Why do you think so few people enjoy fighting games?

[Ipsen]

The learning curve can be a big turn-off.

But if we're talking about the contrast to 'so few people', I would say most people who play video games just don't want to play a different genre. Yea, I believe we're at the point where casual game players outnumber not only the fighting genre, but most other established game genres.

As much as I love fighting games, there are so many complaints that have been levied against them, which are still valid today, and continue to dim the experience.

The established fighting games, such as MvC, Tekken, Street Fighter, KoF, and now BlazBlue all take time in monotonous combo practice to learn the mechanics well; and that's just the basics. From there, you have to get creative to be good.

In previous iterations, you could get away with button mashing; a casual's preferred method, and probably the only way they'd get a win/have fun. Doesn't happen today. At least for my preferred fighter, UMvC3, it seems there's so many ways to punish mistakes AND string hitstun for ridiculous combos, there also seems little room for defensive tactics (or maybe I'm just not seeing it).

All of this wouldn't be so much of an issue if fighting games had a method for better character development. There's only building your own personal skill with particular fighters in fighting games; nothing develops for them within the game. I'm sure we've all grown attached to fighters we've grown skilled with; all the more if something could grow with their use in-game. Pretty much impossible without breaking the balance of the game, but it still feels like it leaves a huge gap without in-game progress (on the topic of character though, Marvel characters have plenty of history through comics, which I love, so there's a bit of an alternative).

 

[Dandark]

Untill I few monthes ago I had never played a fighting game before, then since my friend enjoyed it a lot I bought Blazblue CS.

I have been really enjoying it and it's a lot of fun. I can usaully enjoy a match even if my opponent is better than me and wins, however there is one thing that is really throwing me off.

I don't know about other fighting games but in Blazblue, I have had trouble with people who have learnt all of the combos. They will hit me once and then launch into a huge combo that takes of 3/4 of my health that I can't do anything about. What annoy's me is that from the moment they hit me I was removed from the game, it all depended on them being able to to the combo, I was completely cut out from the game and forced to not play but watch.

This has really thrown me off playing blazblue right now, im not sure if it's the same in other fighting games but if it is then that may be the reason a lot of players new to the genre like me stop playing.

 

[GlorySeeker]

I like fighting games. Ok at em myself. But what really turns me off from playing them, is going online, and just getting raped. maybe people are just like me, and prefer the "Pass the controller around the room" kinda style.

 

[azurine]

for most of 'em, it's the confusing controls and lack of depth that keep me away.

 

[Batou667]

My guess is that it's not very newbie friendly outside the cpu fights. They are games that require a lot of time and effort just to become okay at the game and a great amount of dedication to become good . Time effore And dedication that a lot of people can't affort to put into a game .

Exactly this.

I was always a casual fighter fan, from the 16-bit days of SFII and Eternal Champions, then Virtua Fighter on the Saturn, and then the Dead Or Alive series on Dreamcast and Xbox. But since then, I'm pretty much done with fighting games.

I only played Guilty Gear a dozen times because it's too damn complex. The core fighting system is difficult enough, and then each character has a number of additions or exceptions to these rules. The entire screen is a mess of status bars and flashing meters.

Street Fighter 4: Unless you somehow master moves and tactics that are never mentioned, let alone required, to complete the single-player mode then you'll get your ass whooped six ways to sunday online. I go online and the other player ruthlessly exploits my lack of uderstanding of the game system. Or hangs back and throws an infinite stream of fireballs :/

I want a game that's easy to pick up but difficult to master. Is that so unreasonable? You shouldn't need a Rain Man rating on the Aspie-o-meter just to be able to clear the practice stages. If I ever pick up online fighting again it'd probably be Mortal Kombat.

 

[Deleted]

Why aren't most people doctors, or body builders?
These things are hard to do and usually even affect your lifestyle significantly.
Fighting games are competitive so some people might not like that. There are fighting games for the more casual player like SSBB and MK (they are good games before you flame me).
You can either not play, be a casual player, or a player trying to get good. Nothing is wrong with being a casual but its expected that not everyone wants to get good.

A lot of people in this thread are just scrubs that dismiss fighting games as trite bullshit, they need to just accept that they don't have the drive or motivation to get good. "hurr you just mash all the time, they take no skill. also they're just games so all their effort and skill is meaningless 9_9"

 

[Deleted]

Untill I few monthes ago I had never played a fighting game before, then since my friend enjoyed it a lot I bought Blazblue CS.

I have been really enjoying it and it's a lot of fun. I can usaully enjoy a match even if my opponent is better than me and wins, however there is one thing that is really throwing me off.

I don't know about other fighting games but in Blazblue, I have had trouble with people who have learnt all of the combos. They will hit me once and then launch into a huge combo that takes of 3/4 of my health that I can't do anything about. What annoy's me is that from the moment they hit me I was removed from the game, it all depended on them being able to to the combo, I was completely cut out from the game and forced to not play but watch.

This has really thrown me off playing blazblue right now, im not sure if it's the same in other fighting games but if it is then that may be the reason a lot of players new to the genre like me stop playing.

This only happens because you're new. Anyone can do any long combo on a training dummy, as you get better, you'll have your own combos. Then the game doesn't become as one sided. Two excellent players won't get long combos off each other repeatedly, most damage is done from punishes or small easy combos, because positioning and prediction is way more important than raw damage output.

When you get experienced, you'll know what combos the enemy will try to do, and you can stop them by positioning yourself and countering.

 

[StriderShinryu]

Gah.. I realize that fighting games are not for everyone. They're hard to get into if you didn't get in at the bottom floor back when SF2 came out. They're tough to learn if you have any issue with the process of losing repeatedly to get better. They do take a level of second to second thought to action beyond what you find in most games. The community is great, but does tend to look down on you if you don't take the games seriously and actually attempt to better your level of play.

What I don't really get, however, is people (such as some in this very thread) who say that fighting games lack depth or don't provide enough value. A well designed fighting game is probably the deepest experience you can find in a game if what you're looking at is actual gameplay. Taking a character's move set, truly understanding what all of the moves do and then learning how to apply those moves is only the first level. Once you get there, you need to be able to adapt to and understand both your opponent and their character as well. The better they are, the better you have to be and so on. There really is very little end to the depth.

And as far as value is concerned. Fighting games are one of the few genres where gameplay time is measured not in hours or days or weeks, but in years. As good as, say, Skyrim is I doubt many of even it's most dedicated fans will be playing it this time next year. MvC3, however, will be played years from now. Heck, MvC3 and SF3 3rd Strike were played for almost 10 years before eventually being replaced (and some people still play them seriously).

 

[SpaceBat]

The reason I don't like them is the lack of depth, mostly. If I pay $60 for a new game I want it to last a while.

From a storytelling aspect, you are absolutely correct. I would not know how you or anyone would view this as a flaw however, unless people are under the impression that every kind of game must have a story. If you're talking from a gameplay perspective...holy shit, you have no idea how far you are from the truth. There is a reason why some people spend thousands of hours on games such as Super Street Fighter 4 and still find things they can improve upon.

They're often twitch-fests which require absurd amounts of memorization and then are just nothing but inputting button sequences really fast.

Wrong, fast reactions and fast inputs are only a fairly small part of it. A huge part of high-level fighting is mind-games. The ability to get into your opponents mind, read what they are going to do next and alter their way of thinking/playing to your advantage. It's something you can only get better at by playing the game. I assume you haven't witnessed more than average level play.

They're all the same and they're as much "Mash Attack until win" as "test of skill".

Completely wrong at medium-to-high level play. You might find yourself losing some matches to mashers at the beginning, but the better you become, the more immune you become to random mashers. The moment you're an average gamer, the "mash attack until win" situations disappear nearly entirely.


Although the fighting genre has grown since the beginning of this gen, there are a few reasons why it still may be a bit niche compared to other genre's. Reasons for this may be:
- Online play is often relentless, unless played with people you know.
- It takes a large amount of time to actually become great at the games.
- They're often not balanced well enough (I'm looking at you MvC3 series).
- You need to build up your reflexes for the game, learn match-ups and whatnot, watch pro's play. You don't learn everything in-game, you have to do quite a bit of research outside the game as well.
- Combo's often require good timing.
- It lacks variety, it is not for people in search of story.

It basically has a very steep learning curve, which might be the reason why many people don't want to play it or keep playing it. It's never too hard for anyone, but many simply won't find it worth their time (like me), which is understandable.

The only thing fighting games have is "Push buttons to attack." I feel no more inclined to pay ?60 for that than I would a "Press I to open your inventory" game.

Seeing as you took out a huge amount of content from fighting games such as SSFIV and merely dumbed them down to "push buttons to attack", I could say the same about nearly every game that has ever existed. If I would say "the only thing I have to do in skyrim is wall around and click on stuff with my mouse", it would be just as flawed as what you're saying.

 

[Fappy]

Snip

Great points but I fear your efforts will fall on deaf ears. Some people around here would rather have the story of "Alien" bastardized and retold to them x1000 times before they even begin to admit that there is more to your average fighting game than mashing fireballs. Some people just don't appreciate the joy that comes from the arcade mentality that many fighters keep alive today (including most of my IRL friends).

 

[GeorgW]

They're too hard. The difficulty curve is a wall and the only help most games give is a list of names of moves and a bunch of symbols. There's a market for it, and I've tried to get into them, but there's a reason the SSB series is the best selling, they're the simplest.

That and Super Smash Bros. has all the most famous Nintendo characters in the same title. I'm sure that has SOMETHING to do with it

Sure it matters, but I honestly don't think it makes that much of a difference. The games have always been good, and I often hear it mentioned as the only fighting game someone likes. I doubt that's just the characters' effort.

Okay yeah, I see what you mean. I think its safe to say that its popularity is generated by its cast, but its notoriety is created by its accessibility and fun-factor. I always considered it more of a party game than a proper fight, but then again I sometimes use overly rigid genre labels. What matters is that the game is fun and people like it. I'm not big into tournament scenes anyway, and while I would rather play a game of BlazBlue I would always boot up SSB before any other fighter when there's a big group of friends around. Smashing forward-A and B to win is a lot easier to grasp than quarter-circle punch.

Yeah, I play it with friends and there's a lot of depth there, just not in the controls, which I think more fighting games could do well to learn from.

 

[gmaverick019_v1legacy]

1. They're often twitch-fests which require absurd amounts of memorization and then are just nothing but inputting button sequences really fast.

2. Not much variety, and not much innovation.

basically this, they are over competitive twitch fests that require insane amount of dedication to be any good in pvp

this is why i stick to super smash bros and just have lots of good casual fun with brothers and friends!

plus i tend to enjoy action/adventure games much more than just pure fighter games, as they give me a story and purpose to what i am doing, along with some general kind of parkour/roaming

 

[Fappy]

They're too hard. The difficulty curve is a wall and the only help most games give is a list of names of moves and a bunch of symbols. There's a market for it, and I've tried to get into them, but there's a reason the SSB series is the best selling, they're the simplest.

That and Super Smash Bros. has all the most famous Nintendo characters in the same title. I'm sure that has SOMETHING to do with it

Sure it matters, but I honestly don't think it makes that much of a difference. The games have always been good, and I often hear it mentioned as the only fighting game someone likes. I doubt that's just the characters' effort.

Okay yeah, I see what you mean. I think its safe to say that its popularity is generated by its cast, but its notoriety is created by its accessibility and fun-factor. I always considered it more of a party game than a proper fight, but then again I sometimes use overly rigid genre labels. What matters is that the game is fun and people like it. I'm not big into tournament scenes anyway, and while I would rather play a game of BlazBlue I would always boot up SSB before any other fighter when there's a big group of friends around. Smashing forward-A and B to win is a lot easier to grasp than quarter-circle punch.

Yeah, I play it with friends and there's a lot of depth there, just not in the controls, which I think more fighting games could do well to learn from.

I think it depends on the level of play though. As someone earlier mentioned, at high levels of play (a level of which I am not a part of) the complexity moves from combos to mind games. SSB definitely shares that quality and I agree that some fighters could learn from it, however developers are afraid to mess with the formula too much lest the game be branded "non-competitive". In Brawl they introduced a random tripping mechanic that in many people's eyes (mine included) completely tarnished any chance of a 100% legitimate/fair fight. I never thought SSB should be considered a hardcore tournament game (nor does its creator), so the whole tripping thing doesn't really matter all that much to me. I just laugh at the people who discuss SSB tier lists

 

[Soxafloppin]

Well it certainly is a Smaller Genre than say FPS but I know Mortal Kombat sold 4 Million copies so the fan base is there.

For some reason MK is the only fighting game I've ever really gotten into, the Capcom see me as inferior for that but I'm not bothered!

 

[Schmittler]

The reason I don't like them is the lack of depth, mostly. If I pay $60 for a new game I want it to last a while.

This is my main issue with fighting games. I'm sorry, but no Capcom, releasing a new game not even a year after the first's release, is just silly in my opinion. Yeah, it makes sense from a marketing perspective, but it feels cheap. For the most part, there just isn't enough content, especially with developers charging more and more for DLC.

On the other hand, it's just not worth it to me. Becoming talented at fighting games takes some time, and it's time I would rather use elsewhere. It's not so bad if you have a group of friends to play fighting games with, but otherwise it is difficult for me, and I assume a decent amount of other people, to justify spending time mastering a somewhat repetitive cycle.

 

[Ruwrak]

Getting into them is hard.
Playing online you'll face merely people that are 'that guy' =/

yes you know what I speak of.

 

[Joshimodo]

It's because they're incredibly limited and boring. There just isn't enough fun or content to justify playing them.