The Fighting Game topic

Eighting, the people behind Marvel Vs Capcom 3 and DNF Duel, are making a Hunter x Hunter fighting game!

WHAT?! HELL YEAH!!!

Oh that is gonna be so sick. I can't wait!

Inb 4 it's a arena fighter

The teaser is out and it looks like a 3v3... game. Maybe 2D, maybe 3D, and it's sparking debate online. People do NOT want it to be an arena fighter, people are PRAYING that it's 2D.

While I get the frustration in there being way too many bad anime 3D arena fighters compared to good anime 2D fighters, and I agree there should be more good 2D fighters based on anime licenses, I think the bigger issue is being ignored:

Why are most arena fighters bad? That's the big question, right? Arena fighters aren't good, or at least competitively balanced enough to be taken seriously. Why? Why is it seemingly impossible to make a good competitive arena fighter? There are a few that have made a valiant effort, especially in recent years: My Hero One's Justice, Naruto Ninja Storm, and Demon Slayer chief among them. Those games do have a dedicated, competitive playerbase.

But not a serious one. The FGC doesn't host big money tournaments for those games, as far as I know. By my memory, there's only one arena fighter in history that has managed to get itself taken seriously by the FGC, albeit briefly: Pokken Tournament, which is only half arena fighter, another half of the gameplay is 2D.

Is it simply the format that makes it impossible? A camera too far away from the opponent to see and read their moves, and having to dedicate buttons to jumping/crouching/blocking? Or is it that there have been so many bad arena fighters that the FGC has just written off the entire genre? Or is it the fault of the devs, not putting the time, effort, care, and depth into those games that they need?

Or is it that the genre is stale, and there isn't enough new ideas in the space? Pokken managed to make it big, was that just by riding the coattails of Tekken, or was it the dual-phase format shaking up the genre and adding depth to the gameplay? Or was it the fact it was a dev team unused to arena fighters that made them approach the genre in a new and creative way? If there was a 3D arena fighter made with the ideas and depth of Pokken's arena phase, but lacking the duel phase, could it become successful, or is the duel phase's very existence the only reason Pokken was ever taken seriously at all?

I think it's an interesting conversation. I don't think it's impossible to make a pure arena fighter that the FGC will take seriously, but it needs to be done really, really well.

Edited by PushoverMediaCritic on Jan 6th 2024 at 11:25:49 AM

The reason I’m hoping it’s NOT an arena fighter is simply because of burnout, if it makes sense.

I still like CC 2's main arena fighters for their story modes, really.

Plus, people are creaming their pants over Dragon Ball Sparking Zero, which is basically just a sequel to one of the most beloved Arena fighters in the Budokai Tenkaichi series, so it all depends on the execution

People just think 2d means it'll be like Dragon Ball Fighterz and if it's 3d it'll be like Jump Force.

to be honest, while Eighting's new Hunter X Hunter gamer will hopefully be good, it looks far more low budget then I expected it to be.

tbh i think that's a rather extreme oversimplification

people don't want it to be an Arena Fighter because it usually means that game is DOA.

Kill la Kill's fighting game was announced in an extremely similar way, and when it was announced as an arena fighter and came out the game's scene never took off.

nobody expected it to be bad- ^note and nobody could have expected even Jump Force to be nearly as miserable and broken of an experience as it is its just that arena fighters never, ever succeed outside of casual play.

and i think an interesting point of comparison is DNF Duel. a game announced to much confusion (given that DNF just isn't a cultural presence outside of South Korea) and tepid hype. and then it came out and it was bad. the only thing going for it is that its a kusoge with good graphics (or as leffen called it, a gentrified kusoge).

and despite all of this it still has a scene and saw genuine tournament play!

i think a large difference, of course, is that 2D fighting games have a multiple decades long culture behind them and basically every fighting game has a dedicated community. no matter how bad the game is, people will want to get good at it, and its almost a rite of passage to get good at a niche fighting game where every character has at least one TOD.

and arena fighters just don't have that. and i think there's numerous gameplay reasons why (the camera can never be equal for the players, combos are either systematic or arbitrary, neutral is completely different in a way that's worse for competition, etc etc), but i think the root of it is that people WILL be competitive with 2D fighters no matter what, while people will be casual with arena fighters, and the devs make the games accordingly.

I mean yes. That was an extreme oversimplification. And yes. Everything you said was right.

I just am not willing to put as much detail in a post as you are, as usual. Good analysis.

It is pretty interesting, I remember a lot of people really liking the Kill la Kill game, but I guess it being an arena fighter by default brings instant stigma. Though if I remember correctly, the Gundam Extreme VS series has a decent following in Japan. How balanced are those games? I know they got massive rosters, so there's probably plenty characters more viable than others.

I always figured those games where their own mech-sim niche, not anime arena fighters. While the line can get plenty blurry on that front, they certainly feel different to me.

Probably the emphasis on, y'now, shooting and dodging bullets.

Just going to post stuff about Under Night In-Birth II Sys:Celes here since I don't feel like necrobumping a four-year old thread or whatever.

Its PC version on Steam is getting a rough reception. Signs are pointing towards a Porting Disaster at hand. Ouch.

I've no idea if this tepid reception's the case for other versions of the game on console platforms. I've already got a bunch of other games found on both the Nintendo Switch and Steam where the latter is (in my Steam library). Don't feel like I'd really play non-Smash fighting games on my Switch. Fingers crossed things get better for the PC port.

The lineup for EVO 2024.

Looking at that list of concurrent games... Are we in the best fighting game era ever?

This isn't strictly fighting games, but Capcom is doing a fun survey where you can vote for your Capcom games, games you want to see get remade (including Rival Schools!) and so on: https://captown.capcom.com/en/super_elections.

I said this in the Darkstalkers thread, but I put down as much about Asura's Wrath as I could.

Or at the very least, have him in Capcom Vs at some point. Its still a shame Mv C Infinite Bombed so badly he never got to be in the DLC like he was supposed to (According to Datamines).

Then again, Disney going so syngergetic with the MCU had that happen to itself, so....

Edited by Demongodofchaos2 on Feb 10th 2024 at 2:28:46 PM

To be fair, the next VS game doesn't have to be with Marvel. They could always fall back on SNK, Tatsunoko, Bamco, or hell, they could even take another whack at a Capcom All-Stars game. I'm sure it won't be another Fighting Jam...

I remember in the last few years guys from Capcom and SNK both have been dropping major hints that they're interested in bringing back that series.

My dream Capcom crossover game isn't even a fighting game. I just want Monster Hunter, Resident Evil, Devil May Cry and Dragon's Dogma monsters all in the same action game.

But if we did have a inter-capcom VS game again it would be a great opportunity to have some whacky roster choices. One of my favorites from VS Tatsunoku was from some forgotten Capcom japan-only quiz game. But since her background job in that game was "Earth Defense Force soldier" she was no Phoenix Wright.

Lady Dimitrescu and Asura should be shoe-ins though.

Saki was pretty cool. I kinda wish we got character themes when Tv C came to the west, but I'm shocked it even came here to begin with.

Yeah, Capcom and Tatsunoko had to fight tooth and nail to get all the rights together, and the only character who wouldn't come over to the western version was Hakushon Daimou because the rights were extremely funky (coincidentally, the English Saban dub is technically lost media).

IIRC though, Tatsunoko has obtained all the rights to their anime as of the 55th anniversary a few years back, so doing a sequel to TVC should be pretty easy now.

Edited by Rinsankajugin on Feb 13th 2024 at 6:49:32 AM

We might not have gotten Hakushon, but we got four characters to make up for it.

Now that I'm thinking about it, it's weird how snapbacks are in the game yet only 3 characters can use them: PTX-40, Gold Lightan, and Alex.

Alex is secretly a mech...