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Which fighting games have relatively short moves lists?

M

Mihail

Banned
I've always dabbled in and out of fighting games, but I've never taken them up seriously. It's a love and hate relationship between them and me.

I love the idea of using your actions in creative ways to outsmart your opponent, but I hate having a plethora of moves to choose from. For whatever reasons, it's more interesting to me to have a low limit of moves.

Yes, yes, I'm sure I'll get flak for this, but that's just my opinion.

So what are some good, balanced fighting games without a large selection of moves available? Thanks.
 
Yie Ar Kung Fu

Though I think Urban Champion wins the day. Only 4 attacks.


Wait you said good fighting games....
 
Hmm... Super Smash Bros.?

Actually, I'm not sure -- how many unique moves are present in SSB?
 
You're definately looking for something like smash bros.
Each character has differenct moves of course, but they're all performed using the same few simple button combinations.

Its very much knowing which move to perform when, rather than knowing countless rediculous combinations.
 
Pretty much any 2D fighter fits the bill mainly because there's only the special/super moves and then the normal attack buttons while jumping/crouching/standing. Mastering them is a whole different story (same goes for all fighters pretty much)

3D games generally use "variation" move lists where PPP and PPK (P = Punch, K = Kick) are virtually the same just the last P is replaced with a K which results in a "different" move, albeit not much more different. Only Tekken really deviates from this format using Right/Left Punch/Kick, and learning the movelist of Tekken characters is a must.

But for simplicity, 2D is definitely it. 3D fighters have much more "variables" with the 3D landscape (dodging correctly, or different types and levels of terrain, see Tekken 4) and plethora of reversal moves (very heavy in Dead or Alive series) or very indepth/require great execution such as the Virtua Fighter series.

As long as you choose a "land-based" 2D fighters, basically games where you can't super jump/Delay Hyper Cancel/infinite the shit out of someone ala infamous Marvel Vs. Capcom 2 (which has a steep learning curve, like there's a huge difference between Magneto players if one can perform the ROM infinite and the other can't, or a more extreme example, if a Cable player can't Air Hyper Viper Beam (AHVB) and the other one can) Basically stay away from the Xmen/Marvel Vs. series that Capcom has made and you are left with the more "simple" games (relatively in my opinion)
 
Maybe Super Street Fighter II Turbo or Hyper SF II. Very good, balanced and fairly simple for a traditional 2D fighter.
 
ChennehCis said:
Pretty much any 2D fighter fits the bill mainly because there's only the special/super moves and then the normal attack buttons while jumping/crouching/standing. Mastering them is a whole different story (same goes for all fighters pretty much)
Click to expand...

I'd disagree there... Mihail wanted fighting games with a "low number of moves" -- most 2D fighting games are crammed FULL of special attacks, alongside the standard ones. I might be misunderstanding him, but I was really getting the impression he was looking for something more akin to SSB than SF2.
 
If we're talking about 3D fighters, then both Sonic Champions and Soul Edge. And yes, for a weapon figher with alot of variation Soul Edge have a very short list, while Soul Calibur featured a expanded command list.
 
The Bouncer has a small move list, the combs are very simple.

The single player game is also structured around a story, which motivates you to continue.

You have to clear the game twice with a single character before you can unlock their full potential.

Like DMC and LOTR:Two Towers, you recieve points that you can then use to buy new moves, etc.

The difficulty level is linked to your character's progression, so the fights get longer on subsequent play throughts.

The game uses the classic paper, sissors, stone dynamic. You have 3 different height attacks, each with it's own strengths and weaknesses.

The game also uses the pressure sensitive buttons to give you two movies on each button.

The game also has great Square character designs. Despite the games many faults, it still has the best designed characters out of all the current fighters, easily superior to Soul Calibur, Tekken or Virtua Fighter.
 
War Gods

Every character had exactly the same moves that were pulled off in exactly the same way. However, I wouldn't recommend it to anyone, ever.
 
Fighters, in any sense of the term, I can think of is:

Urban Champion: High punch (strong and weak), low punch (strong and weak) and block high and low

Double Dragon NES-2 player mode: Punch, Kick, Jumpkick (or just jump depending on character), Combo (mashing the A/B repeatedly to defend your front) - note: only mirror matches since the 2 player mode uses larger, more detailed character sprites fro mthe main game.

Kung Fu (Irem): Punch, Kick, Crouching Punch/Kick, Jumping Punch/Kick, Push (when you get molested by a stack of enemies)


For actual fighting games, the game with the least number of fighting moves I can think of is the first SFamicom Dragon Ball Z. Regular attacks (plus fireball button), special regular attacks, special fireball attacks, super fireball moves, super fireball counters/dodge, forward and back dash and a button to either hover to the sky or land on the ground. Now that I think about it, this game even has more if not just the same number of moves as Street Fighter 2 (if you count the 6 buttons of the game as individual moves).

Another one would be the Ranma 1/2 fighter, again for the SFamicom/SNES (DTMC brought it over with crappy voices). The game is pretty much Weak and Strong attack, hold strong attack then press forward and release, tap an attack button repeatedly, and probably others. It's been a long time since I played it (/me shivers) and I can't for the life of me remember any moves other than that.
(licensed games that suck? you kidding me? :P)

And for 3d fighters, probably any that revolve around a freeroaming 3d field (not counting SoulCalibur or wrestling games) and/or up to 4 player support (Powerstone, the GC Naruto games, Smash Brothers, Thrill Kill [never played this one], Wu Tang Clan from EA on PSOne)
 
Super Smash Bros. (N64, GC)
The Powerstone Series (DC)
Kung Fu Chaos (XB)

these games aren't traditional fighters but are all great fun with limited movesets that don't limit the gameplay

If you like PS2...I dunno what to suggest for you...Bloody Roar? Onimusha Blade Warriors?
 
Just play Third Strike.

Yeah, it's the normal Capcom six-button with a amount of specials (along with EXes), but short of going the SSB route, it's hard to find a great fighting game that has a shorter movelist.

That, and Third Strike pretty much ruins every other fighting game anyway, but that's just me.
 
Evil Zone of PlayStation is a great, simple fighter. Each character has roughly the same moves, though each character has strengths/weaknesses. The game plays out like rock-paper-scissors and is surprisingly fun with two people (just medicore against AI, though).
 
you need to give an example of *too many* moves. Is street fighter 2 too many moves?


also, does it matter if your opponent has a lot of movies? Some characters in Guilty Gear XX like Ky Kiske have almost nothing move wise (probably less than a SSBM character even) but that doesn't make them inferior to the other characters.

When my friends and I were first learning the game Ky was one of the more devastating characters for someone to use.
 
DavidDayton said:
I'd disagree there... Mihail wanted fighting games with a "low number of moves" -- most 2D fighting games are crammed FULL of special attacks, alongside the standard ones. I might be misunderstanding him, but I was really getting the impression he was looking for something more akin to SSB than SF2.
Click to expand...

Which 2D fighting games are crammed FULL of special attacks? The one that comes up in my mind is the recent Hyper Street Fighter Anniversary's Ryu that has a fireball, a hurricane kick and a dragon punch. He also has 1 super.

That's the extent of special moves. Everything else is various strengths punches and kicks that take absolutely no skill to do except to press a button. I don't see what's so "crammed with special attacks. There's no super/double jumping in HSF2 and you can't even dash/back dash or roll. You don't have to worry about knocking someone off the screen and you don't have to worry about percentages. You just beat them until there is no more yellow bar.

Simple.
 
ChennehCis said:
Which 2D fighting games are crammed FULL of special attacks? The one that comes up in my mind is the recent Hyper Street Fighter Anniversary's Ryu that has a fireball, a hurricane kick and a dragon punch. He also has 1 super.
Click to expand...

And Ryu in SFA 3 has two different types of fireballs, an air hurricane kick,command moves (F+HK), chain combos, overheads, and three different supers (one of which has two versions)
 
MarkRyan said:
Evil Zone of PlayStation is a great, simple fighter. Each character has roughly the same moves, though each character has strengths/weaknesses. The game plays out like rock-paper-scissors and is surprisingly fun with two people (just medicore against AI, though).
Click to expand...



Hahaha! Evil Zone - forgot about that one. What about Destrega? That I remember was rather simple too.
 
belgurdo said:
And Ryu in SFA 3 has two different types of fireballs, an air hurricane kick,command moves (F+HK), chain combos, overheads, and three different supers (one of which has two versions)
Click to expand...

And even then that still pales in comparison with 3D games like DoA, Tekken, Soul Calibur and VF =/

Even games like CvS2 or MvC2 have just as many moves as A3 but those games aren't so much based on execution of special moves but techniques like Roll cancelling and pulling off infinites, which is what seperates good players from the better ones.

Same goes for SSBM with L-cancels, wave dashes and air juggles. I still think HSF2 is a simple game and a good one to start with as a majority of fighting games use special move motions that can be learnt from the SF series
 
ChennehCis said:
Which 2D fighting games are crammed FULL of special attacks? The one that comes up in my mind is the recent Hyper Street Fighter Anniversary's Ryu that has a fireball, a hurricane kick and a dragon punch. He also has 1 super.

That's the extent of special moves. Everything else is various strengths punches and kicks that take absolutely no skill to do except to press a button. I don't see what's so "crammed with special attacks. There's no super/double jumping in HSF2 and you can't even dash/back dash or roll. You don't have to worry about knocking someone off the screen and you don't have to worry about percentages. You just beat them until there is no more yellow bar.
Click to expand...

Maybe I'm interpreting this incorrectly. I've been taking "huge move list" to mean -all- the special moves in the game. That is, to master the game, you have to learn 3-6 special moves for every single character in the game. Each character in HSFA has their own set of special moves, and the controls for their moves are generally unique, aren't they? As opposed to SSB/SSBM, where the move controls are identical for all characters.
 
I never played it, but what about that Ikaruga Kids game on the N64?

Wasn't Virtua Fighter Kids toned down a fair bit in terms of moves too?
 
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