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[Avallon]

This is difficult for me to put into words, but how do you feel about playing games in a way the developer never intended, specifically multiplayer games.

I guess the best definition of this would be Super Smash Brothers Melee. This game was never intended by Nintendo to be a competitive fighting game as evidenced by its items, stage hazards, and complete lack of balance.

It became a competitive fighting game once the game was “broken” and wave dashing was discovered. Wave dashing was, for all intents and purposes, a glitch, but an entire community formed around playing this game completely against the developers intentions.

Halo 2 was a similar situation with the discovery of BXR. The entire competitive community changed and peoples proficiency with exploiting a bug in the game’s code translated directly into “skill.”

In both of these situations, it was a case of the community embracing the glitch and not flat-out banning it. How do you feel about this?

A more recent example of this is Ultimate Marvel vs Capcom 3 and the introduction of TAC infinites. These will probably be removed in the game’s next patch, but for now they are a completely legitimate tactic, regardless of how obviously broken they are.

Do you think games should be played the way the developer intended, or the way the community decided it should be played?

Would you consider this cheating? Performing a combo that has an indefinite amount of hits, moving faster than should be possible, and instant killing enemies all sound like cheating to me, but are widely accepted in their respective communities.

What say you?

 

[Meccanical]

Isn't that how most hardcore competition communities are started?

 

[Shao Kahn Brewing a Stew]

M26 DART. Made me quit BF3 even though they fixed it later.

 

[Astral/H3X]

Bunny hop. Nuff said.

EDIT: M26 Dart wasn't a skill -- it wasn't hard to use, there was no "skill" in doing it. It was just tape a shotgun with rifle pellets to your rifle. Not the same thing.

 

[Papercuts]

There's a certain point where "broken" becomes unfun even at a casual level and a game suffers until it is patched, but I am generally in favor of it.

 

[Avallon]

Isn't that how most hardcore competition communities are started?

It is. I'm not really a fan of it. Now that we live in an age of patches, I feel these things should be removed and the game should be played as intended.

I'm curious if I'm in the minority.

 

[Thug Waffle]

The competitive value of Halo 2 did not hinge on the BXR. The game was 'competitive' before that.

On-topic: I cannot answer this question, to be honest. It depends on the game, the nature of the glitch and its impact on a given game's sandbox, and more. Not every glitch is game-breaking, as evidenced by the examples chosen by the OP. Neither wave dashing or BXR 'broke' or 'ruined' the competitive value of the titles in which they existed.

 

[Cornbread78]

Somebody needs to post the gif.... but this comes to mind, well, that and the care package glitch, until they finally patched it...

 

[PK Gaming]

I guess the best definition of this would be Super Smash Brothers Melee. This game was never intended by Nintendo to be a competitive fighting game as evidenced by it’s items, stage hazards, and complete lack of balance.

How do you know that?

Sakurai spent hours fine tuning smash (i'm talking about 24 hour days!). Nearly everything was deliberate; Sure, he intended to balance the game around items and stage gimmicks, but there was clearly a rhyme and reason to everything in smash when it came to balance. Combos were intentional, in addition to L-cancelling, and character balance was important. (Ness, Kirby and Pikachu were nerfed as a result of player feedback. DON'T quote me on this though) Melee was intended to be enjoyed by everyone. Casuals & Competitive players could tweak to game as they see fit.

BTW, Melee was competitive before wavedashing was discovered. There's this misconception that wavedashing is a huge integral part to playing Melee, but if you watch high level matches, it's just one part of an incredibly competitive game.

EDIT: Also barely anyone pulls of TACs in actual play and there won't be another patch lol

 

[StriKeVillain]

A more recent example of this is Ultimate Marvel vs Capcom 3 and the introduction of TAC infinites. These will probably be removed in the game’s next patch, but for now they are a completely legitimate tactic, regardless of how obviously broken they are.

:lol

 

[KirbyKid]

This is difficult for me to put into words, but how do you feel about playing games in a way the developer never intended, specifically multiplayer games.

I guess the best definition of this would be Super Smash Brothers Melee. This game was never intended by Nintendo to be a competitive fighting game as evidenced by it’s items, stage hazards, and complete lack of balance.

It became a competitive fighting game once the game was “broken” and wave dashing was discovered. Wave dashing was, for all intents and purposes, a glitch, but an entire community formed around playing this game completely against the developers intentions.

Would you consider this cheating? Performing a combo that has an indefinite amount of hits, moving faster than should be possible, and instant killing enemies all sound like cheating to me, but are widely accepted in their respective communities.

What say you?

This is not true. And your reasoning for your arguments don't hold up.

But I'll answer your question anyway.

It can be hard to swallow some of the odd effective techniques people discover and use in multiplayer games. Some seem clearly like they're glitches (e.g. moving through walls in some FPSs [Metroid Prime Hunters] [ Team Fortress 2]).

When these things are patched out we generally think that the developers didn't intend for them to happen. While this reasoning is sound enough, it misses the more important issues.

1) Authorial intent doesn't matter. They make the games. We play them. If you really understand just how unpredictable and chaotic emergence is, you wouldn't be using what the creators intent/expect as any kind of reliable measuring stick.

2) Playing to win. We have no choice but to use the tools we're given. There are exceptions though. If you really don't like a technique because you think it's cheap or glitchy or whatever, then make some rules against it. Tournaments have all kinds of rules to shape the possible experiences to their liking. House rules are no different. No matter if you're a pro competitor or just playing at your home, we all are free to tweak what the game gives us.

3) Most of the time, complaining or getting bent out of shape about a technique is just that, complaining. Suck it up and deal with it. Even if the technique is still cheap, you can learn a lot about the game and yourself from fighting against it.

 

[RMI]

If a game is secretely broken when it's released there are only really a few options.

1) the developer fixes the game breaking aspect when it's discovered and prevents a degenerate competitive environment.

2) the game developer doesn't fix the game breaking aspect and competition becomes degenerate. The community might die off then.

3) the community creates it's own "official" rules for competitive events. This is a thing that has actually happened before, I think in one of the Capcom vs SNK games. Some kind of rolling exploit was banned from tournament play.

1 is the best outcome, followed by 3 and then 2 which is the worst. If 2 happens, it's time to go find a game that isn't awful.

 

[Retro_]

I don't think there's any absolute answer. It's all case by case

I personally think players should explore all possibilities though. Use whatever is possible in a game's engine and mechanics and then decide after that if it's fun or interesting to play with.

 

[Avallon]

How do you know that?

Sakurai spent hours fine tuning smash (i'm talking about 24 hour days!). Nearly everything was deliberate; Sure, he intended to balance the game around items and stage gimmicks, but there was clearly a rhyme and reason to everything in smash when it came to balance. Combos were intentional, in addition to L-cancelling, and character balance was important. (Ness, Kirby and Pikachu were nerfed as a result of player feedback. DON'T quote me on this though) Melee was intended to be enjoyed by everyone. Casuals & Competitive players could tweak to game as they see fit.

BTW, Melee was competitive before wavedashing was discovered. There's this misconception that wavedashing is a huge integral part to playing Melee, but if you watch high level matches, it's just one part of an incredibly competitive game.

EDIT: Also TAC infinites aren't that big of a deal v_v

Why was tripping added and wavedashing removed in Brawl? It seems like they wanted luck to play a factor in the game. The also tried to remove the most complex (although it wasn't that complex) button combination from the game.

The competitive value of Halo 2 did not hinge on the BXR. The game was 'competitive' before that.

RRXYYRRX then? These button combos played a large role in competition.

 

[PK Gaming]

Why was tripping added and wavedashing removed in Brawl? It seems like they wanted luck to play a factor in the game. The also tried to remove the most complex (although it wasn't that complex) button combination from the game.

Because Sakurai wanted to remove nearly everything that made melee ultra competitive.
See, for all intents and purposes the Sakurai who made Melee and the Sakurai who made Brawl were different people, with different goals and visions for smash.

Brawl had: Tripping, lack of hitstun (no combos), lack of L-cancelling and shoddy character balance (I don't think there was enough time to test all of the characters DON'T QUOTE ME ON THAT) and more emphasis on everything else, such as stickers, level editors, story mode, etc.

BTW, Even if Sakurai cared about making Brawl competitive, i'd doubt he'd leave wavedashing in since that wasn't an intended feature for melee and clearly not a part of his original vision.

 

[Jake Tower]

That's the point of competitive gaming.

 

[Busaiku]

Combos were a glitch in Street Fighter II.

 

[Skilletor]

That's the point of competitive gaming.

This.

As far as fighting games go, "How the game was intended to play," doesn't really factor in. Developers cannot know what will happen once the game is released in the wild.

 

[Avallon]

Combos were a glitch in Street Fighter II.

I did not know this. It seems to be true though. So I guess the consensus is that it depends on the game?

 

[Ben Morales]

Combos were a glitch in Street Fighter II.

When I learned about this back in the day it blew my mind. One of the coolest glitches ever.

 

[Nairume]

It's not okay. Don't be a dick and ruin the game for other people.

 

[Cowie]

I feel like it's sort of bad design philosophy to make a game with a very strict 'How it should be played' mentality. I can't really speak for the developers of any of the games, but I don't think it's reasonable to be upset that people are enjoying your product in a way you hadn't planned on. If people enjoy your game, does it really matter if it's not at all how you intended it?

Makes it hard for me to get too concerned about the developer's intentions. If you had a strict image for how your game should be enjoyed and you don't want me to have fun any other way, then I'm not interested in respecting your 'vision.'

Granted, if we were actually talking about 'Broken' games (i.e cheating, or anything that completely destroys competitive value) then none of this would apply. But by invoking Melee, you totally took me off topic.

Bonus Example: In Team Fortress, rocket jumping was a glitch that was adopted by the community. In Team Fortress 2, it is an official technique that is documented in the tutorial for the soldier. That's how to do it right, if you ask me.

 

[mclem]

If agreed on and understood by all participants, fine. If not, gaining an advantage in a non-intuitive manner like that is arsey.

There was a bug in the original C&C which, effectively, meant you could get by with only ever constructing a single Silo. I was very stringent in not taking advantage of that, because it significantly changed the importance of securing your Tiberium stores. Some of my opponents were less understanding!

 

[kittens]

It depends on so many factors. Basically, if something is too cheap, or breaks a fundamental limitation or mechanic, then I don't like it. If it's something that breaks a minor mechanic or gives only a slight edge, then I'm okay with it. And I hate exploits/glitches that make the game less fun, like snaking in Mario Kart or F-Zero.

This is all pretty subjective, of course.

 

[Avallon]

So what I'm noticing is that the difficulty of performing a glitch seems to correlate well with how the community receives it. If something is too easy to perform (like the care package glitch) it is shunned. If it requires skill to perform, it is embraced.

I think I get it now. My aversion to these glitches is because I suck at games. TIL

 

[patapuf]

So what I'm noticing is that the difficulty of performing a glitch seems to correlate well with how the community receives it. If something is too easy to perform (like the care package glitch) it is shunned. If it requires skill to perform, it is embraced.

I think I get it now. My aversion to these glitches is because I suck at games. TIL

exactly

competitive games are all about a fixed ruleset, balance and a high skill ceiling. Wavedashing in smash increased the skill ceiling for example, the Mass bug in BF 3 lowered it. As long as everyone agrees the "glitch" is fair game as it doesn't lead to balance issues, it's fine.

 

[KirbyKid]

Why was tripping added and wavedashing removed in Brawl? It seems like they wanted luck to play a factor in the game. The also tried to remove the most complex (although it wasn't that complex) button combination from the game.

If you want to know more about who Sakurai is as a game designer, check this aritcle I wrote. He does a lot of things that most people don't understand or wouldn't do. He also works toward completing his visions of games. He had a vision for Brawl for a game more like Smash 64, yet unique from Melee and Smash 64. So he made the changes. New game = new design.

Sounds like you don't know a lot about the actual metagames of these games or how competition and game design work.

Wavedashing is not that complex, and it's not that hard.

Just accurately and smoothing stringing together moves while improvising in either Smash is the hard part. Both games have some very dexterous maneuvers. I made a video showcasing Pit's moves here.

 

[Thug Waffle]

RRXYYRRX then? These button combos played a large role in competition.

The button glitches did play a major role in competitive play once they were discovered. Prior to that, the game was still viable. Double shot and BXR did not make Halo 2 'competitive.'

It's really not a big deal, though. One can attempt to answer your question without speaking towards the Halo comparison at all.

 

[Ndayday]

It can be hard to swallow some of the odd effective techniques people discover and use in multiplayer games. Some seem clearly like they're glitches (e.g. moving through walls in some FPSs [Metroid Prime Hunters] [ Team Fortress 2]).

I like that you brought up Hunters because it has both glitches and exploits. Glitches being going into walls, obviously, and an exploit being shadow-freezing (for those not familiar, a certain character had a short range freeze gun and SF allowed for enemies to be frozen quite literally across the map provided it was done correctly).

That's where the line is kind of blurred for me, I mean it wasn't super easy to do but SF > headshot was a pretty common occurrence. The community seemed ok with it as far as I could tell, but admittedly I wasn't super involved in playing competitively so I might not know the full story.

 

[ZaCH3000]

Most of the time, these glitches in fact add depth to the vanilla multiplayer experience. I enjoy and welcome these exploits because it forces players to adapt and learn new strategies in addition to the ones mastered before. I've noticed, however, that these glitches prevailed in the PS2, Xbox, and Game Cube days more than today.

 

[zoukka]

There really is no question nor options here. If a game can be broken, it will be broken, it's just a matter of time.

 

[Zoramon089]

I guess the best definition of this would be Super Smash Brothers Melee. This game was never intended by Nintendo to be a competitive fighting game as evidenced by its items, stage hazards, and complete lack of balance.

What

 

[kirblar]

Many people like things that let them beat up "scrubs" who simply don't have knowledge of the exploit/glitch because it makes them feel superior/gives them "free" wins against players who aren't as informed. They then get angry that their "tech" gets patched out later, claiming that it led to "more skill" being involved. (Hint: the better player tends to win, no matter what the tools at their disposal are.) The only real advantages you get from discovering new tech are exploiting it early and often.

This is different then how these glitches become part of the fabric of a game - because they're in a tournament environment, you have not choice as a competitive player to fight fire with fire.

 

[emag]

Combos were a glitch in Street Fighter II.

Combos were [arguably] a glitch during development. They were certainly a feature at the time of release.

 

[vocab]

Combos were a glitch in Street Fighter II.

You mean cps 1 chain combos?

 

[RTSD]

Snip.

MFW...

Complain's about TAC infinites... Doesn't mention Lightning Loops, Virgil, or missiles...

But seriously though in fighting games at least, this stuff is usually treated on a case by case basis.

Examples include Akuma in SSF2T:HDR where Sirlin did all he could to try and balance Akuma to use as a playable character in the remixed mode, and yet players were still able to exploit the characters fundamental differences (0 frame throw super) and air fireballs to break him in a way that was almost as bad if not worse than regular ass ST Akuma. However it should be noted that if you play a game as broken as arcade ST for nearly 20 years you can always find ways to deal with even the stupidest stuff, this can be seen in many Japanese ST ranking battles where Akuma is not always banned because the players who have stuck with the game for so long have reliable strategies to beat him.

However there are plenty of examples in older fighters where stupid game breaking glitches and exploits did end up getting banned, but this was usually because these particular exploits were bad for the competitive aspects of the game and not just because they may have been OP.
Case in point, Marvel 2 is considered an excellent competitive game, but also a ridiculously broken one. Even though the game had 50+ characters less than a dozen were actually viable for tournament play. But the gameplay between those god tier characters in Marvel 2 was so good and was also in support of the idea of competitive play that the game was still awesome.

However Marvel 2 has lots on nonsense that is banned from tournaments, but again this is for the reason that these tactics inhibit or go against the spirit of competition and not that they are OP. Examples here would be the Gambit glitch (gambit can leave the screen and throw projectiles from off screen and required characters with similar glitches like Bison to counter, which even then was stupidly hard), and also the existence of dead body infinites, where a character with an infinite that worked on down characters (who were hittable for a brief time before phasing out and having the next character come in) could prevent the opponents next character from coming in by continuing to combo the corpse. If the player doing the dead body infinite had the life lead then he/she could simply timeout the opponent every time with this BS.

So hopefully that shows you some of the rational behind this kind of stuff in fighting games at least, in the case of TAC infinites, if they do end up being an issue then they may be banned in future, but Marvel 2 had legit infinites and people still love that game.

 

[JulianImp]

I used to be extremely competitive in most games but, as of late, I've let go off of that mentality. Nowadays, I still like learning about in-depth mechanics and exploits, but when playing against others I care a lot more about having fun and making sure that doesn't mean the other player/s get bored to death.

For example, I tend to continously come up with new Magic the Gathering decks and favor "cute" interactions or synergy over infinite combos or other non-interactive decks, and also enjoy deck building enough to avoid using netdecks.

The biggest problem I've had with a skill-based exploit was with snaking in Mario Kart DS. It was awful when someone started snaking, a few others snaked to keep up, the rest disconnected, and by the final race everyone was out.

Regarding others, I'm fine with playing against people who use exploits, those who don't but still play competitively, and those who play casually. I've had a lot more fun this way, so that's probably good.

 

[Syril]

I think that there's no point trying to counteract things like this in an organized setting because I don't think it's fun in that setting to have to consciously place limits on the way you play that the game's rules can't enforce. If glitches like that make the game unviable and can't be removed with game options or patches or whatever, it seems like the best thing would be to set the game aside and play one of the other innumerable competitive games out there.

 

[Mindlog]

It is. I'm not really a fan of it. Now that we live in an age of patches, I feel these things should be removed and the game should be played as intended.

I'm curious if I'm in the minority.

I can think of multiple games where that kind of patch would have destroyed my enjoyment. Dismissing a good idea simply because it didn't come from the developer seems foolish. That's just my point of view. It's probably informed by the old pc gaming days when everything was modded.

 

[DaBuddaDa]

I dislike it when the entire multiplayer community does nothing but use the unintentional exploit, and usage of the exploit becomes the entire game, sacrificing the rest of the developer's intent and systems.

 

[Rentahamster]

I wouldn't call that "breaking" a game. It's just using every available tool in the toolbox to its greatest potential, dev intended or not. If it increases fun, depth, competitiveness, then it's all good. Play to win.

 

[kodt]

I say anything goes if it's in game. With the exception of something that crashes the entire game.

If there is a glitch that is overpowered, I think the devs should patch it, not ban players for doing it. It's only natural to be curious and try glitches.

If you are in a competitive environment, any glitches that are considered overpowered or game breaking should be banned from use. But in public games it should be open season, a server admin could ban its use, but there should be no system wide ban.

As previously mentioned some glitches become accepted in the game, bunny hopping, skiing etc... if is accepted by the community then embrace it.

 

[SapientWolf]

I say let it rock for awhile. If the glitch makes the game worse (or unplayable) then either fix it or ban it, but sometimes glitches eventually cancel each other out, or people find workarounds. Some glitches can even make the game better. Like skating in Tribes.

 

[Orayn]

Competitive games are whichever people choose to compete with. Not every game is necessarily an ideal candidate, but if the community and the interest are both there, people will find a way. This may involve glitches, custom game types, or any number of things, but whatever enables competition is what people will use.

I wouldn't call that "breaking" a game. It's just using every available tool in the toolbox to its greatest potential, dev intended or not. If it increases fun, depth, competitiveness, then it's all good. Play to win.

Exactly. If I may allude to Magic: The Gathering...

Spike is the competitive player. Spike plays to win. Spike enjoys winning. To accomplish this, Spike will play whatever the best deck is. Spike will copy decks off the Internet. Spike will borrow other players’ decks. To Spike, the thrill of Magic is the adrenalin rush of competition. Spike enjoys the stimulation of outplaying the opponent and the glory of victory.

Replace "deck" with "tactic" or "strategy" and "Magic" with the name of the video game in question and you've got a decent summary of why people use moves that others consider cheap or game-breaking.

 

[Rentahamster]

zomg don't throw, throws are so cheap, you cheater!

 

[FallingEdge]

In SF2, crossups were considered a glitch. Because of this, VF used a block button to prevent crossups.

 

[Anth0ny]

breaking the game is the shit

 

[Slamtastic]

In SF2, crossups were considered a glitch. Because of this, VF used a block button to prevent crossups.

And good on them.

 

[Ice 9]

Somebody needs to post the gif.... but this comes to mind, well, that and the care package glitch, until they finally patched it...

Caredash class was fun times, I stopped using guns during that time period.

 

[galvatron]

You mean cps 1 chain combos?

The interview where this was said cites 2-in-1s as the glitch.

If a game is secretely broken when it's released there are only really a few options.

1) the developer fixes the game breaking aspect when it's discovered and prevents a degenerate competitive environment.

2) the game developer doesn't fix the game breaking aspect and competition becomes degenerate. The community might die off then.

3) the community creates it's own "official" rules for competitive events. This is a thing that has actually happened before, I think in one of the Capcom vs SNK games. Some kind of rolling exploit was banned from tournament play.

1 is the best outcome, followed by 3 and then 2 which is the worst. If 2 happens, it's time to go find a game that isn't awful.

I agree, but the bolded bit was only briefly the case as the biggest competitive tournaments allowed roll cancelling eventually. Many say it makes otherwise ineffective characters able to compete. Still, it's interesting in that Capcom progressively reduced the effect of this bug/exploit in subsequent ports, finally eliminating it completely in the Xbox version.

That's the only case where I can remember them doing so in home ports. They've done it in arcade game revisions, IMO, to the detriment of the game many times (SF2's last revision limits Guile to single-speed sonic boom and single height flash kicks, SF3: 3S eliminating unblockables).