILLZ to Japan? Don't you think it'd be easy for the Japanese to run a console tourney? Believe it or not, they PS2s also.

Have some fucking sense.

[AI__]

The creators threw the ex characters into the game as a bonus for console and probably spent very little time if any at all, balancing them. Basically they put them in there for shit and giggles, and your telling me that we should consider those characters in tournies? That's absurd. Why play ex characters that the creators themselves don't take seriously?

[tolore]

plus if we allow ANY console stuff we have to start drawing lines. Sure EX 'your favorite totally balanced(you promise!!)' character maybe okay, but what about justice and kilff? what about all the other EX characters, we have to start figuring out as a community what is balanced, and we may not agree. We know the main cast is balanced because the company tested them and balanced them.

1. This sounds like crap to me. It doesn't matter how many characters there are in a game, if they're all usable and learnable, then you use them and learn them. If you're playing this game on a competitive level, you're going to spend hundreds, if not thousands of hours on this game. You'd eventually have a few matches against all the characters no matter how many there were. It should only take a few matches for you to figure out how to get around all your opponents potential moves. Executing that strategy is a different matter, but I assume that's the difference between a scrub and an expert.

This is already why america is worse than japan. The fact of the matter is playing your scrubby sol buddy 1000 times doesn't make you prepared for a real sol, playing your competitive friends 3rd tertiary character doesn't prepare you either.

3. The only reason we don't know how balanced they are is because people don't use them seriously. They aren't part of the standard tournament level play. If they were, I'm sure Aksys would bother to try and balance them out just like they do with the rest of the cast that they know we use.

No they wouldn't, because japan wouldn't use them, which is who the game is made for and who tests the game.

The rest of your reason are okay for AMERICA to use 'em, but the problem is what happens when some of the japanese players want to come to america, or we want to go to SBO? It just plain won't happen anymore, it'll be cutting our small community off from the bigger communities.

[SmileJunkie]

...Venom does fireball poolballs /thread

[Killerwatt]

Hmm. Don't know if troll. That said, I will say this: GG comes from Japan, ergo they are the mothership for the game's metagame. They don't deal with EX characters, so neither should we. If we want to get any respect as GG players anyway.

[space and time]

. . . okay, I'll try rephrasing again. Why is the standard, which is set by Japan, arcades instead of consoles? Why do the Japanese have the standard as arcade machines instead of consoles? Don't talk about EX characters.

[tolore]

because the arcade is where they play the games, arcades sponsor the tournements and provide the space for the tournaments. It's not like america where we, the community, have to do all the work. Arcades want people in them playing games, so they organize everything.

[Digital Watches]

Look, space and time, whoever you are.

I could go and point out the fallacy of each of your supposed counterpoints, but not only would that be boring, it'd also be rather pointless, because this seems to be your main point:

4. This goes back to three. The characters are allowed to change so much because they're considered extras. That wouldn't be the case if they were treated more competitively. Also, the latest version is the only one that really matters. Even though it's lucky for some people that they can still play AC without too much of a difference, AC+ has changes, and if they don't get AC+ and get used to those changes, that's no one's fault but their own.

We're not playing a magical pretend game you made up. We're playing a game that was designed and released. You said it yourself: The characters were not designed to be competitive. No thought whatsoever was put into making them balanced, thinking out how they'd fit in with the overall game, etc.

Additionally, AC and AC+ are not different games. That's the whole point. AC+ is just AC with a bunch of bonus content. Storyline stuff for the fanboys, and funny extras, like the infamous GEORGE BADGUY and new EX characters. By reasonable competitive standards, the games are (for the most part, and certainly were supposed to be) no different.

So I'm NOT saying a game with like 50 characters can't work. I play MBAA, it's a fine game, and every character has 3 different versions, sometimes drastically different from each other. The point is, the game was designed with these characters in mind, and was balanced around the idea that they're all part of the game. This is simply not true of Guilty Gear, and if it was, it wouldn't even be a question. Of course we'd allow EX characters in competitive play if that were the case.

By your logic, why not allow Kliff and Justice? Why not allow, for that matter, gold characters? They're in the game, right? I could kick some ass with infinite-meter Jam (Unburstable infinite with super, anyone?) or IK Mist Finer Johnny, seriously.

So let's be clear: We're not riding Japan's dick, we're not imposing some ridiculous standard because we're afraid to man up. Arcade Perfect is an easy shorthand for Definitely considered during development and balancing. And as in my earlier example of SFIV, if the scene was able to determine that those characters were pretty balanced in the scope of the game, they'd probably be de-facto allowed.

[space and time]

because the arcade is where they play the games, arcades sponsor the tournements and provide the space for the tournaments. It's not like america where we, the community, have to do all the work. Arcades want people in them playing games, so they organize everything.

Wow, thanks for that. I didn't know that. That's definitely an acceptable and logical reason.

Look, space and time, whoever you are.

I could go and point out the fallacy of each of your supposed counterpoints, but not only would that be boring, it'd also be rather pointless, because this seems to be your main point:

No, this was my main point. It was even an entire post . . .

. . . okay, I'll try rephrasing again.

Why is the standard, which is set by Japan, arcades instead of consoles? Why do the Japanese have the standard as arcade machines instead of consoles?

Don't talk about EX characters.

But since you bothered, and I do appreciate it, especially since you aren't just writing me off as an idiot or troll without explaining anything, I'll address it again.

We're not playing a magical pretend game you made up. We're playing a game that was designed and released. You said it yourself: The characters were not designed to be competitive. No thought whatsoever was put into making them balanced, thinking out how they'd fit in with the overall game, etc.

Additionally, AC and AC+ are not different games. That's the whole point. AC+ is just AC with a bunch of bonus content. Storyline stuff for the fanboys, and funny extras, like the infamous GEORGE BADGUY and new EX characters. By reasonable competitive standards, the games are (for the most part, and certainly were supposed to be) no different.

So I'm NOT saying a game with like 50 characters can't work. I play MBAA, it's a fine game, and every character has 3 different versions, sometimes drastically different from each other. The point is, the game was designed with these characters in mind, and was balanced around the idea that they're all part of the game. This is simply not true of Guilty Gear, and if it was, it wouldn't even be a question. Of course we'd allow EX characters in competitive play if that were the case.

By your logic, why not allow Kliff and Justice? Why not allow, for that matter, gold characters? They're in the game, right? I could kick some ass with infinite-meter Jam (Unburstable infinite with super, anyone?) or IK Mist Finer Johnny, seriously.

So let's be clear: We're not riding Japan's dick, we're not imposing some ridiculous standard because we're afraid to man up. Arcade Perfect is an easy shorthand for Definitely considered during development and balancing. And as in my earlier example of SFIV, if the scene was able to determine that those characters were pretty balanced in the scope of the game, they'd probably be de-facto allowed.

What I was basically saying in that part you quoted was that, if arcades weren't the standard, and instead the console versions were, then the EX characters, which while they were just thrown in to be extra, would have stood a significantly larger chance of being rebalanced through the five or six remakes we've seen to actually fit along with the rest of the cast. The keyphrase in all that is "if arcades weren't the standard."

I understand how things are now, I was speaking about the possibilities. I understand AC and AC+ aren't different now, but if EX were part of the standard, and AC+ had drastic changes to the EX, which probably wouldn't happen if they were standard, but if it did, then AC+ would be the game to go to, not AC.

And you mentioned Kilff and Justice. Those two always seemed like boss characters to me, as such, it's not unrealistic that they'd be unbalanced. Bosses are supposed to dominate and all that. EX characters are just different versions of the characters we already know. Gold and Black/Shadow characters are like bosses to me, too. There's no reason to try and balance those.

If you disagree with any of that, that's fine. You've got your opinion and I've got mine. I also got the answer I was looking for. Thanks guys.

[Digital Watches]

Sorry for the confusion. I think my whole point was

So let's be clear: We're not riding Japan's dick, we're not imposing some ridiculous standard because we're afraid to man up. Arcade Perfect is an easy shorthand for Definitely considered during development and balancing. And as in my earlier example of SFIV, if the scene was able to determine that those characters were pretty balanced in the scope of the game, they'd probably be de-facto allowed.

Well, that and what Baiken Alex said.

[EternalLurker]

I blame this thread for not suggesting Justice and Kliff as unexpected, underplayed mains, I guess?

EX characters are just different versions of the characters we already know.

And yet

Gold and Black/Shadow characters are like bosses to me....There's no reason to try and balance those.

@arbitrary double standards: I lol'd.

[tolore]

lol Watches I'm not sure most of the people in this thread have any idea that baiken alex refers to me(or at least didn't until I made this post).

[Hellmonkey]

I guess I should have been more specific and asked why aren't tournaments played on consoles instead of arcade machines.

There is actually an arcade scene in Japan, which is what the game was designed for. GG as well as any of these fighting games are always released in arcades first for this reason; home versions of games are generally released as an afterthought (SSF4 is the first exception to this rule I think).

Arcades provide a place for people to meet and play in Japan not only for casuals, but as mentioned tournaments are organized and held at these arcades as well (note that it's not always people working at the arcade who run these tournaments) Any good player can tell you how important consistent competition and working parts are, and that is exactly what arcades provide. If the entire fighting game scene in the US lived as close together as they do in Japan, we would probably have something very similar, but arcades for the most part are very rare in the US since we're so spread out, and for almost all gaming these days netplay is a good enough alternative to playing in person.

Perhaps the bigger picture you don't see is that these arcades run arcade versions of the game and charge money for it because that is their only method of income (besides vending machines) to pay for the property and maintenance. In return for paying to play, the players get a public area with (hopefully) decent setups and competition, which otherwise are not available.

[space and time]

Sorry for the confusion. I think my whole point was

Well, that and what Baiken Alex said.

Yea, I shouldn't have worded it like that. I made it seem like I was talking bad about something I really didn't mean to even make a part of the discussion. I really only want to focus on Japan, since they set the standard, and why they set the standard the way they do. Sorry about that.

I blame this thread for not suggesting Justice and Kliff as unexpected, underplayed mains, I guess?

And yet@arbitrary double standards: I lol'd.

Comparing a Gold character to a regular character is like comparing Justice or Kliff to a regular character. They're made to be unbalanced, in other words, Bosses. Their purpose is to be able to beast through everyone on the cast. That's what a boss character does. EX characters aren't like that. An EX character is more like a Robo-Ky or HOS, just a different version of the same character, essentially a different character, but definitely not a boss character. They aren't made with the intent of dominating the SSS+ Tier, they're just different characters. Shadow characters aren't really different, but having Unlimited Tension obviously gives you an unfair advantage. If both people do it, it's not unfair, but it could easily kill the fun of the game if everyone is just spamming OD's, or is constantly busting out 100% combos because of 50+ FRC's.

Anyway, I guess you can call it a double standard, if you really stretch the meaning, but it's definitely not arbitrary.

Also, Hellmonkey, someone already answered my question, thanks for trying though.

[Digital Watches]

lol Watches I'm not sure most of the people in this thread have any idea that baiken alex refers to me(or at least didn't until I made this post).

Oh, right.