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Why, Game? WHY!? : Simple Mechanics That can Break a Game

Did you enjoy my rant? I hope it made you think!

  • Yes.

    Votes: 5 11.4%
  • No.

    Votes: 25 56.8%
  • Where's Annie!?

    Votes: 14 31.8%

  • Total voters
    44
  • Poll closed .

Skullgirlsfanboy

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This thread is now closed. :PUN:
I appreciate your support (if it was sarcasm, I took it as support)
And I can say I had a good laugh realizing what a monstrosity this post was.
 
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think I'm just a scrub?

Pretty much, yeah. Nothing you listed is actually broken, and a lot of what you are talking about is a misunderstanding of game mechanics that seems "unfair" because of your lack of knowledge.
 
I understand games very well, and DO like making threads (thus the fanboy part)!:PUN: Anyways, like I said, I think they can all trigger that "can't play" mentality, but I think you didn't understand my post. I was using the noob mentality to explain things to the people that hate it when one touch kills, or they can't jump the beam. (But now that I think about it, this would better fit the beginners' forum...)I did say that I personally ENJOY these mechanics, and don't find them broken, too. Also, I hope to post a forum daily, because it's always nice to have something to think about.
You sure do like to make threads.
Pretty much, yeah. Nothing you listed is actually broken, and a lot of what you are talking about is a misunderstanding of game mechanics that seems "unfair" because of your lack of knowledge.
 
No, this thread really shows that you understand very little about the games you're playing. Most of the of things you call rage inducing or you say are sign of poor balance are actually just techniques you haven't learned to counter well. That's not an insult though, you just need to play a lot more.
 
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No, this thread really shows that you understand very little about the games you're playing. Most of the of things you call rage inducing or you say are sign of poor balance are actually just techniques you haven't learned to counter well. That's not an insult though, you just need to play a lot more.
I train daily, but I think I wrote this poorly, then, huh? I thought it was a good idea to look back at my noobishness from when I started, because those are the things I used to complain about. (I still hate insta-death, but I don't think it's broken) I did finish by saying I enjoy these so-called "broken" mechanics I discussed, and support them fully.
Thanks for your imput, though!:PUN:
(I'll safely say I can file this with the failure threads LOL)
 
I don't like the negative stuff from ASW (defend too much and you take more damage)

feels like an artifical way to force the opponent to be offensive when under pressure
 
What do bounces have to do with resets?

Your conclusion is that broken games are more fun to win than balanced games? I disagree. If you race Usain Bolt in an unfair competition where you get to handcuff his ankles together, would you be proud of yourself for winning? Come on.
 
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If you race Usain Bolt in an unfair competition where you get to handcuff his ankles together, would you be proud of yourself for winning? Come on.


Getting a pair of handcuffs on the fastest Blackman in the world would be an accomplishment :)
 
Guard breaks and Just Frames.

Guard breaks seem like a weak answer to a game that might be too defensive. You could tweak throws, overheads, more meter for the attacker, etc. which I feel are better solutions to the problem I think guard breaks were introduced to solve. I just don't like the message of "blocking too long" as if that's a bad thing and trying to discourage that or defensive play. I like GGXX guard bar as far as guard bars go; doesn't break but you'll take more damage once you do get opened up.

Just Frames moves (as in perfect input for a superior version of this command) are horrible. The game will naturally have high execution for better rewards over time as people get better and explore, why introduce this from the start? It feels like luck getting these moves out. Why have moves that good where you don't want people to do it 100% of the time in the first place? VF5FS has a couple but they are either very lax like Jacky's [6]K:G or totally non-essential to playing the character like Akira's Knee which gives great frame advantage but isn't mandatory to learning/playing Akira at any level. SCV JFs felt incredibly strict and was a turn off for me to learning the game and practicing Cervantes.
 
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Please learn to convey your point in a way that isn't a convoluted mess. Also, please read http://www.sirlin.net/ptw-book/intermediates-guide.html and don't make another post until you agree with everything it has to offer AND understand what its saying (this may take you a while). Resets ALLOW people to play. You only get one ground bounce(red) per combo to otg off of. I can correct you on a lot of other things but that would take too long
 
Is being called a "skullfan" a bad thing?
 
Skullfans unite.
Where we at?
 
As a terrible skullgirls player and a horrible skullgirls fan

I can confirm I have no clue what is being said and the only thing that possibly goes through my mind when playing is "why can he punch me while i'm trying to punch him" the little details show no point in section of the greatness that is this game that is sometimes interesting to listen to.

All in all, When it comes to the game the game is the game that is the game that also is what is made from the greantess that is the group of people that made this game. What is made of the game is what is made of this game for a reason even if the reason for it itsself isn't the best idea of the thing that is being made. So technically it is what it is and we as a group of people agree that the game is both "ehh" but also "yee?" at like the same time because the things that we do are that that we do. These mechanics that would potentially break a game is what makes the game. Also am I the only one that had thought "wait this exists in the game?" Also I would like to say, with the little amount of word that I even have, that these "small" mechanics makes this game big as a whole. I would not want to play a game that consists of simple buttons and stuff (keep in mind that SF is a whole different huugabalagoo when tried to be compared with SG.) If anything i'm just saying stupid butt stuff but like I feel like what i'm saying has *very little* meaning to what i'm trying to say. yeah idk sorry ;-;
 
I've said it before in other threads, but you really need to work on how you present these posts.

Starting disucssions: Great! Do that. The more the merrier.
Making your opening posts a barely readable mess of rambling colloquialisms: Bad. Stop that.

If you want your discussions to be taken seriously then present them in a serious manner. Don't squander possibly good discussion material by loading your thoughts into a shotgun and firing them at a keyboard.

It may seem simple, but this is the first thing that comes to mind when you say "broken": the beam projectile. What? ur uh n00b that cant jump! Well, I can assure you we can all jump, but an 8-hit attack that hits full-screen and cancels everything short of a Hyper Combo sounds pretty broken. If you have the right assist, a beam-user can just play the spam game, and never even move! Of course there are ways around this, but even so, it can slow down any non beam-user, and cripple other characters! (anyone remember Hsien-ko?)

I literally don't even know what you're saying here. I took this paragraph with the plan of rewriting it into more easily understood English to show how much better that is for discussion, but after I actually read it I realized I don't understand it at all.
 
Picture this: You're at EVO. You trained all year. You brought a piece of plumbing, and know how to wrestle.

What happens?

"Repulsor! Repulsor! Repulsor! Repulsor!"
This goes on for 90 seconds straight, and you can't even touch stupid Magneto because your assists died in the first few seconds! You just sit there and cry, as you go from rising star to laughing stock/point of pity. Thus is the way of the broken game mechanic.

Also, side note: if you trained for EVO in MvC3 for a year and were beaten by Repulsor spam you were never a rising star.
 
My expression right now:

whocares.png
 
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I understand games very well
Nope, sorry, you do not. (Does it mean something when I say it as opposed to when other people say it?)

Most of what you talk about is misunderstanding game mechanics, highlighting things that aren't broken when you really understand how a game works, or glossing over catastrophic mistakes that you made that led to the situation you're complaining about ("your assists died in the first few seconds"). Beams? Really? That's "throws are cheap" level complaining.

By "bounces" I assume you mean double-snaps? Because you mentioned a reset, which has nothing to do with that and is not in any way "broken", since a reset by definition gives you a chance to block. Maybe you mean TAC infinites but there's really no way to tell...though since SG doesn't share that mechanic I'll assume you mean double-snaps...but MvC3 doesn't have THAT mechanic so I really have no idea anymore.

Assuming you are talking about double-snaps - you got yourself AND your assist hit in the same combo (and in SG you were near the corner). That's one of the WORST mistakes you can make in these games, like there is very little else you could have done that would be a bigger mistake in any way. You don't think at that point you should potentially lose a character?
 
I think it JUST NOW occurred to me I've never seen a double snap combo in MvC3.
What a waste.
 
I think it JUST NOW occurred to me I've never seen a double snap combo in MvC3.
What a waste.

To be fair, double snaps aren't really needed in UMVC3 like they're in MVC2.

You can just XF and do a BNB and kill both characters, or hell not use XF and do it. Kill 2 chars instead of one, and you spent no meter.

I'm stressed too don't worry. YES
 
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A for effort
 
I dunno if I can add anything else here, but you should work on presenting your work a little better. Read some articles on game design and look how they're structured. You should also try to abstain from spouting a lot of colloquialisms and slang, and be sure you know the actual terminology for things in games. Otherwise, people might not have any clue what you're actually talking about and just tune out. If your aim was to analyze some facet of gaming design here you should cut back significantly on fluff and try to write with a much more analytical/professional voice and perspective.

For example, the first few lines and paragraph you've written are littered with issues that take away from your credibility when you're speaking about fighting games. Keep in mind I sort of don't know dick about fighting games that aren't SG (and even then my mileage on how much I actually understand varies a lot), so we'll look at this from a writing perspective. So, let's take a look:

Picture this: You're at EVO. You trained all year. You brought a piece of plumbing, and know how to wrestle.

What happens?

"Repulsor! Repulsor! Repulsor! Repulsor!"
This goes on for 90 seconds straight, and you can't even touch stupid Magneto because your assists died in the first few seconds! You just sit there and cry, as you go from rising star to laughing stock/point of pity. Thus is the way of the broken game mechanic.

Tighten this up. How we talk and communicate on the internet is fundamentally different from how you should write about a complex topic. This introduction doesn't quite function as a very good hook to the rest of the OP because it's written in a way that's really choppy and messy. Re-read this section and stop for a full five seconds every time you've pressed enter. It gets messy quick, right?

Moreover, you should expand and explain the point of your piece very quickly when you're introducing people to a topic. If you don't, your audience will tune out because you haven't explained to them what you're getting at! Okay, you've provided an example of a mechanic you think is broken. What is the significance of it? What are you trying to say about broken game mechanics? You expand into it later but it's so deep in the OP that by the time you hit it you've probably lost a lot of readers.

I'll be using MVC3 as an example for most of this, because we all hate the way it plays, yet we love it (but not as much as we love Skullgirls!)

It may seem simple, but this is the first thing that comes to mind when you say "broken": the beam projectile. What? ur uh n00b that cant jump! Well, I can assure you we can all jump, but an 8-hit attack that hits full-screen and cancels everything short of a Hyper Combo sounds pretty broken. If you have the right assist, a beam-user can just play the spam game, and never even move! Of course there are ways around this, but even so, it can slow down any non beam-user, and cripple other characters! (anyone remember Hsien-ko?)

I have no idea what you're conveying here. Once more, when you're writing the way you speak you've forgotten that in human speech there's a lot of emphasis in how you say things alongside what you say. When you make the transition to print and (especially) the internet you lose the ability to manage things like tone and inflection because you'll be communicating via text. When you say "What? ur uh n00b that cant jump!" I can practically hear you saying it in your head as you write, with the proper inflection and everything. But when someone is first perusing your writing they will probably just be thrown for a loop and probably end with being confused, which in turn hampers your ability to appear credible.

As a more general pet peeve, though. Try to avoid asking yourself questions and then answering them. When you're writing about a particular topic you shouldn't have to lead your reader by the nose and ask yourself questions for them. Your writing should either naturally lead them to those questions or you have either failed to construct a strong enough thesis or bring forward supporting information in a way that would satisfy a reader.

In short, it is paramount to understand when you write you absolutely have to develop a proper voice and style of writing. Focus less on trying to churn out something daily. Step back and structure your writing before you sit down to even begin drafting. You should always start with a 'hit list' of topics you want to touch on. What are you saying about your topic? What evidence or research do you have to back it up? Outline your writing before you put it to paper. Collect your thoughts and you wont run into issues where your posts appear to be 'ranting' or rambling on without conveying information, which is hands down the worst thing that can happen to you while writing on a topic. Get to the point, avoid fluffing up, and remember that structuring your thoughts will probably in the long run will make you a more understandable writer and help you even keep a tighter grip on your subject matter.
 
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Knowledge


This right here. Either your an English Teacher, a writer, or a good speaker cause this is in fact the proper way to approach any form of opinionated writing (and yes I read the whole thing to see if you hit every point). I do feel that you can ask a question and give an answer yourself as long as it was executed properly or as long as it's still thought provoking.

To the subject at hand... I dunno what to say. I'm a man who learned to play by initiation which is where if you pick up the sticks we don't tell you how to play just whoop you (yeah my childhood was filled with tons of adult lessons) so I've never complained about anything I just adapt or let my cells betry me and fold to my scurbiness
 
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He might not be, but I am.

You're*
HA! I was testing you *runs away nervously*
I usually proof read what I write, then again everything is written on my phone (no internet)
I was gonna be an English teacher but now I wanna teach History
 
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This might be a slight tangent... but I ask in the spirit of the thread title rather than the OP. Are Filia's near instant double overheads and crossups reactable? I played some very strong Filia's lately (GiantKingTurtle, some asian Filias) and I wasn't able to react, especially to the crossups. I tried using standing LP to jab the Filias out of their hops, but it wasn't working. ST.MP on Painwheel worked alright, but I could only do it on prediction, not reaction.
 
but I could only do it on prediction, not reaction.
here is your answer for the most part, especially if being done as a reset and not straight from neutral like from an air dash or something. Now if you're talking about a filia getting you to block iad (instant air dash) jlp jlk jhk vs doing iad jlp jlk crlk while grounded, that stuff is just hard to block period, although reactions can help a little (keyword little) more in this situation.
 
I've said it before in other threads, but you really need to work on how you present these posts.

Starting disucssions: Great! Do that. The more the merrier.
Making your opening posts a barely readable mess of rambling colloquialisms: Bad. Stop that.

If you want your discussions to be taken seriously then present them in a serious manner. Don't squander possibly good discussion material by loading your thoughts into a shotgun and firing them at a keyboard.



I literally don't even know what you're saying here. I took this paragraph with the plan of rewriting it into more easily understood English to show how much better that is for discussion, but after I actually read it I realized I don't understand it at all.

Yep, that about sums up my mind LOL I seem to get some posts nice and clear, and others... Well, this is my first online forum period, not even Facebook, so I definitely have a way to go. Also, I'll try to fix this one eventually, but I think it may be beyond repair! Why did I decide to reminisce!? :PUN: But on another subject, I STILL hate SSFIV 3d. All those Guiles...
 
Nope, sorry, you do not. (Does it mean something when I say it as opposed to when other people say it?)

Most of what you talk about is misunderstanding game mechanics, highlighting things that aren't broken when you really understand how a game works, or glossing over catastrophic mistakes that you made that led to the situation you're complaining about ("your assists died in the first few seconds"). Beams? Really? That's "throws are cheap" level complaining.

By "bounces" I assume you mean double-snaps? Because you mentioned a reset, which has nothing to do with that and is not in any way "broken", since a reset by definition gives you a chance to block. Maybe you mean TAC infinites but there's really no way to tell...though since SG doesn't share that mechanic I'll assume you mean double-snaps...but MvC3 doesn't have THAT mechanic so I really have no idea anymore.

Assuming you are talking about double-snaps - you got yourself AND your assist hit in the same combo (and in SG you were near the corner). That's one of the WORST mistakes you can make in these games, like there is very little else you could have done that would be a bigger mistake in any way. You don't think at that point you should potentially lose a character?
Also, I really appreciate all the things everyone's saying. I sort of am like this with a lot of things: great at playing, but not talking (in a logical way) so thanks for all that!
 
What's your least favorite game mechanic(s)?, and do you feel the way I do, or think I'm just a scrub?

my least favorite game mechanic is infinites and touch of death combos
 
I sort of am like this with a lot of things: great at playing, but not talking (in a logical way) so thanks for all that!
If you were good at playing you wouldn't have said any of these things though.
Upload some matches of you playing, I want to improve and see how better players play!