White Man

"Hold up, what happened to my overpowered character? You mean I have to actually work for a victory now? Welp, that's it for me and this POS. Marvel 3, here I come!" My desire to play CP 2.0 has increased exponentially over the past several weeks. I don't even care about the new content, I'm just incredibly curious to see for myself what the balance is actually like. Most people seem to dislike 2.0, but the reasons they give to rationalize this opinion are so hugely inconsistent that any single player's impression of the game is impossible to trust. The only universal consensus is that Nu is obnoxious again, which I have trouble accepting as a big enough issue to sink the entire game on its own. If it's true that players are leaving the game in droves because they're frustrated that characters they spent hundreds of hours learning no longer score them easy wins, then I have no idea how to respond to that. A small portion of me sympathizes with them, while the larger portion of me believes it's their own fault for choosing to invest that amount of time into something as transient and pointless as a video game.

I don't know if the bulk of your post is aimed at me or TAI-X, but I'm not mad about SFV at all. My relationship with SF is akin to a childhood friend you continue to hang out with mainly out of tradition despite not particularly liking the person they grew into. I don't have much at all in the way of an emotional investment in how the game turns out. I'm just playing devil's advocate and pointing out that, based on Capcom's recent behavior over the last five or six years, the whole bit about them designing the game around fans' feedback is probably hot air from the PR department (more accurately, the handful of overworked, near-suicidal community moderators and spokesmen they employ in lieu of an actual PR department). The games you listed are actually good examples to illustrate what I mean. RE2 came out sixteen years ago back when Capcom was a very different company; they've since refused to develop an updated remake of that game despite virtually the entire survival horror fanbase begging for one. MM Legends 3 was canceled late in development even as fans created a petition with over a hundred thousand signatures to show how badly they wanted it. And while the HD REmake was a nice surprise, it's not something anybody was really asking for. Then of course there's RE6, where Capcom applied approximately zero percent of the critical feedback they received on RE5. And do I even need to mention the bafflingly surreal series of events that led to the demise of the Darkstalkers franchise? The people in charge of making major creative and financial decisions at Capcom do not (typically) listen to their consumerbase — or possibly anymore. This fact is so well documented at this point that you can't call it an exaggeration. I say it now with no more emotion than I'd put into an offhanded observation about the weather.

Hadn't really thought about this until now, but since it just popped into my head earlier... Why the hell didn't we get gold characters in this game? Playable gold/unlimited/boss characters in the home version has been a standard feature in most ASW fighters since GGX.

Not to say that people aren't possibly jumping the gun in some of their complaints, but TAI-X has a point. The fact that they have a playable build up and running is clear evidence that the core gameplay engine is pretty far in development. We'll likely see lots of adjustments before the game's finished, and of course a lot of the visual elements are placeholders, but we're probably already past the point of being able to realistically expect any major overhauls to the gameplay. Also, at the risk of sounding overly cynical, when was the last time Capcom did anything to make anyone believe they care at all about what their fans want? Just look at SFxTekken: Aside from making the health bars less hideous, how many early complaints about that game did the developers address before shipping the final product?

I hope that BGM was a placeholder. Yeesh! I'll take MvC2 smooth jazz over that any day. (For the record, I thought SFIV actually had some pretty decent tunes.)

I think the lesson to learn from this is don't go up against Smash Bros. But hey, at least it outsold Call of Duty!

Next game night happening at Nemo's house. No discussion. As for that OTHER new character... I'll say this much: She's not as out of place in that game as Platinum is in BlazBlue.

Cool. The description for one of the game's trophies says "Finished all 14 characters' stories" in arcade mode and I remember unlockable/DLC characters weren't playable in most modes in BB:CS, so I wanted to get confirmation on this. Thanks!

So ASW finally said screw it and just stopped trying to shoehorn fights into their story modes. I figured this was the direction they were heading after the latest BB, but I didn't think GG would get us there first. Lame. Do you have Sin and/or Elphelt? If so, are they playable in every mode or just certain modes?

Listening to Sol some more, I think what bothers me the most about this English voice is that he sounds too old. Silverstein has this old-guy grumble in his delivery that doesn't sync up with how I've always viewed the character. Sol definitely has a touch of an old man's grouchiness in his personality, but he's still physically young. Ishiwatari and Nakata have always brought that element of youthful energy to the character's voice, especially his lines uttered during battle. I don't think Silverstein was told very much about Sol besides the fact that he's a lot older than he looks and tends to be a bit of a grump. Going off that, the voice he ended up using actually makes sense.

Well, even if every single other thing in this game somehow ends up sucking, we at least have some of the most beautifully groan-worthy trophy titles of any ASW fighter — and that's really saying something.

The netcode for UM:FE will be based on input delay, equal to 1/2 of ping. Hm.

Look on the bright side: No matter who codes what, there's no way the netcode can be any worse than the Xbox 360 port.

I'm not an authority on Japanese culture by any means, but my observation is that etiquette within that culture demands people speak to each other with a certain amount of enthusiasm. Even within very strict professional environments, colleagues seem expected to display a certain amount of energy through their words and gestures when speaking to one another. I believe this is especially true for women, particularly when they're speaking with superiors. I think this is largely where the stereotype of young Japanese girls being perpetually hyperactive comes from. In contrast, people within the United States (as well as the majority of English-speaking European countries for that matter) tend to show less emotion in casual conversations. Appearing too excited when talking about any general subject with someone seems abnormal. The expectation is simply that people pay close attention to what the other person is saying, hence the increased frequency of more subtle conversational cues such as nodding, going "Ah," "Mm-hm," and so forth. Like you pointed out, these cultural dissimilarities show up in the different ways we portray the personalities of characters who are "artificial" beings that lack any motivation to follow proper social etiquette. In these roles, Japanese VAs sound very cold and emotionless because the absence of emotion when speaking is seen as uncanny in that culture. American VAs, on the other hand, express an exaggerated tone of disinterest, as this implies a cognitive detachment to one's surroundings that seems more unnatural than someone with a bland personality. I could be waaaay off base there, but that's my interpretation of why the differences you mentioned exist.

The Steam version of '98:UMFE is now set to be released on December 12th. There's currently no concrete release date for 2002:UM based on what I can see.

Having heard a few more characters speak... I like May's voice a lot. She sounds older than her Japanese counterpart, but still sufficiently, uh, girly, I guess? And her VA actually emotes during her attack/hit vocal clips, which I'm finding to be a bizarrely rare occurrence among the game's English cast. I don't think May's Japanese voice is nearly as annoying as some people make out, but I would say hers is one of the few dub voices that is at least arguably better than the original. Faust is also sounding good to my ears. Kaiji Tang is really good at hamming it up without going overboard with it, which is ideal for Faust; you want him to sound insane without it seeming as though he's trying to sound insane. I only heard Potemkin speak a few lines, but from based on that much, I'm inclined to agree with the people who said his voice needs more filtering. He just sounds like an average dude instead of this massive giant. If nothing else, they could have at least made it sound like his voice was coming from inside a helmet. Zato sounds fine, I think. I didn't hear a lot of him either, but his voice seems to have a subtly villainous silkiness to it that fits the character rather well. That said, I miss the growl that Takehito Koyasu puts into some of his lines — or put into his lines in previous games, at least. I haven't heard him too much in Xrd yet. I think Venom is the only character I haven't heard yet, coincidentally. Does anybody have a link to a video where he speaks? I'm curious to hear if his dub voice is as horrid as everyone is making out.

They probably just want to avoid another Snow Town situation where an especially complex stage causes minimal slowdown in very specific situations and everybody absolutely loses their shit over it as if the screen froze and black smoke started pouring out of their console.

My sentiments exactly. I can't comment on the balance of CP2 because I haven't played it, but saying that more major changes were necessary because the game was getting stale? Really? Tell that to the people who still play Darkstalkers, KOF '98, and Marvel 2. Hell, tell that to the people who were still playing (and enjoying) Accent Core prior to the Plus R update. More than any other kind of game, fighters need to have longevity. If CP isn't fun to play after a year, then the game was never fun to play.

I don't have a PS4 (*shakes fist*) but I did watch a play-through of arcade mode someone posted on YouTube. Not the same as playing the game, but it's currently the closest I can get. Sol sounds like a cheap Steve Blum soundalike. Damn shame, because the actual Steve Blum using a similar inflection would have been perfect for Sol. Ky's voice bothers me more than it probably should. The VA is capable enough, but he sounds too prim and proper... Too naive, I guess. That might've worked for X/XX Ky, but I like the idea of him being a bit more focused and pragmatic now that he's a king. I wanted his voice to have a slight air of someone who doesn't have time for anyone's bullshit anymore. I like what I heard of Axl mainly because his VA seems good at his job. I can see the heavy British accent getting old in a hurry, though. I-No's voice... Man. I want to like it so badly. Her dub lines are pretty amusing (for some reason I find her shouting "Merry Christmas!" when firing notes absolutely delightful), and her voice isn't bad at all, but it's just not there. Like others have said, it lacks the emotional range you'd expect from the character. I-No should sound like a sarcastic, angry, horny lunatic; dub I-No sounds like somebody's mom who gets a little flirty after her second glass of wine. Slayer sounds old but not decrepit, which is good. Ultimately, I'll have to withhold judgment on the VA's performance until I hear his laugh. Millia sounds... vaguely British? The hell? I don't like Ramlethal's voice at all. I imagine the intention was to make her come across as robotic and emotionless, but she just sounds bored. It's hard to tell if the problem lies in bad acting, poor direction, or a mixture of both, but somebody dropped the ball somewhere along the line. Ramlethal never had a particularly intimidating design to begin with, and this voice makes her impossible to take seriously as a boss. Justice is spinning in her grave. None of the other characters really stood out for me. Sin sounds pretty decent, I suppose. Overall, yeah, I'll definitely be switching the in-game voices to Japanese before I do anything else in this game.

Been watching more footage lately, and I'd be curious to hear an explanation why a decent percentage of players rank Zato higher than Faust. Zato has some wacky stuff he can do, but Faust, man... Even in casual matches, Faust players just seem to rack up wins for free. It's like the character has no major weaknesses.

Who even cares. We've had fifteen years of Japanese voices in GG; no reason to buck the trend now. /Johnnyglasses

Exactly. I think some folks are confusing release day patches with release day DLC—day one patches are a good thing. They're an indication that a development team continued to work on a title even after the process of printing the game discs began. A big thanks to the boys and girls at Aksys for all their hard work. You guys are obviously hauling major ass to get Xrd out to a North American market as soon as possible, and the news of a fully-translated library mode proves to me that you're not cutting any corners. I'd say please take my money, but my Limited Edition preorder has been paid for in full, so you technically already have.

Top drawer, Pichy. Because I've seen multiple people ask about this stuff, here's a small addendum covering purchasing options: What's the difference between the standard edition and the limited edition? Both editions are identical in terms of gameplay and in-game content. The LE contains several bonus items, including: A 'Vocal Collection' soundtrack CD, an art book, a metal keychain, and a replica of "The Backyard" for its packaging. The LE will be available for both the PS3 and PS4. Japan is getting its own limited edition of Xrd exclusively for the PS4. The Japanese LE will contain different bonus items, most notably a custom gamepad made by Sanwa Denshi that will be compatible with both the PS3 and PS4. How much will the game cost? The suggested retail prices for the different versions being released in the US are as follows: PS3 Standard Edition: $49.99 PS4 Standard Edition: $59.99 PS3 Limited Edition: $69.99 PS4 Limited Edition: $79.99 How much will the DLC cost? We don't have official confirmation on the pricing for any DLC yet. We do, however, have confirmation that Elphelt will be free to download for the first week following the game's release in North America. Will Xrd be released for any systems besides the PS3/PS4? We currently don't know. Arc's past release history suggests a PS Vita port might be possible in the future, but this is purely speculation; right now, the PS3 and PS4 ports are the only home versions of Xrd that have been announced.

Is that you, Itagaki?

I can't get over how monumentally stupid it was for them to file that lawsuit. If I was in charge of SNKP, I'd fire every lawyer on the staff and deliver their heads to SE as a peace offering. I personally don't care about the games being delayed because A) I already own 2002:UM, B) I don't like playing fighters on PC, and C) new Guilty Gear in less than a month. I do hope they can get these titles out ASAP, though, 'cause they seriously need the dough. SNKP feels like one of those companies that is constantly on the verge of going under (which I guess they more or less have been for roughly a decade now).