Fuck. REALLY sorry for this long-ass post.
AZ Greg said:
Ok, I've seen a few people make this point and I completely disagree. Sure you might lose a ranked match to someone online, who isn't as good as you or who has put in less time, where you only see them one time and before you adjust to the bizarre way they play it's already too late to come back. But I don't ever feel like I'd lose a best of/first to sorta set to someone who is clearly worse or who has invested a significantly less amount of time in the game. And with regards to Melee, forgive me if I'm wrong as I never played it competitively, but don't you have to heavily tweak the default settings in order to make it so that the skilled player always beats the less skilled player (picking stages with no random elements/turning off items)?
I don't want this to potentially derail the thread, so I implore anyone looking to contradict the following statements regarding Melee to be confident their statements are rational.
You're not wrong, you've just been misguided by irrational perspectives on that particular issue. Yes, you do have to heavily tweak the settings; but to level judgement about the game, its competitive viability or its community; is a philosophical dead-end. On a purely rational level, this does not matter. ALL competitive games (including games such as sports) are merely a social contract among a community of individuals that agree to adhere to a standard set of rules.
Street Fighter and all its derivatives are not exempt from this. These games undergo heavy tweaking within their respective communities to reflect competitive values and the variance in rules on display highlight just how cultural/sociological this can be (i.e. Japan vs Western tournament rules). A tournament match in Super doesn't consist of two players just popping in the disc, turning on the machine, playing one match and living with the results - there are
rules and a
format that are
wholly arbitrary that do not derive from the game's creators.
Melee is a non-traditional fighter, so it's quite reasonable that it undergoes heavy tweaking to reflect competitive values previously in place - values derived largely from traditional fighting games. Hence, the lack of items and subtraction of stages that are too peculiar to Smash. However, this does not imply Melee out of the box cannot be just an adequate measure of skill - that game would just be testing a different set of skills - skills not valued by that community.
And about the reversal window that always gets brought up. I've always been fine with it for two reasons. 1.) It makes the game more accessible. Had SF4 been another 3S, or hell even ST (in terms of reversals), then this fighting game resurgence might not have happened. My casual buddies who will do something lame like wake-up SRKs or will mash SRKs through attack strings have stuck with the game a lot longer than something like HDR where they would just get bullied on wake-up and put in throw loops cause they weren't good with the tighter reversals required to escape those situations. 2.) At high-level play the tighter reversal windows were never an issue. Those players got their reversals whenever they wanted them just like in SF4. So sure you can say, "well that's a reward for all the time they put in", but I don't want to beat my opponent with tactics that are only working because he/she isn't good at hitting the tight reversal window. It's only going to hurt you in the long term when you start playing good players and your low-level player abuse tactics don't work anymore. I don't see any problem with having to incorporate bait tactics against players lower on the totem poll.
Are those casual buddies still playing the game? Did they buy the game, even?
The problem I have with this argument, is that you're sacrificing the integrity of the game to cater to everyone. Maybe SSF4 does manage to accomplish being accessible in some fashion, but to what avail? The game's engine doesn't have to suffer to attract the LCD. In fact, I'd argue it doesn't attract the LCD. How much do you really think SF4 expanded the fighting game market? Vanilla sold 2.7 million between 2 consoles. I'd say it barely expanded the market, if at all. I'd say the game largely sold to people already in the market for fighting games.
But then again, I think fighting games that aren't Smash are anachronistic - doesn't mean I like them any less, mind you. But I feel the genre, at large, is growing irrelevant in regards to the actual needs and desires of the current market, which is why fighting games are
still niche despite the fact that more people are buying them now than 10 years ago, and this Neo-Renaissance will not last.
You do bring up a good point regarding net-play, however. I think a lot of people's frustrations come from formulating opinions in the context of that flawed format, which isn't fair to the game.
arstal said:
I feel like in other fighters, such as BB, 3S- you can just overwhelm the opponent, and win without thinking , so you can self-validate even when you're not actually that good.
You keep asserting this
garbage claim, as though you have anything substantial to back it up. You've even indirectly admitted to not dedicating yourself to these "other fighters". Just stop with this presumptuous dead-end.
