THTB
Arez | Booya | Riu48 - Rest Easy, Friends
Okay, in the comments of a recent article, there has been some talk of our community "lacking fundamentals". Okay seriously...wtf is this madness???
I'm tired of seeing this community downplay the fuck out of themselves in comparison to other fighters. Yes, FChamp is hype for Injustice, and yes, he may be sticking around for the long term, as what may happen with other top players from other communities. Does this mean they will automatically dominate?
FUCK NO.
I am tired of this notion that our community is so much worse than others. Inexperienced for the most part? Yes. But not worse, by any means. I keep saying this...you guys sell yourselves short as shit.
Let's go over a few things about MK9, shall we?
Let's get things straight, AAing in just about any other 2D game is EASY compared to MK9. In most 2D fighting games, like Street Fighter for example, AAs will generally be around 6-7 frames AT THE MOST, and will have such favorable hitboxes that makes them very difficult to stuff, and there are even AAs with invincibility frames to make a clean AA even more viable. MK9's AAs are 6 frames AT THE FASTEST. There is NO invincibility, not unless you want to count the AA throws or the armored attacks that require meter. On average, a meterless AA attack is around 9-11f. That is fucking slow. And the hitboxes aren't nearly as forgiving in a number of cases, on top of having fairly quick jumps. It's harder all-around, from a technical standpoint, even if air normals are universal. So it already forces out decent reactions from our players to AA.
In compensation for this, MK9 boasts pretty significant AA damage without meter investment. In something like KOF or SFIV, a meterless AA without a trade is usually not going to net you 20-25%. In MK9, we have characters that will tell you GGPO for jumping. And even if they don't completely rape your life bar, there's a chance at least 1/4 of your life will be stripped. Not to mention, there are a number of characters who have air projectiles that lead to combos, so jumping can be seriously risky at times. This presses the need to be able to advance from the ground in a number of cases.
MK9's blocking is super fucked. Just because you let go of block before blockstun is over, doesn't mean you'll be at the proper frame advantage to attack back. You have to learn to react to a number of attacks and let go of block as fast as possible to prevent blocking issues. Which, if you've played Kabal and Cage enough, is something you will have learned to do. Another case of pushing the urgency to react.
Also, MK9's blocking isn't done by holding back. You have to hold a button. This means that proximity blocking is nonexistant, and, combined with the 2D walkspeeds this game possesses, means that whiff punishing is extremely possible compared to other 2D fighters. This pushes another urgency to be good at spacing your shit.
And then there's counterpoking stuff with only like 20f duration and such small visual cues to go by. That's NOT that easy to really do, and we have players that do it on REACTION (yes, they can be done by reads, but you still have to react to the poke). More ups to your guys' reaction times.
So, if you haven't noticed by now, fundamentally, you guys aren't that bad. In fact, this stuff transfers really well to other fighters. Kid you not, after playing MK9 for so long, I went back to SFIV for a little bit. I'm not kidding, AAs never felt so easy in that game. Jumps looked like total slow-motion for me. Yes, execution likely doesn't transfer entirely since this game has fairly easy execution, but some of the stuff you guys learn, such as doing instant air fireballs as low as you guys do, or playing Kabal at all, does help in other fighters somewhat.
"But Dontay, no top players from other fighters play MK9! We really aren't that well off!" Bullshit. This didn't dawn on to me until he said something, but J360 brought up an EXTREMELY good point to me. If you aren't aware, J360 is an OG Marvel player. And I don't mean that he simply was playing for a while...he literally came up with a bunch of tech for the game and was VERY well known for it all, as well as being a good player. He is one hell of an MK9 player, but if his Marvel experience meant that he was automatically better than everyone, why isn't he as dominant??? Why is it that Blackula, a longtime 3D FG player (trust me, 3D FG experience translates pretty well to MK9), isn't dominating? How did I manage to beat Floe at PowerUp 2011? (Granted, this was early on in the game's lifespan, but seriously, at this point, no one knew everything that was going on with the game, and because Floe had experience over me, he should've won, right?) How is it Arturo wasn't dominating everyone when he was playing a lot??? Ryan Hart should've beat Cookie at EVO2011, should he have not?
Fact is, we've had tons of top players from other games come and play MK9. Did they dominate? Of course not! Again, MK community, stop selling yourselves short just because everyone else does. You guys are way better than you all give yourselves credit for. And with Injustice turning out to be quite different, don't be so ready to jump the gun and say "We're doomed." Because we're not.
I'm tired of seeing this community downplay the fuck out of themselves in comparison to other fighters. Yes, FChamp is hype for Injustice, and yes, he may be sticking around for the long term, as what may happen with other top players from other communities. Does this mean they will automatically dominate?
FUCK NO.
I am tired of this notion that our community is so much worse than others. Inexperienced for the most part? Yes. But not worse, by any means. I keep saying this...you guys sell yourselves short as shit.
Let's go over a few things about MK9, shall we?
Let's get things straight, AAing in just about any other 2D game is EASY compared to MK9. In most 2D fighting games, like Street Fighter for example, AAs will generally be around 6-7 frames AT THE MOST, and will have such favorable hitboxes that makes them very difficult to stuff, and there are even AAs with invincibility frames to make a clean AA even more viable. MK9's AAs are 6 frames AT THE FASTEST. There is NO invincibility, not unless you want to count the AA throws or the armored attacks that require meter. On average, a meterless AA attack is around 9-11f. That is fucking slow. And the hitboxes aren't nearly as forgiving in a number of cases, on top of having fairly quick jumps. It's harder all-around, from a technical standpoint, even if air normals are universal. So it already forces out decent reactions from our players to AA.
In compensation for this, MK9 boasts pretty significant AA damage without meter investment. In something like KOF or SFIV, a meterless AA without a trade is usually not going to net you 20-25%. In MK9, we have characters that will tell you GGPO for jumping. And even if they don't completely rape your life bar, there's a chance at least 1/4 of your life will be stripped. Not to mention, there are a number of characters who have air projectiles that lead to combos, so jumping can be seriously risky at times. This presses the need to be able to advance from the ground in a number of cases.
MK9's blocking is super fucked. Just because you let go of block before blockstun is over, doesn't mean you'll be at the proper frame advantage to attack back. You have to learn to react to a number of attacks and let go of block as fast as possible to prevent blocking issues. Which, if you've played Kabal and Cage enough, is something you will have learned to do. Another case of pushing the urgency to react.
Also, MK9's blocking isn't done by holding back. You have to hold a button. This means that proximity blocking is nonexistant, and, combined with the 2D walkspeeds this game possesses, means that whiff punishing is extremely possible compared to other 2D fighters. This pushes another urgency to be good at spacing your shit.
And then there's counterpoking stuff with only like 20f duration and such small visual cues to go by. That's NOT that easy to really do, and we have players that do it on REACTION (yes, they can be done by reads, but you still have to react to the poke). More ups to your guys' reaction times.
So, if you haven't noticed by now, fundamentally, you guys aren't that bad. In fact, this stuff transfers really well to other fighters. Kid you not, after playing MK9 for so long, I went back to SFIV for a little bit. I'm not kidding, AAs never felt so easy in that game. Jumps looked like total slow-motion for me. Yes, execution likely doesn't transfer entirely since this game has fairly easy execution, but some of the stuff you guys learn, such as doing instant air fireballs as low as you guys do, or playing Kabal at all, does help in other fighters somewhat.
"But Dontay, no top players from other fighters play MK9! We really aren't that well off!" Bullshit. This didn't dawn on to me until he said something, but J360 brought up an EXTREMELY good point to me. If you aren't aware, J360 is an OG Marvel player. And I don't mean that he simply was playing for a while...he literally came up with a bunch of tech for the game and was VERY well known for it all, as well as being a good player. He is one hell of an MK9 player, but if his Marvel experience meant that he was automatically better than everyone, why isn't he as dominant??? Why is it that Blackula, a longtime 3D FG player (trust me, 3D FG experience translates pretty well to MK9), isn't dominating? How did I manage to beat Floe at PowerUp 2011? (Granted, this was early on in the game's lifespan, but seriously, at this point, no one knew everything that was going on with the game, and because Floe had experience over me, he should've won, right?) How is it Arturo wasn't dominating everyone when he was playing a lot??? Ryan Hart should've beat Cookie at EVO2011, should he have not?
Fact is, we've had tons of top players from other games come and play MK9. Did they dominate? Of course not! Again, MK community, stop selling yourselves short just because everyone else does. You guys are way better than you all give yourselves credit for. And with Injustice turning out to be quite different, don't be so ready to jump the gun and say "We're doomed." Because we're not.
