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I’m Done, You’re All Scrubs...

Kroaken

Life is a block string with no gaps.
Not sure if any of you have seen this article from a couple of years ago, but it’s really a great article:

https://mrkingfunk.wordpress.com/2015/12/04/player-perspective/

The main topic of the article is certain mindsets of players in fighting games. It focuses on 4 types: The Novice, The Scrub, The Mid Level Player, and The High Level Player. There’s definitely a few more than this, but these 4 cover the spectrum.

I really think myself and others have fallen into the “mid level” category. In fact, I’d say there’s probably only a handful of people at most who fall into the “high level” player category within the context of this article in the NRS community. I want y’all to read the entire article, it’s a very good article in general if you’re a competitive FG player. But I really wanted to highlight the mid level player aspect because I think it applies to most players here and in our scene. Unfortunately, there’s also a lot the “scrubs”, but I’ll stay away from that for now. ;)

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The mid level player



“The mid level player has a better idea of what’s going on. He can see that his st. MK lost to Evil Ryu’s cr. MP. However, the problem here is that he settles for a misleading conclusion as to what this all means. Instead of considering the fact that his footsies might be predictable (the way he walks, the way he interacts with the opponent’s movement & actions, the timing at which he presses buttons, etc.), he immediately assumes that st. MK is not a very good tool in the matchup. After all, it just lost right? Nah. The fact is, any move can almost always have a purpose in a matchup if used at the right time. Sure, st. MK lost here, but what if he pressed it a few frames earlier? He would have most likely stuffed Evil Ryu’s cr. MP. A few frames later? That would have most likely whiff punished it.”

“The mid level player might know all the moves in the game. He may even have good execution and do perfect Ibuki loops for all we know. But he will not understand the game itself to the same extent that a high level player does. He will often make poorly thought out conclusions based on his experiences because he usually does not have an open mind. Fighting games do not always have clear cut “yes” or “no” answers to everything, there are lots of “maybes” and “perhaps”. Not everything is black or white, and the grey zone is in fact massive. The mid level player might also even delude himself into thinking he is already playing at a high level.”

How to evolve from the mid level: the problem you are likely to have is a lack of understanding of the game as a whole (or as we like to call it, “fundamentals”). You have most of the pieces of the puzzle, but you haven’t quite put them together yet, so you are not able yet to see the big picture. Everything in the game plays an important yet complementary role (footsies, space/time control, yomi, meter management). To see the big picture, you have to open your mind, be honest with yourself and start thinking about the game in a deeper way than you have previously done. Always be critical of any situation and always ask yourself questions, and always be willing to test out solutions. And when you test out solutions, don’t immediately discard them if you are not initially successful with them. Try and ask yourself why they didn’t work in this particular case and whether they could still work if used slightly differently. Curiosity is key. The most common aspect of Street Fighter mid level players don’t understand well enough are footsies and it’s usually a key to reaching the higher levels of play. For Street Fighter footsies, every player should watch this video by Juicebox:
While the tone in the video might be confrontational and perhaps a bit rude, it’s quite the honest eye opener for virtually any mid level player. Not only does it show you how footsies work in that game, it shows you the amount of work you have to put in to truly understand them, in each and every matchup.”

Just for a quick comparison to what the “high level player” is thinking in this situation:



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Hope this is informative and helpful for anyone who takes the time to read it. I already knew this stuff but it really helped hearing/seeing it from a different perspective. It made me realize that I HAVE fallen into the mid level player mentality, when I used to have the high level player mentality. It’s just hard with newer games sometimes, at least for me. There’s so much more information and honestly BS in these new games compared to say SF3:3S, UMK3, MKT, etc. So instead of doing what I used to do in these games, I essentially do something very similar as to what he describes in this article that the mid level player does.

But aside from that, he makes some very good points about talent, time management, and becoming good at the game. Work ethic plays a big role in becoming good in any competitive video game, most notably fighting games. There’s a reason why players like Dragon and SonicFox are consistent. It’s not that they are just naturally that much better than everyone else, it’s about what they put their time into and not being lazy about it. Biggest example of this is SonicFox not focusing on Injustice 2 as much and thus not performing as well as he normally does. It’s not nearly based on “talent” as much as people think. You really have to put in the work in order to be successful in tournaments. And it’s much more about the quality of time than the quantity of time. Unfortunately though, quantity definitely plays a factor.

Anyway, what are y’alls thoughts or responses to this?

*And yeah... definitely a click bait title. Really was thinking of a good title, but didn’t think most of you would click on the thread if it was something actually reasonable, lmao.
Very disappointed at the lack of pot-stirring here, Juggs. Much disappoint.
 

Juggs

Lose without excuses
Lead Moderator
I have :) back when it came out on eventhubs! Good read, tho. Recommended :p
It popped up on my timeline and I meant to talk about it on here then, but forgot about it. And it seemed pretty relevant and talking about fighting game mentality and philosophy is my forte.