For those of you who play non-NRS fighting games...

[Tony at Home]

Yes you can beat a Kabal or Kenshi as Sub Zero, it doesn't change the fact that Kenshi wins the matchup 8-2 or Kabal 7-3ing Sub Zero.

Also it is cute to use Tom of all people as your main example when he is the person most Critical about MK9's balance.

I actually always thought Sub Zero vs Kenshi was 1-9

Might as well be 0-10, because no Sub Zero player is ever going to beat a Keshi player if both players are playing at the highest level and are of equal skill. The numbers just aren't there...

 

[Goldi]

I've always played the Virtua fighter series. And until very recently, what you got on the disc was all that would ever be there.

And we liked it.

 

[Skkra]

Maxintensity25, d3v pretty much nailed it on page 1:

The problem with NRS (as generally agreed upon in other FG circles) is that they patch things too much, too early. This leads to a situation whether the the game isn't given a chance to truly breathe. And when the game does develop, it usually turns out that the patches have either missed stuff that is truly worth looking into, or have ruined the game at high levels.

I originally come from Tekken, but I play everything. In this modern era, especially, NRS's patching methodology is just terrible. As a Bane player, I'm sure I don't need to tell you that it takes, at minimum, months and months to truly flesh out the state of a fighting game. NRS blows their load patching very early on, then walks away for good. If that's how they want to work, then that's fine, but then no one should be surprised when their games have a very short life cycle due to gross imbalance - its 2013, people have options, and so people will just go play a supported, more balanced game.

I'd be much happier with NRS spacing their patching every 6 months, or adopting a Capcom/Namco patching style, where you buy an upgrade to the title. Namco fixed what was a huge top-tier problem in Tekken 5 by releasing Dark Resurrection, and it ended up being an insanely fun game because of it.

Capcom has been releasing SF4 updates roughly once a year, and I couldn't be happier about it. Anyone who complains about the money is ridiculous and kidding themselves - if NRS released UMK9, everyone, myself included, would be lining up to open up your wallet and dump some cash out. Sadly, it's not coming. Meanwhile, for way less than I spent at the bar last night, I can buy the next meticulously tested upgrade/patch for SF4 and get 1000s more hours of fun out of the title.

God do I wish NRS had treated MK9 with Capcom/Namco style. The game is sitting there screaming I could be fucking amazing! but instead it's dying an early death due to the balance. =(

 

[Rathalos]

Maxintensity25,

God do I wish NRS had treated MK9 with Capcom/Namco style. The game is sitting there screaming I could be fucking amazing! but instead it's dying an early death due to the balance. =(

They will probably never go that route, or bother supporting games a year past it's life.

It's just bad business for them, they found what works, and it works great.

They might piss off a very VERY tiny niche market, but the casuals don't mind, and they will keep making sure NRS has a multi million seller every two years.

 

[AK-Israel]

I actually always thought Sub Zero vs Kenshi was 1-9

1-9 Pig's Kenshi, 2-8 Everybody else Kenshi

 

[Skkra]

They will probably never go that route, or bother supporting games a year past it's life.

It's just bad business for them, they found what works, and it works great.

They might piss off a very VERY tiny niche market, but the casuals don't mind, and they will keep making sure NRS has a multi million seller every two years.

Yeah, this is probably right. It's just sad for all of us here who really love MK9 and wanted to see it have competitive longevity.

 

[Eric The Scruffy]

Every other FG community during the Scorpion fiasco looked, pointed, and laughed hysterically at how a company had their backs bent backward because some people got mad at the fact a character had a crossup attack. No other dev would do that. They'd sit there and tell you to get better before complaining.

Even if we were to agree that the scorpion nerfs actually were unnecessary, I'm not sure this is really fair. Look at Marvel 3 sentinel. I remember the first week of that game where he was S+ tier and even Justin freaking Wong thought that character was absurdly stupid. Capcom patched him pretty quickly in spite of how unnecessary it wound up being. You can argue it wasn't as severe as the scorpion nerfs, and I think they definitely learned their lesson afterward, which is why they remained calm during the endless complaints about Dark Wesker....but it's not really something isolated to the NRS community IMO.

 

[Slips]

The way I look at it, is that the first 3-6 months with NRS patching the game frequently is the equivalent to the play testing SF4, Guilty Gear, BlazBlue gets in Japan. The game is pretty much done but there are things in the game that need to either stay or go and the best way to get the answer is to let the players play it and see what happens. That, and to fix any bugs that slipped through the cracks.

There are things in those Japanese playtests that are just as overpowered, underwhelming, whacky and crazy as we see for the first 3 months of our NRS games. Asking them to not patch early on and not fix things like Kabal, Ermac, Kung Lao infintes, Cyrax command grab bomb trap, Superman 70% combos, Aquaman safe trident scoop, Frost trait cancel 50/50's, Black Adam backdash, Zod trait glitch and the list goes on, is like asking Capcom to just release their playtest version and let it 'flesh out'. Broken is broken and over-powered is over-powered. They are what they are. No reason not to fix it. You can't have half the community say patch the game 6 months later and let us play it while the other half of the community is saying if you don't fix xyz then we are all going to quit because the broken stuff makes the game unfun and unplayable.

And yes I know some of it is controversial and make people go crazy like Kano up-ball, Scorpion j1/j3/tele and Deathstroke low gunshots (cue m2dave), but there is 10x more good that come out of these patches than bad.

If you wanna complain that NRS doesn't keep up with their games after the first 6 months or so, that is fine. Everyone would like to see an updated MK9. But saying NRS's problem is they patch too early too often is insane to me. The community held NRS hostage from having their game at Evo until Scorpion was fixed. The community all but boycotted the game again until Superman and Black Adam were fixed in the 'big balance patch'. But they are supposed to not touch anything until after a year? Come on son.

 

[NRF CharlieMurphy]

The way I look at it, is that the first 3-6 months with NRS patching the game frequently is the equivalent to the play testing SF4, Guilty Gear, BlazBlue gets in Japan. The game is pretty much done but there are things in the game that need to either stay or go and the best way to get the answer is to let the players play it and see what happens. That, and to fix any bugs that slipped through the cracks.

There are things in those Japanese playtests that are just as overpowered, underwhelming, whacky and crazy as we see for the first 3 months of our NRS games. Asking them to not patch early on and not fix things like Kabal, Ermac, Kung Lao infintes, Cyrax command grab bomb trap, Superman 70% combos, Aquaman safe trident scoop, Frost trait cancel 50/50's, Black Adam backdash, Zod trait glitch and the list goes on, is like asking Capcom to just release their playtest version and let it 'flesh out'. Broken is broken and over-powered is over-powered. They are what they are. No reason not to fix it. You can't have half the community say patch the game 6 months later and let us play it while the other half of the community is saying if you don't fix xyz then we are all going to quit because the broken stuff makes the game unfun and unplayable.

And yes I know some of it is controversial and make people go crazy like Kano up-ball, Scorpion j1/j3/tele and Deathstroke low gunshots (cue m2dave), but there is 10x more good that come out of these patches than bad.

If you wanna complain that NRS doesn't keep up with their games after the first 6 months or so, that is fine. Everyone would like to see an updated MK9. But saying NRS's problem is they patch too early too often is insane to me. The community held NRS hostage from having their game at Evo until Scorpion was fixed. The community all but boycotted the game again until Superman and Black Adam were fixed in the 'big balance patch'. But they are supposed to not touch anything until after a year? Come on son.

Hold dis knowledge TYM.

 

[THTB]

If you guys think NRS patches too often and too early, play LoL for a half year. The game DRASTICALLY alters every year, and is patched regularly, as new characters are introduced. What NRS does with each game is actually comparable to what Riot does with LoL, excluding keeping the patches going on and on. The only reason it's still not acceptable for an FG to do this is because grassroots clause.

The problem with NRS's patching isn't the frequency, it's that they eventually stop a half year down the road, even if the game is still receiving massive support. You can't do that when things will still pop up.

 

[Rathalos]

There's a gamble in that methodology. Free to play, and updates, like Capcom's method are the future of fighting games. NRS's model is outdated. Their game+dlc+short update window can't compete, long term, with say a Double Helix's model of free to play+dlc+constant update, or a Capcom's model of game+annual, reasonably priced character+balance updates. Essentially, the only thing that NRS offers that isn't offered with free, or other games is a more compelling storymode, but anyone can watch storymode on Youtube without buying the game.

Also, people buy these games to play online, but if you don't retain your online community you will lose new sales to games that have a more robust community: free to play and annual/bi-annual, reasonably priced update games; over time you will lose people to games that last longer, and eventually end up copying one of the more popular models.

And, like I've been saying, as they continue on with the post 1-3 games in MK10,11, you run the risk of alienating certain portions of your base, depending on what choices you make; there's also the issue of the Tekken problem of a roster that's too large. I'm honestly waiting to see what choices they make.

The Capcom style is great and way better then what NRS does, and I wish they would adopt it, but I'm not sure if it is as profitable. Updated versions of games usually don't sell as much, there isn't as a huge incentive for the casual gamer to buy it, they already had their fill from the base game, and consider the Super/Ultimate/Turbo editions to just be cash grabs.

F2P is a very lucrative market on the PC and mobile devices, it's very new to consoles, but if Sony and MS go about it the right way, it will be huge there as well.
I could very much see NRS trying this out, Boon seems to really enjoy DLC, and this is a logical extension of that. But maybe not for awhile anyway.

I also don't think NRS's model is outdated or a gamble, there will always be a market for stand alone AAA 60$ games. Mortal Kombat is the most casual fighting game on the market, people will always buy a new one because of the name alone, they just want to fuck around with it for awhile with their friends and do fatalities.

A nice happy medium would be if the game was a true sequel in name and single player content, but more of an update in terms of roster and gameplay mechanics. But I don't think NRS would even do that, as they like to reinvent their games with each new release.

Because of this I don't think there will ever be a "truly great" NRS fighting game. Just some funs games, and lots of waste potential.

 

[trufenix]

uh, there's no comparison. I hate these threads. Capcom, Namco, and Sega games get financial and playtime support from half (at least the half they care about) of the globe and they have financial / development backing from TONS of concurrently developing titles long before and long after they release their console versions. NRS / Midway would literally fizzle away and die if they took the kind of time that any of them do.

Arcade (predominately asian) players tolerate bullshit much longer than the domestic console market does because they don't have a choice. Ports and console exclusive releases get fixed CONSTANTLY for a couple months and then dropped when the dev gets put on something else. Only (arcade) games that are still raking in dollars long after release (Tekken, SF, Virtua) get the luxury of waiting a year or longer to watch the market and determine if an upgrade is necessary and even then they generally they don't "patch" because they know its not profitable, they release an "update" that they know will be profitable.

I repeat. There is LITERALLY no comparison.

 

[CamChattic]

The Capcom style is great and way better then what NRS does, and I wish they would adopt it, but I'm not sure if it is as profitable. Updated versions of games usually don't sell as much, there isn't as a huge incentive for the casual gamer to buy it, they already had their fill from the base game, and consider the Super/Ultimate/Turbo editions to just be cash grabs.

F2P is a very lucrative market on the PC and mobile devices, it's very new to consoles, but if Sony and MS go about it the right way, it will be huge there as well.
I could very much see NRS trying this out, Boon seems to really enjoy DLC, and this is a logical extension of that. But maybe not for awhile anyway.

I also don't think NRS's model is outdated or a gamble, there will always be a market for stand alone AAA 60$ games. Mortal Kombat is the most casual fighting game on the market, people will always buy a new one because of the name alone, they just want to fuck around with it for awhile with their friends and do fatalities.

A nice happy medium would be if the game was a true sequel in name and single player content, but more of an update in terms of roster and gameplay mechanics. But I don't think NRS would even do that, as they like to reinvent their games with each new release.

Because of this I don't think there will ever be a "truly great" NRS fighting game. Just some funs games, and lots of waste potential.

This hit the nail right on the head these games may be fun to play in tournament but they are not competetive games the development pipeline is clearly not suited to it and in the end their goal is to make games do what they want them to do not make every one be able to win with everyone

 

[HellblazerHawkman]

I'm curious, do y'all really think NRS wouldn't catch heat for doing the Capcom model? Isn't that (partially) why people hate Capcom as much as Activision? Why the fuck would I buy MvC4 (assuming this will happen eventually) when there's gonna be a new version in a few months? Why would I buy Street Fighter 5? The general market already has a hard time getting into fighting games because they aren't for everyone saying you have to spend $100+ to keep updated turns people away. This market ain't as big as CoD, s a company you can't pull in solid revenue for ever like this (worldwide, Japanese gamers probably don't care as much, inb4 racism). NRS comes off as way more consumer friendly then some of the competition, I'd rather keep it that way

 

[xWildx]

People hate on SF a lot for the amount of different versions of the same game they put out, but there's no denying that doing patches in such a way certainly keeps interest up and makes the company money to allow for further updates down the road.

As I said in a different thread, after a while MK began to feel a bit stale, at least for me. Everyone was playing MU's the same, characters were being played the same outside of small instances, and there was nothing happening that anyone hadn't seen before. I believe in this day and age SF-esque updates really help the game stay alive. This method keeps the roster from becoming stagnant and allows for new setups to be discovered that may not have been available in previous versions, forcing players to relearn a MU they thought they had down.

I agree that it's kind of greedy to an extent, but as I said, there's no denying that it keeps the game feeling fresh, even after several years.

 

[Eric The Scruffy]

I'm curious, do y'all really think NRS wouldn't catch heat for doing the Capcom model? Isn't that (partially) why people hate Capcom as much as Activision? Why the fuck would I buy MvC4 (assuming this will happen eventually) when there's gonna be a new version in a few months? Why would I buy Street Fighter 5? The general market already has a hard time getting into fighting games because they aren't for everyone saying you have to spend $100+ to keep updated turns people away. This market ain't as big as CoD, s a company you can't pull in solid revenue for ever like this (worldwide, Japanese gamers probably don't care as much, inb4 racism). NRS comes off as way more consumer friendly then some of the competition, I'd rather keep it that way

People will always hate in the message boards, but to be honest I think the general gaming public feels bemused indifference towards the various versions of Street Fighter IV more than anything else. The hate Capcom gets has a lot more to do with their DLC policy. This is because, LBSH, the majority of players do not understand the subtle intricacies or things like a TAC reset. There's probably a fair number of people in that category who are still playing Vanilla SF4 once in a blue moon.
A lot of people hated on Ultimate Marvel 3 during its release but the overwhelming majority of that hate was due to them adding ancillary features that were supposed to be in the original release like spectator mode as well as wave of characters that were originally planned as DLC for vanilla.
Case in point:

Point is....there is a right way to play this to sell the annual update method that satisfies the hardcore crowd and doesn't rub the masses the wrong way, but Capcom played it dead wrong in this case.

 

[HellblazerHawkman]

People will always hate in the message boards, but to be honest I think the general gaming public feels bemused indifference towards the various versions of Street Fighter IV more than anything else. The hate Capcom gets has a lot more to do with their DLC policy. This is because, LBSH, the majority of players do not understand the subtle intricacies or things like a TAC reset. There's probably a fair number of people in that category who are still playing Vanilla SF4 once in a blue moon.
A lot of people hated on Ultimate Marvel 3 during its release but the overwhelming majority of that hate was due to them adding ancillary features that were supposed to be in the original release like spectator mode as well as wave of characters that were originally planned as DLC for vanilla.
Case in point:

Point is....there is a right way to play this to sell the annual update method that satisfies the hardcore crowd and doesn't rub the masses the wrong way, but Capcom played it dead wrong in this case.

Fair enough. Yeah weren't Jill and Shuma supposed to be in vanilla and promised to owners of the collector's editions or something? I didn't really follow Marvel outside of streams until I picked up Injustice

 

[trufenix]

Jill and Shuma were in MvC3. It's the other 8 characters and 95% of alt costumes that wound up getting shelved. And worse, to be "fair" to people that bought them, the existing dlc wasn't included in ultimate. You only got to use it if you'd already (or later) bought it.

 

[HellblazerHawkman]

Jill and Shuma were in MvC3. It's the other 8 characters and 95% of alt costumes that wound up getting shelved. And worse, to be "fair" to people that bought them, the existing dlc wasn't included in ultimate. You only got to use it if you'd already (or later) bought it.

Word. So it all boils down to DLC shenanigans then

 

[trufenix]

Word. So it all boils down to DLC shenanigans then

Well, the entire situation (tsunami causes capcom to reboot dlc plans into an upgrade that completely invalidates the product) is one gigantic shenanigan (amongst others), but its debateable whether giving Shuma/Jill and the first set of costumes away free with Ultimate is actually ethical.

a) Give them away
+ : Nice gesture to fanbase, more characters, more value for already pretty jagged pill
- : Middle finger to everyone who pre-ordered (the shuma/jill/costume offer was available MONTHS before release) or otherwise dropped 10 bucks on it.

b) Don't
+ : Some exclusive content for people who actually supported vanilla
- : 40 dollar upgrade with a 15 dollar 6 month old add-in that there's no way to get via package or anything.

 

[PANDA]

look at all these Soul Calibur players...
add me on PSN for some games. its been ages since i've played SCV

 

[TH3DISTURBED1]

Since I don't really play non-NRS FGs, all I can say is that the bolded section of your sentence should be led instead of lead. (Bane players...)

But seriously, I don't get why people complain about "all the patching" when for the most part they patched little things. I have never understood why people are so against patching. People who say to "let the game develop" seem to be fine with infinites and glitches, which is are not things that I want to put up with.

I don't know which players you're referring to about fine with infinites and glitches: what I do know is Tom Brady is a HUGE advocate of letting the game develop but having minor patches to patch the infinites and glitches. IMO that is a good way to go about it but companies do not want to wait.

 

[cR WoundCowboy]

I don't know which players you're referring to about fine with infinites and glitches: what I do know is Tom Brady is a HUGE advocate of letting the game develop but having minor patches to patch the infinites and glitches. IMO that is a good way to go about it but companies do not want to wait.

There were many people who said that the Kabal infinite and Cyrax command grab/damage was fine. lol a top Cyrax player STILL says that he needs his damage and in fact should be buffed. Let's also not forget about Smoke and Jax 100% combos. That to me isn't depth, yet alot of people are fine with it.

 

[rurounikenshin]

Mitsu is still highly punishable on 2KBE which is the only thing conditioning you to block low, where Pyrrah can win with literally just BB, 3B, 1K and stab punish any mistakes. I hate Mitsu deeply but consider Pyrrah far more autopilot. He has to take more risks to open you up.

Then dont do 2KB BE, mitsu is a poke god, you are not always supposed to throw 50/50s and if you play with Pyrrha throwing shit out, you will get whiff punished, 1K is punishable, 3B is -16 with pushback, stab is -18 I think, BB is really easy to whiff punish, just space her correctly and block her 66As. Dont get me wrong, she is really good, but mitsu is far more difficult to condition.

 

[Temjiin]

Then dont do 2KB BE, mitsu is a poke god, you are not always supposed to throw 50/50s and if you play with Pyrrha throwing shit out, you will get whiff punished, 1K is punishable, 3B is -16 with pushback, stab is -18 I think, BB is really easy to whiff punish, just space her correctly and block her 66As. Dont get me wrong, she is really good, but mitsu is far more difficult to condition.

I don't play Mitsu but I understand how to fight him. I play the characters that take the huge risks like Voldo and Maxi. I have no complaints about the balance but ignoring Pyrrah in the braindead discussion is simply madness.