Why does the FGC like stupid shit and what can we do about it? (My take on scene growth)

[Dreiko]

What it boils down to is a status quo that's been collectively built up over a long time, and it looks like a waste of time to anyone that wants to touch an anime game. The collective behavior is adding up to a status quo that just sucks. They are wiser to avoid it, even if it actually hurts their Game and they don't improve!

I feel the above quote and especially the bolded part touches upon something which to me seems to be the integral difference between the two groups in question. To the people doing this or anyone here really, even me to an extent, knowingly choosing to be bad and deciding to not improve is, for a lack of a better word, pathetic.

Now, there's a whole chasm of difference between being an asshole to people and merely judging inside your own head, but I think if we don't remedy the source of the judging then it'll poison everything else.

As for how to do it, for how to manage to deem something important enough to partake in it for thousands of hours and not consider others fools for not seeing the worth in it, well, it depends on the person in the end. I don't think it's fair to only cauterize this specific group or scene or community. I think it's mostly human nature and everything is pretty much the same. What governs popularity is arbitrary things in the end, random uncontrollable things.

Doesn't mean we shouldn't endeavor for improvement. Merely that we should keep realistic expectations while also not being too overly negative for no good reason.

[TheRealBobMan]

I remembered something silly that happened with a fellow student in a game design class probably over a year ago, and since it's relevant to fighting games, have decided to share it here.

I don't remember why it came up, but as we're waiting for the professor to show up, we strike up a conversation and Street Fighter gets mentioned. I tell the guy I'm not a fan of 4, and not so much even a fan of 3rd Strike even though it has some good elements, and mention that I play Guilty Gear because I like the mechanics in it more. Since we're studying design, he asks what's up with SF4 and why I don't like it compared to other fighting games. I mention that I don't like how FADC is commonly used at higher level play but is sort of unnecessarily hard (even compared to FRCs), I don't like the emphasis on defense and positioning when mobility is low compared to airdashers (I come from a Smash background), and I really REALLY don't like how mixup is handled. Some (most I think?) characters don't have standing overheads, and the ambiguous crossups are ****ing stupid since you can have the guy jump in, look like he's going to land in front, actually land in front after his hitbox makes contact with your hurtbox, yet you had to block TOWARD him since he somehow was behind you when he made contact.

After my little rant, which is just my opinion (ONE PERSON'S OPINION!) of why I don't like one game compared to another, he says he now never wants to design fighting games because the players are "too elitist and demanding". So, not wanting this to be his last impression of competitive players, since he says that he likes SF4 and think it's a fine game, I ask him about basics.

"Just so we're on the same page, you know what I mean when I talk about 'mixups' right?"

"No, what's that?"

I'm not going to say that an entire community of players has this shallow an understanding or this sort of attitude, but Novril's original post of this thread was addressing this particular problem. A lot of the time people pick up games, have fun, and get into them, without putting any real effort into understanding them. They're "just having some fun", and it's possible because the input/output is pretty straightforward at that level. I hit him more than he hits me and I win. What we'd like is for people to maybe try paying a little more attention and look at the underlying rules that actually make these games deep. Playing at my example's level is probably like playing Angry Birds, when he could have been playing intermediate or high-level street fighter. I might not think it's as good/fun as high-level GG (or BB or Akatsuki or Melee or VOOT or Team Fortress some other competitive game), but I do think that higher level play is more engaging and fun than "mash buttons" play, and would like people to know what that's like. Playing American football at a low level isn't much more than trying to pass the ball and run without getting tackled, but high-level football has strategic depth involving positioning and predicting the other team's play. I think... I've never played at a level above trying to throw the ball in a straight line more than 10ft, but I'm sure people have more enjoyment than I did or they wouldn't be playing it.

And if they can learn what the underlying game is like, maybe they'd look at other games and decide they like those games too. If they decide they don't like the game at a higher level, the best thing they can do is move on and find something else that offers more fun. If they really enjoy button mashing they can keep doing that too and I wont complain as long as they tried not mashing those few times.

As much as I agree with the posts about the maturity levels and community attitude being a little negative, I agree with Novril that educating new players that take the time to look beyond the button mashing is probably the best thing we can do to find new people to play with. Most of them like the games they play on a level that doesn't offer the potential maximum enjoyment the game can offer. The post was worded a harshly, but that point remains. I'd like to think that while some games fall apart at the highest levels because of a boring dominant strategy, or bugs, or emphasis on skills that don't require player interaction, players are better off finding out about that sort of thing as early as possible so they can find something that's better designed to have fun with. If, after that, they decide they like the game the way it was before they found out it's borked, and handicap themselves to keep playing it, I wont stop them. If some people don't want to put in the effort to play at a higher level I respect that too (I barely have enough time to try to not suck at playing I-No, so I can't really play other fighting games on the side at a level above "pick the easiest character and learn what his/her moves are").

I remember that in the local Brawl community, the players that performed really well tended to stop hosting get togethers centered around playing the game (which is what helped build the community in the first place), and put more emphasis on hosting tournaments out of their houses or a local venue so they could get all of or a cut of the venue fee, and then played predominantly with each other and shared information almost exclusively with each other. This wasn't just 2-3 friends trying to get better at the game together, but generally most of the "top10 in SoCal" status players. When people got access to frame data, they shared part of it but not all of it. There were important system mechanics that tournament winners knew about for years before the information became public. While that's every bit the fault of players that didn't know (for not finding out for themselves - if you play to win you'd probably want to keep secrets) it's really sad that things turned out that way. The game was considered unfun by many players, including those same winners, and people could have made a quicker transition back to Melee or to other games had they known about some of the stupid mechanics. But that would have meant less prize money. As much as I understand playing to win, I'm only going to do that if the game is fun while I'm doing it. If the game sucks when I play to win, and it isn't obvious that it sucks, I'd rather have someone help me find that out so we can play something better. If a game is cool, but there's another cool game over there, I'd appreciate having people show me. If that never happened I'd have never found out about GG.

So... Xrd is coming soon, CP is "sort-of" out now (people that follow BB hardcore have it, and people that play it casually or might be interested will get it soon), +R is out on almost everything (hurry up US PSN!). What is everyone doing to find new people to play with?

*edit*

Oh, by the way, what is the joke about that shirt from Novril's second post? All I know about the Marvel community is Pringles, Salt, Moustaches, and Kusoru won some big tournament with Rocket Racoon.

Edited November 14, 2013 by TheRealBobMan

[Vulcan422]

*edit*

Oh, by the way, what is the joke about that shirt from Novril's second post? All I know about the Marvel community is Pringles, Salt, Moustaches, and Kusoru won some big tournament with Rocket Racoon.

I honestly have no idea. This may help.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CPM

[Fenrir Werwolf]

WTF is happening on this thread

Also, every community has different problems, but I guess that this thread is America-centric?

Oh, and you cannot force a person to change idea on a game. Over-insistent attitude is more negative than else.

Said that, I'm out

[Fryght]

*edit*

Oh, by the way, what is the joke about that shirt from Novril's second post? All I know about the Marvel community is Pringles, Salt, Moustaches, and Kusoru won some big tournament with Rocket Racoon.

MAX (marvel letters) CPM (capcom letters)

Cost per impression is derived from advertising cost and the number of impressions.

Cost per impression ($) = Advertising cost ($) ÷ Number of Impressions (#)

Cost per impression is often expressed as Cost per Thousand Impressions (CPM) to make the numbers easier to manage.

So, basically, the joke is that if you want to max your ad revenue, you stream Marvel and AE tournaments.

As for this thread:

I think it is hard to get people to play games that are not as much in the spotlight. Anime gets a bad rep for some reason, even though the games tend to be good (imo).

Players already in the FGC tend to stick to the beaten path, which - for most people - is usually Marvel or AE.

For new blood, the skill threshold is usually fairly big. With both AE and Marvel, there are enough lower skill players for them to have some fun matches with each other. You don't need a lot of skill to mash out shoryukens in AE all day and have fun with that. Worst comes to worst, you eat a punish, but unless the other player knows his shit, you can usually get away with being blocked. Now try doing the same thing in AC. You will probably eat a 50% combo and end up in an okizime situation. That is because we have been playing this game for 10+ years. It was the same with Starcraft. There was no real way for new blood to get into Brood War (unless you were very very persistent). Then Starcraft II came around and there was an influx of new blood, because people remembered the name. Those people could play each other and have fun. The same thing happened with Street Fighter 4, Marvel and Mortal Kombat. Everybody and their grandma has played SF2 when they were young. There was a huge Marvel scene with all the pompous grandeur in the US. Most people remember MK from playing it when they were young. With GG, sadly, we don't have that mainstream recognition to fall back on. That's why I think it is nice that when people do get interested, they can check out stuff like Guilty Bits, which should shoehorn them into the game somewhat. I feel that Xrd might get some new blood into the game, as it aligns well with what the main public likes to play. Of those people, only a few will stick around, once the depth/time investment required quota breaks a certain point, as happened with Marvel and AE as well. We can only hope that until then, people will feel rooted enough to stay with the game. However, most people tend to have a short attention span and will move onto the next big game as soon as it arrives. Sadly, not even Xrd will fare to well when it has to vie for attention against the next Call of Duty, for example.

Edited November 14, 2013 by Fryght

[George Costanza]

I'm sure this has been said before, but I think that the a major issue is that Fighting games are INCREDIBLY different from other genres.

An action game, an FPS, even an RTS.

There are tons of mechanics in these games, mechanics that can be used to become a super skilled player when used and understood at its best.

However the best thing is.....you don't have to go on the internet or wade through walls of text to be good at these games.

You can learn how to play the game through the GAMEPLAY, simply playing the game will give you an understanding of everything. By the time you beat the game, you may not be the master of masters but you know what's going on and you're probably atleast a little adept to it. You know what shit does and you know how shit works and the key part is you didn't have to do anything other then PLAYING THE GAME in order to gain all this knowledge.

It didn't feel like school

It felt like a video game.

This is where fighting games tend to fall flat.

You can play the singleplayer in a fighting game on i's hardest difficulty and you probably know a good 2% of what the hell is going on in this game.

It's very hard for fighting games to teach you its mechanics without it turning into "WORDS WORDS WORDS WORDS WORDS"

The only other alternative is to be told "Well there's these helpful videos/wikis that you can read/watch that will help you"

But that's a problem. Most people don't want to do things that involve them NOT playing the game in order to learn how to play the game.

It gets to a point where it stops feeling like a video game and starts feeling like school.

[Vashimus]

I think it is hard to get people to play games that are not as much in the spotlight. Anime gets a bad rep for some reason, even though the games tend to be good (imo).

Players already in the FGC tend to stick to the beaten path, which - for most people - is usually Marvel or AE.

For new blood, the skill threshold is usually fairly big. With both AE and Marvel, there are enough lower skill players for them to have some fun matches with each other. You don't need a lot of skill to mash out shoryukens in AE all day and have fun with that. Worst comes to worst, you eat a punish, but unless the other player knows his shit, you can usually get away with being blocked. Now try doing the same thing in AC. You will probably eat a 50% combo and end up in an okizime situation. That is because we have been playing this game for 10+ years. It was the same with Starcraft. There was no real way for new blood to get into Brood War (unless you were very very persistent). Then Starcraft II came around and there was an influx of new blood, because people remembered the name. Those people could play each other and have fun. The same thing happened with Street Fighter 4, Marvel and Mortal Kombat. Everybody and their grandma has played SF2 when they were young. There was a huge Marvel scene with all the pompous grandeur in the US. Most people remember MK from playing it when they were young. With GG, sadly, we don't have that mainstream recognition to fall back on. That's why I think it is nice that when people do get interested, they can check out stuff like Guilty Bits, which should shoehorn them into the game somewhat. I feel that Xrd might get some new blood into the game, as it aligns well with what the main public likes to play. Of those people, only a few will stick around, once the depth/time investment required quota breaks a certain point, as happened with Marvel and AE as well. We can only hope that until then, people will feel rooted enough to stay with the game. However, most people tend to have a short attention span and will move onto the next big game as soon as it arrives. Sadly, not even Xrd will fare to well when it has to vie for attention against the next Call of Duty, for example.

Well I highly doubt ArcSys's goal with Xrd is to try and compete with Call of Duty, but I agree with your point.

As for the way "New Blood" is treated, and I'd hate to sound preachy, but think it's that a lot of people really just aren't aware of how unfriendly they appear to people, either because that's simply they way they are or they just gradually became that way over time and haven't noticed it. This is a case for a lot of communities. Even then, it's still possible for these people to help players get better.

Now I don't know him personally, but just by glancing at his posts, I can safely assume Novril is a very blunt, brutally honest, straight-forward person and is not one to sugar-coat things. When called out on it by others who think he's being insensitive/rude, he says "That's just how I normally speak."

And that's fine. We're human. Not everyone's going to like everyone they meet in life, and we can't change people. But just looking the effort done into making the Guilty Bits videos, it's also apparent that he wants to help newer players get into Guilty Gear and help the scene grow. He might not seem nice, but he's certainly kind, which are two different things. And that's the case with this thread. Good intentions, but not exactly conveyed in the best way, so you can't fault people like reaVer and Star-Demon for giving backlash.

People are gonna play whatever they wanna play. We can't fault anyone for liking something and playing it. Don't call someone stupid for liking Marvel, and then get pissed when someone calls you a weeaboo for liking anime fighters. No one likes to be labeled. Someone prefers AE over Guilty Gear? OK, that's his thing. Max posting a hundred videos of the new Killer Instinct and getting hype? Whatever, he's excited for the game, who are we to judge? The best thing to do is help people out the people coming in who are already interested, as "converting" people rarely gets anywhere.

Again, sorry to sound preachy.

I'm sure this has been said before, but I think that the a major issue is that Fighting games are INCREDIBLY different from other genres. You can play the singleplayer in a fighting game on i's hardest difficulty and you probably know a good 2% of what the hell is going on in this game.

It's very hard for fighting games to teach you its mechanics without it turning into "WORDS WORDS WORDS WORDS WORDS"

The only other alternative is to be told "Well there's these helpful videos/wikis that you can read/watch that will help you"

But that's a problem. Most people don't want to do things that involve them NOT playing the game in order to learn how to play the game.

It gets to a point where it stops feeling like a video game and starts feeling like school.

I don't know what person in their right mind that upon first picking up a fighting game and learning, it's their first instinct to play the arcade mode on the hardest difficulty.

I agree fighting games can be pretty daunting for new players. You're expected to plow through research and match videos and just try and connect the dots from there. But this is why we're seeing more and more people helping out to make it easier for these folks to understand these games. And if they don't, oh well. Fighters aren't for everyone.

Edited November 14, 2013 by Vashimus

[George Costanza]

I don't know what person in their right mind that upon first picking up a fighting game and learning, it's their first instinct to play the arcade mode on the hardest difficulty.

Well the idea is, if someone can learn how to play every other genre by playing the singleplayer on various difficulties then naturally that would be their reaction to their first dose of fighting games

[TAI-X]

I actually think fighters have a significant edge over "bullet hell" shooters in getting new players interested. Any shmuck can start wasting the CPU on Normal in SF or Marvel right away, and if they're new to the genre they'll feel like they accomplished something. If the community is diverse enough, they can move on from there to low-ranking human players and experience a pretty smooth learning curve. On the other hand, newcomers are going to be utterly annihilated no matter what on their first Dai-Ou-Jou playthrough, and it will be the same way every single time through until they get better.

[mAc Chaos]

Bullet Hell games are actually easier since you can just repeatedly play the same level over and over and over until you get it right. Playing FGs requires analysis and playing with live human players.

[TAI-X]

No argument there. But they certainly sting harder the first time around, and that can turn people away a lot faster than fighters.

That's of course assuming they don't immediately take advantage of the infinite credits in most home ports, repeatedly continue all the way to the end, and complain that it's too short and easy.

[00Bubbles00]

On the first day they released the BBCP patch (yesterday) that added the Torifune Beginner Lobby, there were a lot more people logged on playing, even though it was a week day. I thought this highlights well how the amount of pros and vets at BB are scaring off the noobs... at least from playing online...

[White Man]

On the first day they released the BBCP patch (yesterday) that added the Torifune Beginner Lobby, there were a lot more people logged on playing, even though it was a week day. I thought this highlights well how the amount of pros and vets at BB are scaring off the noobs... at least from playing online...

Surprise surprise, less fanatical players enjoy having the opportunity to test the waters and experiment at their own pace without getting tossed off a cliff for failure.

Something a lot of vets within the FGC seem to struggle with is the fact that new players don't like being pinned against a wall and beaten to within an inch of their lives before being thrown to the ground and spit on. I've seen others suggest the idea that maybe the pros can take it a little easy on newbies until they get the hang of the game, and people usually come back with some college essay about relative skill levels and optimal learning systems and all this BS put together to justify not even risking having their win ratio take a slight hit. Either that or they start channeling David Carradine and give this zen master speech about how the young grasshoppers will never realize their true potential if they don't challenge opponents much stronger than them and so on and so forth, like playing fighting games makes you the protagonist of a shonen anime.

"I got humiliated in the arcades as a kid when I was learning how to play these games, and by glorious God, that's how the next generation ought to learn them! Trail by fire! Let those latecomer scrubs get the button mashing and dropped combos beaten out of them! THIS! IS! SPARTA!

"On a completely unrelated topic, does anybody have any theories on why the community doesn't seem to be getting any new members?"

Obviously, people who can never accept losing are in the wrong genre. And yes, there is truth in the idea that playing against someone who is appreciably better than you will improve your skills faster than just about anything. There is a line, though. No matter how much you tell yourself that racking up a forty-game win streak against Joe Newbie will make him love the experience of getting his ass gift-wrapped and delivered to his front door, the truth is you're just stroking your own ego. Nobody enjoys losing constantly, and nobody learns anything from getting completely overwhelmed before they even know what's going on or have a chance to fight back. If you take away someone's hope of ever becoming really good at a game, you've just taken away any motivation they have for continuing to play it.

And no, I'm not suggesting you treat new players like charity cases and donate free wins to bribe them into sticking around. But if you're good enough at a game that you can completely dominate someone, then you're good enough to know how to play so that you're providing them with a genuine challenge while still giving them the chance to actually play the game instead of watching their character get comboed over and over and over again.

"But I play these games for pride and self-improvement, not to give free lessons to casuals!"

Then avoid the casuals. Block players who let you get a double perfect on them. If someone's on a fifteen-game losing streak, politely encourage them to seek a lobby with people who are nearer to their skill level. Do whatever you can to avoid playing against people who offer you no challenge; just don't come back here and bitch when you notice the community shrinking because the old players are leaving and nobody is stepping up to replace them.

[Agni]

Bullet Hell games are actually easier since you can just repeatedly play the same level over and over and over until you get it right. Playing FGs requires analysis and playing with live human players.

Very true. I think I can make a comparison here...

I like racing simulators. Like FGs they have a SERIOUSLY competitive community and can be a little hard to get into, especially when you start doing tuning--any racing sim worth a damn will have literally hundreds of options to tweak from you caster, camber, toe-in/out, tire pressure, gear ratio, fuel/air-ratio, suspension stiffness. And like FG's, basically the only way to know this stuff is to go onto forums and talking with other players, though at least with sims you can crack open vehicular engineering books

But, say, when I want to improve my time on The Hockenheimring in Forza 4, I can play alone, practicing by myself, not getting judged by others.

In an FG, to get better, you MUST play other people. And get beat on. For weeks, and then you WILL slowly get better, still losing and only after a ton of time getting bodied will you finally start having a decent win-ratio. There is simply nothing we can do about this. It's something hardwired into the genre.

Another thing: when I DO compete against others in racing sims, I'm up against 7-29 other people. If you lose it's less personal. But in an FG that person who bodied you is quite literally right next to you as you both endure the awkward silence after a match. And when you lose, it's because of them--they outplayed you. Meanwhile in Forza 4 maybe I just overcooked a corner and spun out in the grass. No other player can say "that dude lost because of me".

I'm not saying that this needs to be gotten rid of--it's part of the intense competitive nature AND the personal mano-a-mano aspects to the genre. But it's a reason why new blood doesn't flow in as much.

Edited November 15, 2013 by Agni

[Fryght]

There are so many layers for new players to get through, though:

• Execution
  
• Blocking
  
• High/low
  
• Footsies
  
• Combo's
  
• Wakeup
  
• Matchups
  
• Playstyles
  
• Etcetera
  

Most new players will already drop off when having to learn execution (basic specials, such as hadouken vs shoryuken motions). If you can not even use the basic arsenal of moves that is supposed to be at your disposal, I guess it is fairly frustrating. That's why a lot of people just mash their face on the controller. For a lot of people, having to learn the motions is already a huge investment with very little pay-off ("Oh, I can throw hadoukens now!!! Shame that they never actually hit my friend who knows how to play, though!"). They would prefer to play something easier to get into, so they can start having fun straight away.

The players that get past that point will then usually start honing one skill. For me that was trying to get combo's down pat. I would rush in like an idiot all day, just trying to land combo's, which would be very predictable and easily punished. Eventually I got around to focusing on other aspects as well and becoming a more rounded player. Then again, I tend to only very occasionally play with a friend of mine (the only one still interested in fighting games).

Even if you give new players leniency to learn, there is no way they could win over a reasonable player, even if that player only punishes with jabs. Everything will be blocked instinctively and new players are blind to figuring out what they can do to break proper blocking. Once they figure out how to throw you, you will break their throws instinctively etcetera. Like someone else said, it requires analysis and understanding on their part, before you can start having fun. Much like it is with chess. There is no shortcut to experience the richness of the game. You can teach a player how to set up okizime, but it will take them a while before they figure out why they should.

That's why new players need a 'kiddy pool', where they can muck about with each other, without getting curbstomped. And even then, they have to commit to a game for at least a few months, which is a luxury that most games can not really afford, in this day and age.

PS: I still remember reaVer did not get along very well with the SF players on the dutch FGC forums back in the day. Funny to see him making a point for them now, here

Edited November 15, 2013 by Fryght

[SuperJ]

here's my take as someone coming from a non-airdasher background. anime games are not intuitive

street fighter is intuitive. don't whiff. make your opponent whiff. at a base level how are these goals accomplished? walk and jump. of course these goals apply to pretty much every fighter in existence but how do anime games compare? walk, run, double jump, super jump, air dash at arbitrary heights, etc etc

it's relatively clear what's going wrong when you keep jumping into a dp or walking into a sweep. it's relatively clear that your sweep and your low fierce keep the opponent's walking and jumping in check. basic offense and defense that work at all levels of play. what about anime games? "how do i stop you from jumping at me?" "press this button." "but then you jump again and i get hit!" "don't press buttons." pfffft

not only is it easier in street fighter to show someone what works, it is easier to see why something is working. you know that part in zelda where the old man says "it's dangerous to go alone, take this"? that sword is always going to be useful. basic footsies can be taught quickly and is always going to be useful in street fighter. what's the equivalent in anime games? why isn't there an anime footsies handbook?

as others have mentioned, a piecemeal education is pretty much worthless. i think for players to stick around with anime games, they need some sort of big picture or set of fundamentals that isn't "do 100 different things in 100 different situations." homework is inevitable (beginners aren't gonna iad successfully the first time), but what is possible imo is to minimize and focus the homework so that the beginner can more quickly get to a level where they can just play without knowing a bunch of minutiae or feeling helpless in neutral

being able to put movement theory in words would be a good start. although honestly i think new players should start off with or get better at street fighter but that probably isn't a pc answer on dustloop

[qwerty]

The crazy thing is that Guilty Gear is really not that different from SF in the sense that you're talking about. Jumping in is still risky, it's just not downright suicidal. You want your SF forward jump? IAD. You want your SF neutral jump? Well, you can have that too, and you can even choose between two normal jumps or a super jump.

You want your crouching forward? For most characters it's 2S. You want your fireball? The Slash button will suffice. DP? This game has zero frame air throws for a reason.

It's not that the game is unintuitive per se, it's just that it assumes you already have a strong foundation on which to build. If you go in to the game with no fundamentals to speak of, then it seems much more daunting than it actually is. Which is no different from Street Fighter, really.

[Agni]

SuperJ: What...?

Airdashers are not super-complex compared to SF, "don't whiff" applies to all fighting games in general. If you whiff, you can get punished, how the hell is that different in SF and in airdashers?

Airdashers have more stuff in them, I'll give you that, but if you already want to get into them I'm assuming you're ready to deal with complexity of that kind.

[AmericanKris]

The community needs some personally. Some villains, fan favorites and hype beast.

[SuperJ]

snip

i mostly agree with you on the SF/GG analogues. i also agree that, fundamentally, air neutral follows the same thought processes as ground neutral (don't whiff, force incorrect reactions, etc)

"air neutral" is the keyword though. what does a neutral jump entail in SF? it's relatively safe and forces the opponent to commit to gain ground, but you do not gain ground yourself. whereas in GG, you can iad for initiative, dj.9 if they're watching for airdash or if anti-airing is awkward at that angle, wait and see with dj.8 or sj.8 as you've said, threaten low air dash/land and run if they're giving you too much respect (and delay your double jump if you expect them to react), air dash backward to make space, land quickly, or stay on top of someone running at you, and so on. of course this is guilty gear so you have to deal with faust/may j.h and kire tatami and air stun edge frc and fd cancels and kliff overheads and all that

all of this is in addition to your ground game. if you can remain aware of your neutral options wherever you are on the screen, awesome! but to expect a beginner to process or intuit all this shit, all the possible interactions that result from having highly rewarding and relatively safer air options, is asking for a lot imo.

snip

i never said not whiffing didn't apply to anime games. lol

it's interesting that you say prospective players should be "ready to deal with complexity of that kind" because i've seen people say things like "you should play guilty gear because it's actually an easy game"

[mAc Chaos]

"you should play guilty gear because it's actually an easy game"

lol I've never heard that, ever.

But I know what you mean with SF. It makes more logical sense since it fits real life more. You can't jump twice in the air, that needs to be explained, but not just jumping or hitting someone with a sweep.

Edited November 16, 2013 by mAc Chaos

[Agni]

it's interesting that you say prospective players should be "ready to deal with complexity of that kind" because i've seen people say things like "you should play guilty gear because it's actually an easy game"

I....what.

Back when I was getting into the overall larger FGC I remember that people were talking about GG like it was the Battletoads of fighting games or some shit.

[STenSatsu]

He probably is talking about people saying that the difficulty of entry is overstated, which it is. Don't think I've ever heard it called easy, but tons of people, including myself, have said it is not nearly as hard to get to a midrange US level as many people say it is.

[Vashimus]

The aspect where I'd say Guilty Gear is easier than SF is that it isn't heavily link based like SF4 (unless you play Slayer). Sure, you have FRCs to learn the timing of, but at least you're able to do SOME stuff while you're still learning. In SF4, if you wanna get even halfway decent at the game, you HAVE to learn what links into what and learning the timing of them. Links are a pain in the fucking ass to any new player, I can tell you from experience. They say Street Fighter teaches people the fundamentals of any fighting game, like for example, punishing the opponent's mistakes. And I agree. But if players can't even properly execute that punish because they haven't gotten the timing of their links down, then what's the point? It's no wonder you see new players in SF4 mashing on sweep or throw. It's simpler and knocks the opponent down.

In Guilty Gear, you can pace yourself and learn things little by little and still reach competent levels. In SF4, learn your links or forever suck.

Edited November 16, 2013 by Vashimus

[Parasite_eve25]

It all comes down to popularity and ease of access and simplicity take marvel for example everyone loves it because anybody can win at it give to a first time player tell them how to pop X-factor and hooray they can mash win against a whole team essentially and as others have said SF4 the way i feel its the simple gateway for beginner FGs it teaches you basic fundimentals and is easy to see and teach because of its slow paced action thats why alot of people flock towards those games because they're easy from the get go and they do have their advanced stuff. but then you show them something like GG or BB or Skullgirls and they get lost so fast because immediatly or their SF and marvel stuff gets thrown out the window and they say it sucks cause its not like street fighter ive gotten this response so many times ive tried to teach but dudes just dont want to put in the time and effort when you can spend half the time to learn a capcom game because they cater towards ease of access more than recent FGs.