Fighting games, tiers, and downloadable errata.

[Lago PARANOIA]

Is there any particular reason as to why fighting games haven't embraced the idea of:

A.) Putting basic character stats (health, speed, super meter buildup, priority, power, etc.) in a simple array that gets loaded during the course of a match and:

B.) Periodically updating these stats?

I really don't understand people wringing their hands over crap like 'Tiers are for You-Know-What' and going into blatant denial over the whole existence of bullshit like Metaknight and MvC1 Wolverine and whatever. They should be pushing for mandatory updates of the character stat matrix every six fucking months.

I especially don't see why people don't adopt this for mascot fighters. Nothing ruins a mascot fighter more than having a huge diverse roster of hilarious/badass/awesome characters that tug at the nostalgia strings and then finding out that some characters suck too much or rule too hard. The only people who could possibly get pissed off by this are inflexible tourney wankers. But they're not even the majority of tourney wankers, who aren't the majority of any fighter that's worth its salt.

So what gives?

[Koumei]

Is there any particular reason as to why fighting games haven't embraced the idea of:

A.) Putting basic character stats (health, speed, super meter buildup, priority, power, etc.) in a simple array that gets loaded during the course of a match and:

B.) Periodically updating these stats?

To some extent, just fiddling with the numbers isn't enough - a character might lack any kind of ability to deal with aerial foes. Of course that's the kind of thing you want to catch during playtesting, which isn't done any more. Some guys spent about a year recreating SSFIIT for PC (within the last 5-10 years), and most of that time was "trying to tweak and perfect everything for balance". This included "getting tourney pros on board". Even in the end they still had to go "This move is very good if you do it as QCF+Kick, it makes Cammy kind of easy-ish, at least against the AI. But as a charged move, it's not very good... against the PC, maybe a little easy isn't a bad thing."

There's some amount of holdover from when fighting games were on arcade machines (that couldn't download updates) or console cartridges (back when they couldn't download updates). Hardcore fighting game fans are actually quite opposed to change - both in the sense of the game changing and in the sense of now having something that needs to connect to the Internet and apply updates when their old SFII never did that.

MvC1 Wolverine and whatever.

Any of the Capcom Versus games made by Capcom has pretty shocking balance - they didn't actually worry about balance in favour of cameo characters and big splashy effects. As such, they're loads of fun to play, but not good for serious tournaments. I recommend Guilty Gear XX#R for something that has been balanced enough that you can use any character in tournament play - though some are admittedly easier or harder, some characters excel against some others, and some are easier or harder against the AI (remembering that the AI can often be caught with a lucky Destroyer whereas a skilled player cannot).

I especially don't see why people don't adopt this for mascot fighters.

I'm not sure what you mean by mascot fighters, but I think you mean "Fighting games using the cast of some existing series or whatever", such as Marvel Superheroes, Marvel vs Capcom, X-Men, X-Men vs Street Fighter, Marvel vs Street Fighter, or Smash Brothers?

In that case, I think the general assumption is that they don't need to make it a serious fighting game, they can just fuck about and make it "fun for fans of X", even though that can make fans really annoyed, and by spending time making it good as a game in its own right, it can appeal to more than just fans of X. Smash Brothers really hasn't helped this - thanks to that game (which is an absolute ball in multiplayer at parties), all games which are just "Characters from ___ meet up in a fighting game" are sneered at.

[Maxus]

BlazBlue does have downloadable updates/patches/tweaks for characters as the game goes on

[OgreBattle]

A.) Putting basic character stats (health, speed, super meter buildup, priority, power, etc.) in a simple array that gets loaded during the course of a match and:

The things that can be quantified, like hit points and stun bar and movement speed, that would be nice to have.

[Archmage]

If they patch the character stats to rebalance the game, how are they going to sell the newest version of Marvel vs. Capcom Super Turbo Mega Ultimate Alpha IV: Double-stuf Edition?

[Username17]

Pretty much. I'm not sure that there's been any really innovative work in fighting games since the development of special tag team moves. And the previous piece of innovation was probably Fatalities in Mortal Kombat 1.

New fighting games can only promise new shiny graphics and a newly leveled playing field as everyone finds their favorite strategies and characters fiddled with. There's nothing else driving new product, because there have been probably two genuinely new concepts in the last twenty years.

If you could balance the playing field and/or improve the graphics on the fly via patches, you wouldn't need to buy a new Fighting Game for a decade. And then the genre would become deader than it is now.

-Username17

[Koumei]

Pretty much. I'm not sure that there's been any really innovative work in fighting games since the development of special tag team moves. And the previous piece of innovation was probably Fatalities in Mortal Kombat 1.

Fatalaties are just window dressing, they don't actually change the way the game is played. The addition of Desperation Moves and Super Moves in King of Fighters was a bigger deal (indeed, was big enough that it's rare to find a fighting game that lacks such things).

The various attempts at adding a third dimension haven't taken - whether it's the multiple layers thing in early SNK fighting games which basically just gives some tricky dodge options, or the Tekken style where you circle your opponent but it's still just a dodge more than anything else, or the free-roaming approach of Ehrgeiz. At the end of the day, most games decided it's better to keep it mostly 2D.

The tag team business was a winner, though.

[Whipstitch]

To some extent, just fiddling with the numbers isn't enough

This is very true, particularly given that matchups tend to exaggerate some strengths or weaknesses while making others irrelevant. For example, the old SF2 games had an inherent rock-paper-scissors dynamic going on between characters who zone out well (e.g. Sagat) vs characters with lots of maneuverability (e.g. Claw) vs. high risk bruisers who wreck face when someone stumbles into their threat range (e.g. Honda). That makes balance tweaks a real problem, since a character like Honda already has monstrous power and priority on what tools he does have. Just making him move faster or making his moves even more potent may help out a li'l bit against fireballers but it would also make him an even tougher match up for the characters he already has a bit of an edge against. What you'd really want to do is make varied characters who aren't so type cast in the first place in order to have more levers to pull on, but that is easier said than done and at odds with basically printing money via sequels.

[Surgo]

Any of the Capcom Versus games made by Capcom has pretty shocking balance - they didn't actually worry about balance in favour of cameo characters and big splashy effects. As such, they're loads of fun to play, but not good for serious tournaments

And what you just said is some serious bullshit. Marvel vs Capcom 2 had an extremely large competitive scene (which was also notable for having lots of people who were good at that game but not other fighting games), and Marvel vs Capcom 3 is also huge. This isn't flipping out with nerdrage or something, this is just a simple fact.

Sure, the balance in MvC2 looked like a joke but it had over fifty characters. There's going to be some wheat and some chaff pretty much by default at that point.

There's some resistance to patching because it can be done too early. When a game is still changing its meta ten years after release date, like in the case of SSBM, you have to wonder if "too early" actually means "ever".

[Lago PARANOIA]

I say we pretend like Surgo didn't just make that laughably amateurish argumentum ad populum argument and give him a chance to make a better one.

What do you guys say?

[DSMatticus]

Popular does not mean good or right, but "has a large tournament scene" does mean "capable of supporting a large tournament scene." The only actual debate here (beyond contesting matters of fact) is what "good for serious tournaments" means, and if having lots of large tournaments qualifies, and that sounds like an elitist snorefest of "my game is better than your game."

I look forward to it.

[Pseudo Stupidity]

Typically "good for serious tournaments" (for fighters) means having a decent number of characters who are playable at a high level.

This is why MvC2 has a good following. Same thing goes for SSBM, Guilty Gear, and other games that have good (and sustainable) scenes. Games where tournaments devolve into a very small group of characters are the games that are hurting. Look at what happened to SSBB, the scene fractured (pro-ban and anti-ban [GUESS WHAT CHARACTER]) and tournaments dwindled. There's a tournament scene still, but it's only losing players.

Games without options get stale, and it's true of other genres as well. Look at fucking Starcraft, you can go with a ton of different and viable strategies. Hell, the most popular competitive game in the world is League of Legends, and the vast majority of its cast is playable in tournaments. It's not a coincidence.

Popular does mean right/good for tournament followings. If your game can't attract players it is obviously NOT a good game for tournaments. Ultimately all that matters for tournament scenes is money, and more people = more money.


On patching: Yeah it's pretty much money. Unless you can do micro transactions on fighters (Street Fighter hats, anyone?) it's going to be that way forever.

[Koumei]

The fact that tourneyfans for MvC are often only good at that game actually says quite a lot. Anyway, various incarnations of SF2 had a tourney scene despite being "Ryu, Ken, Sagat". Lots of people all playing the same few characters doesn't mean it's balanced, it just means heaps of people are happy to play the only few good characters.

Typically "good for serious tournaments" (for fighters) means having a decent number of characters who are playable at a high level.

That is not how it has actually played out historically. The majority of characters being viable at a high level of play makes it a good game, but doesn't have much bearing on how it does in serious tournaments. So MvC1-2 have eight hundred characters, half of which are playable. That's just the "throwing shit at a wall" approach, and I refuse to be impressed by it. They should have halved the cast and just focused on making a really good, balanced game (and updating sprites, as Morrigan can attest).

Same thing goes for SSBM, Guilty Gear, and other games that have good (and sustainable) scenes. Games where tournaments devolve into a very small group of characters are the games that are hurting. Look at what happened to SSBB, the scene fractured (pro-ban and anti-ban [GUESS WHAT CHARACTER]) and tournaments dwindled. There's a tournament scene still, but it's only losing players.

Indeed. No items, no randoms, Fox only, Final Destination. The original Smash Bros was a silly fun game and people made it a tourney game then stripped all the fun away and made Fox the only character. I'm glad to hear they've improved the general cast.

On patching: Yeah it's pretty much money. Unless you can do micro transactions on fighters (Street Fighter hats, anyone?) it's going to be that way forever.

Now that even Guilty Gear is going cel-shaded polygons, selling new costumes is totally a possibility. Or games could release new characters for about $5 each as DLC, complete with new models and textures, movesets and so on. So you don't need to add "Super" to the front to add four characters and re-sell the entire thing, you can just sell those extra characters on a monthly basis and people buy the ones they want.

The thing is, going 3d is a recent thing for Capcom, and they're the "big player". Until recently, it wasn't much of an option, but this has the potential to take off, and is a better idea for the growing "online play" scene (as the game just needs to check for the same auto-updates and the same characters - or download each others' purchased characters without unlocking them - rather than having seven slightly different versions of the game). Hopefully we'll see it move in that direction.

[Kaelik]

Koumei, you clearly have nothing of value to say about fighting games.

You are saying that MvC that has hundreds of characters, half of whom are viable should have cut the cast down to make a balanced game. That is stupid. Good games can involve a bunch of bad options as long as you have a large number of good options. Would you rather play 3e or 4e D&D?

Similarly, you are complaining about Fox being the only good character but praising them for improving the regular cast in Brawl. That makes no sense, because there are at least 3 characters who regularly beat Fox where there are absolutely no characters that regularly beat metanight.

[Koumei]

You are saying that MvC that has hundreds of characters, half of whom are viable should have cut the cast down to make a balanced game. That is stupid. Good games can involve a bunch of bad options as long as you have a large number of good options. Would you rather play 3e or 4e D&D?

They should have removed the sub-par options, yes. To casual gamers it doesn't matter because you pick the person you like the look of and button mash. To hardcore tournament gamers it doesn't matter because you pick whichever characters are the best. For people who enjoy learning the game and playing it against friends on a semi-regular basis or beating arcade/story mode with everyone, of course it fucking matters. And for the first one, which was made back when arcades were still a thing, it mattered in the sense of "some characters you pay a dollar to play through some amount with, others you pay a dollar to see Round 1, Fight, KO, Continue?"

Similarly, you are complaining about Fox being the only good character but praising them for improving the regular cast in Brawl. That makes no sense, because there are at least 3 characters who regularly beat Fox where there are absolutely no characters that regularly beat metanight.

I was saying I was glad to hear it, going by the assumption that Pseudo-Stupidity was telling the truth. The only Nintendo console I own at the moment is a 3DS, so I have to take the word of others on the Smash Bros metagame evolving. But the original was either "several characters are viable if not reliable because they work well with random factors" or "Fox Fox Fox Fox Fox" (although that was more of an issue in certain levels where his speed + laser worked really well together, so when they force Final Destination, that's no longer the case).

[John Magnum]

Is there anywhere I can get a decent layman-accessible analysis that goes into a bit of depth about why Meta-Knight is so unstoppable? I mean, I get that the basic idea is speedspeedspeed, but I'm interested in why Meta-Knight is speedy enough that he shuts down every other Brawl character but Fox can still be taken down reliably by several Melee characters. I don't really know that much about fighting games, but that sort of analysis and discussion is pretty interesting to me.

[Kaelik]

I was saying I was glad to hear it, going by the assumption that Pseudo-Stupidity was telling the truth. The only Nintendo console I own at the moment is a 3DS, so I have to take the word of others on the Smash Bros metagame evolving. But the original was either "several characters are viable if not reliable because they work well with random factors" or "Fox Fox Fox Fox Fox" (although that was more of an issue in certain levels where his speed + laser worked really well together, so when they force Final Destination, that's no longer the case).

He was telling you the truth. He told you the truth that SSBM, the game you are making fun of for being Fox Only is not Fox Only, and in fact several other characters are very viable without any changes.

You said you are glad they improved the cast. They didn't. There were no patches, the new game isn't more balanced. The specific game you were complaining about is now more balanced than it was because people learned how to play Shiek an Jigglypuff better.

[Pseudo Stupidity]

Koumei, you are incredibly wrong about SSBM. Fox has not won a tournament in YEARS (the best Fox players don't even place top 5 consistently, and even at his peak Fox wasn't forcing out everyone else) and final destination is rarely played.

Characters who have placed top 5 in recent [~2 years] large-scale tournaments (to my knowledge): Peach, Jigglypuff, Captain Falcon, Ganondorf, Falco, Marth, Fox, Sheik.

The ones that win are usually Falco, Peach, and Jigglypuff, but that's likely because the best players use them.

Meta-Knight: He is fast, his moves have very high priority, his moves are often disjointed, he can actually combo (though mostly with upair into MORE FUCKING UPAIRS), he has incredible KO potential, he has actual approaches (something nobody else has in Brawl), his recovery is amazing, his edge game is amazing, and he has an advantage in every matchup.

In Brawl nobody can really approach except for MK and Diddy Kong with a banana. MK can also safely poke at people from outside their range, and capitalizes on mistakes well because of his shuttle loop being ridiculous. It helps that Brawl is a slow enough game to allow for nigh-perfect play.

In Melee Fox is never working at full potential, even though he is the best character on paper (he also lacks a truly safe approach and gets punished hard for mistakes). In Brawl Meta-Knight just abuses his advantages until he eventually wins. There's very little opportunity for counter-play against him and even if you hit him Brawl is very forgiving of that sort of thing. He's a lot better than other characters at landing hits AND capitalizing off those hits.



Throwing shit at the wall totally works for characters, by the way. Who cares if half the cast is shit when there's 400 perfectly good characters to play? Sure it'd be great if everyone was good, but I'm fine with not playing the bad ones in serious games.

[John Magnum]

Interesting. What makes Meta Knight (and Diddy Kong with a banana) uniquely able to approach characters safely? What's the "shuttle loop"? Sorry, I really am pretty ignorant about terminology and stuff but this is really interesting to me, thank you very much for posting it.

[Pseudo Stupidity]

On MK and Diddy approaching: MK is safe because he has moves with very little lag (in some cases you can cancel their animation after the hitbox, like his downtilt) and often enough range to be safe spamming them on somebody's shield.

Example of safe approach due to low lag: He can glide attack very close to the ground and immediately grab. If he hits a shield with his glide attack it produces enough stun that, if done correctly, his opponent's only option is to roll/spot dodge immediately to avoid the grab. If they use either of those options and MK decided NOT to grab, however, he will punish them for it.

Diddy with a banana has some shenanigans that essentially covers him if he makes a mistake. His approach is a lot more complicated than MK approaches and I haven't played Brawl in a very long time.

The shuttle loop is Meta-Knight's up B attack, he goes up, does a little loop, and immediately goes into a glide. It has huge knockback, is extremely fast, and lets him use his glide attack (a very, very good attack that can be canceled if you use it just before hitting the ground).


To quickly balance MK You would have to reduce the priority of a lot of his moves (make them be able to 'clank' with attacks instead of pass through them at the very least), increase knockback on his upair to make it less of an auto-combo, and reduce knockback on his shuttle loop so it stops killing people so early.

He'd still be broken unless you slowed certain moves down, and then they'd look weird so you'd have to fix the animations.

[Surgo]

I say we pretend like Surgo didn't just make that laughably amateurish argumentum ad populum argument and give him a chance to make a better one.

What do you guys say?

Are you retarded? Nothing I said was not factual, and nowhere did I say "it's good because it's popular". Or are you trying to say to people who are actually having serious MvC2 tournaments "stop doing this, it's not a good game!!!! :(" If people have been having serious tournaments with them, and this is a very common occurrence, then it is pretty safe to say that the game is good for serious tournaments. Or are we going to reject this because it's *shudder* inductive logic?

[Surgo]

As far as SSBM goes, there was a large period of time (the MLG days) when the majority of tournament wins went to Marth. He fell out of favor for a while, but I think he's had something of a renaissance in recent years. I'm not entirely sure -- I stopped following the scene for a long time.

[Pseudo Stupidity]

The game was really young during that, I'd say the wins weren't going to Marth so much as they were going to Ken. He was just better than people before PC Chris started winning everything.

Marth is kind of back again (I went to APEX earlier this year and there were quite a few who got into brackets), but there's no standout player for him so he just kind of exists. Now that the game has matured there are actually more viable characters than before; I forgot to include Pikachu in my list of tournament top 5s.

[Lago PARANOIA]

Are you retarded? Nothing I said was not factual, and nowhere did I say "it's good because it's popular". Or are you trying to say to people who are actually having serious MvC2 tournaments "stop doing this, it's not a good game!!!! " If people have been having serious tournaments with them, and this is a very common occurrence, then it is pretty safe to say that the game is good for serious tournaments. Or are we going to reject this because it's *shudder* inductive logic?

Look, here's the original post:

Any of the Capcom Versus games made by Capcom has pretty shocking balance - they didn't actually worry about balance in favour of cameo characters and big splashy effects. As such, they're loads of fun to play, but not good for serious tournaments.

None of that crap you spewed was actually a refutation of what she said, unless you're making an argument of 'lots of people play it, therefore it's good'.

Here is the exact framework of the exchange, but with some words replaced.

Iemuok: "Any of the Exalted games made by White Wolf have pretty shocking balance - they didn't actually worry about balance in favour of hyperporn and big splash effects. As such, they're loads of fun to play, but not good for serious games."

Ogrus: "And what you just said is some serious bullshit. Exalted 2nd Edition had an extremely large fanbase (which was also notable for having lots of people who were good at that game but not other TTRPGs), and Exalted 2nd Edition is also shaping up to be huge, as far as TTRPGs go. This isn't flipping out with nerdrage or something, this is just a simple fact.

Sure, the balance in Exalted 2E looked like a joke but it had over fifty distinct charm trees. There's going to be some wheat and some chaff pretty much by default at that point.

There's some resistance to errata because it can be done too early. When a game is still changing its meta ten years after release date, like in the case of Exalted 1E books still being adapted for 2E, you have to wonder if "too early" actually means "ever"."

[Surgo]

It absolutely was a refutation of "not good for serious tournaments". I believe that the inductive observation of massive numbers of Marvel vs Capcom 2 tournaments over the past decade is sufficient to show that that is wrong. Is that an argument from popularity? Yes it is, but the premise and conclusion are not "lots of people play it, therefore it's good" as you assert -- they are "lots of tournaments are run successfully and enjoyably for it, therefore it's good for tournaments". And quite simply, if that isn't a satisfying criteria for "good for tournaments", I'm not sure what is.

While your word change is well done, the part where it does not work is that "good for serious tournaments" and "good for serious games" are different concepts.