Why do you think so few people enjoy fighting games?

[loc978]

I'm going to go out on a limb here and pose that fighting games are more popular than they've ever been.
Thing is, back in the arcade days, they used to be a larger percentage of the gaming market because gaming itself was a niche interest, and most gamers back then were looking for very difficult performance challenges. Nowadays, gaming is a much larger thing, and most gamers are looking more for a cinematic experience.

 

[Reishadowen]

To the main topic (because I'm too d*mn lazy to read anything else apparently), probably because almost all fighting games eventually get to the same pitfall: I call it the "back-shielding asshole" pitfall. If you've played a fighting game, you more than likely have gotten up to a character somewhere that serves as a "boss", which is nothing short of brutally unforgiving and will take down half your life bar in a single combo if you don't know exactly what the CPU is going to do and when, all the while managing to block about 95% of your attacks you manage to actually hit them with, before they turn around, perform six kicks, a grapple, knock you into a dizzy, then fling you across to the other side of the room.

As for why not just fight multiplayer with people, well, this isn't the days of the SNES where we go over to a friend's house then play MK or Street Fighter anymore. Alot more game-time is spent over online formats, and I'm even going to bother going through all the problems with that...

 

[2733]

because the only way to really get into them is to have a community of people to play against who are on your same level. the only fighting games I ever really got into where soul caliber 2+3 and that was because my friends and I all started playing at the same time and stayed at basically the same level while we played. I think better matchmaking could revitalize the genre

here's hoping soul caliber 5 fixes 4's balance issues.

 

[jVictor]

I used to consider fighting games nothing more than a passing fancy. I played Super Smash Bros and some Soul Caliber here and there, and did not consider them to be an interesting genre. Fast forward to college, where my roommate and his friends are fighting game aficionados. I went from someone asking how to do a hadoken to being able to pull off combos into supers, and I'll tell you that makes all the difference.

Now I play Blazblue, SSFIV, UMvC3, and whatever else my roommate or I can get our hands on. As of now we're looking forward to skullgirls, which looks promising. It really matters who you play with when it comes to fighting games. I've made plenty of friends in local tournaments and get-togethers. Watching others play is just as entertaining as playing yourself, especially if the players are skilled.

If you ever get the chance, watch a tournament stream (especially EVO). You can almost taste the hype in every match.

 

[jVictor]

I used to consider fighting games nothing more than a passing fancy. I played Super Smash Bros and some Soul Caliber here and there, and did not consider them to be an interesting genre. Fast forward to college, where my roommate and his friends are fighting game aficionados. I went from someone asking how to do a hadoken to being able to pull off combos into supers, and I'll tell you that makes all the difference.

Now I play Blazblue, SSFIV, UMvC3, and whatever else my roommate or I can get our hands on. As of now we're looking forward to skullgirls, which looks promising. It really matters who you play with when it comes to fighting games. I've made plenty of friends in local tournaments and get-togethers. Watching others play is just as entertaining as playing yourself, especially if the players are skilled.

If you ever get the chance, watch a tournament stream (especially EVO). You can almost taste the hype in every match.

 

[jVictor]

I used to consider fighting games nothing more than a passing fancy. I played Super Smash Bros and some Soul Caliber here and there, and did not consider them to be an interesting genre. Fast forward to college, where my roommate and his friends are fighting game aficionados. I went from someone asking how to do a hadoken to being able to pull off combos into supers, and I'll tell you that makes all the difference.

Now I play Blazblue, SSFIV, UMvC3, and whatever else my roommate or I can get our hands on. As of now we're looking forward to skullgirls, which looks promising. It really matters who you play with when it comes to fighting games. I've made plenty of friends in local tournaments and get-togethers. Watching others play is just as entertaining as playing yourself, especially if the players are skilled.

If you ever get the chance, watch a tournament stream (especially EVO). You can almost taste the hype in every match.

EDIT: Sorry about the triple post. My browser messed up. Is there any way to delete the extra posts?

 

[geK0]

Because they're bad at them. And that's not an insult, these games have deceptively steep learning curves.

People will accuse these games of being button mashers because that's all most people know how to do when they start the game. Once you take a closer look at all these moves, their speed, power, button combinations etc, you begin to realize that button mashing isn't the best strategy.

For the record, im not a huge fan of fighters... Im terrible at them!

 

[Bad Jim]

I'd say it's down to learning curve. With this in mind I suggest a few ways to combat this.

- The default mode of online play shall be with a handicap applied. This handicap will not just reduce damage, but also reduce speed and hitstun so combos will be harder to do. It shall be up to the weak player to disable handicap, not for the strong player to enable it. At least for low ranking players.
That way, noobs will at least be able to win some of their early matches and have fun.

- Macros shall be tournament legal. Further, there should be a macro system built into the game so that everybody can do it, not just people who buy special controllers. This will make special moves and tricky combos equally available to all players. It will also make fighting game skills more transferable, as you will be able to map moves the same way for other games.

 

[Dreiko_v1legacy]

Sorry to sound like a CoD fanboy, but it's all about the multiplayer. I play Blazblue and I'm sure I've played 100s of matches against my friend... with us using the exact same characters every time (Rachel vs Noel). The depth is finding out exactly what strategies work, finding them obsolete once people learn to counter them, and then coming up with more strategies. Even then you still have to be one step ahead of your opponent and you have to mix up your strategies as much as possible, that and actually having to pull off such precise button combinations under pressure.

I can see why people wouldn't like that. There's a phase between learning the basics and actually holding your own against other players where the game gives you no positive reinforcement whatsoever.

And for all the Blazblue players in this thread: Jin's Icecars, how do I stop them? I'll never call a move cheap, but my friend stopped using him before I could ever find a strategy against that.

If you're talking about naked ice cars as a way to approach then that's super easy to stop. You just block and punish with a poke. Instant-blocking the second hit of the ice car should make it all that much easier. No good Jins ever throw ice cars outside of combos unless they're either trying to guard crush you or they're trying to catch you in the startup of mashing something out, which should be easy enough to avoid doing.


As for that phase, yeah, that's true. The game does an excellent job of letting you know why you lose. It's never a clusterfuck like MvC3 or something too fast to notice like SF. If you fail to block a low there's a yellow ! if you fail to block an overhead there's a red ! if you get thrown there's a green !! if you get hit with an air unblockable move there's a blue !!, if you drop a combo the counter turns blue and the hit you messed up on is numbered and if you waste your burst you instantly know you've made an error and may well pay for it. Some people just can't take all the reality hitting them all the time and just give up.

I'd say it's down to learning curve. With this in mind I suggest a few ways to combat this.

- The default mode of online play shall be with a handicap applied. This handicap will not just reduce damage, but also reduce speed and hitstun so combos will be harder to do. It shall be up to the weak player to disable handicap, not for the strong player to enable it. At least for low ranking players.
That way, noobs will at least be able to win some of their early matches and have fun.

- Macros shall be tournament legal. Further, there should be a macro system built into the game so that everybody can do it, not just people who buy special controllers. This will make special moves and tricky combos equally available to all players. It will also make fighting game skills more transferable, as you will be able to map moves the same way for other games.

Sorry but both of those are terrible ideas.


It is meaningless to win with a handicap cause your foe will be able to (reasonably) claim that if it was a fair fight then you wouldn't have won.


If by macro you mean pressing just one button to do one move instead of actual inputs, that's kinda the point of the games you're negating here. It's part of being good at a game having the skill to do moves and combos, to buffer them under pressure and to negative-edge or option-select properly. It is these things that make people good or bad at games and to completely obliterate them is plain ridiculous.


Not everybody should be able to do the tricky combos and have perfect execution. If everybody could then it wouldn't be special any more! That's the entire reason why fighting game communities are so strong, there's few epic strong players and the rest look up to them and aspire to play like them one day. Even if you did make the game you describe the simple fact that everyone can do combos in that game equally as much would instantly render it boring.


Also, how would a macro for combos even work. There's so many different factors to take into account, you'd need like 30-50 different macros if you're to cover every single possible situational combo a single character can do from all parts of the screen and so on...and how would you even go about pressing the macro input to do that whole combo...who remembers 30-50 different buttons. It's much easier to remember 4 different buttons and just learn the combo sequences in time, like an instrument.

 

[Lunar Templar]

hehe, i think its ironic, all the people crying 'no plot' when the best sellers of late hardly have any of it, or its a 'side thing' to get to when ever your done dicking around in the bushes.

but, OT: its not really newbie friendly, AI tends to be ether cheap or to easy, and hardly readys you for a combatant with a brain. then there's the steep learning curve (i suggest the aid of a Sherpa) in order to be 'above average' in terms of skill


that said i will wreck your shit in KI1

 

[Bad Jim]

It is meaningless to win with a handicap cause your foe will be able to (reasonably) claim that if it was a fair fight then you wouldn't have won.

It would be meaningless anyway. It would be a game against someone you didn't know and would probably never see again. Who wouldn't be anything special if he was in the low ranked "handicap league".

But it would be fun. It would be less disheartening for noobs, which would result in more of them playing, which would reduce the need for handicap, as there would be more terrible players to draw against.

And if you really care about a meaningful victory, you could just turn it off whenever it favoured you. You need never suffer a hollow victory if it bothers you.

Not everybody should be able to do the tricky combos and have perfect execution. If everybody could then it wouldn't be special any more! That's the entire reason why fighting game communities are so strong, there's few epic strong players and the rest look up to them and aspire to play like them one day. Even if you did make the game you describe the simple fact that everyone can do combos in that game equally as much would instantly render it boring.

No, no, no, that's not how it works. Executing moves and combos consistently is just the first step towards being an epic strong player. Then there is learning the appropriate times to execute your combos/specials/misc moves. Then you work on mind games. The second and third steps are fun and interesting. The first, unfortunately, is not fun and usually far too hard and long.

Being able to execute tricky combos is not the point of the game. It's just frequently mistaken for the point of the game because you have to spend so long learning it before you can play the real game.

Also, how would a macro for combos even work. There's so many different factors to take into account, you'd need like 30-50 different macros if you're to cover every single possible situational combo a single character can do from all parts of the screen and so on...and how would you even go about pressing the macro input to do that whole combo...who remembers 30-50 different buttons. It's much easier to remember 4 different buttons and just learn the combo sequences in time, like an instrument.

You don't need to cover every possible combo. You could just use the really powerful ones that make a big difference like infinite juggle combos, kara throws etc. And you could assign them to any kind of input sequence eg quarter circle forward + left trigger = fireball + FADC.

They wouldn't make your execution as good a pro, but they would make it much better.

 

[Digitaldreamer7]

You can all get deep and try and figure out why as an industry this and they really are good games that. The only reason i'm not into fighting games any more, is simple..

Arcades are shutting down.

Killer Instinct is on my top 10 favorite games of all time list.

Fighting games don't translate well to consoles. The experience of 10-20 strangers all huddled around an arcade machine taking turns whooping each others asses kind of like an impromptu fight club is lost on consoles.

Yes, the multiplayer online option is there, but as others have mentioned, you can't pick and choose your battles. Without some intelligent match-up software, it ends up in newbies getting the shit kicked out of them over and over again til they quit.

And, 60$ for a game that hinges purely on a small multiplayer player base alone is shitty. I'd do it for 30$ but not for 60.

 

[FalloutJack]

-Reeeeeepooo Maaaaannn!-

Even with the provisos of your discussion, the fighting game community probably doesn't agree with the statement. I, personally, am old hat at Street Fighter and Mortal combat, with a degree Soul Calibur goodness, a hand in Power Stone, and a decent fanhood of Blazblue. I've been around the block and I have a reasonable amount of skill, though not as good as a flipping expert. It's those incredible experts that tell me that gaming devotion is strong in all its facates. I'm not sure that other genres are even that much comparatively better.

 

[mitchell271]

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.

Lack of depth. Lack of depth. You're kidding right? Have you ever played a fighting game where any 2 rounds are the exact same? NO. There are infinite combos to be created in a well put together game (i.e. BlazBlue, Street Fighter, Tekken) and they are infinitely replayable.

What I think you don't like is repetition. Depth and repetition are 2 extremely different things.

OP: I think the reason is that really good fighting games are hard to get in to. You have to learn to timing for each move for certain characters, learning button combos and etc. etc. There's a huge learning curve and some people don't like that. I do. But whatever, to each their own.

 

[G-Force]

There's no story, there's no puzzles or anything to work your mind, it's just trying to get the same combos all the time.

A fighting game match is a gigantic puzzle that tests both your reflexes and your strategy. Fighting opponents and seeing the wholes in their offense and defense while maintaining the flow of the match is the ULTIMATE puzzle. Does the solution lie in timing, can you bait certain attacks out, will you need to "force" your momentum and steal the pace. All of this you need to factor on top of how many rounds you need to win, health, super gauge and time left in each round in addition to the playstyle of yourself, your opponent and the unique properties of both your characters.

Oh don't forget you actually have to make these decisions on the fly.

If that doesn't sound like a taxing, mindbending puzzle, I don't know what does.

 

[z121231211]

Last time I played a fighting game, which admittedly was a few years ago when the PS2 was still relevant, I beat someone who'd been playing that game for two years by simply mashing A.

Sounds like you were playing on beginner mode. A lot of fighting games have it set so that when a certain mode is selected you give up a lot of control over your character to be able to mash a single button multiple times to do a combo. Upside is that if you don't know how to do combos in the first place, it allows you to actually do some, downside is that it's only a certain few predictable combos that higher level players would punish extremely easily. Really all you proved was that you can devote years of your life to something and still not be that good at it.

And seriously, for every genre out there there are people taking it too seriously. But I guess I can't dispute you when fighting games have real-life tournaments devoted to them.

 

[imagremlin]

Reasons I'm hearing:

1) You will be destroyed online
2) There's been no evolution in a long while
3) The gameplay is repetitive
4) There's no story

Mhh.. for a moment I thought everyone was talking about FPS'

I think It's cultural. I understand they're still pretty big in Japan/Korea. On this side of the world, people prefer their Noob-Unfriendly, stagnant-genred, non-storied, repetitive games to have guns.

 

[DarthFennec]

There's no story, there's no puzzles or anything to work your mind, it's just trying to get the same combos all the time.

A fighting game match is a gigantic puzzle that tests both your reflexes and your strategy. Fighting opponents and seeing the wholes in their offense and defense while maintaining the flow of the match is the ULTIMATE puzzle. Does the solution lie in timing, can you bait certain attacks out, will you need to "force" your momentum and steal the pace. All of this you need to factor on top of how many rounds you need to win, health, super gauge and time left in each round in addition to the playstyle of yourself, your opponent and the unique properties of both your characters.

Oh don't forget you actually have to make these decisions on the fly.

If that doesn't sound like a taxing, mindbending puzzle, I don't know what does.

And see, that's fine, when you're up against, you know, an actual opponent. Honing your strategy to take advantage of an opponent's flaws works fine when your opponent actually has a few flaws. That's what I mean when I say I like playing fighting games with my friends. But single player and fighting the cpus ... I can think of millions of better things to do, sorry.