The Break #160 - SG GF - Masta Chibi VS FC ChrisG
Just to show how dumb that head is. I knew it was going to be a problem the moment I got caught in my first NOM loop.
BSL - Spring Season - Week 5 - KOF13/SG/AE2012/UMVC3
Another good show as usual from box sessions. Dios X shows off some sick overhead resets using Filia that I didn't know about. You'll see a nice bit of Painwheel and more talk about the game from Viscant. Double ass is abundant here. I think people are definitely relying too much on her right now.
RipTen Dojo: Interview with Skullgirls Audio Director Vincent Diamante
Choice quotes:
NG: Were there any challenges in particular that stick out to you? What would you say the most challenging part of overseeing the entire audio side of Skullgirls?
VD: The basic sound effects were definitely the most difficult part. Nearly the entire development time, I was working on just whoosh sounds and impact sounds. From the beginning, there was this idea to move away from where fighting game sound design was going, especially in the 3D fighters, and bring it back to the more old-school, more abstract quality that the serious tourney fighting game players remember from a decade or so ago, while rectifying it with this visual look thats unique and ultramodern. I spent a lot of time working with [the project leader and designer] Mike Zaimont as well as parsing comments on the sound in SRK, Dustloop, and elsewhere.
Since we were constantly letting people see progress on the game through things like Friday Night Fights and presence at tournaments and conventions, things like YouTube comments and blog posts really informed my process of getting a sound that the fighting game community would best respond to. Its pretty neat that I could get feedback from the FGC on new sounds on a weekly basis. Of course, even with my ear constantly to the ground, the sheer diversity of the community meant some people appreciated this specific sound design more than others, but I think this ultimately ended up really successful.
NG: Going off of something you mentioned in your comment, where do you feel that sound design is going in regards of newer fighting game titles? There does seem to be a focus on more electronic/synth feel to a lot of the 2D fighting games, especially so in Street Fighter X Tekken, which I felt had a somewhat forgettable soundtrack. If you could change one trend in current game music, what would it be?
VD: Theres definitely some cool stuff going on these days. The quality that can be had these days with audio budgets, both in terms of money and memory, are pretty incredible. There are some really good game soundtracks out there these days. In terms of interactivity, though, I think weve stepped backwards compared to the really interactive soundtracks made with sequenced music back in the 90s. Of course, increasing memory meant we could start doing high quality recordings of soundtracks, but this was at the expense of interactivity. I think now, anticipating the next generation consoles, were getting to a point where we can have both high-quality music and high-interactivity music.
Now, for fighting games specifically? Id love to see what other genres of music can be paired with some cool fighting game action.
It's a nice read and there is more at the link. Sound is definitely very important when it comes to fighters. I've come to notice that a lot of the better selling and popular titles in the American fighting scene(even outliers like smash historically had very sharp and distinct sounds) tend to have some rougher sound effects. Smash, MvC2/MvC3, Guilty Gear, Skullgirls, Soul Calibur, KOF, Mortal Kombat and others with sharper effects appeal to a lot of people(like me). Others like BB, Melty and Arcana seem to have really weak sound for some reason. I also think the voices in BB tend to get annoying quickly. The Japanese vocals in some music and weak impact sounds don't help one bit.
I also didn't like the shape many extended combos are taking and feel that within the space of half a year or so SG gameplay would largely boil down into hitconfirms into long xN normal cycling ground loops with a chance of reset. So I think this is sort of welcome.
It most definitely will. ToD combos are already appearing and I think it's crazy that Severin can kill Mike Z's solo character with three resets like he did at WNF. Shorter combos needed to happen. I was pretty pissed for the first five minutes, but this change makes a lot of sense.
I tried to ask on the stream if any changes/updates were being made to tutorial mode but never got the question through. More than adding some movelist, I hope the game eventually goes through the trouble to explain more of the subtle elements you'd have to dig through the internet or pour over the wiki to understand--stuff like ground techs(so many people not realizing what blue vs red bounce meant near the beginning when making combo videos, lol), IPS basics, unblockable protection, anti up-back frames on jumping, 0-frame resets retaining IPS, etc.
The announcement of the PC version said there would be more tutorials added. It's pretty cut and dry. If he wanted to add combo trials then they probably would have explicitly said that instead. This game does need some trials, though. BB's trials were a big help thanks to their replay functions(not like SFIV or MvC3). I'd be much further along in Skullgirls by now if it had trials.
Additional tech window for throws was probably needed, it is next to impossible to see them coming unless you know who you're playing against and they have predictable tendencies. I loved that though, it was all I did as solo Painwheel. Drives my friends nuts.
The throw tech change is definitely one of the better system wide changes there(along with 120% assist damage). Getting into a good reset position in this game is easy and the rewards for throws are really good. Not to mention how easy it can be to combo after grabs.
I really like the whole solo/duo/trio setup for this game because IMO you can use it as a powerful self-training tool. If you need to learn a character, run with them solo online and build up your fundamentals/defense; you don't need to know terribly extended combos to make progress yet, but you need experience dealing with defending against all the varieties of cheese a team setup can toss your way and recognizing your openings/opportunities to get past assist calls when you don't have one of your own. Then you can upgrade to a duo and familiarize yourself with this or that assist, having DHCs and alpha counters as available options, general team strategies, etc. Then once you're ready to seriously optimize what you have and desire a finer, well-rounded toolkit of options, you go to trio.
I tried this approach, but it didn't work too well for me. It might have turned out better if I had trained with friends.
This is all independent of personal preference and assumes that trios will shape the final form of meta in this game, but I think it's really well designed.
Faster walk speed is the only big change left that I've wanted to see for a while now. I mentioned it to Mike on SRK a while back(after the overall speed boost) and he was considering a small increase. These shorter combos bring it that much closer to Vampire/GG in my eyes. Upping the walk speed would pretty much make Skullgirls my modern day catchall for GG, MvC2 and Vampire.
And there's another happening on 6/16!
http://goutama.net/event/vol11/
Exciting stuff.
This is good news. Isn't Tokyo supposed to be the big center for fighting games? The game should have a bright future in Japan if it can gather attention in Tokyo. All it needs is an arcade release.
It's important that everyone be able to make their "Back that ass up" shirt before the patch hits!
I just hope that I don't have to make a shirt for Napalm Pillar someday. It's definitely the next scrub target now that hornet bomber is set for a patch.
I love these changes- really good work.
Probably going to wait to get back to this until it comes out on the PC though.
It seems like this is what everyone else is planning. It's the PC, Diablo or big 360 exclusives getting in the way. I just wonder if any of these guys are actually coming back.
