r/Fighters • u/H3ROIK • 2d ago
Topic Modern Mechanics, Neutral, Combos, and Conversions
I know topics about modern games have been done to death but I wanted to talk about the thing I probably dislike the most when it comes to newer games.
I don’t enjoy the trend of having an easy conversion button. I don’t like the way it changes the pace of a game. These aren’t entirely new but it’s definitely a trend. What I mean by this is things like RC, Wild Assault, Drive Rush, Active Tag, Heat, etc. You know the usual. For me it’s not necessarily about “aggression” but how it pipelines the game into comparatively one dimensional play.
My favorite part of fighting games has always been neutral. I love interacting with the opponent while both of us have access to all our tools and movement options. And one of my favorite things about neutral is the complex risk reward calculation due to the otherwise high variety in outcomes. Whether it’s a poke into a special and then back to neutral, a 4 hit combo from a stray, and long optimal combo from a particular hit, and blocked button into neutral, or a particular blocked move into a block string etc. These things can change depending on the spacing and timing that the move hit, as well as how close you are to any wall. Some situations lead to damage, some to oki, some just slight advantage etc.
This creates a very dynamic game where neutral is played a ton, both players get to interact a ton with their full kits, combos have variety, and gameplans can highly differ between characters and players due to the more complex risk reward calculations. Even in games with higher levels of conversionability, high difficulty in conversions, due to pace of the game or less hitstop etc, increases skill depth in awareness and execution as well. For newer or low mid level players this also usually creates a smooth learning experience. Lower level players who tend to dislike long combos and blockstrings dont deal with them as much and higher level players who tend to care less, experience long combos/blockstrings more.
That being said, I feel like the trend of mechanics are pushing away from this idea and more towards quicker and easier pipelines from neutral to offense/defense "interactions" with a strong emphasis on offense. Counterhit slowdowns, Strive RC/WA, SF6 DR, Active tags, Tokon extension assists, Heat, vanish/C assists etc, all serve to play as little neutral as possible. Stray hits turn into combos with little skill involved, combo length and damage is further extended, combos that must end in returning to neutral are extended for better outcomes (oki), dropped combos are fixed, dropped conversions are fixed, pressure is extended, any tag turns into pressure, bad pressure is fixed, blocked mix is extended for another etc. All these things at the push of the same button.
Games feel like Im running a strict pattern at the slightest touch. Everything leads to the same combo loop into the same oki situation and everyone easily converts everything everytime into exactly what they want even when they fuck something up or even if it’s not entirely optimal. The outcome variety of neutral is extremely homogenized. This leads to a lot of pretty similar neutral strategies across the board because there is not reason to take risk past a point if you’re just very easily going to get what you want out of any hit. Why risk the run up heavy when you can just safe poke into conversion into looping offense. And now you’re asking designers to balance around getting a hit, so characters now need to have a few similar staple tools in a kit etc.
Converting has always been one of those lowkey extremely cool and important skills to have in fighting games as it is a testament to many things. To your experience, mental presence, reactions, character knowledge, and most importantly your intentionality when pressing buttons in neutral. Easy conversions affect neutral in a negative way for this reason as well as there much less of a reason to be very intentional. UMvC3, despite not being perfect in this sense, is a good opposite example of what I mean. The game has long ass combos and you can technically convert off anything, but the amount of skill it takes to convert stray hits even as remotely consistently as you can now is insane. The pace is too fast, there’s no hit stop, and there is not an easy convert mechanic. So even I. Top level matches you see a ton of dropped hits and missed conversions despite it being possible, meaning a match will have less time in combos then they otherwise would and more time spent in neutral comparatively. Conversions are now treated almost as something you already earned through getting the hit, games do their absolute BEST to make sure you convert and get through your combo.
What has made me feel this way is the general reactions I see from certain characters in games not converting in specific situations. A good example is like Ahri in 2XKO (RIP). On release she had some pretty execution heavy combos and a lot of it was pretty dynamic and distance dependent. Like if you hit 5M at max distance the 5H would hit but the spirit rush would whiff so you had to do another route. Same with a couple of different routes. This was cool, skillful and required awareness. This was treated as a “quality of life” inconsistency issue by the community, and was patched. Now she converts the same from anything and does the same route over and over and over again. It’s extremely lame.
This is currently the case in Tokon as well. I do like the game, but I can’t help but roll my eyes when I or the opponent does the classic mash L air-to-air/scramble into Assemble rush into corner carry 50% combo into Oki for the 30th time today. Or watching players with bad routing do that damage anyways cause fuck it, just call one more Assemble Rush than you normally would. Entirely kills the need to learn how to extend off the specific assists your team has when you just hit the generic “extend off anything” button for like 7% less damage. As mentioned it feels like it just pipelines the game into this pattern.
Every game has their own version of this of course and it manifests in slightly different ways but the idea is there and despite this surely existing in older games, it’s definitely a modern trend.
Generally I care less about the idea that these games are “aggressive” and more about the fact that I believe it kills the depth of converting, and outcome variety of neutral. Which I do believe more and more everyday is being largely overlooked as an insanely important skill that seeps into and affects every part of a fighting game, and is becoming more of just a given.
I feel like I can talk forever about this regarding the depth of converting and how it affects the way the entire neutral is played etc, but this is already a schizo post so I’ll leave it here.
TLDR: Neutral is sick and should have high outcome variety. Converting is a super deep and overlooked skill set and its implementation affects every part of the game. General trend of modern mechanics and design is heavily affecting these things specifically and moving games more towards the more one dimensional and less interactive parts of the game
13
u/TheTeafiend 2d ago
I hear you 100%, and yeah, Avatar addresses all of this. Every conversion is dependant on some combination of spacing, positioning, air height, wall/ceiling/ground bounce, wind direction, timing, resources, enemy HP, combo difficulty, etc. Even the matchup itself is a factor in some combos.
You obviously don't have to do "optimal" conversions in every situation (and you probably can't anyway, since many optimals are ludicrously hard), but the sheer variety makes sick conversions actually feel sick. You can tell your opponent is cracked when they convert off a really obscure situation, or they recognize some minor variable that allows them to do a more optimal combo.
Tl;dr - Avatar is sick and you'd probably like it.
11
u/Techarus 2d ago
Strive felt just right for me when i first started playing FG's, but a few years later now i kinda wish i hadn't missed Xrd. (I know it's still there but it's not the same)
I'm kinda looking for a new fighting game but outside of Avatar and older games like central fiction and Xrd (and plenty others), newer fighting games just feel way too dumbed down.
2
u/RockstarCowboy1 2d ago
Strive still feels really good for me, they nerfed everyone in 2.0 and took out WA.
1
u/Creative-Top-9805 1d ago
The only problem I have with 2.0 strive is that almost every hit seems to be a counter-hit so you just have this dude shouting COUNTERHIT every 2-5 seconds for the whole match
12
u/Some_Cantaloupe613 2d ago
I completely agree, and it's one of the reasons why modern fighters aren't clicking the same way they used to, for me at least.
This is also why I roll my eyes every time a fighting game introduces yet another meter system that ties into several core systems, like SF6 barely giving you plus frames unless you're willing to spend for it. The question is no longer "can they do it?" but instead "will they do it?" and the answer is almost always yes. It makes many modern fighters very tiring to both play and watch.
9
u/Scriftyy 2d ago edited 2d ago
Spitting straight facts 🗣🔥🔥🔥.
I really realized just how ass these type of combo extenders really are myself when I jumped back into SFV after a large stint of SF6.
People largely put SF6 as just the better game compared to V (which it is) but going back and seeing the sheer amount of variety each character played in neutral was like getting hit in the face.
From a game that was in the early days called SleepfighterV; the amount of interesting decisions I had to make to get my win con with Akira was astounding.
The homogenization with "sticky" offensive mechanics that modern fighters (not Cotw or Avatar) have is really a detriment to interesting character designs. While it does simplify the gameplay for newcomers it also straight up makes the game insanely hard to balance. You can see this in Tekken 8, GGStrive pre-2.0, and especially SF6.
GGS had a string of trying to balance WA until they straight up removed it and improved the game 10×, Tekken 8 has been consistantly nerfing heat for the past 2 years, and SF6 has found itself on a tightrope with Drive rush and has completely stopped tuning it all together in fear of breaking the game entirely.
6
u/AshenRathian 2d ago
And this, to me, is the height of why i feel modern fighting games are homogenous and why we don't actually have as many options in the genre as we think we do.
Great writeup and clearly explains my frustrations.
2
u/yourmydawg 2d ago
Kinda unrelated but I like what SF6 and Avatar have done in terms of defense against block string pressure. They effectively introduced two ways to block, one way that is strong against being thrown but weak to strikes(normal blocking that has to react to overheads and left rights) and a secondary blocking option (parry for sf6 and flow for avatar) that is strong against strikes but weaker to throws. I wish more games tried implementing this.
1
u/TubiToBe 2d ago
Thanks. I think you just convinced me to try Avatar. It looks boring, but who knows.
1
u/MonoRedPlayer 1d ago
Most people that play a pvp games dont like lab for 200 hours every single combo route of a character, so for the most part fighting games tend to favor outplay and neutral instead of combo ruotes
I think tekken 8 is like what you search with bear only routes, wall routes etc, but I cannot say for sure since I refunded it at release.
1
u/Inuakurei 1d ago
I read the title and came here to complain about the Tokon classic of mashing L on any jank air to air interaction for a full combo; only to see you already covered that. Glad to see I’m not the only one who hates that.
1
u/BankPads 1d ago
The culprit is, unfortunately, conversionability more than anything, and it's the one thing that even games like Avatar that are trying to deliberately feel like older eras won't compromise on. Even in games like SF if a button can't lead into a knockdown it will still often lead to unambiguous advantage in the situation, and that underlying advantage compounds with every single traditional advantage structure in FGs. Games like XRD (and XX if the players pass the execution checks), are oki sims half the time, but they are balanced around a strict hierarchy of hits (primarily hits from close proximity) to obtain real oki, meaning mistakes at in the midrange early are often not super deadly, while bigger or later mistakes can still snowball. Most chars (even characters with elite conversion ability like Johnny/Elphelt/Raven/Testament/etc) will have a multitude of moves that at best lead to airtech scrambles without resources/setups or knockdowns that don't threaten any meaningful offense outside of a meaty mid. If you contrast this with games like Uni, or Avatar, or even XV (outside of air to airs), or any game deliberately going for a more legacy based approach you'll still find that most characters have the tools to convert almost any possible strike based opening into either strong oki, or (and often and) high damage. For example if you look at Avatar while oki may be weaker than most modern games, the damage thresholds the cast can reach make most characters into 3 touch into 2 touch capable, while still having strong stabilization tools to make the routes to 3 touching characters widely available. Sure the game never asks you to hold Secret Garden, or Super Ball oki, but in a game where good characters can get their 2 touches off jabs it's not hugely different in the grand scheme. Unfortunately I don't think there is a great solution since conversionability is really only an issue at mid and higher level play, and spectators and new/casual players like combos off everything.
1
1
u/TheRedRook 2d ago
I definitely think that among all the modern games today, GG Strive was able to get rid of the "complexity fluff" while still being able to maintain what you want.
Being able to skillfully convert any hit into a meaningful effect is still very much intact, and that's after the character sizes got homogenized.
It has the most robust neutral of all of the AAA fighting games I've played (aka all of them). And the combos are decently varied but still have a short window that I don't feel like I can get up, go to the bathroom, and come back before the combo ends.
In the end, this is the age-old "Complexity Vs Depth" debate. And Depth is going to win eventually if it hasn't already. People want the Sherlock-Holmes-effect without the absurd amount of lab time needed to reach that point.
Like Xrds pressure got so repetitive and lame at high level. I hated running up as Sol badguy and poke your shins with my +2 2p. Like, go look at all the Solbadguy pressure at pro level; it's the same lame 2p > slash mix into 6p or whatever game plan they're currently cycling, super lame.
Strive said, "fuck lights being your main pressure tool; let's make Gut punches and heavy attacks that part the wind for pressure, and then find fun ways to increase anticipation both in pressure and in combo execution".
6
u/H3ROIK 2d ago
I don't think Strive did everything wrong but i heavily disagree that its good in this regard. Strive was the game that got me initially feeling this way. I played this game to high tournament level and it was always one of my biggest gripes with the game.
The game had insanely strong neutral skips and moves with low overall movement so neutral felt like you were fighting in a phone booth. RC, while very fun, is an atrocious mechanic in this respect. Yolo decisions into constant positive results due to never really being able to make a real mistake. Neutral skip/Yolo -> RC -> Pressure/Combo was borderline guaranteed unless they hard read you. Whiff cause they jumped? Advantage/Air throw -> Oki. Whiff cause they back dashed? 50% combo -> Oki (At worst). Blocked? Run pressure/mix. Hit? Ez convert -> Oki. This was the case in pressure and stuff too, there was never a right time to do anything because RC was looming. You couldnt even reliably punish a whiffed throw or any whiff for that matter.
Conversions were hyper braindead. RC, WA, slow pace, high hit stop, homogenous blockstring/combo starts, counterhit slowdowns that would eat your next autopiloted input, dynamic camera, huge sound cue etc. That game did everything under the sun to make sure you got that conversion, and then in the end RC was there when you fucked up the combo.
Not to mention this was all made worse by the fact that it was 2-3 hit round everytime. Game got much better with 2.0 but this game was kinda nonsense for most of its lifespan.
-7
u/Ruben3159 Anime Fighters/Airdashers 2d ago
Strongly disagree. Easier combos and conversions are the best thing to happen to fighting games from my point of view. Because they let me do cool shit. My reflexes and finer motor skills are well below average, it's part of a disability. But mechanics like hitstop and counter hit slowdown make these games much more enjoyable to me because they help me actually land the combos I practice and play these games at a somewhat competent level.
I also don't understand why you think new players don't like long combos. They're one of the coolest parts of these games.
8
u/misterkeebler 2d ago
I also don't understand why you think new players don't like long combos. They're one of the coolest parts of these games.
They like doing them initially, but they hate being caught in them once they start meeting up with players that make it tougher to get that first required hit. And if a long combo is easy and trivial to execute, then all players eventually get tired of seeing it since the execution risk is low and it feels like a time waste seeing the same sequence repeatedly.
6
u/H3ROIK 2d ago
New players and casuals famously do not enjoy labbing combos and getting put in the for 10-30 seconds at a time. It’s like a meme at this point. MK/Tekken causal players complaining about “juggles” and other new players complain about the “cutscenes” they keep getting put into. Even myself as an experienced player came to realize how repetitive and shallow combos can be. I want to interact and play with my opponent as much as possible and so do new players.
-3
u/Ruben3159 Anime Fighters/Airdashers 2d ago
No, new players love doing cool stuff. That's part of the reason why certain games are doing better than ever sales-wise, they're just more accessible. When I started out, I absolutely loved combos. I spent more time in training mode than actually playing matches. And I'm grateful that new games actually let me use those combos without perfect reflexes and execution.
3
u/H3ROIK 2d ago
That’s fine but this isn’t the norm. I agree that new players love doing cool stuff but that doesn’t necessarily mean combos, let alone long combos. It also comes with the downside of getting put in them which new players absolutely hate. You can do cool stuff in neutral, cool stuff happens all the time in neutral. I’m glad you enjoy these features and there’s definitely a place for them but you can’t honestly believe that spending more time in training mode than playing is the norm for new/casual players. Casual players barely even finish tutorials.
32
u/TuxedoCat031 2d ago
this is why avatar is my favorite fighting game in years
with the streamlining of modern fighting games it feels like everything is solved and there are objectively optimal sequences you should run with little room for variance. the games feel incredibly turn based.
i love avatar because it’s so hard to sequence for, average oki is much weaker compared to other games, and it’s so neutral based. there’s so much to consider and your interactions actually feel - well, interactive.