#fgc community

[krakencran]

Where all my Mortal Kombat fans out there. Who actually still gives a shit about this terrible fucking franchise of subpar video games with shitty storylines. Who else glazes the totally awful story line of Scorpion and Noob Saibot?

Who else looks at photos of Baraka and immediately thinks “smash?” /j

Is MK even relevant anymore? Do we still care?

[gear-project]

How often do see Guilty Gear being brought up outside outside the FGC?

Within the FGC is rare enough because of how niche it is, outside the FGC it tends to take the form of memes and random jokes instead of the form it was intended to take.

To be honest, it’s an ongoing struggle just to get “anyone” to take Guilty Gear seriously as a work.

In times past, friends of mine and others have told me “don’t take it that seriously” or “just roll with whatever”... but, let me ask you:

How do YOU want Guilty Gear to be interpreted?

Are you fine with people assuming whatever?

Are you fine with people looking down on a work that has had so much creative efforts poured in to it?

There are some people I know who take the Lore seriously, they genuinely respect any and all aspects of the story, no matter how strange it looks to an outsider, and they understand the deeper philosophical meanings and symbolism brought up in the game.

I’ve met far too many people who use Sol Badguy as an excuse to be crude and foul-mouthed to whomever they meet, as if he was a symbol of anarchy and rebellion...

That’s NOT who Sol Badguy is, which most do not understand, or even care to understand.

It’s not really within my powers alone to change people’s mindsets... nor can I force them to take things more seriously... or rather, respectfully.

I want the FGC and those outside it to stop acting like random hooligans, thugs, gangsters, and miscreants.

I want people to be more mature, more understanding, to clean up their acts and realize “FREEDOM” (as in the FREE on Sol’s belt) requires responsibility, not just an excuse to live however you want.

It’s wishful thinking on my part, I know... but above all else I want people to make an effort to coexist with other people, regardless of differences.

Get the bias out of your heads.  Stop bashing anime, stop using biased phrases like “anime fighting games” or “weeaboo”, understand what animation really is... get educated instead of living in perpetual ignorance...

Stop looking down on beginners in fighting games, stop rage quitting and throwing tantrums via text or over microphone... be more willing teachers instead of trolls or flame baiters.  Teach instead of mock.

There’s so much that needs to change if you ask me... not just in the GG community, but everywhere... but it has to start with a single person being willing to change who they are.

I wouldn’t expect anyone to truly understand Guilty Gear until any of those changes take place.

[gear-project]

The Necessity of Balance

Was talking to [GEAR+HEAD] recently on Steam about why people have this mind-set that they have to always optimize their damage or create Touch-of-Death combos in fighting games.

There’s this “show no mercy” mindset going around in the FGC where players optimize and optimize and optimize to create strategies that basically destroy other players before they even press a single button in a match.

I saw this mindset in Marvel, I saw it in Ultra SF4, in fact I see it in most Capcom games and communities... and now most recently DBFZ (I saw not one but TWO “Touch of Death” combos in the past day from that game, but there’s probably even more ToD combos being discovered).

Part of the reason you DON’T see it in games like Guilty Gear and BlazBlue is because of one simple well-built mechanic: Damage Scaling.

Don’t get me wrong, Danger Time Mortal Counters and Fatals do occasionally happen... But it’s because they rarely happen that the game can operate in a balanced and hyped-up manner, keeping things fun and random.  And while you have monster damage characters like Slayer and Sol who do all the heavy-hitting, they are also hampered by certain other aspects of gameplay and matchups they just can’t get around.

Even if you know all your Gatling routes and know the most optimized damage Beat Combo routes, most of the time that damage is never going to happen because of things like your neutral position (i.e. you’re typically NOT in a Corner), Burst Mechanics, Tension resources, Gravity, Push-out, and other factors that keep you from absolutely locking an opponent down.

But, setting all the mechanics aside... where does that mindset come from?

Why do gamers have to be merciless in fighting games?

If your knee-jerk response to that question is that in a Tournament you play to win: Well, what if you’re not in a tournament?

What if you’re sitting on the couch next to a close friend or relative, shoulder to shoulder with your girlfriend playing fighting games?  Just there to have fun.

Are you going to absolutely murder them too?

Are you going to destroy all hope they have of playing the game with your Touch-of-Death Combo Mindsets and Optimized Logic?

So they can never touch a single button, and the match is so tightly controlled they can’t do anything?

Are you going to discourage any and all interest in fighting games within the person sitting next to you?

Is your opponent even aware you can do this to them?  Have you even warned them of the prospect?  Or even just taught them ways to escape it?

Fighting games often have to mechanically alleviate the horrors of this prospect of unplayability by creating BALANCE.

But can you balance a player’s mindset?

Oh sure, there’s “American Resets” and combos designed to be low damage in order to put your opponent in a tech trap or optimized position for an even more damaging Black Beat combo... but that’s not what I mean by BALANCE.

That’s just circumventing conventional notions of combo rules.

A balanced player’s mindset is this: playing to HAVE FUN.

When you play “to have fun” you’re also self-aware of the experiences your opponent is having.

If your opponent is struggling, you don’t just beat the ever-living daylights out of them, you teach them things, you support them, or you liven things up.

People often ask me why I airdash over people’s heads, or Bandit Revolver over someone’s head, or spam random Fafnirs: it’s wild, it’s reckless, it’s silly... but it also lightens the mood.

When I can be so acutely aware of a match that I can stand “just outside” Kum Haehyun’s “Hand Slap Field” and stand there and taunt my opponent as if to say “I’m not going in there, and you and I BOTH know it!”

When you can do amazing things like FD-cancel float away in to the sky with I-No so your opponent can’t reach you, or you use Slayer’s j.2K all the way down when you’re in the air... or Footloose Journey from an Airdash.

You’re playing, but you’re also taking in the whimsy and humor the game has to offer... the freedom to play however you want.

You aren’t there to simply DESTROY your opponent (even though Guilty Gear has a mechanic for that!).

So, rather than treat all your opponents like a footstool, destroying all prospects of them to enjoy the game, you think about what it means to play fighting games, lest we forget that fighting games are still actually “games”.

Whether it’s Danger Time, ISSEN or Weapon-Locking (in Samurai Shodown), Hellfire, X-Factor, Resonance Blaze, or whatever comeback or randomized mechanic you can think of...  It’s all there to broaden the experience, to create a balance between you and your opponent.

The push and pull forces of EXES (in UNiST), the randomness, the fact no two players are the same, even in Mirror Matches... It’s all something to be RESPECTED.

Respect the Balance, not just in the mechanics, but in other people, and in yourself.

[gear-project]

.       .       .

Currently I am struggling with the overall immaturity of some players in the GG community.

People who just say whatever they want without caring if it hurts people’s feelings or not.  Bashing the characters they don’t like, bashing the story, bashing people who LIKE the story or characters...

It’s like... if you play fighting games just to be a troll to people, and a large percentage of the mainstream FGC players are trolls, how the heck are we supposed to be a “community”?

And don’t give me the tired old excuse “that’s just how we are”... or “you take things too seriously”.

There’s actual RESPECTABLE people in this community, and I’ve met them!

The people who work hard to translate info, the people who work for ARC System Works and with them, the friends I’ve met and played with regularly online and had fun with... The guys who work hard to set up well known tournaments like Frosty Faustings and EVO.

I get a lot of flack for just being who I am too: 

“Just stick with the lore” people say, “no one cares about the story” or “we only care about the gameplay” or “anime games suck”.  The same tiresome people who post endless pictures of Baiken and Elphelt’s cleavage or Jack-O’s hips or Jam’s legs as if that’s the most significant thing to care about!

I’m tired of “working hard” for people who are savage and crude... in fact it’s not even them that I’ve been working hard for (yet they reap the benefits like spoiled kids)... Such people are about the equivalent of the Zako punks you beat up in GG Boost Mode in Isuka as far as I’m concerned.

When do we stop behaving like punks off the street and start acting like civil human beings who are capable of showing respect to others?

Said people would never even listen to me nowadays, they just insult you, laugh at you... so how do you reach such people?  How do you grab that stupidity and rip it out of them?

They only acknowledge you if you beat them in fighting games, and that mentality is really the dumbest of them all... Why? Why are people like this?

Just because you main an S-Tier character that beats mine, you won’t listen to me?  Is that all this boils down to?  Are you really that dense?

What sort of world did you grow up in where violence is the only answer?

How do I save people who want to be ignorant their whole lives?

[gear-project]

Non GG Lore question: few people posit that Bbtag is essentially a send off letter to the 2D sprite era. You think it's true? (if it is, so sad :(

No it’s not, and I’ll tell you why:

Because there’s a bunch of other 2D sprite fighting games out there coming out long after BlazBlue did.

Blade Strangers, Cerebrawl, Vanguard Princess, Slashers: The Power Battle, Phantom Breaker, Skullgirls, Yatagarasu Attack on Cataclysm, Chaos Code, Blade Arcus, Senko no Ronde, and the list goes on and on and on…

That doesn’t even include stuff prior to BB or GG like Melty Blood, Akatsuki Blitzkrieg, Fallen Angels, Waku Waku 7, Power Instinct, Big Bang Beat, Rumble Fish, and others….

If you’re not aware of these games or the developers making them, you SHOULD BE.  These people are just like us, passionate about sprites and fighting and character design, and they want the world to know they exist.

ARC System Works was even smaller than they were starting out, but it’s worth paying attention and getting the word out that people do want to make games that are good quality.

And while SNK and ARCSys and Capcom are probably more famous for it, lest we forget the roots and humble beginnings they all started out with.

Try these games, add ‘em to your wish list, watch a Youtube vid if you gotta.  Follow the developers on Twitter… keep the talent alive.

As an aspiring game developer myself, I wish to support this community of game devs as much as possible!

[alewave17]

Well, this will be my first post about my work, thanks to all my tumblr followers who always supported the edits and wallpapers with beautiful comments. ❤️

Custom Fightstick Art

DBZ Themed

Goku-Vegeta-Trunks

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Este sera mi primer post sobre mi trabajo.

Custom Fightstick Art

Tematica DBZ

Goku-Vegeta-Trunks

[vice-s-assistant]

Two members of the Southern California fighting game community were involved in a traffic accident on Interstate 15 near Baker, CA early Friday morning.Bobby "Lil ...

Some sad news today for FGC.