Welcome to another perch of StaticFalconar.
Ever since my last blog of any kind, I have been working on a project that I've been putting off for too long and of course videogames.
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The biggest one as of late: UFC 2009
Having played Street FIghter 4 for the past couple of months and now this, I gotta say I am impressed. There are a lot of things they did right but after a couple weeks of playing it, I gotta say nice try, but you ain't no Street Fighter. Now, don't give me any bullshit saying this game is deeper or what not. The only thing that UFC 2009 does better than SF4 game mechanics wise is have a super kick ass tutorial so show everybody how "deep" the game is. To that I give them an applause and credit. However, this "deep" game is trounced by the lack of game balance. You could be winning a match and out of nowhere get suckered punched for a KO or get your throw revsersed for an instinct Flash submission even if you have full stamina bar. Honestly, there isn't much "skill" involved when everything boils down to twiching the right analog stick. Add to it the online is a game of who can mount the other person first (because even if you know what you're doing, if you get mounted its very hard to get out of), if I didn't have the damn connection error problem that never keeps track of my win/lose record.
But!!!!!! I will say there are some redeeming factors though, that does make this game good enough for a purchase if your friends are into it as well.
The game is basically a big game of rock paper scissors, so spamming your knock out punch isn't going to do anything. The only real game of skill here is mindgames of rock paper scissors put to the theme of UFC and violence. Despite the fact that you don't have to have actual skill in doing the harder and instinct victory moves, it makes for great casual fun. I would definitaly not play online since since lag and people spamming instinct win moves are not a good combination, but I have bought the game and am still glad I did since I am having a blast with my friends.
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The project that I have been working on since SF4 came out was of course writing up a guide for SF4. I started just taking random notes (while I played) here and there and before you know it, I have a skeleton to an actual guide. Then in week or two off after school ended, I used all my notes and put it in real words for all to see. I am still technically working on it since I have yet to finish all the characters and I would want to put the Pros @ work section in the similar vain to what I did with my previous guide.
I hope you guys all love it, cause here comes the bad news.
My summer plans basically make it so that I cannot be in front of the computer or my PS3 as often as I was before. This means a somewhat goodbye to Giantbomb and gaming for a while as I would be lucky to be able to download the bombcast on a weekly basis even. I honestly don't know how many of you recognise this profile or care enough to miss me. Whether you agree with me or not, I had contributed and shared my love for the fighting game genre writing various guides and of course hosting the monthly PSN tournaments for SF4.
Well, at least until the end of summer there will not be another "Power of nothingness, Rage-quit demon...." tournament; so hopefully somebody takes the initiative and keep the PSN SF4 scene alive on Giant bomb by hosting thier own. Honestly its not that hard, all you need is an excel sheet to keep track of people and IMO league play (round robin) style is better than single or double elimination. Since anybody from all over the world can join these tournaments, lag will always be an issue hence going round robin by timezone (or if not that many people join and everybody has to play everybody) nobody would be eliminated in the first round placing them dead last when it was lag that killed them. Its an online tournament first of all so putting it in the same "hardcore" tournament setting as the real tournaments is IMO the wrong way to go. Treat it as a Bombing run and just tally up the scores at the end of the day to declare a winner. Even though I had only ran two GB tournaments (and yes we always seem to run into some problems), these are the lessons that I learned to bridge the gap so that even if you suck at the game, you will still have fun. Or crap all over my ideas and do it single elimination paring up people as far away as possible; as long some form of SF4 PSN community is alive I'll be happy.
Despite not having regular internet connection over the summer I will still continue to write the SF4 guide and update it when I can. Til then, time to hop off this perch and fly away; peace.
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