Maybe someone’s kid or friend or sibling turned the game on and ran into you?…
When I used to try online matches, I liked playing using Dhalsim and Dan, and had a fun match against a hyper aggressive Akuma player that spammed the usual moves at me. I smashed him fairly hard first match, let him take round two fairly dominantly, let him feel fairly in control for round three, then finished the round with this… 😁
Instant rage quit, got lots of messages saying what an asshole I was and how I cheated, and was a loser who didn’t take fighting games seriously since I use Dan after, it was all very satisfying. Sadly, I gave up on playing fighting games online after that. It was fun while it lasted, and now I live vicariously through you lot! 🙂
Post by unimportantguy on Aug 5, 2021 11:21:14 GMT
SFIV was a really fun game to me, but I generally found that the community of players was pretty awful and toxic, and it got worse over time. I got more hate-mail over SFIV matches than I did over Dark Souls PvP, and that, my friends, is saying something. The Dark Souls PvP salt back in the day was very real indeed but the SFIV name-calling was on a whole other level. As soon as people saw Cammy in the vs. screen the torrent of abuse would start, and it would often continue for multiple messages after the match was over. I actually created a "Welcome to my ignore list" form letter that I would send to SFIV players, to which I eventually attached a link for information on anger management classes. Wish I still had that, but I think it disappeared a computer ago.
By comparison, nobody really talks to me in Guilty Gear. Occasionally people will use the canned "good game!" emotes or bow after a match and that's about it.
lol I'm bad at Strive part 41: I meant to do that
I've been discussing with some other people recently the fact that I tend to have really sloppy execution. I've had it suggested multiple times that I try switching to a dpad, but I find that not only do I dislike using dpads for fighting games (have ever since I was a kid - I owned an arcade stick for my Turbo Duo back then), but I think my execution is actively worse on them.
It can actually be hard to tell at a glance whether I'm making execution errors or not - in this video, it may look like I'm screwing up a lot, but actually I only have one unintentional input in the whole match: the super jump in round 3. The rest of that flailing around was all things I was doing quite intentionally - even if a lot of them didn't work out the way I saw it in my head, my mistakes were tactical, not execution-based.
One final note on this video: I love May's animations. The thumbnail provides an excellent example, but in general she is just adorable and that matters! Aesthetic is an important part of character choice.
I played online SF4 a lot for a few years. Overall, I met some good people. But I got my share of hate messages and obvious rage-quits too. They weren't a lot but there were enough to make things unpleasant at times. I still feel like the beefed-up aesthetic of SF4 ("do you even hadou-bro?") brought in an aggro crowd compared to previous SF games and SF5. I think it was far worse on Xbox though than PS3. After all, some of the big FPS Xbox trolls had to take a break sometime and they had Ken Masters all ready 😁
As for execution - I think you should always use the controller type you are more comfortable with. I'll always choose pad vs. stick for 99% of fighting games. I've heard people say sticks can be better but I rarely found that to be true for me. Only in certain games or with certain characters (or certain moves for them) would it be equal.
If you do feel like you are having any issues with consistent execution or execution under pressure, I would recommend practice mode against CPU opponents if GG has that. SF and KOF usually have a "cpu vs. record" feature where you can record the CPU movements and then play them. This was great for me in practicing the Raging Storm in Capcom vs. SNK 2 against jump kick pressure. Good for parries in SF3 as well.
Sometimes just doing the move over and over again really helps. I can remember two instances:
In 1992 - if you could dragon punch reliably, your Ryu/Ken was going to win matches. I could not do that so they were practically unusable for me. However, once SF2 came out for SNES, I took it upon myself to really learn how to do it in a way that felt right and reliable to me. I must have DP'd 1000 times but I finally "raised my level". It was a great feeling. And despite the fact I did it on a pad, the confidence and skill translated to arcade sticks too.
In 2002 - I wanted to become better with the Raging Storm with Geese in Capcom vs. SNK 2. I pretty much did the same thing - just constant Raging Storms until I could do it like 10 times in a row without dropping one. I tried the original motion and the "shortcut" motion and realized one works for me on one side, and the other on the other side. I practiced with pad and stick. I got significantly better and then practiced against the CPU under pressure. While I'm out of practice now, I can usually get my muscle memory of that move back and consistent within an hour.
My workplace has some of those MAME arcade cabinets with a bunch of games on them. One of them is SF2 Turbo. I've been playing it the past couple nights on my breaks and I cannot believe how much more comfortable I am with an arcade stick than a pad. It must tap into some ancient childhood muscle memory. I could hardly believe myself when I picked Zangief tonight and just started pounding out SPDs like they were nothing.
Guilty Gear does have a record feature but I have no idea how to use it. I should probably learn anything about it.
It's really only the Marvel vs. Capcom series that I'm better at with a stick than a pad. But it's a huge difference. I think the air combos felt more naturally to me that way as well as the ease of the combos with the 6 face buttons. Even if I had a gamepad with 6 face buttons, it's totally different playing it than a natural joystick setup with 6 buttons.
I could never get the hang of KOF with a joystick though. That's gamepad all the way.
I think that "record" feature could be really helpful. Definitely worth getting more comfortable with that feature.
I would record characters throwing different speed fireballs in order to get comfortable with parries.
And since you actually control the characters when doing the recording, you can have them play however you want. That means that you can have them do really deep jumping attacks or cross-ups or stuff like that. It's kind of funny to try to be your own worst enemy but you tend to know what can trip you up. Like record someone doing a jump kick and then an empty jump into a throw right after. I became much cooler under pressure against aggressive rush-downs this way.
The only issue with record is that the CPU will get confused if you throw them or they end up on the wrong side of you.
Post by unimportantguy on Aug 6, 2021 11:33:48 GMT
While my latest video uploads, here's a realization I had about May's Mr. Dolphin earlier:
It can be Roman cancelled into another dolphin! It did not at all occur to me that that would work until this afternoon. I may be a bit slow on the uptake sometimes.
Oh hey, while I was getting the formatting on this post right, my latest video finished uploading:
lol I'm bad at Strive part 42: A Whale of a Time
I am not too ashamed to admit that whale was completely accidental, but it completely worked out in my favor when I remembered whale can be Roman Cancelled for some truly deadly mix-up.
Post by unimportantguy on Aug 7, 2021 11:59:06 GMT
lol I'm bad at Strive part 43: MAY PAWNCH
I'm fairly sure I've mentioned before that I really dislike how the alternate color sets in Guilty Gear Strive will change the skin and hair colors of characters, and this palette for Ramlethal is one of my very least favorites. Maybe that motivated me to win? Usually Ramlethal wreckes me.
I decided to take the plunge tonight and ordered an 8bitdo Arcade Stick. It should be in my hands within a week's time and I'm sure I'll be talking about it here when I get it. In the meantime, it's time for
lol I'm bad at Strive part 44: Chipp Damage
Chipp Zanuff infamously has the lowest health of any fighter in the Guilty Gear games by a fair margin. But he is also very fast and damaging in his own right. Which explains why this match is fairly short and the file size was small. Of particular note to me on this one was the end of round 2. I guess the active frames on Chipp's super start earlier than I thought they did because I could've sworn I was safe there!
Wow, that's a really nice stick! I just read up on it a little. It has such a classic "NES Advantage" look ... which is almost definitely intentional given it's name 😎
A few of the pics I saw had people using the stick in front of the Switch Lite or just the controller for the main Switch. It's funny to me cause the controller is huge but the actual game screen is tiny. I suppose people do that with phones too these days. There's just something amusing to me about that.
I'd probably twist the stick or pound on the buttons so hard that the display screen would fall down 😁
Post by unimportantguy on Aug 9, 2021 10:33:22 GMT
I did mention in my OP that in addition to posting our own matches I saw this as a place to post pro matches. Well, EVO is happening this week, and the conclusion I draw from what I've seen so far is that, based on his reflexes and play skill, Leffen is not human. Maybe that explains why he's such a toxic shithead online if he's not human at all.
Post by unimportantguy on Aug 10, 2021 11:52:57 GMT
I didn't post a Strive video yesterday because it was a very rough day at work and some upsetting things happened, but I'm feeling a little more normal now and ready to post more
lol I'm bad at Strive part 45: Doin' it Live
As a general note regarding pretty much all of my hobbies ever, I really don't practice enough. In fighting games, what this tends to mean is I spend a lot less time in Training Mode labbing things out than I really ought to. So when it comes to a rare matchup, I genuinely have to figure things out live. Axl Low is Guilty Gear Strive's dedicated zoner, and probably the rarest character in the cast for me to see anyone actually play. What you can see in this match is me figuring out, live, in front of an actual opponent, what his moves are like, and how to deal with them. Perhaps most importantly for me and my playstyle, I spend a significant of the match trying to figure out how much of a lazy troll I can get away with being. At this point, I can kind of play decently when I set my mind to it, but one of the core rules of the genre as far as I'm concerned is "Never work harder than your opponent makes you."
Edit: As a side note, I watched a video the other day where a guy was talking about how he felt like the few frames where you can still do stuff after knocking your opponent out in fighting games is a vital form of player expression. I dismissed it as dumb at the time, but I find myself rapidly hammering the taunt button after rounds ever since, hoping to get May's dolphin-petting taunt. It doesn't always work.
Post by unimportantguy on Aug 11, 2021 19:56:43 GMT
Tilted: Adjective. When you let something negatively affect your mood/actions. Commonly used by players of video games.
lol I'm bad at Strive part 46: Tilted
Sometimes it can be really easy to get into a negative headspace when you're on a losing streak. I really should've just put the controller down and done something else for a while.
Post by unimportantguy on Aug 12, 2021 20:12:17 GMT
I got my new arcade stick yesterday! I haven't had a stick since I was like 10 and it's kind of breaking my brain to have a wireless one but goddamn is it really nice. Unfortunately, that does mean I have to deal with a phenomenon that comes along with any new controller...
lol I'm bad at Strive part 47: Singin' the Control Scheme Blues
I really have no idea if other people use this term, but my group of friends tends to refer to that sensation of switching between games or controllers causing you to fuck up as the Control Scheme Blues. They are pervasive and insidious. I wonder how my opponent here would feel if they knew I beat them while heavily struggling with Control Scheme Blues?
Post by unimportantguy on Aug 13, 2021 11:02:07 GMT
lol I'm bad at Strive part 48: More Control Scheme Blues
I'm slowly getting adapted to my new stick, through a combination of live-fire exercises and time in the lab. It's really funny to me that I'm still winning plenty of matches this way.
It took me months to get used to the stick I bought for Marvel vs. Capcom 2 when I first got the Dreamcast. I had never bought an arcade stick for home use and the learning curve was high. Luckily, I adapted to it and also Alpha 3 so that I was fully comfortable with it when Capcom vs. SNK 2 came out.
Going from pad to stick is a really hard transition but for some games it's worth it in the end.
Thing is - it's so fun since the stick kind of makes you feel like you are playing an entirely different game.
