Things I've noticed while I play UMK3

[Derek]

-UMK3 is NOT a thinking mans game

What I mean by that: I've recently noticed that while playing UMK3 my mind is totally blank. I find myself just playing no thinking, no strategy, because I already know what to do, rush. I know how to pressure and react to most situations and never find myself in that "what should I do against this guy" train of though. Not even playing people like CD, DC, Shock, Annihilator, Frankie, etc. Believe me I'm no slouch and I can take matches from just about anybody at any time.

While writing this I'm reminded of how I'm exactly the opposite while playing SF3: 3rd Strike. I'm always thinking and I rush when the time calls for it I never repeat myself and am always thinking of what the other person can do to me at any given time.

-Moves rarely trade damage

What I mean by that: Your spear can hit Kabal while in his dash but if he's close enough your spear will hit and you'll still be hit by his spin leaving you open to take a decent amount of damage on the ground. Another example of this is a U. Sub vs. U. Sub match, if you JK at the same time they'll either go through each other(WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT SHIT?) or the person who is higher up in the air will usually win the JK battle but not always. This certainly isn't because it's an older fighting game pretty much every fighting game since SF2 has moves trade hit for hit. Double K.O.s do not happen in UMK3 sometimes there is a tie because both players have an equal amount of health left when the round ended but I have never ever seen a double K.O. in a UMK3 match and rarely see it in MK2.

-There are some really laggy kids in the U.S.A.(XBL)

What I mean by that: God damn I hate lag. I don't understand why I can connect with someone in Portugal in some cased but play someone in the same country as me and have them lag like hell. A good example of this is Yoshi 2085/iTz x Yoshi, I can play him with a minimal amount of delay and he's in the U.K. and then play Darxyd3(I haven't in awhile because he'll drop maybe his lag has stopped now or w/e) and just lag everywhere.

Anything you guys have noticed?

 

[Frankiebonez]

perfectly timed simultaneous moves in UMK3 cancel each other, and neither hit will react. Like if 2 players rush up and both go for a LK starter, the LK animation comes out and no one gets hit. SF3 is different, for someone who knows so much you should know this lol.

Other than that, lag sucks. Thats about it.

 

[Derek]

But SF2 came out before the original MK and moves traded in that. I'm really confused as to why they didn't put that feature in.

 

[Frankiebonez]

because they chose to have them cancel

 

[Derek]

because they chose to have them cancel

That's gay.

 

[Frankiebonez]

then dont play umk anymore bro lol

 

[Shock]

Sorry to burst your bubble Frankie, but that's not how it works.

It's the collision box positioning and pushing, the boxes are all there, but coincidentally out of range. If say, two Sindels, or Jax and Sindel go to knee lift or two Sub-zero's JK eachother at the same time, the collision hit box for the attack begins far enough behind the character high verticle collision to miss. It doesn't actually cancel the collision. At the beginning of the round, P1 or P2 is randomly chosen to have priority on simultaneous contact, and no matter what they will always win double hits.

The first is the regular boxes generated by the game (in this case N64 MKT which although in many cases is slightly off, for this is correct), the second is the outline of the character sprite (which I added in yellow) which the red bar represents the center 1/3 approximate area, usually a little less but right around 30%. The red box represents the character who didn't have priority.

In SF games, double hits are common, because many moves have collisions with longer durations, and the collision boxes in Capcom games are sometimes extremely crazy.

 

[Derek]

It just looks like they're doing it if you ask me :?

 

[Frankiebonez]

Sorry to burst your bubble Frankie, but that's not how it works.

It's the collision box positioning and pushing, the boxes are all there, but coincidentally out of range. If say, two Sindels, or Jax and Sindel go to knee lift or two Sub-zero's JK eachother at the same time, the collision hit box for the attack begins far enough behind the character high verticle collision to miss. It doesn't actually cancel the collision. At the beginning of the round, P1 or P2 is randomly chosen to have priority on simultaneous contact, and no matter what they will always win double hits.

The first is the regular boxes generated by the game (in this case N64 MKT which although in many cases is slightly off, for this is correct), the second is the outline of the character sprite (which I added in yellow) which the red bar represents the center 1/3 approximate area, usually a little less but right around 30%. The red box represents the character who didn't have priority.

In SF games, double hits are common, because many moves have collisions with longer durations, and the collision boxes in Capcom games are sometimes extremely crazy.

Well thats just fuckin retarded then... its determined randomly by the computer at the begining of the fight if one person will get an advantage or not? Where is this documented. I would like to read that.

 

[dreemernj]

I'll document it on the Wiki, lol.

Go into MAME. Set P1 and P2 attack buttons the same. Have opponents stand next to each other and hit the attack buttons. The same person will win every time for an entire round. Next round it'll randomly pick who wins simultaneous hits again.

I think it's a stupid way to do it but there are a lot of really weird aspects of how MK games work. There's no point comparing them to SF because on a very low level, SF is a much more solid game.

I maintained the no double hits in my engine but I made it randomly pick who wins every time there is a collision. I still am not sure if I like that though. It may end up being that there will be double hits because I am not a fan of victory depending on randomness.

And that priority goes for projectiles too. If both characters are on danger and they both fire a projectile and they both get hit at the same time the character selected to have priority will win.

 

[ZAQ]

Is it random? Or does the side that the player is on/speed of attack a factor.

The right and left walls have different rules. Maybe somehow that factors in.

 

[dreemernj]

It is random and it holds true for the entire round.

If you set attack buttons the same and pick 2 different characters there might be times where 1 attack is faster than the other. In that case its just a matter of 1 attack beating out another, not a double hit being awarded to the higher priority character.

But if both players attack so that the collision happens on the same frame, the player with priority wins.

It really comes down to how the game processes collisions. In games like SF, it checks both character's attack boxes for collisions that occur in the current tick, sets flags for when collisions happen, and before it finishes processing the tick it causes all characters to react to collisions that have happened.

In MK, when a collision occurs, it alters the state of your opponent instantly. So, whoever connects first wins instead of a double hit happening because the opponent is switched to getting hit before it even gets around to checking his collision boxes. The instant switch isn't always noticeable by animation alone though because it can take a couple of ticks for the animation to catch up, but the hitboxes and character state have already been affected.

This is along the same lines as glitch canceling in that you can tell the order the game takes for doing things. It checks for special move triggers before it checks for collisions. But state changes due to special move triggers don't happen instantly, a flag is set that tells it to switch states at the end of the current tick. Thats why you can glitch cancel. It detects you are trying to do a freeze for instance, sets the flag to change state to freeze at the end of the tick, then detects the collision and causes your opponent to react to it instantly. So when you glitch cancel in extreme slowmo you can see your opponents location on screen be altered by the punch before the freeze begins since that happens instantly. Their animation doesn't change instantly though because of the lag in animation. Their location on screen and their shadow update before the animation does.

 

[KillerMiller]

This is very interesting, I always wondered why there are no Double KO,s in any MK game.

But it also means that everyone has lost or won some rounds simply because they got the double hit advantage, or because they did not got it.

For me, this is a major flaw in the MK fighting engine, I mean for example, just look at 3rd Strike matches (high level matches too) how often double hits appear (quit often) and specialy on high level, 1 hit (which would be a double hit, can make the difference between lose or win).

Or look at Super Turbo, the matches are full of double hits sometimes.

 

[dreemernj]

If they made it so there could be double hits I don't think you would see it happening a whole lot. Everything about the game is different from the other games you mentioned. To see double hits mean as much in this as they do in those games would require changes to the priority, hitboxes, and animation timing in general.

 

[O Juggernaut 0]

For average to below average players I have a certain strategy which responds to what character I use, which works 99% of the time.

When playing equal skill to above my skill I play totally different. I can't 100% beat them with it but it helps having a certain mind set/ strategy before and during the game, opposed to getting stuck being rushed down and them forcing you to make a mistake.

But there're aren't alot of above average players on XBL except for 85% of the people on here. I basically know all of the "best" players and I know who can, and cannot consistantly beat me.

 

[MKF30]

Ehh, I kind of disagree about the "UMK3 not being a mind game" I think it's opinion personally, me I HAVE to be focused when I'm playing any MK game at high level...

Now to some players I'm sure they can work with having a "blank" mind playing with no worries, therefore they're more focused in their own way and perhaps even players with the "mickey mantle" effect in where you play well somehow when you're drunk..(that I never get with video games because they require fast reflexes most of the time in one way or another) but yes even drunk players some how play better when their under the influence then when they're sober.

The collision box thing is interesting, I don't like playing with them on because it's distracting to me lol