Are Fighting Games Harder To Learn Than Everything Else?

[@vodkagobalsky]

This is hilarious. I literally saw a mom and her 5 year old daughter playing 3S at MagWest last weekend and the kid is choking the stick with both hands just moving it in every direction as hard as possible and the mom is mashing the buttons with both hands as hard as she could. They were "playing" the game.... I contemplated politely letting them know that's not how the game is controlled in fear that they would break the stick or the buttons because I had to use that very same machine to run our CVS tournament. Luckily, arcade parts are made to take a beating and nothing broke.

[@SirMaxKnight]

>new james chen video >2h36m >leeeeeets goooooo

[@Goukimane]

Sajam was adamant that fighting games aren't harder to learn than any other game and it felt like his argument was entirely based in just not wanting that to be the perception of the genre. As someone who has played other games and put lots of hours online into games that are played competitively, nothing comes even remotely close to demanding what fighting games demand, both mentally and from an execution perspective. That's what makes them so great.

[@han3wmanwukong125]

Sajam has softbrained takes all the time. I accept the backlash for making that comment, but it's his nature to have takes based on how he feels and then play them off as rational thoughts just because he's thought about them a lot. You are 100% correct. Even if nothing more than pure execution of the most basic actions you can take, street fighter has 6 different normal attacks per character AT MINIMUM, all of which have distinct properties which you MUST apply to play at the baseline.

[@Goukimane]

​@@han3wmanwukong125I agree with him 95% of the time, I also understand how someone who has been playing fighting games at a high level for a long time could see them as more trivial. And also I totally get why he maybe thinks it's important to make fighting games seem more approachable instead of feeding into the elitist mentality you see from some of the crustiest FGC guys who think they are actual Street Fighters, at least in spirit.

[@Nyanzaburou]

I mean, that's just your perspective. I don't think sajam was disingenuous, that's just how he sees it. My perspective is that fast rts games (sc in particular) are a step above all other competitive games in difficulty. Esoteric strategy, no upper limit for speed of play, decisions almost entirely on incomplete information. no right answer to an individual's perception of difficulty.

[@NoName-lk8ij]

@@Nyanzaburou If you count MOBAs (LoL, DOTA) as a part of RTS then I'd agree that that genre is slightly more demanding, but if not I would still give it to fighting games as being harder due to more match-ups you gotta learn for your character.

[@Nyanzaburou]

@@NoName-lk8ij yeah i consider both dota and lol to be similarly difficult partly because they have 100+ chars. Matchups are much more impactful on your gameplay in sc games even if there are only 3 so its not necessarily easier imo

[@luxerhusku2609]

11:01 holy shit, that's me! I have been playing fighting games for a long time and thats what I always do in Training mode. Practicing combos and then try to do the same combo online because they all start with a jump in attack. This guy really understands me and I just started this video! :O

[@-J.P.-]

I think this debate could be a fun EVO panel. Get James, Sajam and a couple other people on both sides of the argument, and just argue live. It'd also be interesting to hear the take of people who are just getting into fighting games, but have played other competitive genres before at a high level, like some of the people the Sajam Slam brought in.

[@problemsnearyou8899]

Cause you mentioned it, I wouldn’t be where I am without your first attack series Chen ! Extremely thankful ! I’d tell any new player taking fighting games seriously to watch your series

[@Pretzels722]

Unintuitive things: -Animations not matching the high/low/overhead properties - Tekken solved this with the colour system, but there are countless examples of this. -Plus/minus on block. A real life fight doesn't have turntaking so clear cut. -Command grabs. Jumping up and away makes your character literally phase through your opponents grasp which makes no sense. You also can't tell visually if something is a normal grab or a command grab. -Punishable moves on block. -Some OD specials / supers having startup invulnerability, and some not. In most games you have to read a guide outside the game to find out, or lab it. -Buffering moves. The tutorials dont cover this and it doesn't make intuitive sense to start up a move before the previous one is finished. -Charge inputs not showing you when something is charged. Games also don't tell you that you can hold down+back and still charge - the tutorial on the screen shows an arrow that is just "back". -Not being able to block midair (some games allow this but others don't). -Invisible extended hurtboxes for various moves such as fireball recovery. -Delay teching and option selects in general. -Whiff punishing for big damage does not make intuitive sense. In a real fight, if someone were to throw a whiffed punch from far away, the most I could do would be to knock their hand away.

[@ThirtyfourEC]

Good point with fighting games going against instincts. It's a whole new set of rules to follow. Maybe it's just fighting as a whole that's hard to understand since not many know how to truly fight including myself. Mike Tyson's quote " Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the mouth" holds true to how most interact with the training mode. I wish SF6 had Guilty Gear's player made combo trials but for scenarios as well. Every character could come with key training mode drills like how to punish a DP with X resources, punishing sweeps, and niche situations to most players like a parried blanka ball.

[@brightmamba889]

Maybe season 3

[@baldbishop1667]

What i learned about fighting games is that there is a Meta by levels, SF6 is my first SF that i took seriously and i started at rookie, what i learned is that i saw my enemy as a virus, if i am week against jump and he is only good at jumping i will get fucked up. Now, if i develop to the point his strength no longer affects me, he is neutralize. So i go foward, but foward are other people with other gameplan that can mess me up an so on, on each level there is a meta, you need to be good at that meta in order to succeed, but noticing what are you are lacking sometimes is hard and even if you know the right answer cant pull it off.

[@MisterTwit]

I don't know everything about every genre that exists so I could be wrong, but I'm pretty confident that fighting games are the only genre of competitive gaming where the frames actually matter. To my knowledge the only other kind of competitive gaming where they matter is speedrunning, and even then that's not a constant concern, just a matter of optimization in key moments. But in fighting games they matter in pretty much every moment you're playing, and that's _on top of_ everything else that fighting games demand.

[@han3wmanwukong125]

We are now in the renaissance period of fighting games and I recall STRONGLY the arcade "wild west" period between the mid 90's to early 2000's and 100% just before it died. James is 100% right it was a different time where we are all just trying to figure out the nature of things. No youtube, Game FAQ's was limited, video tech wasnt readily available.... and if you played against someone you talked with them.

[@SaintKines]

I grew up in the 90s and 00s and we learned most of it from playing at the arcade and different guys would figure different things out and we'd learn it through them. Also playing at home like you said and magazines could be really helpful. Some games would have an official "Strategy Guide" you could buy that would have most of the information you wanted but not all.

[@MisterTwit]

There was internet back then if you knew where to go, but it was just local dialup BBS or newsgroups like alt.games.sf2

[@schwaaard]

As someone who is (once again) trying to 'get gud' at fighting games (specifically games like MvC2), there is simply a higher saturation of execution skills and knowledge than any other genre. To play a typical racing game, you have a button for acceleration, a button for braking, an emergency brake (or button to drift or do a 'special' thing), and a method of steering. There are general principles of racing in terms of how to take a corner and when to start braking, and you have a bit of RNG to deal with when it comes to the other racers. ...And that's it. You can memorize the tracks easily enough simply with repetition, and it's relatively simple to learn when to start braking on certain turns and what lines to take. --Now, let's apply fighting game requirements to it. First, you can do basic steering simply enough, but you have to push a combination of buttons at just the right time to accelerate and brake. You don't simply have to know when to hit the brake button--you have to be able to execute a brake when you want/need to. ...Which, again, is not intuitive, and requires not only memorization but muscle memory to do effectively. And that's just to brake. Now you need to do that to accelerate, use the emergency brake, drift, hop, twist, lean, and a myriad of other techniques. Do you HAVE to do all of them? No, but your opponent is, so you have to memorize the sequence for each of those as well, know when to execute them, and be able to do it in a split second, otherwise you don't stand a chance. And while your main 'opponent' in a racing game or a platformer is the track or level--elements that are more/less fixed with a minimal amount of relevant RNG--your opponent in a fighting game is pure RNG. If you play a fighting game a lot--and I mean A LOT--you start to learn what each character is capable of and get a general sense of what you can expect to deal with. But it is still completely random as to when and in what combination, and as soon as you factor in a human opponent, a lot of that goes out the window. (For very high level players who know every character inside and out, they can narrow down the scope of viable moves in a given situation, but that requires a great deal of time and concerted effort to learn every character at that depth.) Essentially, the barrier of entry is already incredibly high just to be able to do what you want to do when you want to do it. In Mario, I know one button jumps, one button runs...and that's about all I need to know. I can beat the fixed levels/enemies with just those two things if I want. The skill comes down to timing, reactions, and pattern familiarity. You don't have to learn how to jump--it's a button press. If it was a fighting game, the stages would change every time you go through them, the enemies would behave randomly, and you'd have to do 'Down, Down Forward, Forward + A' just to jump. AND, you have to jump at a certain angle and make contact at the right part of the enemy, or the enemy somehow hits you first. Once you've spent hours memorizing all your character's moves, and manage to get the timing and execution down in isolation, now you need to do it against a moving target that's doing the same thing to you. Which is a whole different ballgame. You need to learn what moves counter other moves, at what time certain attacks will work and when your opponent's moves will have priority--and be able to react in a split second to adjust to what is being done. --That's not even counting advanced techniques like advancing guard and any number of other 'special' offensive and defensive techniques that require even more precise timing and button sequences. ...And this is all before spacing technique, combos, character nuances, glitch exploitations, match-up adaptation, and overall fighting technique/style can be addressed. All things which your opponent is able to do to various degrees, based on innate skill and time spent in the game. Granted, not all fighting games have that many elements, but even vanilla SF2 requires a lot of that. Different blocks for different attacks, throws beat block, cross-ups require blocking adjustments (most of that isn't the case for games like MC with a button block instead of directional, but there's still a lot to learn), arial attacks trump normal attacks but not anti-airs, overheads need to be addressed differently...and there's those special moves that can make or break a match that require memorization and timing to execute at will, never mind effectively. The reason you see folks just mashing buttons is simple: they are used to buttons doing specific things and producing the result you want. In a fighting game, you can't just pick it up and do what you want. Just trying to walk up to your opponent and hit him with a punch can be a challenge. Maybe he hits you first, and you don't know why. Maybe he blocks and punches you instead, and you're trying to figure out why you can't do the same thing to him. Unable to sort out the ridiculous amount of nuance and unspoken rules about priority, hit boxes, etc.., you just try to spam special attacks. But you aren't executing them correctly, and when you do, your timing isn't right so they don't work. The few times you manage to get everything right, you're no longer doing it when you want, so your opponent easily evades and capitalizes. Do that for 30 minutes and you're done with the game. Punch Out is a game that requires some time to get good at, but you only need to know how to push a total of three buttons and use the d-pad to block, duck and dodge--all of which is relatively intuitive and can be learned and executed at will in about five minutes. You quickly start to see patterns, and just need to react to them appropriately. Same patterns each time. Simply knowing how to punch and dodge isn't enough, of course--you have to execute at the right time. But you don't have to 'get gud' at punching first. You just push one button. It does what you want it to do when you want to do it, and you quickly learn when it's safe to do it and when its not. A gamer can have full comprehension of what he can do and how to do it less than five minutes. He can have a general understanding of what his opponent can do within two minutes of going toe to toe. After that, it's refinement and reaction. You don't get to that point in a fighting game for hours upon hours or even days. The frustration doesn't come from a lack of mastery, but from simply not being able to do what you want to do when you want to do it, and not knowing all the small nuances that determine whether your attack is effective, countered, blocked, or even ignored. Learning what you can do is an extensive process in and of itself, but then you need to learn how to apply that to a largely unpredictable and dynamic opponent who, more often than not, seems to be able to shut you out of the game completely and render your fledgling knowledge impotent.

[@sawyersimpkins9428]

just wanted to say the piano at the end is nice and I wouldn't mind it being longer

[@killerb255]

The hardest thing for people to learn is how to unlearn. People often get stubborn and set in their ways.

[@RainStorm148]

i remember the first time i tried playing a 2 on 2 fighting game. my tendency to panic when a rushdown character is approaching me caused serious teamwork issues. and when i tried to play neutral more i end up letting the enemy team 2v1 my partner so it was very frustrating to me. sometimes i am forced to jump in to save my partner despite being low on health, just to make sure the enemy team doesnt get away without trading. fighting against my own instincts is not a good experience but it does feel rewarding when the "WIN" pops up

[@gaelfranco8411]

Ive played First person shooters, and third person shooters to a high level (not profesional or anything), and i can easily say that fighting games are WAYYY harder to learn. Just like James said, because nothing makes sense at the begining. And even after a couple of years of me actually trying to get better (which i feel i did) at fg, theres still so much stuff to learn. It seems like i have to dedicate my life to a single game to even be decent at it.

[@roncrudup2110]

All competitive games are hard. But I do think that fighting games have a higher floor. For example, my 10 year old daughter plays soccer and basketball. She picked up soccer much easier because the floor is lower. Most kids can grasp the concept of running and kicking vs running and dribbling a basketball. This doesn't mean that soccer is easy as it is very difficult to play at a very high level. There is a reason why modern fighting games are using simple controls. The goal is to lower the floor for accessibility while keeping the ceiling high as possible. I was playing SF6 here and there over the first year. Recently things started to click and I am playing the game way more.

[@CyberDragoon656]

For how many people try to explain that fgs aren't harder than any other genre, how come it always ends up being boiled to in terms of just normal reasons why people quit. "I dont understand what is going on.", "my mental state is bad when playing fgs" (and keep in mind for some its only fgs it seems.) Or "Maybe fgs arent for me due to plateauing and never improving in x amount of hours." Etc? Along with a small part of alot of people parroting what CC say without 0 understanding as to why certain phrases keep being repeated over and over when their base line answers do not work and then they say "FiGhtiNg GaMes MaY nOt be fOr y0u" when they end up not being good at teaching new players. And just to put things into a personal perspective not only have most of the usual phrases have had an effect on me as someone who has played fgs on and off alot (mostly single player due to a shitty isp and just being generally discouraged to play online.) And multiple other genres and can see that most do not either want or have the ability to play and learn fgs like how the fgc wants. (Yes, locals exist, but they aren't 100% accessable to everyone, even discord groups.) In fact, when my friends and I went to either a local arcade/a sf6 release event (this one i asked a friend to help me due to not having a license at the time) and no one got the bug to play them. One outright said he refuses to learn fgs, one only will play platform fighters (I.E smash and rivals etc.) and one said he can not remember combo strings along with irl stress, i bring that up due to the same causing me to be demotivated alot to play them. Whenever I hear anyone talk about multiplayer games, it is every genre or most well known comparisons to fgs but never any fgs. So, while some might think fgs aren't harder given how unless i specifically find people who play them, how the beginner plight seems to be mostly ignored and how many pretend to play teacher without understanding/not remembering how hard it is as a beginner, i have to disagree on how people try to downplay how hard fgs are in comparison to other genres (also just cause I have seen it on reddit a lot i have to add, no, limiting yourself to modern controls will not help you in the long run.)

[@ForestTekkenVideos]

Possible topic of discussion for a future Tuesday show: block strings with lights. I saw kzbin.info/www/bejne/qajMZXp9ZsybgpYsi=EMGVC5sRNPQBeNOu video, and it seems like there is a big disparity for some characters when it comes to the frames and spacing after their jab strings get blocked. The characters with big negative frames aren't as good.

[@Mage_Nichlas_]

You have to try to get a bit better and actively notice your little victories. I've been Platinum with Guile for many months and play different characters with my friend. I got SF6 on preorder and I've played SF2, Alpha 2, and SF4 on 3DS fairly casually and mostly against the CPU for maybe 10 years. *ONLY NOW* in the last like month have I even attempted to hit Medium Kick at all aside from Dee Jay's Medium Sweep, Sobat, and Up Kicks. Even though I don't really like it for Guile since his isn't cancelable, not having Sweep to poke with is great. Especially with Akuma(or any shoto I guess) I've learned to actually buffer Crouching Medium Kick into Fireball and it's sick. Plus, being able to Crouch Medium Kick into Drive Impact on reaction instead of "I wanna Sweep!" into getting Punish Counter DI'd is such a strong tool and powerful pivot if you've conditioned your opponent to read where you would usually stupidly Sweep.

[@UltraChenTV]

That’s so cool! Good for you! You’ll actually learn the medium buttons are almost universally the best buttons in the game. Obviously not with Guile, but crMK into Drive Rush is kind of the meta in SF6 right now. But Guile can also get Punish Counter with crMK and LINK it into a Heavy Flash kick. Same with Drive Rush crMK. If it hits, you can Heavy Flash Kick link off of it. That’ll make you feel even more sick! ^_^

[@brightmamba889]

I think the majority of the problem is having to remember combos. If you're bad at fighting games, you are on defense the majority of the time. People for the most part hate defense because your not in a position to score.

[@brightmamba889]

2:22:35 Maybe they can give an incentive for landing a certain amount of Anti Airs and whiff punishes.

[@HJayZ91]

I agree with some things James said, but also a lot that I don’t agree with. I feel like it comes from the fact that he has such a deep understanding of how fighting games work but a lack of understanding of how improving and climbing to the high level works in other genres

[@SomniaCE]

I don't think the conversation should be framed around high level, it should be feamed around hitting that intermediate level or even just becoming a casual that can do a few combos/execute a basic gameplan

[@depictiongames9758]

The big issue for me is I’m a new dad so I’m lucky if I get 1-2 hours a few times a week. Fighting games require hours and hours and hours just labbing before the real game actually starts

[@rabbyd542]

It's hard to build the fundamental knowledge. Then after you learn that you need to learn a lot of specific information.

[@craigfletcher-zn8kl]

Your on fire in this one 🤣🤣🔥🔥

[@SomniaCE]

I think the reason Tekken and Soul Calibur were so much bigger with casuals is because the 3rd dimension of movement made the games way more intuitive and the characters themselves have tons of moves doable by just pressing a button + a direction. The fact that they also typically had more single player content than 2D counterparts for 20 years or more also helped...

[@UltraChenTV]

One of the BIG things people don’t think about are the fact that most of Tekken moves ALSO move you forward and backwards and such. So mashing actually makes your character be aggressive. In standard 2D fighters, mashing makes you go nowhere for the most part outside of a few specific moves. And for that reason, it’s far less effective. Having Strings that work on whiff that move you forward is a BIG deal for newcomers.

[@SomniaCE]

@@UltraChenTV Very true!

[@moffspinkin]

Fighting games may not be harder than other genres, I agree on unintuitivness but other important thing that discourges people is that they can be just so infuriating.. like getting lockdown as you said, or trying to chase down Jade in MK11 without teleport (other equally irritating genre are souls likes). But I dont agree that there is no small wins in fighting games - when you block something that you just drill yesterday - it feels great! For many people that can be landing that one combo even if they loose .

[@moffspinkin]

what makes fighting games even more irritating is usually very poor feedback on what just happen in the game (if you want to know what happened you have to quit match and go find your replay or lab situation)

[@thec0r379]

I don't think group gaming is going to work for fighting games and for just one reason: people want to play lol. That's the biggest difference with team games in my opinion. You are constantly getting your turn to play. I personally enjoyed the matchmaking lobbies of Super Street Fighter II Turbo: HD Remix. It was nice that we got to chat while waiting to take our turn and it was very civil no one was salty when taking a loss it was more of a king of the hill mentality in there and less of "how do we take the king down?" lol It's nice that 2XKO has the tag team element where your team mate can still support you and the whole losing together thing means you have a support system. I really do think they have to continue working on that campaign mode like Street Fighter 6 to help teach mind set. I just don't think you can make fighting games more intuitive because they by their very nature do not seem to be lol. There are just way to many moving parts that make a fighting game what it is. I think that is what made Smash such a popular game because it just broke off from the traditional mechanics and did its own thing while still keeping some elements intact.

[@UltraChenTV]

That’s why I want it to give free points for just watching. But for sure you’re right. But the brilliant thing is that those who don’t want to watch don’t have to use the feature. It won’t hinder you not using it. But for those who want to, there’s even a small side benefit for them. But it will definitely be the less popular way to play.

[@brewslidepark]

Team games just are inherently more popular than 1v1, it's not any easier to learn or w.e. id argue a training mode is still a huge boost over team games, cause you can set up absolutely any situation to figure out how to counter it. You can't set up team formations, positioning, cool downs etc in a solo training session of a team game. I think the main things are skill translation, aiming and map awareness. How to play around and in relation to a team. 1v1 fighting games are only applicable in other fighting games so it works for your favor if ur already into them but against u if ur not cuz there's no real high accessability option for casuals. There's obviously low skill fighting games but none of them are popular right. I love fighting games but cause I learned and felt the hype from offline events, or having someone talk and teach me w.e hands on. Being able to witness what's cool and then learn why, or playing grand finals at your local w everyone watching. But that's not exactly what every new player of a multi-player game is going to do. I agree with your takes James chen, I Moreso am speaking of comments or overall discussion around it. Lastly if you're still reading this, I just wanna say smash is hype. So many smash ultimate matches go down to last hit and they're incredibly enjoyable to watch. The rivalries or must see matches are more pronounced than in other fighters too. It's a shame most the Capcom cup is so un hype to watch, while also feeling harder to access than something like an average yearly smash tourney. I'll watch any tournament if tokido, diago are there but it's so rare nowadays and I get that it is what it is but doesn't change that I rarely watch an sf match if I don't kno the players

[@brewslidepark]

Also talking about shit at the highest level, it doesn't matter what it is it's incredibly difficult in any activity. At the highest level fighters are different skills than shooters it's simple, there's no comparing the 2. It's like saying Joe shmo pro golfer can't play basketball like what criteria exists where that matters. I'd say fighters should be more appealing cause of the ability to earn money or success is completely on you, if you think you're that good then it's in theory easier to make happen than if you're good in a shooter it's like find a team, practice, everyone has to play well when it matters. Playing against j wong is like, if I played tenz in valorant I'd never get a kill I'd be happy just getting to play against him. At least I can learn from how jwong plays or what he hits me with etc. But again I like fighting games so I'm not the correct person to go to for this opinion cuz I already get it, the problem is from ppl that don't get it, what makes them get it

[@markmessi9020]

Yes, yes they absolutely are. A year later into my fighting game journey and I'm dropping combos like crazy and my 4 million year old veteran friend says SF6 has easy execution. WHAT?!? 😂

[@mr.420themasterblazer9]

The answer is yes, but everything is just one big combo now or 2x

[@velorama-x]

non-arcade racing games are also hard to learn and they are not intuitive. you might think that, because almost everyone knows how to drive a car, but (racing) car physics at racing pace are a completely different beast compared to how a road car trimmed for safe handling behaves. i think the main difference here is that racing games involve a lot more practice and it's very easy to gauge if you've improved or not because you can just look at the time.

[@problemsnearyou8899]

For people who drive fast & don’t have an extensively rich understanding of car physics can figure out a driving sim like Gran Turismo . It’s due to the fact that driving has become intuitive for humans . FGC games don’t exactly translate to real life fighting like MMA or boxing cause of the supernatural aspect to fighting games (Hadoken/Shoryuken/Tatsu even as examples)

[@UltraChenTV]

The interesting part about that is that the unintuitiveness of a simulation racing game actually matches real life. My friend knows how to drive fast in real life and has no problem with racing sims. Thanks to him I’ve also been able to try and drive cars on a race track and it’s equally as unintuitive. Hahaha. But also, the default things are still there. Accelerating and braking and turning still do what yo expect and it’s about learning when is right and when is wrong to do those things. But they are still the core of what you do even as you learn more. In Fighting Games, the natural way of learning is hitting buttons everywhere. And Jumping a lot. And spamming that one move that’s really strong that is actually really weak and will get you killed even at mid levels.

[@subasafreak]

you gave a point Chen but, the real reason people quit is because the real rules of engagement in fighting games are hidden from new players and casuals, no attract screen teach you those no tutorial teaches you, fighting games are not hard to learn, it's just that the real rules to play them are being gatekept from newcomers by the FGC and game developers. simple as you said, you cant expect people to learn a 30 years old hidden rule that is not stated anywhere until a salty player that lost to the same guy as you tells you "pressing button does not work". fighting games are not hard it's just that they are being played within a gated community, FGC players are like soccer moms only they understand the game and they ok with the situation, they better understand that money comes from the audience and gate keeping them is counter-productive.

[@darkmensag]

Gran Blue versus ain't ftp it has a few demo characters I own the first game and i played the new game betas etc, but if the characters I want to play aren't accessible for me to use I won't play it. Thats a different beast than "yeah play the whole game for free but pay me cosmetics"

[@UltraChenTV]

Right, but isn’t League still like that? Only some characters are free at any given time? Or did they change that? It was like that when I was playing.

[@darkmensag]

@@UltraChenTV all champions can be bought with in-game currency/crafting materials earned by playing. you can at least try a few and eventually get the ones you want! how many is beyond my understanding xD

[@watchmesquatch]

Definitely the hardest. Most games have a natural learning curve, like for FPS it's just point and shoot, rinse and repeat, and you will naturally get better, good even. Fighting games do not have a natural learning curve, you have to learn frame data of your chatacter and your opponents characters if you want to be "good." There is nothing natural about frame data and having to memorize it for punishing or frame traps. Its all anti intuitive for most. Spacing also isn't intuitive for anyone who hasn't taken a karate class or something like that.

[@KingOfStreetFighters]

Mango doesn't know frame data and he's one of the gods of melee.

[@Noko744]

Thank you. Its been absolutely insane watching people pretend FG's are not more intimidating and less intuitive to learn. Its literally everyones shared experience. Why is it only this genre that has this perception? Maybe because its true? Lmao.

[@jakeperalez4470]

combos are soooo easy for james chen but not pressing DI lmao

[@UltraChenTV]

Execution is easy. Reactions are not. LOL!

[@TheGaara802]

Fighting games are easily the hardest, you can play for hours and still be absolute garbage. Only other game that is just as hard as fighting games is rocket league. All other games you can become decent within a much shorter amount of time. I've been playing fighting games on and off for 20+ years and I still didn't understand when the fgc be using the crazy ass terms and notations.

[@Sergio-wc1wn]

I very much disagree, other games aren’t easier to get decent in they are just better at making you feel like you are decent at them earlier

[@chupasaurus]

That's not even an argument, as it very much depends on how are you spending those hours. Also Rocket League has a FG mode that is 1v1.

[@UltraChenTV]

Yeah. That’s a really big factor. Again, all games are equally hard to learn. That’s not a question. But Fighting games are the least intuitive. At the start, there’s nothing your brain tells you to do that actually works.

[@KingOfStreetFighters]

Hey James, love the podcast and can understand what you're getting at, but I find several flaws with your arguments and some statements you make. 1. I don't understand where you get this notion that MOBA bots are useful to learn against. They have been complete garbage in all of the 10+ MOBAs that I have played. They are the equivalent to a level 2 fighting game CPU. In fact, with ghost AIs in fighting games, fighting games have a much closer experience to playing against a real opponent than any MOBA AI I've tried. If by "good bots," you mean that you're left alone to explore and learn the map with some minimal pressure imposed upon you by the bots, then sure, I guess. But that's like playing through arcade mode on easy difficulty where you get to practice landing your jump combos and every once in a while, the CPU anti-airs you. You only learn a very small subset of the game, but not enough to put you past the beginner levels. (Can't really comment on RTS or FPS bots myself, so maybe your argument holds for those genres). 2. I don't understand your argument about genre intuition. You legitimize the intuitiveness of right-clicking and running away in a MOBA, which are the level 1 fundamental actions of the game. But then compare it to the unintuitiveness of fighting game footsie RPS, which is really a level 2 strategic component more for intermediate players than beginners. They are not on the same level. I agree with another commenter @Jazzyluvsyou100 that it seems you're looking at other genres you don't know with a different standard than you do with fighting games that you fully understand. A more proper comparison to right-clicking and running away are -- walking, blocking, attacking, throwing -- the level 1 fundamental actions. These things ARE intuitive -- you press right on your controls to walk right, you tap up-right to jump to the right, you press a punch button to punch your opponent. If your opponent attacks you, you move out of the way or you block. if your punch hits the opponent, they take damage. These are the "right-clicks" of fighting games. @Jazzyluvsyou100 shared some great examples of the level 2's of MOBAs and they are just as, if not more, unintuitive than the fighting game RPS. Secondly, when you say that running away doesn't work in a fighting game or that you can get killed immediately at round start... yes, those are true *IF* you're fighting someone significantly better than you. That happens in ANY genre. If you're playing a MOBA as a beginner against someone with 5000+ MMR, you would also not "get to play." You would be significantly outfarmed, bullied in lane, ganked, etc. A MOBA combat engagement can literally end in 1 second -- you would be killed before you even process what happened. 3. It's a contradiction that fighting games are seen both as "button mashers" (implying it takes no skill), but also as an intimidating genre to get into because of huge skill/execution barriers. I don't know if these are different groups of people holding these perceptions, or if the same people somehow believe in both simultaneously. it's interesting to think about.

[@KingOfStreetFighters]

By the way, just wanted to clarify that I agree with you that fighting games have a retention problem compared to other games. And I agree with many of the things you mentioned as potential causes -- teams, coaching, tutorials, progress, extrinsic rewards, fun, etc. I just don't fully subscribe to the "lack of intuitiveness" theory.

[@UltraChenTV]

1. For the bots, yeah, they really do allow you to get a feel for the game because much of the time you aren’t fighting them, especially early on. It allows you to learn the flow, learn how to fight minions, understand how Towers affect your goals, etc. There’s a lot of time where you are doing your own thing early on, and bots facilitate that. There’s no such thing as doing your own thing in Fighting games. 2. You haven’t seen a lot of the clips of the dude who is getting slaughtered by someone just doing Honda Headbutts and they’re yelling they can’t do anything at all! (They never try to block the Meaty Headbutt.) Or the clip of the girl who basically started crying because someone learned to do Sheeva’s unblockable stomp over and over again. No one was playing at a high level. It’s VERY easy to get destroyed by someone else even when they are low level. I’ve had friends brag to me that Meaty sHK into crHK was an unbeatable tactic in SFII because the opponent couldn’t block it and they could loop it until they died. Clearly their opponent never tried blocking either. 3. It is a contradiction and that’s a great point. I think what it is is that when people don’t understand how a Fighting Game can be skillful, they feel like the other person is just better at making than they are. Going along with 2., oftentimes when you die in ingratiating ways like that, it feels like the opponent Is just making “better” than you. I wish I could find the recent twitter clip of the guy getting super mad at the Honda because he couldn’t do anything or get any punches out in time vs. the meaty Headbutts.

[@DavimonVtube]

I don't fighting games are the hardest to learn. Just one of them. I definitely think League, dota, is harder also rts are harder imo. The thing fighting games don't do that mobas and other genres do is trick you into thinking your good so you you don't feel bad.

[@UltraChenTV]

Again, the video mentions that all the games are equally hard to learn. But Fighting Games are just the least intuitive. There’s nothing your brain tells you to do naturally that actually works in Fighting Games.

[@lsthree6996]

You can't p2w in fighting games.

[@ShinOwen2]

Because they don’t like to lose, and learn from the lose. And everything is not for everybody. What about Tekken vs Capcom? That was a team base game.

[@chupasaurus]

Tekken vs Capcom is a thing Ono had to run away from the stage during last year's EVO.

[@thec0r379]

No one likes to lose lol. I kind of came to an epiphany not to long ago. I was playing the final boss and like most final bosses, it was frustrating...before I got a chance to beat it someone basically challenged me...and while it wasn't as frustrating, I was still losing. It's then that I came to realization that one isn't unlike the other the only difference is one is a human and the other is not. It's really about the challenge at the end of the day. Obviously you can rage quit a boss but it's frowned upon when you do it to another player. It's funny to me that something so obvious doesn't compute when we have these conversations. At least with the boss there is a perceived pattern, and eventually you can learn when to take your turn. Taking your turn against someone who knows how to prevent you from doing so is a whole other ball game you have to learn.

[@Jazzyluvsyou100]

highly disagree. The difference is that you know you are bad/what you need to improve at in fighting games. it's that simple @1:01:44 No, relearning habits is hard in EVERY GAME, and every game it is hard to change habits. Moving is just as hard as aiming for example, learning different strafe pattens double jump patterns, curving in the air, etc. etc. You don't just "aim", that is part of it, you also juke etc. etc. Good movement is just as important as good aim as it helps counter aim and make it harder. Every excuse you have is just that you actually understand fighting games, but you don't really understand other games enough to be critical on yourself. Starcraft 2 for example is way more daunting than in terms of floor than fighting games. Hey guys, dozens of units, complex economy, lots of multitasking, lots of timings, etc. etc. etc. If i got you to learn starcraft 2 or Broodwar you would be fucking lost. Moba games are like a complex mishmash of obscure mechanics, creep agro, farm, positioning, when to fight, what do the hundreds of spells do. You are litterally describing in the moba the simple intuitions you have in playing it, but you dont care if you are good. Instincts kill you in EVERY GAME, you have to develop instincts, when to run/ fight in games is something that needs experience on when it is actually good, that comes from experience. Do you know how many bad stupid fights you take in league or dota to actually figure out if your character can do something or is capable? it takes hundreds of hours. Games are not intuitive, fighting games aren't either. The only thing that makes fighting games "harder" is that gamers wont have as many transferable skills from other games. There is nothing harder about learning fighting games than any other competitive game. I have played competitive quake, competitive tf2, gotten to master in starcraft 2, gotten to 6k mmr in dota, There is nothing "harder" about fighting games than any of these other competitive genres. You keep going on about "intuitiveness", dude, what the fuck is intuitive in a fucking moba? Why did i do no damage? oh he has alot of armor and lifesteal, so you did no damage.... How did that guy escape my trap? oh yeah he purged it with X item, why do my spells not stun him, oh he has BKB, why did i get turned into a sheep, he didn't do that earlier, oh yeah, he bought an item that turns you into a sheep. Why do i shoot the creeps and not the enemy if hes right in front of me. Oh yeah, the creeps will aggro on you and he will win the trade. Etc. etc. etc. incredibly unintuitive, genre is MASSIVELY popular. So was starcraft so are card games. Video games are unintuitive in general. Shooter for example, like tf2, apex, CS, quake, all have complex hard to learn stuff. CS is like a fucking mystery to me, i SUCK at CS compared to arena/arcade shooters, entirely different beast, wierd gun recoil mechanics, economy, utility items etc. etc. Something im just not that good at, cs is incredibly unintutive.

[@UltraChenTV]

People say these things, but the evidence doesn’t correlate. The thing is, a lot of these games give you time to learn. You aren’t ROUND 1 FIGHT DRIVE RUSH and never get to play ever. And on top of that, RTS and MOBA have far better bots to learn against. I can take my time vs. CPU opponents whereas CPU opponents in Fighitng Games are almost useless. Again, the intuitiveness of a MOBA comes from the fact that I click where to move and I click things to attack, and when I’m scared I can run, etc. The details can come later. In Fighting Games, the natural tendency is to mash. And your character does fucking nothing when you mash. You aren’t even moving. You are stationary. Nothing is happening. In order to even get you started, I have to immediately start teaching you dumb shit that makes no sense. Even in a MOBA, my friends told me practically nothing when I jumped in and I was able to move, to attack, to explore the map, etc. Who cares about all the details you mentioned. It doesn’t affect me immediately. It’s not a concern at my level. Especially fighting bots. And again, learning proper strafe patterns etc. BUILD ON what you already know and have learned. Oftentimes Fighting Games are, “Cool. You learned X and Y now forget they exist. Because they were really bad for you all along.” Like… Jumping is really powerful at first. And then you find out you should actually almost never jump. Like… it’s not building on established knowledge. You are literally being told you’ve been playing 100% wrong in the first place as opposed to “You are thinking in the right direction, let me teach you how to do it better.” There’s a huge difference between “You’re strafing wrong, do it this way.” and “Stop doing that thing that’s making you win completely because it doesn’t make you win later. You need to do completely different stuff than you’ve been doing. Most of what you’re doing is wrong.” It’s brutal. Again, the evidence is there: Fighting Games are the simplest games to look at. They are on paper the easiest to process as there’s very little information needed to be processed on the screen. Yet fewest people play them, people abandon them faster than other genres, and it’s way harder to get people to play and watch Fighting Games than other genres. I am not going to ask you to listen to the whole 2.5 hour video, but I make a lot of different points along the way. It’s not simply that FGs are less intuitive. There’s more to it than that.

[@Jazzyluvsyou100]

​ @UltraChenTV you literally proved my point. You aren't good enough at other games to understand that those traps happen in shooters, and those traps happen in mobas, and those traps happen in rts. Ok lets use your example about jumping and explain another thing that happens like that in dota. So in dota, at low level harassment based mids are extremely strong at low level, because it overloads the mental stack of players trying to get farm. I played heroes like this for a long time, i eventually got to a level where this strategy basically didn't work. IE, i have to completely rethink laning and lane control. They will actually contest my last hits. These traps exist in EVERY game. You are CONSTANTLY doing the strategic wrong thing this entire time in other games. You just aren't good enough at the game to know what you should be doing. Take league for example, in league there is lane control. So when you attack enemy heroes the lane creeps attack you, so every time you harrass, and they don't harass back, the lane pushes. because your creeps are still hitting thier creeps and thier creeps are hitting you. This changes where the lane is, and can make you safer or what not. This is NOT an intuitive system. There are times you need to control the lanel, push it up a little, freeze the lane etc. etc. These take time to learn when to do. And the first say 100 hours of league i was literally completely oblivious to lane control. And you say "its not a concern at my level" neither are fucking good anti airs in street fighter, ive played master players in street fighter that absolutely SUCK at doing anti airs, and jump constantly. Top 10 percent of the street fighter population. Im sorry, but you can get away with PLENTY in fighting games as you start. Ill use another example, so when apex legends came out, i had a kill to death ratio of like 7 or 8 or something crazy like that, then i came back a couple years later i came back and i could barely get 2 kill to death ratio. What happened? The players got better, i wasn't just out aiming and out moving people, i actually had to have good positioning and even better movement. I got my ass kicked essentially. " BUILD ON what you already know and have learned. Oftentimes Fighting Games are, “Cool. You learned X and Y now forget they exist. Because they were really bad for you all along.”" That isn't even true for fighting games, almost every strategy has at least some application as you learn more. Like what skill do you learn in fighting games that you just throw out completely? Jump ins are still used plenty, DIs are still good sometimes, maybe certain buttons? I cant think of a single skill that i learned in fighting games that i couldn't learn at least something from it. Also plenty of people use strong at low level strategies in other games as a crutch and then they get to a certain level and just STAY there. And sometimes they hit a wall, and then learn from it. And also for my strafing example, you also dont get it. “You’re strafing wrong, do it this way.” Its actually, your strafing wrong because your aim is bad, so now you have to relearn how to aim because your moving differently and how to move, good luck for the next month retraining your muscle memory and how to approach fights. You will hit walls in every competitive game, especially those with both mechanical and knowledge based checks. Bots in moba games are basically useless as well, dota for examples bots are so generically bad that they are essentially useless at tell you how to actually play the game. You learn the basics of the basics, how to move around, how to buy items, etc. etc. The onboarding process for learning a moba is HARD. That is why it is usually done with a friend, every person i know that has played these games gets onboarded with some mates.

[@UltraChenTV]

There are a lot of people in the comments here who have played multiple genres and they agree that Fighting Games are the most obtuse. The strafing example is exactly what I said: you just need to aim better. A lot of it comes down to learning to aim better. Now you’re moving differently and sure you need new muscle memory, but it is still a variation of what you were doing before: trying to move and shoot. The MOBA examples are tough because I DID play MOBAs very briefly, and my intention was to keep playing it with friends so I was trying to genuinely get into it. And even not knowing what I was doing, I was having fun. And I never had to care about any of those more complex things and I was having a good time. And the BOTs were good enough to learn against and have a good time with friends. I can’t even get my Fighting Game loving friends to pick up new Fighting Games. Tried teaching them Guilty Gear long time ago and they didn’t even want to try. There’s *something* going on with Fighting Games. I always give the example of Cammy’s Spin Knuckle in SFV: great move at the start, terrible move even at mid levels. But it’s hard to understand why you should stop using it when it rewarded you so well before. And while Jumping can still be useful later on, when you tell people to stop Jumping, there’s nothing clear and simple to do instead. I’ve had times teaching newer players to stop Jumping and they have zero idea what to do instead and now I have to explain Footsies to them. Which I always joke is called fundamentals but is one of the hardest things to learn and understand. And the fact that most people start fighting games by pressing buttons and it’s actually better NOT to press buttons in Fighting Games is really awkward. That’s a perfect example of not building on what you instinctively want to do at first. I’m not even sure what the example of leaving and coming back and everyone is better is about. That happens in every game. People don’t play Fighting Games as easily and they don’t even watch it as much as other genres. MOBAs are super complex, but why are there significantly more viewers when the game is so complex? Why are more people able to watch a great play in a MOBA and get excited more prevalent than with Fighting Games? If other genres are just as unintuitive as Fighters, what else odds holding Fighters back? Like I even said in the video, I wish it was the cost vs. Free-To-Play but almost no one in my chat downloaded the free GBVSR copy on Steam to try that out. Like I even say in the video as well: maybe Fighting Games just aren’t fun at early levels. Which is different than intuitiveness, but very related. I really do think there’s something uncomfortably unnatural about Fighting Games that puts people off, that drives them away quickly and early on.

[@Jazzyluvsyou100]

​ @UltraChenTV Lets tackle this. You are conflating one thing. You are talking about team games vs 1v1 games. Team games, by default, have more appeal, simply because sharing in things together rather than as rivals is a more common way to play with friends and to learn. I will ask you one question.... where are the 1v1 shooter games? oh right, they basically don't exist, and i played quake duel for years. Its a natural problem with fighting games. Team games are simply more appealing We can literally go to 1v1 games that are not turn based that are popular and fighting games are not just successful, they are MAGNITUDES more successful. Lets combine the daily player base numbers of fighting games of the big 3. Sf6, Tekken, and Strive. Sf6 "30k" peak players tekken "10k" Peak players Strive "2.5k" Peak players This is just PC on steam, so lets just triple that as data we have seen has shown that there about twice the number of console players as PC 120k players actively playing a 1v1 competitive game every day so probably around 250 thousand active players per day, its obviously more than that because not all players are on at the same time, so its a pretty big genre. The closest we have is RTS games for 1v1 live action games, and the data is a little hard to find. And for starcraft 2 the most i can find around 70k a day.... lets say the average person plays 4 games of starcraft 2 as most games are short, but im not sure, maybe 15k active players a day? its probably lower than that. And Brood war has around 10k active players from publicly available data. Warcraft 3 only has 6k games played per day, so games are longer, maybe 2 games per player so 3k active players? So Fighting games are bigger than RTS, by like a factor of 5-10 times its size and thats JUST factoring in the top 3 competitive fighting games. Id argue that fighting games are not more "unintuitive", its not about being intuitive, its about how people play games, they play with friends, its that simple. Or a 1v1 genre, modern fighting games are doing INCREDIBLY well, they are doing better than any 1v1 competitive genre that is live action. I think your argument fails to understand that onboarding of players mainly happens via friends, and fighting games are harder to onboard because its a 1v1 game. But fighting games since rollback netcode improvements, year after have gotten better and the player base have increased. Lets take this example "I always give the example of Cammy’s Spin Knuckle in SFV: great move at the start, terrible move even at mid levels. But it’s hard to understand why you should stop using it when it rewarded you so well before. And while Jumping can still be useful later on, when you tell people to stop Jumping, there’s nothing clear and simple to do instead. I’ve had times teaching newer players to stop Jumping and they have zero idea what to do instead and now I have to explain Footsies to them. Which I always joke is called fundamentals but is one of the hardest things to learn and understand. And the fact that most people start fighting games by pressing buttons and it’s actually better NOT to press buttons in Fighting Games is really awkward. That’s a perfect example of not building on what you instinctively want to do at first." Who cares if they are bad? you don't get that you are slipping in this concept that you think other games just naturally slip you into getting better and better. That is NOT what happens, Most players hit hard plateaus, they stall, not just a little bit, but ALOT a bit. i have had players stuck in dota 2 at the same MMR for years, actually, thats the most common thing. i have a friend that has HUNDREDS of hours of dota not understand how to switch creep agro, ok. Fighting games aren't just more intuitive than mobas, they are astronomically more intuitive than mobas. Just google "how many hours do you need to understand dota" the first result is a reddit thread saying you need hundreds of hours to not even be confused and somewhat confidant. "People don’t play Fighting Games as easily and they don’t even watch it as much as other genres. MOBAs are super complex, but why are there significantly more viewers when the game is so complex? Why are more people able to watch a great play in a MOBA and get excited more prevalent than with Fighting Games? If other genres are just as unintuitive as Fighters, what else odds holding Fighters back? Like I even said in the video, I wish it was the cost vs. Free-To-Play but almost no one in my chat downloaded the free GBVSR copy on Steam to try that out. Like I even say in the video as well: maybe Fighting Games just aren’t fun at early levels. Which is different than intuitiveness, but very related." because its a team game, and also viewers of mobas are kind of shit compared to the size of the playerbase. 65000 viewers per day on a game with millions of active players per day isn't even good. Street fighter has an average of 17000 viewers per day. dota 2 has around 20x more active players than street fighter. Fighting games considering their player size are incredibly popular streaming games based on active player count. I dont really even play card games, but lets take some statistics from hearthstone the most popular card game its 15k avg vieweers on twitch.... less than street fighter and it has 350k average concurrent players. so around 2-3 million players.... The "unnatural" part about fighting games is that problems with 1v1 games, that is what makes them unnatural, its not the game mechanics, seriously, it not the game mechanics. Its because its a 1v1 game that has both knowledge and technical skill. And it is the most popular 1v1 video game genre in history that is not turn based. If you can find the giant group of players playing 1v1 fps players, id love to join them, but they kind of don't really exist, because all the most popular shooter games are TEAM games and 1v1 shooter games are less than .0001 percent of the fps market. 1v1 games will never be as appealing as team games/party games even when games that were 1V1 games like starcraft came out, the most popular modes were custom maps and for fun modes like fastest map possible.

[@UltraChenTV]

Just letting you know that: 1) I hope at no point I seem angry. I love conversations like this. So if you are down to keep it up, I’m down too. ^_^ 2) I’ll get to this whole thing in a bit, just busy these next few days heading out to First Attack in Puerto Rico. 3) I have to say I absolutely agree that Team Games make it a LOT easier than 1v1. That’s been the predominant argument why people don’t play Fighting Games as regularly. But I think there’s more to it than that. Even when there is a good group of people willing to learn together, people quit Fighting Games faster. But again, there’s no one to carry you. Maybe 2XKO will fix that.

[@roniragetv6344]

the real answer is SF6, MK1 and Tekken 8 are all garbage

[@ThirtyfourEC]

Preach brother. I came into this fighting game comment section to make say this myself. Glad to see someone else like minded. Have a great day. Lol