I've got my hands on Street Fighter IV and although I can tell it's a very high quality product, the philosophy of the game itself is abysmal to me. It's substance is on such a steep curve that really, if you don't already know things like cancels and likewise things, you're really just pissing in the wind. What I consider an exception, that is complexity, is the rule in SF4 and from what I can tell other Street Fighter games. It's really the idea that you have to learn the complexities in order to play and really enjoy the game. Figuring out basic combos and sticking with those could work but at that point, I should really be playing another fighting game.
However I've played every Mortal Kombat and Soul Calibur game and I've developed fingers and a brain capable of learning so complexity isn't the issue, just how it's done.
So I'm asking those who've played other fighting games, what game could I or should I get into if I disliked SF4? I'm really itching to get back into fighting games and really the japanese variety because the American side of things are kind of limited. Virtua Fighter? Tekken? King of Fighters? Any suggestions would be really helpful.
Well if you want 2d fighters all of them are pretty complex, but I guess the best fighter I could recommend with good gameplay and more simple than SF4 is HD Remix.
As for 3d fighters Virtua Fighter is for the hardcore so you'd best stick with Tekken or Soul Calibur on that front.
It's not that I want a simple fighting game, but one that I can enjoy on the surface and dive into if I choose to which I'm capable of. But if a fighting game's core is only the complexity, then I'll probably won't like it. I just wanted to point that out. A fighting game with a great tutorial can still be enjoyed by me despite being hardcore.
Between the two HDR has a more simple structure and doesn't have oodles of characters and delayed hyper combo craziness.
"
Not at all, MvC2 hypothetically you could button-mash & know no combos & still have a decent chance at winning. HDR is basically a mathematical equation, as soon as he goes online he'll be raped instantly. I downloaded HDR & I fuckin hate it. I can't believe they sucked all of the fun out of the game. PLUS the combos in MvC2 are infinitely easier, I can't even do finishers in HDR.
If you want something that isn't as complex as SF4 but still rewards the smart player, I would have to recomend Samurai Showdown 2 at that point. SamSho 2 relies on really tense gameplay that isn't too combo centric. The rest of the series kinda abandons that philosophy IMO
If you want something more modern... your kinda outta luck. Maybe the new King of Fighters since they seem to be going for the old-school SNK feel for that game (I haven't played it yet), but otherwise fighters simply don't try to be as accessible as SF4 really : /
MK and Soul Calibur aren't high up the totem pole when it comes to steep learning curves.
They just don't have as much to learn and are pretty straightforward (though I can never impact guard if it was worth my life). I enjoy popping a few matches on SC4 now and then so I'm cool with that.
Well, all the Japanese 2D fighters require extra knowledge, whether it be Guilty Gear/BlazBlue camp or the SNK side of things. SNK probably easier to break into though, found them much more simplistic overall. Anyways, I personally find GG (and BB) both a bit hard to comprehend, way too many stuff you need to bring into consideration, probably the most newbie/casual unfriendly games out there. I enjoy GG a lot none-the-less but if you dislike that in SF4, I'd try not to get near these.
Tekken has a couple easy combo characters, but most characters will feel sluggish unless you are pushing the right button combinations. I'd say its pretty easy to get into overall. Those maddening tournament player combos mean that I probably won't fare well online though...
What I've heard of VF (which is limited really) is that its a bit more technical than Tekken. I won't say more since VF players (Or Tekken players) will probably eat me alive by saying stuff I don't really know.
MKvsDC is totally out of my radar, I have no interest in it at all so it gets a mention.... and thats it.
MvsC2 seems... insane! I'm buying it but like Tekken... Those combos are something I'll never acheive. One of the fastest fighters out there too I think.
And! Well... Arcana Hearts (PS2) I have no damn clue about. An all girl cast... with loli printed all over it... something I'd never own probably... If I did, I won't play it with anyone else. :P
well it's true that MvC2 will have an easier online community but I stand by my belief that the simplicity of HDR's moves (a handful for each character, mostly quarter circles, half circles, charges, and mashes) and characters (a few shotos, a few charge characters, a few grapplers, and a few that are none of the above) makes it a better fit gameplay-wise for OP.
But if he wants to go online it's true that maybe he should go MvC2 where he will be among other new players and has the chance to get lost in the craziness for a few weeks.
I would be fine with playing a complex game so as long as there is a gradual curve in getting there. If that's not an option, the game has to at least to the simple/dumb stuff well.
Tekken 6 from the sounds of it sounds like it's getting there and I might consider trying that. MvsC2 seems like a game I need to try to see whether I can really play and have fun with it with just basic knowledge. I already wrote off Guilty Gear and BlazBlue.
MKvsDC is actually right up my ally because it's basically honors the way I've played fighting games for a while, that is to say the way MK and SC have done it. Unfortunately I only own a PC at the moment and it's frankly irritating me when there's no PC version.
@Tuffgong: I'd watch a couple high level matches on Youtube to get the general feel of the games.
I always found that useful for games I am uncertain with.
@Anyone who recommends MvsC2
Really now? I'd rather not see myself (I haven't got much experience as well) being pummeled to bits, by insane air combos I can't comprehend. I've played quite a bit of MvsC (against the AI) and quite frankly those air combos are pretty much nessessary to enjoy that game.
On the upside, its probably the cheapest option (I think?).
I love Street Fighter Alpha 3 (Upper or Max whatever its called), it's basically the last iteration of Alpha 3. You can take any character (and there are a bunch including all the SSF2T characters) and take them on this crazy adventure mode and win power ups and level ups. It's bat shit crazy but has to be my favorite. You can get it on PS1, Dreamcast, and I think even the GBA.
" .On the upside, its probably the cheapest option (I think?). "
HD remix is the same price. Some of the old SNK fighters also come in $20 collections, so if you count them individually they would be the cheapest. That's just splitting hairs at that point though.
Well, SFIV is really as low on the learning curve as far as 2D Japanese fighting games go, unless you want to play something like Smash Bros. Why are people citing HD Remix as a good beginner game? It's faster than SFIV and therefore the special moves are harder to do, not to mention that the people who still play that game online are probably very good. I would recommend MvC 2, but only because you have a higher chance of going against someone who sucks (like me) earlier in it's release cycle.
Serious, you said yourself you can learn all the complexities of a game, so get to learning. All the other games are going to be devoid of newbies by this point as well, except for maybe MvC2 when that hits this week (This week is it?) so maybe get yourself some of that down. But the only reason everybody seems to know everything about the game is because it's been out for like 6 months, most of the new players have either eventualy learned all that stuff, or left. You can still get into it, it just might take a little more effort that's all. I can't do all those crazy FADC's but I still manage to win most of my matches, I got lucky in that my main character (Balrog) doesn't need to use them.
Find a character you are comfortable with, but yes you are right to a degree, you need to at least know about most techniqued such as safe jumping, crossups etc to be able to get more enjoyment out of the game, you don't need to utilise all of them.
You won't find much enjoyment anywhere else other than maybe a Tekken or Virtua Fighter, even then the online components are going to have people who will destroy you in an instant.
@The_A_Drain: Unfortunately it seems like I already know the answer to my question.
In the end it's the same games I ended with that I started, namely Soul Calibur, Mortal Kombat, and Tekken which I haven't played but I feel like it could fit. Maybe if another DoA game comes out, I'll see if that strikes my fancy. The only mystery and the one people haven't mentioned is King of Fighters and it's probably the same deal as SF but no one's said anything.
I should learn because I want to, not because I have to and that's what irritates me about a section of the fighting game genre and frankly gaming in general.
@Tuffgong: It's true, you already know the answers to your question. I, too was impressed by Street Fighter IV as a fighting game, but did not enjoy my experience with it. I'm not a hardcare fighting game player, so I stick to the Soul Caliburs, Tekkens, and DOAs of the scene. I've played some Guilty Gear XX# Reload on the original Xbox and got a kick out of it. It was certainly difficult, but also so flashy and chaotic that I still had a good time.
If you want to try something that's 2D, flashy and free, don't forget Vanguard Princesss (download "vampri101.exe") for the PC. Check out some Youtube videos here.
Well, the way I see it, other genres are no different. There are some core skills that apply to almost all fighters in much the same way simply getting the hang of looking around in an FPS. But with fighters out of fashion and tons of people playing FPS games all the time, nobody seems to realise that. Oh sure, the same skills apply to other genres like third person shooters and action games of today, but you can say that about fighters and other genres of the time like beat'em'ups. So there is a similarity, it's just that today tons of people play shooters so noone has to hop on a forum and "How me look round?!"
I picked up Virtua Fighter 5 super super cheap this afternoon, I gotta say, nowhere near as bad as I thought but it's still a typical 3D fighter in my eyes, not smooth at all, to much focus on grappling and long combo strings. But hey, i'm enjoying it more than I ever did a Tekken or DoA.
I agree though that you should learn to play because you want to, not because you need to. But you have to ask yourself do you really want to? If you just want to button bash for fun, that's cool too, but you wouldn't expect to be able to run around shooting at the scenery in an FPS and not be capped in the head. Online gaming is pretty competetive nowadays no matter the genre. It just happsn to be that with fighters being so out of fashion in recent years, that the wall of entry is jagged and looks difficult to climb. When in reality it's no more difficult than the same wall for FPS games, but you already know the ins and outs of an FPS (I assume, if not, this still applies on the whole)
Maybe give VF5 a go, but you will still learn more from Street Fighter, and besides, once you get down the characters moves (which is no different from learning to control any other game, it's a small pool of the same basic motions you will see over and over, and slight variations thereof) you will be able to pick up more than just that one character (not true of 3D fighters, they all seem to have very very different characters) and as you play more and more, you will eventually learn what does and does not work for yourself rather than trying to memorise walls of strategy text and expecting to understand what it means.
Just go with the flow for a while I guarantee you before you know it you will be winning games or at least holding your head above water. Better yet, get some friends into a fighter and you all start out evenly then.
@The_A_Drain: I think you're giving too much credit to SF in being the "standard" fighting game. I know the basics and can pick up pretty much any fighting game. Hell I've learned all of Sagat's moves and can play with him but it's the way SFIV leaves you out to dry that pisses me off too much. The analogy you make the FPS I think applies just fine to games like MK, SC, Tekken, and DOA because they have enough of a basic and easy to get into base that if you know how to play one, you can play the others and enjoy fighting games in general.
I sat down and learned characters in MK and Soul Calibur. More so SC because they had a tutorial mechanical that was decent enough to show you how the move was supposed to be done and how it looked. I guess some fighting games don't understand that if you're going to make a deep or complex game, it has to be fun to get there and motivate me to want to learn certain characters. SFIV makes me do it he hard way, and in my opinion the wrong way, and ends up making it look like work.
Well, there isn't much I can respond to that with. If you don't want to play the game, don't. Sure, it could have as good a tutorial as Soul Calibur, but there isn't a whole lot to explain, each mechanic is pretty simply at heart and there are a ton of online tutorials. Heck, most of the stuff online about SFII will work in a vaguely similar way (Cross ups, safe jumping, linking, cancelling etc)
I also disagree that by playing MK, DOA, SC etc that they are interchangeable. In my opinion they are not, each damned character is like playing a whole other game. Whereas SF, KoF and most other 2D fighters, almost every character conforms to one of 3 archetypes, the quarter/half circle guys, the charge characters, and the 360 grapple characters, with a few odd ones dotted about that aren't drastic deviations from the norm.
Now, that's fine if you're game only has 3 buttons like Virtua Fighter, how different can characters be with 3 buttons? Not very is my experience so far with VF5. But with games like MK, you can know one character inside and out, but another will completely baffle you without staring at the moveslist for an hour. To me that seems counter-intuitive.
Maybe you just don't like the game and havn't realised it? That's fine if you don't, but I think saying i'm giving 'too much' credit is a little bit backwards. Given SF2 practically hauled the genre out of joke territory and into the serious, depth of combat focused genre it is today, and set standards which almost every game to follow borrowed from for over 20 years. I think it's a little hard to give it 'too much' credit. Now, SFIV specifcially, sure, considering todays standards, it's tutorial mode is fucking weak. In fact, it doesnt have one I personally don't count challenge mode as a tutorial mode.
But it has a MASSIVE online community with tons of info and wisdom to impart, much bigger than any other fighter.
It also doesnt help the official guide is so wrong as well, it has a lot of errors in it.
@The_A_Drain: Well my point with games like MK and SC, if you know what the button configuration is, you can still have fun without learning a character's moves and not miss the point of the game. I happen to think that the point of something like SFIV is to learn all the complex things the game isn't telling you. At that point, I'll pass. I personally didn't like the game but that is a game that is meant for the hardcore fans who already know how to play. I play a lot of video games and the fact that I felt at odds with SFIV means there's nothing for me to cultivate from that game.
I guess this hearkens back to the issue that gaming is having right now. How to deal with teaching the player and game presentation in general, which is a better way of stating the same old "casual vs hardcore" issue.
The issue I have with Street Fighter bugs me enough that it just doesn't feel right for me to say I don't like it and leave it alone. I want to like it, I should like, but it doesn't want me to. I don't know. Putting it in words has given me some closure though. *Waiting for the next big fighting game release*
Well like I said, if you don't like it, then don't play it, there's no need to put yourself through unnecessary trouble just to play a game you dislike.
However, I still disagree completely. I stand by my above points, learning the ins and outs of one single character in MK gives you almost no advantage with any others, nor any experience with other fighters or 3D fighters, the difference between characters are simply too great, and the controls imprecise.
Whereas in SF, and most other 2D fighters out of Japan, once you have learned, or even grasped the basic principal of a particular tactic, you can apply it to some degree in almost any 2D Japanese fighter. And once you know how to do a QCF, you will know that you can do the majority of other characters moves without a single thought, allowing you to concentrate more on strategy than memorising huge lists of shitty moves you will probably never use. It's pointless. The simplicity of the characters movesets allows you to concentrate more on your game.
I simply cannot agree that the same is true even remotely of 3D fighters, or Mortal Kombat.
But like I say, noones gonna hold it against you for not playing a game you don't like, that would be madness.
The answer is simple Tuffgong, you need to get a 360 and I need to get SF4(I really want to pick it up). We will play against each other until we think we're good and then we will go online and get raped in every way possible, but we'll still have fun while we do it.
I would also suggest picking up Tekken 5 it's probably pretty cheap and I love it.
@Tharrington: Do you think Tekken 6 in the US will be console only?
Anyway I still think SF and games like that do nothing to help anyone get to the real meat of the game because it assumes you already know how to get there. And I'm talking about the stuff beyond the QCF moves because anyone can do those and yes those are basic fighting game mechanics. If you already play games, you should be able to play a fighting game just fine that does the low end and high end well. But with SF, it's just the high end that matters and it just leaves you hanging in that respect and a lot of complicated fighting games do that. That's why I think the genre suffers so much. It went overboard from where it was the moment games like SFII and such made the genre "serious" which is akin to FPS game clans and tournaments. Fine for them but that's not normal by any means.
I've been walking around my house and arguing with myself about this for hours now and I think I'm good. I think by now I can determine which fighting game (in my opinion) is too complicated for it's own good.
I made this topic because I wanted to see what people said about games that i haven't played but I think I could enjoy like Tekken or DOA. Thanks people!
Well, I still don't see how that is true, given most of the 'high end' stuff in SFIV is simple by nature but hard to master, and I get along fine without bothering to use most of it all the time. I still win something like 70% of matches.
Maybe it just seems that way because other fighters don't have any depth at all. Just sayin'.
@Tuffgong: Yeah, I don't think Tekken 6 will go to PC.
I also don't think you're right on SF being to complicated. It's more that a new player doesn't fully understand it. Any new player just jumping in can't compete with the practice and understang of a long time player. If i started playing now I would have no idea where to start and no matter how much I play I would most likely never be as good as someone that has been playing from the SF2 arcade days.
@The_A_Drain: Just wondering, how long have you been playing SF?
If my 8 year old brother can play and become proficient at Street Fighter, I don't understand how no one else can. I mean quite honestly it is one of the easiest fighting games to pick up. I mean every picks up on the jump forward kick, leg sweep attack, and that's enough to get you through a bit until you get used to the game.
Casually, since it was released on the SNES on and off.
Seriously? Since HD Remix's release.
Starting out with that one game (SF II on the SNES) allowed me to move onto any other fighter I wanted to, very very easily and get to grips with them very fast. Unless of course the game was shite, or has no depth and simply revolves around combo memorisation like a lot of 3D fighters, which i'm not good at so obviously have a little difficulty.
Whereas friends of mine who started out playing nothing but Brawl or Soul Calibur 2, cannot play other fighters for beans, not even 3D ones.
@The_A_Drain: I feel that is a very big thing right there. You've been playing 2D fighters for a long time. Where as good chunk of people starting now are used to this 3D age which play quite differently. Not to mention that I could just be terrible at life and not get these crazy 2D games. Maybe I'm just not the right person for them but I'll keep giving them a try.
" @The_A_Drain: I feel that is a very big thing right there. You've been playing 2D fighters for a long time. Where as good chunk of people starting now are used to this 3D age which play quite differently. Not to mention that I could just be terrible at life and not get these crazy 2D games. Maybe I'm just not the right person for them but I'll keep giving them a try. "
I dunno, I mean, I also played Killer Instinct, Mortal Kombat and other fighters back in the day, and I got the same jerky, slow, feel and felt the same lack of strategy I feel in todays 3D fighters with the exception of Soul Calibur.
Maybe it's just me I don't know, but I get a definite feeling lf 'right' from games like SF, SC, Guilty Gear, and to some extent KoF etc. Whereas I get a definite feeling of 'wrong' from games like Mortal Kombat, Tekken, Virtua Fighter, Killer Instinct etc.
I love Street Fighter IV. But I'm so bad at it- that it frustrates me when I loose the 200th time- so I know what you mean. But that's online for you. Either play how you like with a buddy- or go hardcore. I'm geting desintegrated online- but maybe one day I'll learn something from all these defeats. And just to show you how bad I am, I didn't get the The Line Starts Here achievement (common) But I did get the Hard Fought Battles achievement (uncommon)
From what you described, it sounds to me like Tekken might be a good series to get into, especially if you liked Soulcalibur and MK. And Tekken 5 is pretty damn cheap now, so in terms of bang for your buck, it's the best way to go.
@The_A_Drain: I get what you're saying and in a way that's what I've been meaning. It's about how the game feels to you, and that is all personal opinion and if you don't like how feels you're probably not going to play it long enough to get used to.
I think we have an understanding here so I think I'm done with this, but thank you for being civil this entire time (I expected a bunch of rabid freaks in here taking this topic as an insult). It makes coming back to these conversations much easier.
"I mean every picks up on the jump forward kick, leg sweep attack, and that's enough to get you through a bit until you get used to the game. "
See.... I have no idea wtf you're talking about, that might as well be gibberish. I've totally lost my love for SF because it's become a mathematical algorithm to the pros & they just fight over which nerd can solve it faster. P.S. I'll kick your 8 yr old brothers ass in MvC2 ; ) lol
Gibberish? You jump forward. Kick. Then crouch and kick. There's no maths involved. Jump Kick, followed by a sweep. Leg Sweep isn't SF gibberish, it's a term used the world over for any leg attack designed to knock the opponent off his feet by sweeping his legs away.
I can totally understand the "SF gibberish" phenomena, but that shouldn't be gibberish to any gamer on the planet. It's the most basic attack string ever concieved, jump attack, ground attack.
If you want gibberish we can start talking about FADCs, links, cancels, wake up games, mix ups, kara cancelling, katobi cancelling. Etc. :P
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