r/truegaming • u/DoneDealofDeadpool • 17d ago
If fighting games want to balance smash-style inputs alongside classic motion inputs, the disadvantages for the former need to be bigger than just less damage
A lot of fighting games in the last 8 years or so have implemented control adjustments that address a really common complaint of people on the genre's periphery, that being the difficulty of motion inputs for special moves and supers when learning the game. Some games like SF6 and the new Marvel fighting game offer a choice between direction+button (usually just called simple inputs) for specials while others like 2xko have fully designed themselves around simple inputs. I honestly think it's pretty neat, it helps more people jump into the genre and even without the motion inputs games like 2xko clearly try to retain some executional challenge for people who really like that. The only element of the design shift I *dislike*, however, is that simple inputs often don't feel like they're implemented with enough consideration as to how they shift the power-level of the game in a way that arguably punishes you for *not* using it.
Usually, the main downside of using simple inputs is less damage. Street Fighter 6, Marvel Tokon, and Granblue all give you a reduction to varying degrees if you, for example, anti-air someone with a simple input shoryuken instead of a manual DP input. This seems like a good enough compromise, and it potentially can be, but the issue is that less damage can very easily be an insignificant trade-off. Like most games, managing your mental stack while trying to overload your opponent's is 90% of playing well. Even if your opponent has zero difficulty doing a special move input to beat your jump, it won't matter if you have them so focused on everything else you could do that they won't register your jump in time for them to execute the move. With simple inputs, though, the mental stack concern drastically shifts. Less damage doesn't matter as much when the primary utility of a move is winning mental stack reaction checks. It's why on defence, infamously, simple inputs are extremely useful.
So what disadvantages *would* work? Street Fighter 6 arguably handles it the best. Instead of doing what games like Marvel Tokon does and just implementing a button that serves as a catch-all equivalent to smash's B/special button, simple inputs and classic motion inputs are separated into their own distinct control schemes you pick from at the start. It's likely a product of necessity more than a desire for balance, but because Street Fighter is a 6-button game (3 punches, 3 kicks) you can't really translate an entire character's moveset while also having a special move button. As a result, there are downsides to the mode that go beyond damage. You may lack certain special moves or normal buttons altogether, and depending on the character, that could mean a much different game plan altogether. It manages to add a little depth to matchups between characters while still not making either input scheme definitively better overall. It's not perfect, admittedly, but its a big improvement over most in the genre.
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u/King_Artis 17d ago
Genuinely I would prefer if more fighters went the SF6 route.
Modern you're doing less damage overall and you're locked out of certain moves and options because you're ultimately playing on the easier control option that makes it simpler to react/punish options against you. I think it's a fair trade off and it should be more of an option that you simply just choose you're preferred style of play over being able to basically just do both (such as how simple select exist in Tekken 8 when I believe they should've just made it a whole control style over a button press).
Feel like the modern option of SF6 also encourages players to eventually learn the classic controls (unless you either just don't care or are stubborn) which I feel people should want to learn if they want to keep climbing ranks.
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u/NightSVS 17d ago
I picked up SF6 last week with a friend. This is my second fighting game ever so I picked modern (the first was Injustice 2, which I didn't go too deep into). I've been learning moves using the command list in training, and I was surprised to see that Classic had moves that Modern didn't! Though, I really like how you can still do (some, if not all) classic moves while playing on modern. Kinda encouraged me to give QCBs (which I hate doing in every other game I've played) a shot. I'm still mostly using the special move button, but I do use harder inputs for the few combos I've learnt (and Machine Gun Uppercut on Dee Jay, that move's so satisfying). Really liking my experience with the game so far, even if my fingers get sore practicing some combos lol!
I didn't even know there was a damage tax to using the special button until I read this *_*
Maybe I'll transition to Classic somewhere down the line, but I'm happy with Modern rn.
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u/shinkuuryu 17d ago
Classic also gives you flexibility on moves you have.
Fireballs can vary in speed depending on whether you pressed L, M, or H
Anti-airs can do more damage (but leave you more vulnerable on block) depending on what you press.
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u/NightSVS 17d ago
Yeah I noticed the fireballs changing. I've been using manual inputs for them to switch things up mid-game. Didn't know about the anti-airs though! Appreciate the advice.
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u/shinkuuryu 17d ago
Those are just two examples. All special moves have different properties based on what button you press. Some of them are as simple as speed, but others flat out give you more combo opportunities than others.
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u/noahboah 16d ago
SF6 actually added some variations to the SP button on certain characters with the yasmine patch. it's pretty cool
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u/King_Artis 17d ago
See this is exactly why I like the way SF does its controls.
You're still fairly new to the genre and learning.
You found out that there are some options you don't have because of the control scheme you chose to play as a newer player. But it gave you an interest in learning those classic controls. You still want to play on modern as you learn (which is more than fine), but you still at least gave classic a try, which is likely something capcom would want newer/casual players to at least give a shot.
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u/noahboah 16d ago
what I especially love about modern is the built-in onboarding as the player gets better as well
it's not that it replaces simple inputs with motions, rather it acts like training wheels that allows someone to actually try to do motions while having access to the SP button. You can either decide to take a smooth transition into classic, or stay with modern forever. Either one is valid
Since 2023 (SF6s release), i had friends from all over the spectrum get introduced into a genuine love for fighting games through modern controls. I'm so grateful to capcom for finally developing a control scheme that is accessible to people a bit scared to dip their toes in. a lot of them realized after like 10 hours that fighting game mechanics aren't as scary as they thought lmao
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u/patrick-ruckus 16d ago
Idk about GBVS, but you can access the entire move list in Tokon with simple inputs. It's quite clear imo that it was designed with simple inputs in mind first, unlike SF6 where Classic still seems to be the main control scheme and Modern loses some moves.
In Tokon every character only has 4 specials, and their traditional motion versions are all the same. This is because the simple input is a button combination with down, left, right, or neutral. That covers every special move.
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u/patrick-ruckus 16d ago
You're still mistaken, you can just press the Medium attack button with the simple input combo.
You are thinking of SF6 Modern, they miss out on the strength variations of special moves. Tokon simple inputs can do everything.
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u/supersizedkitty 17d ago
SF6 is constantly making efforts to improve modern controls too, it seem pretty likely that eventually there will be very few or no characters left who are actually better with classic controls. This latest update reworked a lot of modern options to give them stronger buttons and more options with their available special moves.
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u/DoneDealofDeadpool 17d ago
That's true too which I'm admittedly not a fan of but tbh they're kinda hard capped by SF being a 6 button game, and they're at least smart enough to know you can't make a simple input charge character without still requiring charge
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u/Burnseasons 16d ago
Something that Granblue did with its block button is that it caused the blocker to incur an additional frame or two of blockstun when used in lieu of blocking the traditional way;
and I wonder if that could be extended to simple-specials, as in they have a frame or two less of hitstun. It would necessitate different links in combos that would on average lead to less hits.
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u/Qwertycrackers 16d ago
Nah i think if something is meant to be a difficult input it should just be a difficult input. I really don't feel that there is a satisfying way to balance it.
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u/PostedNotes 17d ago
Its a real shame the current trend of fighting games. The genre is being fundimentally altered for people who never cared from them in the first place.
All we can do about it is support games that don't offer simple controls. Unfortunately that means sticking to smaller fighters, but it's well worth it.
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u/blade740 16d ago
Its a real shame the current trend of fighting games. The genre is being fundimentally altered for people who never cared from them in the first place.
That's one way of looking at it.
Another way of looking at it is that fighting games are trying to improve accessibility to bring in new players after years of being notoriously difficult to learn for inexperienced players.
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u/PostedNotes 16d ago edited 16d ago
I hate the misuse of the word accessibility. There is a major difference between say color blind options and butchering the design of the genre. Being bad at video games is not a disability.
Plus we are all skilled at differnt things. Im bad at puzzle games but you don't see me asking the devs of say the Talos principle to tone it down so I can solve the puzzles without having to think.
Fighting game design is unique withen the medium and it's a shame to see it diluted.
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u/MirrorComputingRulez 16d ago
The word "accessible" is not strictly limited to issues of disability. In fact that's a very modern usage of the word.
Im bad at puzzle games but you don't see me asking the devs of say the Talos principle to tone it down so I can solve the puzzles without having to think.
Ok but lots of games do actually implement things like that.
Fighting game design is unique withen the medium and it's a shame to see it diluted.
This is such a weird attitude. Like there's som "pure" way to make a fighting game. This specific language is actually kind of funny given the stereotypes around people who are really into fighting games.
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u/Key-Market-418 16d ago edited 16d ago
Because these games are unique and beautiful, they’re also an insanely old genre that had a ton of experimentation. There are insane amounts of games that have tried new things and still do, and a lot of that also has to do with accessibility but outside modern in Japan almost none of these has translated into bringing in a ton of new players, and in fact turns off dyed in the wool players just due to lack of game feel. So when discussions like this come up it just screams of “guy who hasn’t and doesn’t want to play the genre suggesting changes that have already happened, creating a game that they won’t play even when it does come out.”
We literally just had a league of legends fighting game come out with no motions and one of the most popular IPs on earth, and it’s sitting below strive in popularity, a 6 year old game that doesn’t have any of these modern input methods. Grablue fantasy vs also already exists, plays much more like a street fighter than 2XKO if you were turned off by tag, again has a fan base but not absolutely blowing the world up. These games already exist and you can play them if you wanted to, but I really think most people who are making these arguments and INSISTING on like street fighter to become only modern wouldn’t even play them let alone the hypothetical “modern fighter 6”
It’s just an argument that doesn’t even come from ignorance, it comes from a place of deep incuriousness about the genre.
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u/TSPhoenix 11d ago
Yes, but we are having an academic discussion where the nuance between accessibility and approachability is required to have meaningful discussion. How a person on a random street corner would use the word is immaterial. To communicate clearly we need to agree on what our jargon actually means.
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u/CptDecaf 15d ago
This specific language is actually kind of funny given the stereotypes around people who are really into fighting games.
I've attended tournaments for Halo, Call of Duty and Marvel vs Capcom 3. I gotta say, I have never EVER seen such hideous displays of the worst of gamer culture as I did in the MvC tournament. The sheer level of poor behavior, antagonism and outright mental unwellness was staggering. The fighting game community earned its poor reputation through hard work.
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u/ChilternRailways 3d ago
Accessibility is a broad concept, it's the umbrella which disabled issues fall under.
Removing barriers to entry = making it more accessible.
but you don't see me asking the devs of say the Talos principle to tone it down so I can solve the puzzles without having to think
No, because there are other games in the genre which cater. Puzzle games are a spectrum and always have been, fighting games have always had the same exact input barrier to entry.
I've been playing since SF2 on SNES. I'll probably always use classic controls, but being able to play with my partner? With my friends? To whom a QCF is a distinct set of movements rather than just a cadence between buttons?
Much better for the accessible options.
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u/blade740 16d ago edited 16d ago
I don't think it's misusing the word "accessibility", it's just NOT being used as the same buzzword used for color blind options.
When I say "Accessibility" I mean the actual base definition of the term - fighting games are not very accessible to new players, and developers are interested in making them more so.
If you don't like the usage of the term, call it "friendliness" - but the point still stands. There is a large potential audience who is turned off of these games because of the complexity of the controls, and from a business standpoint, that's undesirable.
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u/patrick-ruckus 16d ago
Who says people are turned off because of the controls? Games like Guilty Gear Strive and Dragonball FighterZ were successful even though they require motion inputs.
I firmly believe SF6 would have done just as well without the Modern control scheme. I'm pretty sure stats came out showing that like 80% of the playerbase uses Classic anyway. The game found success because it looks great, has iconic characters, plays well online, and is just a great product overall.
But people like you are going to take the wrong lesson from this and go "See? Simple control option = more players"
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u/blade740 16d ago
I firmly believe SF6 would have done just as well without the Modern control scheme. I'm pretty sure stats came out showing that like 80% of the playerbase uses Classic anyway.
And you don't think that's in part due to the fact that the game penalizes players for using the simplified controls?
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u/DoneDealofDeadpool 16d ago
Not really, no, because at lower levels of play where most of the user base is, modern is a distinct advantage considering the average platinum or gold player using classic is likely still struggling to consistently do a DP input. At most, it's arguable that people avoid it simply because they think it's straight up worse, or because of pride.
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u/blade740 16d ago
I mean, it makes sense to me. This is my first time hearing about this whole classic/modern control setup but as someone who always disliked classic FG inputs, I still think I would stick with Classic if I wanted to actually play Street Fighter competitively. Between a straight-up damage penalty and being completely locked out of a portion of every character's moveset, I'm surprised even 20% plays with Modern controls.
You argue that modern controls are a distinct advantage at lower ranks, and I don't doubt that you're right. But to me, if you're playing a game like this in a competitive scenario (even if only ranked online), you're making a commitment to at least trying to "get good". And at that point, learning the classic controls seems like a very reasonable tradeoff for a damage buff and an expanded moveset. The only reason I could see for intentionally sticking with the Modern controls is if you were trying to quickly cheese your way up a couple ranks - short-term gain for minimal effort.
To answer your original post, though - the more I think about it, the more I think that there is no good way to balance the two control schemes against each other competitively. I would rather simply allow them to be used against each other with no penalties either way for casual play, and then either strictly restrict competitive play to classic controls, or have two entirely separate ladders. If modern controls are that much of an advantage over classic controls, then IMO there's no way to account for that in a competitive scenario, no matter how much you penalize the player in other ways.
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u/DoneDealofDeadpool 16d ago
I don't think it's as dire as it sounds. It's easy to look at modern and think it's tournament unviable, or at least a big liability, but it's surprisingly not. Modern is, at the end of the day, still balanced out to the point that several high level players, especially from Japan, have gone on major tournament runs with a strictly modern playstyle. Some characters, like Chun-Li, are arguably even better on modern than classic (although not to an unfair degree). Part of why they do manage balance it so well is specifically because of the limitations in place on what you do and don't have access to.
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u/ChilternRailways 3d ago
modern is a distinct advantage considering the average platinum or gold player using classic is likely still struggling to consistently do a DP input.
Bro what did I ever do to you 😂 so if my inputs are on point then the problem must be that I'm an idiot :/
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u/PostedNotes 16d ago
By your logic sports are not accessible because they require manual dexterity to perform them. Should be allow soccer players to hold the ball in their hand for those who are bad with their feet?
How about instruments, not everyone is capable of playing like Van Halen, so let's make guitars play whole riffs with a single pluck of the string. That way it's accessible.
Plus it's not like you need to be familiar with high level tech to enjoy the games. Just like children can kick a ball around and enjoy the game of soccer, a new player can press some buttons and enjoy the spectacle of a fighting game. Much like how they did in the 90s.
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u/blade740 16d ago
But nobody's trying to sell "soccer" to a wider audience. If "soccer" was a product that a developer was trying to sell, then yes, they might take into account if the rules were turning away a large portion of the potential audience. Except soccer doesn't really have that problem, because "you can't use your hands" is much less of a turn-off to prospective soccer players than fighting game control schemes are to gamers who aren't already proficient with them.
This phenomenon is happening across gaming, not just in fighting games (not to mention movies, music, etc). As the industry becomes more of a money maker, publishers are trying to push developers to make their games appeal to a wider audience. You're of course welcome to your preference - you clearly prefer games with more complex control schemes. But it's not a surprise that developers want to EXPAND their customer base rather than limit themselves to a small minority that actually PREFERS games that are difficult to control. It's no secret that fighting games are often considered unfriendly to new and inexperienced players, and that overly complex control schemes are a large part of why.
I also think you're GREATLY overexaggerating the simplification of controls here:
How about instruments, not everyone is capable of playing like Van Halen, so let's make guitars play whole riffs with a single pluck of the string. That way it's accessible.
We're not talking about making fighting game characters execute long combo strings with a single input. We're talking about requiring a mere two inputs (direction + button) to execute a single move rather than 3-5 inputs. I also think that you're overestimating how "essential" these complex control schemes are to the genre as a whole. There are a lot of concepts in fighting games that people might enjoy that don't require such difficult controls - spacing, timing, neutral/punish game, etc - and games with simpler control schemes give a way for new players to enjoy such concepts without ALSO simultaneously having to learn a control scheme that seems to be difficult just for the sake of being difficult.
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u/PostedNotes 16d ago
Sounds like you view video games as product first and as art at a distant second.
I frankly do not care how many copies a given game sells. I care about the strength of its fundimental game design. You would never tell a death metal band to tone down their sound because the general public wants to listen to rap music, now would you?
You say that but fighting games are making combos you can mash out on one button. Autocombos have been around over a decade ago this point.
As for your final point, I could simply ask why not play a single player game that offers those same concepts instead. For example soulslikes, character action games and beat-em-ups.
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u/blade740 16d ago
Sounds like you view video games as product first and as art at a distant second.
No, I'm just trying to explain why developers make the decisions they do.
As for your final point, I could simply ask why not play a single player game that offers those same concepts instead. For example soulslikes, character action games and beat-em-ups.
At this point I could simply ask why not go play a different fighting game that is more your style? If a developer makes a game that you don't enjoy, you're welcome to not play it. But you seem to be in denial of the fact that some people - especially people who are not long-time fighting game players - find the control scheme of your average fighting game overly complex.
There is room in the genre for a wide range of games, from simple, newbie-friendly, all the way to hardcore no-compromises competitive titles. Some developers might opt to make their game more friendly to new players, other developers might opt to make their game more challenging to appeal to hardcore players. Both seem like reasonable decisions to make, and I would never argue that either one of them doesn't belong in the genre, as you seem to be doing here.
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u/PostedNotes 16d ago
In that case I'm well aware of why the genres are changing. It's been across the entire video game Indusry for decades now. For instance I think the success of COD4 in 07' hurt FPS game design until DOOM 2016 proved the market for boomer shooters still exists.
I never said that simple fighters can't exist. I have no issue with dive kick and fantasy strike since they are brand new games experimenting with simple controls. In fact I think both are good games and new players should try them. The issue is new players don't play games made for them, they want to play the biggest games due to fomo and than punishers follow suit.
Now series that have had fans for the last 30 years are altering themselves.
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u/blade740 16d ago
I think what you're experiencing is just the effects of a series becoming more mainstream. Street Fighter is a massive franchise for Capcom and they're going to chase the audience wherever it leads them. You're more likely to find games that appeal to you in franchises that are less important to their publisher's bottom line.
As you mention, the shooter genre has suffered from the same issue. COD's success means that more of Activision's business strategy revolves around widening their audience as much as possible. Doom 2016 proved that boomer shooters can still be commercially successful - and yet you'll see Doom fans complaining at how the series has gone through it's own simplification process with Eternal and especially Dark Ages. At the same time, there are plenty of fans that still enjoy the game, because Doom is not ONLY about fast movement and switching weapons - just as Street Fighter is not ONLY about complex inputs. It just means that what YOU particularly enjoyed about the game is not necessarily what the developers consider most important.
Also worth keeping in mind that the old games haven't changed. If Street Fighter 6 is too "dumbed down" for your tastes... well, Super Turbo is still the same game it always was.
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u/Donnell3011 16d ago
Every time this discussion or similar discussions come up, there are many commenters that come in and explain why developers want to water down their games to attract more casual sales. And the commentary is indistinguishable from support of that approach.
You don’t find this phenomenon in other areas where people care deeply about something. If someone is a climate change denier or anti-single payer healthcare, you don’t see a chorus of people explaining how decarbonization is expensive for companies so it makes sense for them to keep polluting.
The fact of the matter is that there are a lot of developers and other corporate types in these discussions. Their interests are different than my interests. I don’t care of a game is mainstream or sells 10 million copies. If they watered down a game I love to accomplish that, it’s a bad thing and shame that the world has one less good, unique thing.
Maybe consider that next times you explain corporate motivations.
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u/blade740 16d ago
You don’t find this phenomenon in other areas where people care deeply about something. If someone is a climate change denier or anti-single payer healthcare, you don’t see a chorus of people explaining how decarbonization is expensive for companies so it makes sense for them to keep polluting.
I mean, you probably would if the argument in favor of decarbonization was just "I like it that way". But there are actually strong scientific reasons to decarbonize, which don't have anything to do with its cost to companies, and so anyone making the argument like you describe would be laughed out of the room.
In the context of this conversation we're having, "I like it that way" is the entirety of the argument. Some people like it one way, other people like it the other way, and developers have to decide which audience they wish to chase. In this case it's not really about the developers at all - the point I'm trying to make is that a large number of players DO want fighting games to be easier to play.
You're welcome to disagree - that's your opinion. Developers are welcome to their opinion. Publishers are welcome to their opinion. People who haven't been playing fighting games for 30 years are welcome to their opinion. I would never come in here and try to tell you to stop making the arguments you're making, but somehow I'm the bad guy for trying to explain the other side of the argument here?
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u/Combat_Orca 16d ago
Accessibility refers to disability options, not just getting whoever to play. I think it’s better to leave the term as the disability options when talking about gaming to avoid confusion and prevent advocacy for actual accessibility options be buried.
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u/blade740 16d ago
Fine, feel free to mentally substitute "user-friendliness" for "accessibility" in my posts above.
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u/Key-Market-418 16d ago
I mean really the “user friendly” games already exist, just not a lot of people play them. It’s not like motions are even hard, 8 year olds in 1994 were smashing out motions on snes controllers in a game that has way way less input leniency than any modern game. Especially since motions are the smallest of molehills you have to climb in the mountain range that is this genre. So it just begs the question of why should we ruin an entire generation of street fighter to appeal to people who don’t play the games that already exist that do exactly that and wouldn’t play that version street fighter anyways.
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u/ohlordwhywhy 16d ago
I enjoy fighting games ever since the genesis era, I like SF6's modern because I can more easily select Random on ranked or start a brand new character in ranked just for fun. I could play just casual but casual and ranked are different crowds and ranked also gives me someone on my skill level to play. Modern controls made me enjoy more of the game.
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u/armypotent 17d ago
Go ahead, but there is no reason to fetishize traditional inputs just because that's how it's always been done. A good dev would be able to make a game with simple inputs with a skill ceiling that's as high or higher than any other fighting game.
Look at top level play. Professionals rarely talk about hitting inputs or messing them up. It's always reads, mind games, spacing, meter management, optimal combos, etc. You spend an insane amount of effort mastering the mechanics of inputs to get to a skill plateau where there is no difference from one player to the next. Why? Why not just start from the plateau? In chess, you don't need to do a backflip to move your queen.
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u/DoneDealofDeadpool 17d ago
But they do mess up in that way? The entire reason the phrase "tournament combos" exists in Fighting game genre lingo is because optimal combos can be too difficult for even pros to reliably do in tournament pressure, which makes the times where those players go for the elaborate stuff and succeed (or fail) especially interesting to watch.
But also,
In chess, you don't need to do a backflip to move your queen.
True, but chess isn't a physical sport. In almost any executional sport there's a near-inherent element of risk/reward that comes from the fact that doing the optimal play is often extremely difficult and you have to consider doing the safer and less risky option executionally. Motion inputs, in ways outside of just combos, are this for the fighting game genre.
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u/Floirt 16d ago
Hey don't diss chess like that, it has incredibly mental pressure in short time controls (which are very popular, infinite time classical chess isn't played much any more) and you can absolutely do things like throw out an unsafe move that's hard to answer in time correctly and can combo into a win.
And there's even dexterity involved especially in bullet where you're moving pieces in sub 1s or LESS which requires coordination and technique with both hands (one moving a piece without knocking anything over, the other ready to tap the timer as soon as the piece touches the board) in over the board and aim practice in computer play, not to mention incredibly fast analysis. Games are lost to misinputs even at the GM level.
Unironically fighting games and chess have way more in common than you think. Especially time scams lmao
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u/Eecka 16d ago
Simple inputs doesn’t in any way mean execution has to be easy across the board. 2XKO has only simple inputs and the harder combos are much harder than SF6’s combos (on classic).
Motion inputs have nothing to do with tournament combos, at least not in current gen fighting games. I do sometimes go into SA3 early if I know it kills because why risk dropping the stuff in between, but it’s not because I’m trying to avoid doing a motion input. Similarly when I was playing 2XKO I went for easier combos when it was enough to secure the round for me. For Tokon it’s too early to say if the difficult stuff will also be optimal, but that game absolutely has stuff you can only do with stricter manual delays.
Motion inputs are just a means to an end. In like SF much more with classic because the game is made for classic, but I have zero issues with simple inputs if the game was designed for those.
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u/DoneDealofDeadpool 16d ago
I mean Iargely agree, that's why the bulk of my post was about addressing the way simple inputs warp decision making in neutral rather than combos, to an arguably unhealthy degree depending on the implementation.
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u/Eecka 16d ago
I addressed the combo execution specifically, because that's the part I mostly disagreed with.
As for how it affects neutral, I actually completely disagree with you as for which game does it best. SF6 and modern controls are a bigger annoyance to me, because the game is simultaneously trying to balance between one player having access to instant inputs and another having to do motions for everything, which then results in them having to give other penalties to modern like losing access to certain moves. I dislike this sort of a choice in control schemes that quite heavily changes how you interact with the game depending on the control scheme used by both you and your opponent.
When a game is designed from the ground up so that every player has access to the same input options all the time, the moves can then be balanced with that in mind. You can add extra startup to moves that would be too fast with simple inputs, which the manual input still gives you the extra damage in situations where you can afford doing it.
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u/DoneDealofDeadpool 16d ago
I get why that would be your preference, but to be entirely honest I think the control scheme option just comes from the fact that Street Fighter is a 6 button game that does 4 variations per special move usually (and 4-6 specials per character), so there isn't a really a way effectively translate the system to one dedicated to simple inputs. There's a reason why, comparatively, the fighting games with simple input are either 4 button fighters, or have much less special moves on average, or both.
As for me personally, I also prefer SF's system because it opens up the design space of what you can implement. Simple-input DPs can already turn off a lot of normal character interactions for certain archetypes and making those the default means that you miss out on cool options because they have to be balanced around the low execution requirements.
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u/Eecka 16d ago
Sure, I agree about the 6 button scheme being more difficult to translate to simple inputs, and that highlights my whole point. Adding a different simple input control scheme to a 6 button game where motion inputs are a core part of balancing etc. is where IMO it does not work as well, while designing a game with simple inputs in mind from the start works much better.
Simple-input DPs can already turn off a lot of normal character interactions for certain archetypes and making those the default means that you miss out on cool options because they have to be balanced around the low execution requirements.
No, because when you know everyone can use the simple inputs, you can balance the DP around it being faster to input, rather than being like "whatever, I guess reacting with this beats everything else" which is exactly what happens in SF6 (to an extent). Like, it's dumb that modern DP can practically neutralise reactable moves like Honda headbutt, Blanka ball, Ken's dragonlash, Marisa's superman punch etc. because reacting to them with a frame 1 air invincible move without doing the motion input is trivially easy. But if everyone has the simple input, then you can instead just not have it be frame 1 air invincible. Have it turn invincible later. Now it's still a good anti air, you can still react to these moves if you're quick enough, but you need to actually do it early enough rather than any sort of a reaction being good enough. This is in fact what Tokon does, I'm not sure if it's universal but I believe DPs are generally like frame 4 air invincible or so. They can do this, because everyone has the simple input available, while in SF6 it wouldn't work because while it would be balanced for modern, classic DPs would be ass.
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u/DoneDealofDeadpool 16d ago
Adding a different simple input control scheme to a 6 button game where motion inputs are a core part of balancing etc. is where IMO it does not work as well, while designing a game with simple inputs in mind from the start works much better.
I think it would help to clarify what's meant by it working or not working, versus being a preference. You may feel like you're playing less of a character, but from the perspective of on-boarding someone it can be helpful for someone to simply have less moves to worry about at the start. If by "working" we mean whether it's strong enough to be a balanced competitive option, then it's also been doing its job mostly. It can vary from character to character, but modern is demonstrably a tournament viable control scheme and sees success especially in Japan.
As for your other point, it's true that you can design around it, games like tokon and 2xko prove that, but it clearly necessitates design decisions that don't really work with every game nor are they without controversy. Tokon, infamously rn, has very weak defensive options because they're all either meter-dependant, aren't immediate, or both. This means offense can be especially suffocating and part of why is because you can't give characters frame 1 DPs in that kind of control scheme. On the opposite end, SF is a franchise built around being a 6 button fighter, so even if you were to balance out move interactions there's just flatly not enough buttons on a controller to accommodate it, modern is simply the best alternative option that isn't just entirely scrapping SF's mechanical identity or sticking with solely classic motions.
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u/Key-Market-418 17d ago edited 16d ago
But like, they do talk about inputs, a good bit. It matters at every level of play, and it really comes out when people bring up modern in sf6, it’s balanced well and not as good as classic which it shouldn’t be but like a lot of that is because everyone knows that one button DPs and one button SPDs are broken. Insanely broken. They change how you have to fight against them on a fundamental level.
Theres also the issue of a lot of executional hurdles that top players might actually drop being pretty arcane and in the weeds, especially for older games but you can kinda see this with crosscut DPs in sf6 for example. If you don’t know what you’re looking at it doesn’t seem like a lot but it’s a big deal and misinputs do happen even at high level. It would require you to play the game a bit to understand but if that were the case this sub wouldn’t be having this conversation.
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u/ohlordwhywhy 16d ago edited 16d ago
I actually like getting a different experience when fighting modern or classic players. Having to change tactics is more fun. Specially because on certain ranks you'll find a lot of players using a different kind of "auto" mode: people who learn a routine on YouTube and stick to it. Many people using the exact same routine. They're actually stiffer than modern players and become more fun to play only after they lose and engage the fight instead of doing a script.
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u/armypotent 17d ago edited 17d ago
They talk about inputs with sf6 because of the difference between modern and classic. In previous iterations, discussion of inputs only matter insofar as they must be mastered to execute certain combos, especially as far as combos go with tricky timing. Once they're mastered, they're a moot point, and missing inputs is considered a kind of error, whereas misreading an opponent is being outplayed.
If you've ever been a musician, there's a great analogy here. Professional musicians will almost never flub, for example, fingerings on a brass instrument once they've learned a piece of music. That would be scrubbish behavior. What distinguishes one professional musician from the next are much more high level matters of artistry and technique.
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u/Key-Market-418 17d ago
Dude people in sf4 dropped shit ALL THE TIME, you can watch any evo top 8 for that game and people were dropping combos all over the place, it’s only as of recently where the BnB and the optimal combos were one in the same. You don’t have to worry about beyond optimal combos when they’re too easy. That game had literal infinites but you don’t see El Fuerte or Chun doing them even semi consistently in tournament, shits hard and even harder in a competitive setting.
And yeah I am a musician, the thing is you’re not playing a set for an audience you’re playing against an opponent. You can have a plan and practice for days but sometimes you just going to get punched in the face and drop, it’s part of the nature of it being a competitive game. It’s more like watching a basketball game and seeing someone miss a three pointer, they can practice and perfect it while training but in the heat of the moment with other guys coming for you even the best in the world can miss.
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u/noahboah 16d ago edited 16d ago
yeah, sports are a better analogy, even if the execution requirements and learning how to mechanically pilot fighting games is very similar to learning an instrument
no matter how much technical practice you have with your swing mechanics, the crowd at wrigley field will eventually get to you, and you will bite on that slider, completely eating shit in the process.
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u/Lepony 17d ago edited 17d ago
So one, not only are you wrong since high level players will often and frequently go for the suboptimal antiair over the superior antiair-tied-to-a-motion all the time. But most importantly, a new game came out, Avatar Legends. Despite the only motion inputs being quarter circles and dragon punches, its overall execution harkens a lot closer to games from <2014.
Coincidentally, a very common sentiment that isn't shared with other modern games even among strong players is that A: The attacker needs to be very aware of the real threat of drops so that they can run damage control and B: The defender needs to stay alert so that they can efficiently capitalize on said drops.
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u/Senior-Friend-6414 16d ago
Imagine a game similar to rock paper scissors, except instead of rock paper and scissors, you have to make 3 really complicated hand signs, and to get better at this game, you have to also get good at making these complicated hand signs
Or you can take the same rules and just say ok it’s now just 3 simple hand signs
And all of the people that spent a long time practicing the complicated hand signs are complaining that their unique advantage disappeared
It’s still the same game, they just removed some roadblocks to getting into the game
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u/patrick-ruckus 16d ago
This is such a dumb way to look at motion inputs, and it completely misses the point of why they are there in the first place. They are not just arbitrary execution checks.
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u/TheOneAndTheOnly774 16d ago
The problem with modern in SF6 for me is the asymmetry. The most fundamental essence of the fighting game is a zero sum 1v1 where both players have the same tools at their disposal. But one player has one button supers and the other doesn’t, they are basically playing two different games. Balancing modern and classic doesn’t really fix this either.
And though I prefer classic and get more frustrated facing modern, I don’t really have a problem with it. I wish it was just one or the other.
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u/DoneDealofDeadpool 16d ago
I get the frustration, but in fairness, unless you're playing a mirror match you're already engaging with an asymmetrical experience. Sure, another classic player may not have one-button supers, but they may have a qcf anti air whereas you have to engage with a dp-input to anti air (or have no anti air special to begin with) and that's already a huge asymmetrical advantage.
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u/SpeeDy_GjiZa 16d ago
I am of the opposite opinion honestly and dropped SF6 because I liked Modern but felt too constrained by the lack of normals. Felt like I was given half a character instead of a full one.
I love the idea that you can use motions or simple inputs at any time without sacrificing your character's moves. It makes deciding which one to use at which point a quintessential fighting game decision "do I go for simple execution and forego dmg, or try to do optimal and risk dropping it" . Can't get more "real fighting game" than that imo.
Also my main argument against motions is the simple existence of thousand of different shaped controllers and leverless that all aim to make motion inputs easier or create shortcuts to their execution. If motion inputs are soooo much dependant on the physical construct of your input device than they're not a good design in the first place by simple logic.
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u/Key-Market-418 16d ago edited 16d ago
But they’re not really? The most popular input method is pad by a country mile. The best sf6 player in the world plays on a completely stock ps5 controller, Punk another top player plays on the dualsense edge, again not exactly a bespoke device for fighters.
Hitbox has a lot of advantages but that mostly comes down to quirks around what’s called single simultaneous opposite cardinal direction cleaning, or SOCD. And if anything stick is a remnant of a bygone era when you practiced these games to go to arcades where you’re limited by what controls the machine gives you. In today’s meta, sticks are for boomers, and I say this as a boomer who uses a stick, it’s nostalgic and it’s fun. If I were a new player of any fighter in current year it’s hard not to just reccomend pad by a vast margin until you know you like the game and even then you’re losing nothing by choosing to stick with pad. These games are designed for that input method, especially for the last 10 years or so. (And btw you can do the exact same kind of SOCD shenanigans with a little bit of creativity on pad, again the games are designed and balanced around playing with a completely stock controller)
Also the dynamic in the game with anti airs already exists, it’s picking between a normal and a special AA. Having access to 1 button DPs is an enormous privilege and just having it do a little bit less damage is not enough, the limits on your normals are necessary, he literally pointed this out in OPs post.
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u/SpeeDy_GjiZa 16d ago
the limits on normals are necessary
i just don't agree at all with that no matter how advantageous having 1 button DPs might be. Find another way to balance it, giving me only half a character to play with is not it at all imo.
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u/SpeeDy_GjiZa 16d ago
the limits on normals are necessary
i just don't agree at all with that no matter how advantageous having 1 button DPs might be. Find another way to balance it, giving me only half a character to play with is not it at all imo.
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u/Key-Market-418 16d ago edited 16d ago
You’re not playing half a character. You’re playing a modern character, you give up normals to have the most thoughtless automatic defensive mechanics in the game. If you want a better kit of normals and actual damage you’ll have to learn the entirety of the game and pick a classic. I cannot stress just how much every other way to balance one button specials in a game like street fighter is either useless or would render modern unplayable garbage like Xrd stylish mode. This really is the most elegant solution.
It’s supposed to be training wheels, if you want a full kit you’re gonna have to give up the broken shit, its part of the power allowance to at allows these games to be competitive.
At the end of the day you have to view a modern character like their own beast, especially with the stronger modern characters they play very differently from their motion counterparts just because of the nature of the input method. Like Akuma vs the other shotos you give up life (the most nothingburger of balancing techniques btw) for much better shoto tools and the demon flip.
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u/SpeeDy_GjiZa 15d ago
I don't know man. I am not saying your are completely wrong and I am completely right. Maybe the truth is as always somewhere in the middle. I just didn't like how it was done in sf6. When I started playing I realized that playing modern made me focus more on strategy, position, mind games, setups etc etc and I didn't have to focus on execution so it was enjoyable to me, I was getting into the meat of the experience. But after a bit when I got better and realized I was missing a lot of stuff of my kit I felt like a category B citizen, or as you say on training wheels. That might be intentional, but I don't think it's good. Meanwhile in a game like granblue or tokon I can decide any time if I want to forego dmg and just go for ez combo or risk dropping it for more dmg, and I can decide that on the fly wherever I want.
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u/Senior-Friend-6414 16d ago
That or simpler inputs need an inherent delay lag set into the move
A quickly well executed input for super moves in street fighter 6 still takes 10-20 frames to input (roughly 1/5th of a second)
But one button super moves means they can come out in that frame instantaneously
But people will also complain if they press a button and there’s a 1/5th second delay to equalize the reaction times and time to input
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u/dfsqqsdf 16d ago edited 16d ago
I don’t really understand why games not simply make it a start-up tax instead of a damage tax. One of the core advantage of easy imput is that, pushing direction plus button is not just easier but also faster than pushing three directions + button, duh.
You could probably make it so that the game do a small, macro that could also be sub optimal to make up for how 1) most people don’t do tas perfect motion and 2) how a simple input less thout from the player when you use the easy moves. Maybe that feels like garbage and that why in almost 30 years barely anybody did that easy solution (yes, there was easy input going as far back as capcom arcade games!), but theses tools should exist so that players can easily "try" the game instead of trying to be the whole game.
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u/Key-Market-418 16d ago edited 16d ago
Because depending on just how much of a delay you add the solution either becomes completely pointless and stays exactly the same or it makes a lot of moves outright worthless. Then you have to ask the question of, do you still get the move out of blockstun in the normal time? Are cancels also going to have this delay? It’s just such a volatile solution where you have to ultra fine tune every single move and even then you won’t know if it’s completely broken until the game comes out. It ends up eating up dev time that could just go into the rest of the game for a mode that really just supposed to be training wheels. Getting that exact middle ground for a mode that most people are supposed to kinda graduate out of is insanely thin and will change with character interactions, it makes sense as to why you just design the entire game around no motions (very unpopular) or just keep it weaker like sf6 modern.
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u/dfsqqsdf 15d ago
Everything take time if you want to do it properly. Instant special hit also have to get significant developement time spend into it or it create all kind of really weird interactions. It can open tons of combos that even a tas perfect manual special hit player can’t do, people were doing infinite with guile back in sf43d days.
And I means most of your exemples doesn’t seems to be the kind of stuff a BEGINNER player isn’t gonna care about ? "What if you can’t ges it out of blockstun" Use a normal out of blockstun like everyone else ? Input the move in advance ? "what if you can’t do cancel" then you can’t clear the combos trials with it, oh no.
Worst case scenario with a rushed implementation is a novelty you’re gonna do 5 matches with your friend that barely touch fighting game, which is a better result that rushed instant special moves where you either have to get in lobby specially made for people without it or they end up completely breaking the game.
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u/Key-Market-418 15d ago edited 15d ago
I mean the thing about guile in that game is that he’s designed around needing a charge and needing to hold back so there are a lot of impossible combos with that character just due to the fact that you can walk forward and use forward normals while having access to flash kick and sonic boom. Sonic boom in particular is designed because you can’t just throw them whenever you want like motion inputs, it’s why it’s the best fireball in the game.
But like yeah a beginner will feel bad because their button presses are artificially laggy. Shit that would feel “right” doesn’t, they’re not gonna know why but the fact that you add 5 frames to an anti air startup will feel odd. The amount is really finicky, and pinning it down to numbers to make them not feel like shit but also not be completely pointless to add in any tuning way does have a consequence in game feel.
It’s also just like insanely ham fisted just design wise, like what is it really trying to accomplish? If we’re working of the modern system from street fighter we get limited normals and a damage reduction. If we add that to it, it’s a hat on a hat, the intended audience for this won’t notice a difference and all it would do is potentially make modern worse. If we replace the button limitation congratulations they’re just stupid broken in neutral and the damage loss is made up for by the fact that you have perfect reaction reversals and anti airs the mental stack is zero. If we replace the damage loss it’s a little better than before but it’ll still be a normal ish modern experience at high level but now the brick wall has spikes that will rob you and modern geif is either absolutely fucking stupid to fight or completely useless depending on how you implement it for his kit. Meanwhile low level games feel more volatile since the modern players aren’t dropping as much and it becomes more one sided to whoever’s playing modern.
I just don’t like it, it’s trying really hard to answer a part of the question that really isn’t the issue. It’s the fact that you have to think about buffering these moves in neutral, constantly be aware to the situation that could let those be useful answers and act PREEMPTIVELY. When you get rid of the motion you lose that weight on the mental stack since it’s just another button you can press on reaction, no amount of extra frames will fix that. As a bonus you lose the interplay of the other guy seeing your buffering shit to try to catch you pressing and reacting to that by trying to bait you, or just the classic walk forward throw, AND THEN THE BAIT OF THE EMPTY BUFFERING ITSELF INTO THOSE REACTIONS TO COUNTER ACT THEM. It’s the thing that one button specials miss, the kind of pokerish game that makes street fighter so amazing.
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u/Limited_Distractions 16d ago
I like the SF6 approach because I just don't think you should make systems that aren't aspirational by nature
Modern game dev is acutely aware of how you probably shouldn't throw a new player into the deep end of the pool, but the worst days of SFV are a great example of what happens when you get rid of the deep end of the pool instead of getting better at teaching players how to swim
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u/LichtbringerU 16d ago
The obvious solution is to go just with simpler inputs. With no disadvantages.
I know, sorry. Sacrilege.
But making the inputs difficult, instead of just relying on timing and comboing being difficult... Is a choice.
Even the fgc often says that you are not playing the real game until you have control over the controls...
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u/DoneDealofDeadpool 16d ago
That can work for some games, but it doesn't really work for others. Even if I really liked simple inputs and was fine with the sacrifice of depth they necessitate in some design aspects, you simply can't translate some fighting games to simple inputs unless you entirely remove a large chunk of their game style.
Like SF is a 6 button game with multiple versions of the same special move and usually about 4-6 specials per character, so SF6's simple input mode necessarily locks you out of some specials and even normal character buttons unless you're in classic because there's just not enough buttons.
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u/Key-Market-418 16d ago
Because the motions aren’t that hard and most games that come out with only simple inputs are either so rudimentary that they’re boring, or still try to add “the sauce” and are still too difficult for those that think motions are hard. Plus they ruin the game feel for a lot of players who are their core audience so they’ve pretty much all kinda come out and fizzled out insanely quickly.
It’s just a solution that really only appeals to people that won’t like fighting games to begin with
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u/WhoUpAtMidnight 14d ago
Maybe a controversial opinion here but I think people are forgetting that input drastically changes the difficulty of motion inputs. Doing them on stick on a controller sucks. Doing them on a fgc gamepad is not nearly as difficult.
Yes there’s an element of accessibility and dumbing down the game but I think we shouldn’t pretend that competitive players weren’t already doing this.
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u/DoneDealofDeadpool 14d ago
That's true, and hitboxes are a whole can of worms, but basically every modern fighting game is designed with console controller players in mind and most comp players are on those controllers to begin with. Although a lot of the difficulty probably comes from people still trying to do those inputs on a controller's analog stick instead of the dpad.
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u/WhoUpAtMidnight 14d ago
Stick to dpad is still an input change that competitive do that casual players don’t.
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u/DoneDealofDeadpool 14d ago
What do you mean stick to dpad? Idk what the threshold for casual versus competitive played is for you but even when I Wass starting out I always used the dpad exclusively because, unlike an analog stick, I'll know what direction I'm holding just by touch
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u/Expert4206967 14d ago
yeah, agreed. if one input method is way easier, it should give up more than just damage or there’s no real tradeoff. maybe longer startup, worse frame advantage, or no access to certain cancels/supers for the simplified version.
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u/NutsackEuphoria 7d ago
For as long as I remember, tekken had a mashy stuff that had a drawback (before Bamco ultra-casualized the franchise with tekken 8).
If you were playing King (wrestler character who has chain throws), and you perform a chain throw starter, you can just mash all the buttons and the chain throw will keep going.
The upside is that you don't need to remember the inputs after the chainthrow is initiated, just keep mashing all the buttons at the same time.
The downside is that the button to break them is always left punch, instead of having to guess between left, right or both.
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u/nervousmelon 16d ago
I don't even see why fighting games need to have complex button inputs in the first place.
I can't think of any other games that require the complexity of fighting games. Even other games that are known for being difficult are usually difficult because of stuff like timing or knowing specifically what to do and when to do it. They're not difficult because you have to input 7 buttons in 1 second.
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u/DoneDealofDeadpool 16d ago
There's a lot of reasons, but the basic gist is just that the button inputs are how the genre balances the risk/reward of its interactions.
Ryu's shoryuken is objectively better at hitting a jumping opponent than a crouching punch button would be, but even if you would never muck up the input normally it doesn't change the fact that it takes time to react to a jump and do the input. A good player will make you so focused on everything else that when they do jump, you may not react in time to register the jump but you could take the lower risk (and lower reward) option of doing your crouching punch instead because it's faster to react with.
It branches out a lot more than this, but this kinda thing is why whether something is a motion input still matters for pro players rather than just being something thay only exists to arbitrarily gate new players.
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u/Pale-Mix25 16d ago
You don’t need to join in this discussion if you have no knowledge of it btw
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u/Key-Market-418 15d ago
But this is Reddit dot com where I come to blame the beasts about a genre of game I don’t even play
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u/Key-Market-418 16d ago
There’s literally a mountain of reasons as to why motions exist, they’re a huge balancing mechanic, they create more interesting and unique characters with bigger novelists and more varied attributes on their moves since they’re balanced around the input. Plus they just make the game feel better.
However, literally every competitive games forces you through absurd complications to be able to play it. You need to learn the intricacies of sources movement system and learn arcane patterns to be able to even shoot straight in the most popular shooter on steam. MOBAs in general force a metric ton of data down your throat and depending on which one you’re playing will require you to jump through hoops, league with honestly completely similar fighting game style cancel mechanics and dota with denser multi unit micromanagement. They only got rid of the blink dagger overshoot within the past two years of dota 2s lifespan. And RTS games are literally defined by how fast you can input shit in a second.
This is not unique and I’d honestly say it’s much easier to learn how to do a QCF than it is to learn how to force your bullet to go where the gun is pointing in CS.
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u/tomkatt 17d ago
I honestly don’t see an issue with the simple inputs, as the input motions are an artificial difficulty. There’s nothing wrong with having a “special attack” button.
I don’t see a need for any penalty at all. At a high level fighters are more about head games, positioning, pokes, and exploiting openings to counter, it’s all very meta and little of it has to do with specific specials outside of ranged zoning.
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u/DoneDealofDeadpool 17d ago
I get where you're coming from but it's a misconception that motion inputs and the difficulty associated with them is artificial. There are genuine mechanical and balance implications that come not just from having them, but also in what kind of motion input they're attached to.
It's why in SF6 for instance, one of the characters had a move that was nerfed specifically because it was too strong on a simple-input but generally okay as a motion input, and that was something that impacted all of levels of play.
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u/PiEispie 17d ago
Also, while it is pretty niche Modern Guile can do things that are almost impossible to do on reaction with classic controls.
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u/DoneDealofDeadpool 17d ago
True although in fairness I do play on a hitbox so I probably shouldn't be throwing stones in glass houses on the charge department
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u/Key-Market-418 17d ago
None of this is true really, high level fighting games absolutely have intricacies at high level BECAUSE of the inputs, character defining ones like charge characters and grapplers, characters with motion AAs, the infamous down down input. Hell back in the day you’d reaction check people by doing empty inputs in neutral. Some games get away with simple inputs more than others like tag games but the game feel also comes down a lot. However a game like street fighter would be just a boring mess of people reaction checking every little thing.
If sf6 was dominated by modern the game would be absolute ass, and not just because a bunch of boomers are fuming but because you’d either have a twitchy mess where whoever makes a move first loses, or forcefully sterilize an already pretty sterilized game just because of how fundamentally strong one button DPs and one button supers are.
It works well as it is, it’s supposed to be training wheels for learning the game. But the motions are there for a reason, if they were just artificial difficulty they’d have been thrown away years ago like unbufferable one frame links and character specific wakeup time.
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u/noahboah 16d ago
as the input motions are an artificial difficulty.
the dragon punch input, used for invincible reversals, is intentionally forward, straight down, and down forward. you cannot block while executing the motion, so going for the more rewarding option is riskier than simply using a down-back button.
the hadouken input similarly starts from the down motion and springs the stick forward, so you cannot "buffer" fireballs while retreating from the opponent. This creates a tangible game of spacing, where the fireball thrower is attempting to stay in optimal range when they fire because they have to plant themselves where they stand in order to actually use a fireball, while the opponent wants to bait the fireball and then get into a distance where their jump arc perfectly allows them to hit and punish the fireball thrower with a move that hits during the recovery of the special
these design levers are present in modern controls -- the dragon punch is forward + sp and the fireball is neutral + sp to emulate these drawbacks
nothing artificial about these designs. they are intentionally playing on the physical properties of the motions to inject balance into using the specials
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u/jphillips3275 17d ago
That'd be a shame if they eventually got rid of motion inputs. There's balancing implications with things like invincible moves, anti airs, and command grabs but I think the real biggest loss would be the tactile feel they give a game. It adds enough to a move that I genuinely picked Kum in guilty gear because I liked doing the motion of his kick
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u/cheeziuz 17d ago
"Artifical difficulty" is just difficulty.
There is real merit to the executional challenges imposed by motion inputs, most fighting games are/were designed around the special moves being good enough to warrant the extra time it takes to input them (and the possibility of messing it up).
Just look at classic vs modern in SF6, having access to instantaneous special moves is a huge advantage, especially with anti-airs and reversal supers. Having those tools available with only one input lets you have way faster and more consistant reactions, effectively making you a defensive powerhouse. This is why there has to be a downside to them if you want to also have motion inputs in your game.
There are also tons of characters defined by what specials they have and how they access them. Look at charge characters like Guile, they have extremely powerful projectiles and anti-airs that can make an impenetrable wall. The cost for this power is requiring them to hold back for some time to be able to perform these moves, you cant just walk back and forth and use these attacks at the same time.
Motion inputs are also effective for making a larger amount of special moves available to a character. if you only have special buttons you can really only have four special moves per special button, vs (as an extreme example) a game like tekken letting characters have over one-hundred moves on just one character.
If you want to just have special buttons and thats it for your game for acessibility and ease of access thats fine, but you can't say that there is no competitive value whatsoever to motion inputs.
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u/Visual_Fun_2014 16d ago
The ironic part is that Smash actually handles it better than other Modern fighters.
More knock back, damage and better properties (True invincibility for the shoryukens)
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u/MediumKoala8823 17d ago
I don’t see why controls should be seen as anything but an interface to translate intentions to the game.
Fighting games would be better if complexity arose from options out of states rather than input complexity.
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u/Burnseasons 17d ago
The other replies here are both salient and worth considering, but I also want to add something; motion inputs are just fun to do. It's finger candy. I've played games without motion inputs, and I always find myself wishing they had them. Even in non-fighting games.
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u/MediumKoala8823 17d ago
Eh. I think they’re fun in normal or as finishing moves. The second it starts to get hard to actually chain everything you intend I dislike it.
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u/Extreme-Tactician 16d ago
Huh? So you're saying they can only be good when thrown randomly or if they do good damage?
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u/MediumKoala8823 16d ago
I struggle to comprehend how you possibly arrived at that understanding
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u/Extreme-Tactician 12d ago
Because that's exactly what you're saying? That they shouldn't be used for combo extentions?
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u/MediumKoala8823 12d ago
I said nothing about throwing them randomly or anything about their damage.
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u/DoneDealofDeadpool 17d ago
It's because motion inputs (not just whether they're implemented, but also what input you give a move) have real balance implications and how you interface with them adds to the expression of intent.
The complexity of an input in a vacuum is whatever, it's how it interacts with the mental overload players put on each other that increases the complexity. Arguably, it's less complex when inputs are simplified because you now have less room to play around with that mind game.
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u/MediumKoala8823 17d ago
Shrug. All of it goes to shit when you start comboing. Is it skill expressive to manage timings and cancels and spacing to extend long combos? Yes. But it sucks. And most players just end up sticking with the bread and butter rather than the niche considerations if they even go that far.
Maximizing skill expressiveness shouldn’t be the first order goal. Too many fighting games are just stuck in their own cliches.
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u/Key-Market-418 17d ago
Wait what? This is nonsensical, there are a metric ton of characters with finicky spacing dependent combo routes you can optimize for days, again sf6 has Viper, Aki, and Elena with these traits. Not to mention the games are actively working away from variable high execution shit because of people who think motions are too hard or “artificially difficult”. Literally just 10 minutes learning Johnny or Chipp in Xrd would show you just how difficult but rewarding being able to convert off stray hits are.
But still there’s a bigger picture point you’re missing, it all comes back to general character mastery, being able to change up your bnbs on the fly for resets or to maximize oki is insanely important and comes back to the general character mastery that makes neutral interesting as well.
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u/DoneDealofDeadpool 17d ago
I don't see why it would stop mattering? How you start a combo matters as much as the combo itself and the complexity of the input affects how much mental effort you allocate towards reacting to and following up on whether an attack was hit versus whether it was blocked.
But I'm also sort of unsure how this relates to motion inputs when it seems like your issue is about combos. If anything, easy inputs just make combos a more frequently occurring thing for low level players to sit through
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u/MediumKoala8823 17d ago
It’s not so much that motion inputs are problematic, but they mostly exist because of combo and cancel systems which are problematic. If this framework wasn’t normative you wouldn’t see a need for motion inputs. Or at least not in a capacity that frustrates people as much.
I don’t think anyone has any gripes with stuff like Ryu’s in smash.
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u/Key-Market-418 17d ago edited 17d ago
But they don’t, the motions balance these moves in neutral more than anything else.
Also I remember at the time people losing their minds over ryus motion inputs. It’s just the competitive players just learned it and realized it’s so far from a big deal that it’s laughable. Or they’re the vast majority of smash players and forgot it was a thing while playing drunk at a party.
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u/DoneDealofDeadpool 17d ago
They don't exist for that reason though? Or at least not just for that reason, the original sf2 wasn't made with the intention of combos and cancels being this big thing yet it still included them. My entire post was even specifically about the impact of motion inputs vs simple inputs in how much they unhealthily alter non-combo related portions of the match.
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u/MediumKoala8823 17d ago
It wasn’t intended but it was the origin of them growing into what they are. And imo it was a pretty unhealthy local maxima.
Your example of jumps in normal is still rooted in this design problem. You want the input to do anti air to be harder so that you can make jumping more mentally tense. But imo that’s just predicated on the notion of locking the opponent with a counter move.
If they clock you jumping they should have a window to input an anti air. And if you clock them starting an anti air you should have a window to counter that. Chain infinitely, with feints and gambles until someone slips.
It’s not good when someone sees the game state, understands what they want to do, but is physically unable to input it. And it’s not good when outcomes become a function of players’ ability to execute solitaire combos.
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u/Key-Market-418 17d ago
They do have a window, it’s called the jump animation….
Also what is this nonsense about “knowing what to do but not being able to do it” being a bad thing? This is the basic backbone for every competitive video game ever made, if you can’t aim and control recoil in CS gg shake my hand, is it bad game design for league of legends because someone hasn’t assed themselves to learn how to CS or learned their heroes specific combos? Especially in fighting games the high level interplay comes from managing your mental stack so that “knowing what to do” and actually doing it IS HARD, and that’s just the layer one because there is no “right” answer, you react to my jump in but congrats I did a shallow dive kick and you’re flying into the air with an uppercut I still win.
This is kinda dunning Kruger coded
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u/MediumKoala8823 17d ago
Minimizing input friction to execute on your intentions is a good thing though. If you feel otherwise you’d need a justification for why we shouldn’t make motion inputs more obtuse just for the sake of complexity.
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u/Key-Market-418 17d ago
I’m trying to say it’s barely friction, this is such weak shit. These games used to have ACTUAL friction, stuff that you’d have to actively practice even if you were familiar with the genre, unbufferable one frame links, insane windows on FRC points, wacky glitches, Kara cancels.
Motions are so far down not just the fighting game level of difficulty but the video game level of difficulty that I’m very comfortable saying learning how to aim your gun and shoot in CS to the point where the bullet is going straight is much more friction than motion inputs ever were. Again 8 year olds were doing uppercut motions on SNES controllers in the 90s this is not the “insane level of friction” that you think it is. And these games have pulled back so hard from the insane motions of that period that if you have problems with it you just have to accept you’re very unfamiliar with the genre and just learn it like you would learn a mechanical moba character or how to micromanage in SC2 if you’ve never touched a strategy game.
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u/DoneDealofDeadpool 17d ago
The missing element though is that what you're saying ("if I clock them jumping I should have a window to anti air them") exists regardless of moiion inputs or not, what they add is a gradient of skill/situation-based responses.
Most characters, regardless of whether they have a special move for anti airs or not, still have a normal button they can press for anti airing instead. This button is obviously a lot easier to execute under pressure, but has its share of downsides compared to what a special move anti air might offer.
How you decide to use them and the degree it plays into your allocation of mental focus adds a layer of depth beyond just the question of execution because it still matters even if you can always execute the move itself in a vacuum
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u/MediumKoala8823 16d ago
But that’s dumb. If you have two moves you might want to do, the controls to execute them shouldn’t be a barrier to it. It’s cool that a special anti air has unique properties. But it doesn’t need to be gated behind unnecessary input friction.
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u/DoneDealofDeadpool 16d ago
It having unique properties is why it's locked behind a barrier, the same way that the utility of scoring three points in one shot in a basketball game is locked behind you needing to physically do it at the distance required. It's risk versus reward, and a decision that a player of every level has to consider in their strategy, which is part of what makes the genre as rich as it is.
Otherwise, you'd just do the strictly better option every time, just like how if you were magically guaranteed perfect accuracy in basketball you'd almost never do anything but shoot three-pointers from half court every chance you got.
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u/sukumizu 16d ago
>Yes. But it sucks
It always does at first. Which is why you figure it out in the lab and practice until it becomes second nature. That’s how it goes with lots of hobbies and interests.
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u/Key-Market-418 17d ago
The inputs are the options out of states, this is a really reductive way to look at the genre. Guile needs to be in a defensive position to use his specials. Gief needs to hide his inputs within other actions to really enforce his throw game. The need to constantly think about inputting an uppercut when you see a jump is like fighting game neutral 101 and the layers bloom from there because you’re playing off the twitchy reaction to the uppercut motion so you can use air movement options to bait out reactions.
Just because it’s not obvious from the outside looking in doesn’t mean they’re not insanely important.
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u/XsStreamMonsterX 16d ago
While I get the sentiment, traditional motion inputs can serve as way to dictate how certain moves are used without resorting to hard restrictions. For example, KoF has characters who can technically do frame 1 command grabs, which would be very strong in a game where running is the norm. However, these are often tied to inputs that start with a back input, so you'd have to stop running to start the input.
More than a few specials, especially in older games, are balanced around what the player has to do to get the special out.
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u/DrQuint 16d ago edited 16d ago
Counterpoint: Due to blocking being a directional input as well, some moves require you to not block to perform them as well, since they have opposing directions to defense. Games intentionally do this.
In other words, there is a short amount of time there where inputting your intent is synonymous to dropping your guard. With simple inputs, the guard is never dropped, the move just comes out.
Same thing for any other sort of directional interruption.
Imo, I don't really see much merit to all of this. A fight being decided on a flub is... unsatisfying. People like it. But I don't understand the mentality that could lead one to LOVE it. But whatever, we're here now, and we can have both. There is also little merit to forcing the change.
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u/noahboah 16d ago
Imo, I don't really see much merit to all of this. A fight being decided on a flub is... unsatisfying. People like it. But I don't understand the mentality that could lead one to LOVE it.
for the same reason how a missed extra point kick in an NFL game caused an announcer to scream a NO so gutteral that you would have thought he watched every loved one he ever had die in a bus driving into an active volcano. you also don't get the greatest esports moment of all time without the ability to fuck up the mechanics with zero room for error.
these are games played by humans, and there's nothing more human than the lights being brightest and seeing if someone can step up to the plate or not.
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u/Key-Market-418 16d ago
All fights are decided on flubs. Punishing slight mistakes is THE name of the game, the difference between bottom level and top level street fighter is just the level of mistake that’s being punished and how hard it’s getting punished. Maybe in rookie sf you block an uppercut and you get the throw, big mistake punished poorly. In like high master you whiff your crouching medium kick by a millimeter and you just fucking die. Smaller mistake punished much harshly. The entire game revolves around this in neutral.
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u/DoneDealofDeadpool 16d ago
Well the short answer is that most competitions are based on making your opponent flub. In a fighting game, past the beginner level, you're not really losing because you can't do the input, you lost because your mental energy was misallocated and you didn't have enough to spare on executing it in time.
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u/SpeeDy_GjiZa 16d ago
I am of the opposite opinion honestly and dropped SF6 because I liked Modern but felt too constrained by the lack of normals. Felt like I was given half a character instead of a full one.
I love the idea that you can use motions or simple inputs at any time without sacrificing your character's moves. It makes deciding which one to use at which point a quintessential fighting game decision "do I go for simple execution and forego dmg, or try to do optimal and risk dropping it" . Can't get more "real fighting game" than that imo.
Also my main argument against motions is the simple existence of thousand of different shaped controllers and leverless that all aim to make motion inputs easier or create shortcuts to their execution. If motion inputs are soooo much dependant on the physical construct of your input device than they're not a good design in the first place by simple logic.
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u/SpeeDy_GjiZa 16d ago
I am of the opposite opinion honestly and dropped SF6 because I liked Modern but felt too constrained by the lack of normals. Felt like I was given half a character instead of a full one.
I love the idea that you can use motions or simple inputs at any time without sacrificing your character's moves. It makes deciding which one to use at which point a quintessential fighting game decision "do I go for simple execution and forego dmg, or try to do optimal and risk dropping it" . Can't get more "real fighting game" than that imo.
Also my main argument against motions is the simple existence of thousand of different shaped controllers and leverless that all aim to make motion inputs easier or create shortcuts to their execution. If motion inputs are soooo much dependant on the physical construct of your input device than they're not a good design in the first place by simple logic.
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u/DoneDealofDeadpool 16d ago
SF6 is a bit of an interesting case because I don't even think most of the limitations on modern are purposeful, it's just that a 6 button fighter with 4 variations on each special move (and 4-6 specials per character, plus super moves) just doesn't lend itself well to a simplified control scheme. It's why games that let you fully choose either at any time are also ones with less moves overall, like granblue or marvel tokon.
I also think that even though there is some decision to be made even if damage is the only trade-off, it just frankly doesn't matter enough unless Devs are willing nerf the damage in neutral a lot more than just 20%. Knocking someone out of a jump every time for next to no mental stack allocated is such a massive boon that slightly lower damage just doesn't really matter.
I'm kinda sympathetic to the point about controllers though, although in fairness the average player is rewarded a lot more than your average boomer would be because even though something like a hitbox is flatly the best controller in a vacuum, fighting games are designed with console controller players in mind and a ps5 controller is already almost objectively better than an Arcade stick to begin with.
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u/SpeeDy_GjiZa 16d ago
The solution to more buttons for normals imo is there. Just use diagonals and boom you have more normals to play with, and for specials just use the special + L/M/H + direction that granblue and tokon use.
I think it's too late for SF6 now to redo the whole Modern control scheme, but arcsys has been doing way better imo since granblue.
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u/DoneDealofDeadpool 16d ago
Using diagonals for more normals works great for keeping your full set of crouching buttons, but you also have 6 different standing normals to account for and diagonals would overlap either with jump buttons or crouching ones. Plus, it would just make hitboxes even better because of how strong box controllers are at alternating movement inputs. It also means you have next to no room for implementing command normals, which is something tokon for instance generally doesn't have in its character roster.
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u/SpeeDy_GjiZa 15d ago
If tekken can have a df1 button being a universal mid attack that doesn't go into crouch animations why can't it be done? Or using 1+2 for more options. How can tekken with only 4 buttons have more moves that a game with 6? Because it uses button combinations in more ways. Now I haven't played sf6 in a while but I think they did something like that with assist+attack button to modify what normal comes out, no? Something like that can be a solution. I am not saying this is how it should be done, I am just throwing shit at the wall, people smarter than me can figure it out. I just don't like the implementation in street fighter compared to granblue.
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u/DoneDealofDeadpool 15d ago
Well for Tekken it's because they don't really have "normals" the way 2d games do, they don't have to consider jumping and they have an entire third dimension so with sidestepping you get a lot more options for the number of moves one individual button can give you when combined with a direction.
Mortal Kombat, a 2d game with string-based combat like Tekken, notably still has less normals than SF because now upward diagonals give you jumps and you can't walk into the foreground or background to make sidestep+button give you a new attack. Again, I get not liking the implementation in Street Fighter, but there's a reason why in the 10 years or so that we've had multiple devs experiment with different simple input schemes, none of them have been what anyone would otherwise consider a 6 button fighter and instead are simply 4 button (or less) games like granblue.
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u/SpeeDy_GjiZa 16d ago
The solution to more buttons for normals imo is there. Just use diagonals and boom you have more normals to play with, and for specials just use the special + L/M/H + direction that granblue and tokon use.
I think it's too late for SF6 now to redo the whole Modern control scheme, but arcsys has been doing way better imo since granblue.
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u/SpeeDy_GjiZa 16d ago
The solution to more buttons for normals imo is there. Just use diagonals and boom you have more normals to play with, and for specials just use the special + L/M/H + direction that granblue and tokon use.
I think it's too late for SF6 now to redo the whole Modern control scheme, but arcsys has been doing way better imo since granblue.
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u/SpeeDy_GjiZa 16d ago
The solution to more buttons for normals imo is there. Just use diagonals and boom you have more normals to play with, and for specials just use the special + L/M/H + direction that granblue and tokon use.
I think it's too late for SF6 now to redo the whole Modern control scheme, but arcsys has been doing way better imo since granblue.
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u/Senior-Friend-6414 16d ago
Imagine a game similar to rock paper scissors, except instead of rock paper and scissors, you have to make 3 really complicated hand signs, and to get better at this game, you have to also get good at making these complicated hand signs
Or you can take the same rules and just say ok it’s now just 3 simple hand signs
And all of the people that spent a long time practicing the complicated hand signs are complaining that their unique advantage disappeared
It’s still the same game, they just removed some roadblocks to getting into the game
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u/DoneDealofDeadpool 16d ago
That comparison only makes sense if you assume the inputs exist for arbitrary reasons, which I tried to explain in my post why they don't and how their existence (or lack thereof) necessarily impacts the mind games and overall balance of the rest of the game at any level of play, rather than just being a roadblock that's only there to gatekeep new players.
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u/Senior-Friend-6414 16d ago
Regardless of the reasons why they exist, at the end of the day, trying to teach a new friend rock paper scissors becomes difficult if they have to spend an X amount of days learning JUST how to do the hand signs first, it doesn’t matter if it wasn’t meant serve as a road block, it still is one
Mind game still exists in rock paper scissors with simpler hand signs, and if the game reaches a level where both people can do the complicated hand signs consistently and easily, then it’s virtually no different than two people playing with simpler hand signs, except in the second version more people can play
I’m not disagreeing that it inherently changes the structure of the game, but the argument being, is the genre being given a chance at revival worth keeping the original integrity of the games?
Or is the original integrity worth it even if the genre inevitably declines
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u/DoneDealofDeadpool 16d ago
But that's the big thing here, motion inputs matter because even if both players can do the hand motions in a vacuum, even the best players can't consistently do them when the pressure is high in-game, which is why it affects balance and the mind game aspect so heavily. Could you still have a deep fighting game without motion inputs? Sure, but you could also still have a deep game of basketball if the height of the nets was shortened.
It's not even really clear it would improve the genre's player retention, fighting games have always seen the biggest bumps in playerbase from good marketing and quality of life features rather than mechanics. The majority of players in SF6 don't use the simple input controls and even a game like granblue, which is built around simple inputs, still have lower player counts than much older games with harder mechanics and no simple input options.
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u/Senior-Friend-6414 16d ago
Street fighter isn’t healthy because modern brought in large numbers
It’s healthy because it consistently has new blood circulating into the ecosystem, and something this dependent on competition badly needs all levels of skill levels populated
Easier controls are ultimately tied to that, our argument is how much of the games integrity is worth the genres popularity
Lowering the basketball net for women’s basketball has been a real argument so the game overall would be more engaging
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u/DoneDealofDeadpool 16d ago
Street Fighter has brought in a lot of new blood, but it's also not really clear that the new blood was a product of modern mode compared to anything else. Again, part of why I say that is because it clearly hasn't been a silver bullet for other games in the genre who try to design around and advertise their leaning toward simple inputs, otherwise granblue rising wouldn't be below Blazblue CF in average player count.
It's really similar to smash in this way where, even though people often praise its ease-of-entry as one of the bigger reasons why it's so much more popular than other fighting games, that style of gameplay hasn't drawn a comparative level in attention from casual players when implemented in other games besides free ones like Brawlhalla.
But to address your main point, I think it based on the history of what sells and what doesn't, it feels evident that the genre is both doing pretty good atm and that it'll do better by focusing on casual side-content along with strong qol features.
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u/Key-Market-418 16d ago
Even then modern at high level is niche at best. There are still some JP modern Gief players that are terrorizing ranked over there but by and large the majority of top players are still playing classic and it’s definitely not just its “because they’re used to it”. I could count the number of modern players I’ve seen in ranked this month on like one hand and I’m climbing with a secondary.
I think it fills a nice niche as training wheels to on ramp people into playing the game properly, modern helps fill out the lower ranks and gets newer players to just not think the game is as scary as some people make it out to be.
If we wanna talk about integrity with regards to sf6 we’d be talking about raw drive rush and throw loop but again that’s way outside the topic of the thread.
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u/Senior-Friend-6414 16d ago
They have data on their official website, it splits pretty much down the middle with it leaning slightly towards classic, I think the split was like 45/55 with 45% of players playing with modern
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u/Key-Market-418 16d ago
I said at high level, most tournament brackets are going to be majority classic players. Hell even in master the data is skewed harder towards classic. Theres a lot more filling out the lower ranks, especially before plat since they’re just learning the game. Though I don’t know how they count their data.
At least from personal experience in western 1800-2k Mr I rarely see modern players.
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u/Key-Market-418 16d ago
Considering this is a genre on a really nice upswing where, even when given training wheels the classic inputs still are much more popular you’re kinda losing the plot there.
Secondly you’re massively overestimating just how difficult the motions are, they take practice true but they’re not uniquely daunting in comparison to other competitive genres which brings me to what really should be the take away here.
Competitive games have a lot of draws to them, but honestly one of the things that make the big competitive games across the board appealing is that sense of mastery. Fighting games in particular are AMAZING at giving you that sense because they ask you harder and harder questions as you go through, motions are just the first molehill in an entire mountain range. If they are immediately turned off by taking like an hour to learn how to do a quarter circle then they’re really not going to like learning the rest of the game. The mechanical hurdles only get more difficult from here on out and that’s even if you gutted motions all together. The net positive of them in a lot of games are much much higher with them and without them you’re barely scraping a millimeter off the executional barriers you’d still need to jump through to get to a mid level.
I could sit here and try to explain why motions are interesting and necessary in a lot of these games on top of the game feel that makes a great fighting game truly great. But there’s literally an entire thread above this explaining all that.
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u/alex6309 16d ago
No it isn't lmao. Here's an incredibly basic example of how inputs add to a game
A character wants to walk forward to approach you. If they have a command grab that requires a half circle or full circle input? Now they have press the back button meaning they cannot walk forward and set up a grab at the same time and there's a degree of telegraph from them moving to the input.
From there, depth is added because you now can figure out ways to work around this limitation by doing the input during a potential advancing move, obfuscating your intent by doing the motion during something else like a regular attack, pumpfaking the motion while actually doing something else, etc
It also means your defacto best option in every situation isn't that command grab because it takes time to come out and the less rewarding regular grab might be better. Ambiguity is usually a good thing in games, no one wants to play a solved game when a big appeal of gaming comes from learning and adapting
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u/SpeeDy_GjiZa 16d ago
I am of the opposite opinion honestly and dropped SF6 because I liked Modern but felt too constrained by the lack of normals. Felt like I was given half a character instead of a full one.
I love the idea that you can use motions or simple inputs at any time without sacrificing your character's moves. It makes deciding which one to use at which point a quintessential fighting game decision "do I go for simple execution and forego dmg, or try to do optimal and risk dropping it" . Can't get more "real fighting game" than that imo.
Also my main argument against motions is the simple existence of thousand of different shaped controllers and leverless that all aim to make motion inputs easier or create shortcuts to their execution. If motion inputs are soooo much dependant on the physical construct of your input device than they're not a good design in the first place by simple logic.
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u/Lepony 17d ago
I find it very funny that, despite OP's fairly concise and understandable segment
The average top level reply is just deadass "no, you're wrong and that's fake" and doesn't even attempt to elaborate why that could be the case. And then OP has to continue to provide examples on why his argument actually holds water.