What If Fighting Games? Solvable Game States are BAD

[@HQRubbish]

What if... you posted a comment on a Roubbster vid?

[@RedBull78hero]

Why this kind of video isn't longer? I'm seriously asking this question, I want to watch this topic for hours.

[@TheConpressor]

now that you mention it, can't even count on my fingers how many times people i've fought says "how do you counter this" and i tell them the solution only to hear "well thats too much" or "thats too hard" or "how are you even supposed to know that" or the argument "but then you do yadayada" because obviously i'll have to counter their counter. So nowadays i usually just say lab it because they don't want a solution, they want a surefire way to win, which doesnt exist in fighting games, nor any game really. It feels like they just want you to agree that something is broken or unbeatable so they can feel that they didnt lose to YOU but your character.

[@thirteenonline9503]

I loved this new style of video. Genuinely thought the graphics and text add a lot. And I see the potential to be endless with this. Very cool, keep it up

[@HQRubbish]

Thanks for the kind words, I can't say I am super happy with it (but then again I rarely am, haha). But I feel the quality is at least decent enough for me to consider doing more of them.

[@mechanicat1934]

This is sort of what I think of when people talk bad about Oki and 50/50s in general. Like... Your opponent has tendencies. You don't deal with 50/50 in a vacuum. Even if you've never been hit with that 50/50 by this opponent before you still have some time playing against them to gather information about which option might appeal to them more. Something as simple as experts and rookie's having different tendencies. Though part of this might just be from newer players getting told to lab out solutions to stuff a lot. Nobody ever brings up the fact that an answer only works if you got your Yomi together. Though you *are* supposed to figure that out on your own usually.

[@verbatim7508]

My opponents don't have tendencies. They're only tendency is that they do something different that I don't expect every time, even when I try to adjust and do the counterintuitive thing instead.

[@XionTheSylveon]

This video is absurdly solid. Thank you. This boils down the essence of why a lot of arguments against good but, nuanced tools typically falls apart.

[@HQRubbish]

Absurdly huh, that's pretty damn high praise. Thanks.

[@Demonstormlord]

Yo, that Captain America photoshopped with Guile's haircut is awesome!

[@ividboy7616]

So basically people are big mad that they have to actually use their brain instead of having ez one size fits all answers to situations

[@Demonstormlord]

To comment on the content of the video itself, I think it's interesting that the kind of attitude you deconstruct seems to have misunderstood fighting in general, as a concept. You touch on it when you mention competition, but really any fighting, whether in a traditional fighting game, a board game, or even IRL is a constant struggle. Even solid fundamental strategies and techniques are subject to equally solid and fundamental counters, otherwise every boxing match would be a race to see who jabs first, for example. I don't really have an answer to this attitude, I just found it interesting to consider, since I hadn't before now.

[@HQRubbish]

Yeah, the idea of a "solvable game state" as a concept to aim for is so alien to me. Was a bit of a wakeup-call hearing this sort of argument over and over.

[@KingKlose82]

"Oh...Oh my God...." 😅

[@genuwine21]

And that is why I tell friends who don't play fighting games that fighting games are like a card game. You have many options and some are better in certain situations, some can't be used without spending additional resources, and some characters can have better versions of some options.

[@thetaomegatheta]

More people should learn game theory, understand how decision-making works, and use mixed strategies in these situations, instead of pure strategies.

[@user-wl2xl5hm7k]

Yeah. Once you know all the potential moves, just have fun.

[@verbatim7508]

These people WANT to learn game theory. They WANT to understand how decision-making works. They're TRYING to use mixed strategies. But it's not working and all you're telling them to do is back dash.

[@finallyanime]

Subbed man! Dig the videos

[@HQRubbish]

That's pretty rad of you.

[@rando7096]

I used to ask that question back in the day tbh..I just think ppl are either a. “I can’t do solutions proposed so I’ll look up criticisms for them” or b. “Idk fighting games that much so I can’t understand the gamestates well enough to know that my argument makes little to no sense”. That’s just usually how it went down tbh

[@lounowell4171]

I think you have to read between the lines, people don't present their full argument but I don't think it can be boiled down to "what if fighting games?" entirely They're implying that the initial 50/50 is strong, and your proposed counter-measures aren't sufficient to deal with it. In the case of S Tier characters in certain games, they'd be absolutely right. It's still a flimsy argument, but when debates go down this path I tend to try and steer us back to talking meaningfully about the game - I feel the frustration that led to this video, but I dunno if getting too caught up in semantics is the best way to respond.

[@HQRubbish]

I think you are being extremely charitable in your take on the meaning. The critique to the proposed counter-measure is not aimed at the situation described, but an entirely different one that stands outside of the current context. I don't think it is reasonable of me to ascribe your meaning on top of the more literal interpretation. And as you say, even if one were to do so, the ensuing counter-argument holds pretty much 0 weight.

[@goofball2487]

I'd love to see this elaborated on, especially in a 2D context. Low-level Tekken is saturated with canned punishes, knowledge checks, and reactable lows, so it can make sense that a real brutal mixup would be rough for players climbing that ladder- Especially coming from one of the game's historically strongest characters. Furthermore, I've genuinely never heard anyone use this line of thinking outside of Twitter. That might say more about the discourse than anything else.

[@stylorenvgc]

Fighting games are like chess but there really aren't any checkmate situations. Aside from maybe if your opponent has a touch of death off of a hit at 99 seconds.. but even then you could just not get hit by it. The game is pretty much always winnable, if you have any health left you can still win the game. You don't run out of pieces and moves to make, there's always something

[@Thunderwake.]

Me in sf3rd strike: just wake up parry throw tech DP Bro

[@towkgouki2158]

yes, sir

[@swamidesperado8075]

Yea because if they countered your counter you got outplayed

[@zerarch77]

Video title is confusing. Counterplay does not make game states solvable, it does the opposite. Some people want shallow games that are easy to solve, where they can do something simple on autopilot and win automatically without considering the opponent.

[@HQRubbish]

While it is certainly true that a game completely devoid of counterplay is "solved", the same can be said for games that allow completely binary reactionary counterplay to options rendering them useless. Both are bad.

[@verbatim7508]

Someone shared this video with me to prove some kind of point, and I wound up thinking this is one of the worst videos on the subject of fighting games that I've ever seen in my life, which was pretty disappointing to say the least, but it compelled me to leave this overly long comment in response, because I think it's important. I can agree, on FACE VALUE, that it's kinda stupid to be given a solution on how to counter one of my opponent's options, only for me to turn around and say, "but what if they pick a different option that counters my counter?" What's _actually_ stupid here, though, is the fact that you're not seeing the underlying question being asked. People understand the counters. They don't need to hear that you're supposed to neutral jump when you think the Zangief is going for an SPD. So when somebody asks, "what if my opponent punishes my neutral jump" (or "what if fighting games," as you put it), what they're REALLY trying to ask is, "how am I supposed to KNOW which option my opponent is going to go for at any point in time?" They're not interested in hearing the solution to their counterplay. They KNOW you're supposed to block the first hit and then jump if the Zangief is trying to tick SPD you. What people are asking about is when they can be SURE that the Zangief is going to go for a tick SPD. That is the question that none of these brilliant fighting game content creators such as yourself has the answer for. All you ever get is milquetoast shit like "pay attention to your opponent's decisions" or "watch for patterns in their behavior"-which, of course, ignores the fact that fighting games are ALL ABOUT ironing out your patterns so you can try to be as unpredictable as possible. How are you supposed to make a decision when you aren't 100% sure of what they're going to do? Then you'll say something like, "oh, well, you just need to evaluate the risk/reward for each of your options"-which 1.) nobody can realistically make a detailed risk assessment on the fly in a match when the pressure is on, especially when you need to make these decisions in a matter of splits of seconds a lot of the time, 2.) doesn't give people an inkling of how such risks should be assessed in the first place. Maybe tell someone, instead of allowing your brain to explode when getting hit by an SPD when you thought they wouldn't do it, here's something you can do to help yourself mentally recover from this situation, and here's what you can do to proceed. No one ever talks about these things. Nobody ever talks about the psychological elements of fighting games, they only talk about raw game mechanics, and then act confused/frustrated by people who struggle to improve. It's actually insane. And as for your insinuation that solvable game states are bad-uh, no. That is ridiculously silly, and I almost want to say it's just factually wrong. There is NOTHING wrong with solvable game states. For that to be true, you would have to be against the existence of overheads, or any reactable moves at all-because anything like this can simply be reacted to and beaten out with a fast enough move. You would have to be against punishing DPs, because there's generally only one correct thing to do when you block a DP, and generally, that's punish it with your most damaging or most corner-carrying combo, making sure to end it in a hard knockdown. These situations are solved. And they are good situations. They should be in every fighting game. In fact, I'm pretty sure you could design a fighting game where every situation is solvable and still have it be a very fun and competitive game. Just because it hasn't been done doesn't mean it's impossible. We already have games like chess, and chess has existed for centuries. Chess isn't a solved game, but it is solvable. Every single position on every board has a "correct" move. You probably wouldn't try to argue that chess is a bad game just because it's completely solvable. Super ironic that someone in your chat brought up chess at the end of this, btw. Like they don't even understand how the very existence of chess kind of blows up everything you said in this video.

[@Mushiotaku]

congratulations or sorry that happened

[@myboy_]

Bro is really trying to play rock paper scissors GUN

[@luisenriquemendozahernande5798]

Get better at guessing, it's that easy

[@verbatim7508]

@@luisenriquemendozahernande5798 Nope

[@Mushiotaku]

Your argument around posting comments to counter the biased youtube algorithm is the stupidest I've ever seen. Oh sorry sir, we are all shit tier comments. Of course engagement metrics are literally all the same right?

[@HQRubbish]

Dr Hogback I presume?

[@Mushiotaku]

@@HQRubbish hog deez

[@user-wl2xl5hm7k]

@@Mushiotaku We don’t have the YT algorithms, they’re all hidden (mainly due to intellectual property laws). Fighting games algorithms are all perceivable.