Xbox 360 vs PS3

[sawyen]

DoA4 isn't scrub savvy, nor shallow. Its just that until you learn the countering system, the juggle system, the critical hit system, the crush system, and other tricks like slow escape, you might take it for a button masher.

However, try this against someone who has mastered the above features, and you will find yourself getting battered over and over again. DoA is more scrub savvy than most at a very low level; a noob might win more games than you'd expect against an average player, due to the ease of combos and the like, but that means nothing, at a high level its deep and scrubs need not apply.

I stradle the line between average and good by the way. A rank online.

Perhaps I lack the initiative to actually learn to love DOA.. Can't really blame me tbh.. DOA2, DOA3 are uberly broken games.. the counter system is overpowered and as I recall there's no counter reversal. Maybe someone might find me wrong, as I didn't play them longer than a rental anyways. Having said that, I am perfectly aware of its juggling system, crush system (its called frame stun move in tekken), critical hit (counter hit), and slow escape (grapple break in tekken) as I play both tekken and VF4 as well.

I have no ranking online as both Tekken and VF4 dont support online play. I have no idea how well I stack up against online players but I'm perfectly confident calling myself a strong player.

Also, when I meant scrubby game.. is the mean fact that the beginner player tends to have far too many poking moves (what we call 7/8 frame moves) that requires little to no practice on frame timing and have excellent recovery for them to exploit without even learning the game. Scrubby games thus lack the line that differentiates a normal advent player against a newbie, or jsut plain scrub that exploits a single move over and over again. Like i said, DOA3 have far too many poking moves that does superly high damage and have only near 2-3 frames of opening to initiate punishment.

As a matter a fact, I played DOA4 on a demo booth.. and I nearly crushed everyone there just by the fact I played like a scrub and exploit only the moves that have low frames and excellent recovery over and over again (of course with my brains as well.. I dont go do it again and again continuously). And I didnt even learn the moves.. the stuff just came by mashing the buttons with occassional directional button. Even those who claim that they were good DOA3 players had trouble winning a 1st time player like me. All I used was a little scrub nature, turtle, and some side steps. In DOA4 the guessing game bit is far too easy to achieve, move are executed far too easily.. and the reward that comes from a set-up is too little to justify for a professional play. Turn on scrub-turtle mode and you've increased the chances of winning alot.

[sawyen]

Sorry for a double post:

But I wanted to clarify... Tekken has its share of problems as well. I'm not saying games like Tekken and VF4 are uberly perfect. But at least the game has a learning curve, and you can tell whether the player is a good/normal/scrub/poor player immediately by playing with them. A scrub player will win some matches, but with careful play, its much easier to shut down a scrubby player in those games while in DOA4 you'll suffer terrible hardship and lots of coin loss (if they were on arcade) before you can win a scrub. And he'll walk away claiming victory when the W:L ratio reaches like 10:5. I don't know whether these things happen online, but these things are most often the cause of fights in arcades.

Anyone that played the recent Tekken 5 would have known that Steve 7 frame special mid jab (f+1), and a host of other okizimi moves are far too overpowered. Nina's 1+3 rainwheel can be near fatal when you're locked on the a wall and the only way to get around it is wall escape or careful tech roll (which incidently needs hours of playing before you can actually master them). And Julia's tech-roll punishment is far too good.

[Stewart]

A few points: the countering in DoA3 and before was broken yes, now its much improved. The window for countering is much reduced, and you can't just spam counters all day and win. As for pokes, again, this is only really a problem until you've got the game down cold; Christie for example - great jab, can be used many different ways, including a 14 hit combo that requires nothing more than back and punch. However, its also as easy as pie to counter.

So, your scrub bashing punch might get that 14 hit combo against another scrub, but against someone who knows whats what, you'll see a couple of jabs doing hardly any damage, before the scrub gets countered and gets 5 times as much damage as the few jabs did.

Also, as stuns and crushes are the key to doing real damage in this game, and poking doesn't really allow you to do that, you will simply be able to dish out more damage than even the most determined button basher, and should win 95% of the time.

In short a scrub can button bash \ poke on DoA very well if against another scrub - against someone with even a basic understanding of the countering system as well as the (suprisingly) slow and precise critical hit - stun - combo system they will hit the mat.

Online when I play one of the really good players (SS Rank) the combos don't come thick and fast, they come in bits and pieces; a stun to set the combo up, followed by a mix of punches and kicks, high, low and mid attacks: this is to keep me guessing on the countering and allow the combo to continue. If they just went for it and bashed out a million punches in a row, regardless of how many frames that attack is, it wouldn't be effective.

Also bashing the same button leads to the same strings (So for example Christie, if punch is pressed repeatedly, will always do mid punch, mid punch, high punch, mid punch, high punch). That is the string. I've seen that string a million times, and I know how to counter it. A scrub will always start and finish the string making it easy. An SS player will start the string, and after a couple of hits will switch. Making strings easy to recognise and counter is DoAs built in anti-scrub feature.

Anyway, get a 360 and wait for Street Fighter. As a fighting game fan I'm sure you appriciate this game for what it is - the finest 2D fighting game of all time. Coming to an Xbox 360 with full online support near you.

[sawyen]

You have a point on low level scrubs.. but I'm talking about mid-level scrubs who already have a basic knowledge of the 3D fighting genre.. examples are ppl with the likes of me who never played DOA before but just using some basic understanding of moves from other 3D versus games would allow me to rack up wins without majorly trying. That was my complain about DOA, ppl playing with scrubs with a little bit of brain will have a hard time to fight. I'm saying this as a point for being a scrub.. , and I actually not that proud of.. I can tell I was pissing alot of the people off. 14 hit strings, well.. we do have 10 hit combos in Tekken, but other than newbies who think they're superly cool.. no known tekken player would actually attempt to finish a 10 hit string... they either dont do it, or only use the first 3 hits that is possibly guarenteed on counter hit and cancel it.. after which the moves leaves plenty of punishment areas. These moves can be understood and dealt with far easier.

True.. Good players do simple combos, and the matches are down to footwork and all in all the pace set-up. That goes with all versus games. I for one is those ppl that typically pisses scrubbies and other players of with excessive poking before lining them up into a guessing game set-up. Its the backbone for all versus games. For the ages long I have played Tekken, other than making combo videos, I have never used a combo that requires more thinking than chewing bubblegum. My complain REALLY, was that the setting up is far to easy to make up in DOA4 during the demo booth. I only needed a coupel of moves which i instrinsically learnt by trying some of them on the spot and I coudl live off by palying a little safe and timing my set-ups correctly. Another things is that DOA's basic juggles deal far to much damage, just a simple and some button mashing will see almost 40% of ur bar gone. And those arent even okizimi tech catches where it requires some set up to lead ur opponents into doing say a backroll or side roll.

Poking wont deal alot of damage, but its the key to a fine set up. DOA allows this to be exploited far to easily. I'm not saying a player CANNOT be good at DOA.. But I find it disturbing that the line between someone trying to be good player and someone just there just being as a** cannot be clearly drawn. Say a grade B player meets with as a**hole player with a rank C that incidently plays like me.. .. I'll probably have equal chances of winning not because of my skill and understanding of the game.. but just for the plain fact that I'm playing like a 'thinking' scrub..

[Stewart]

I agree on the basic point that DoA only really has 2 sorts of players - good and everyone else. A scrub can beat a decent player more often than on other fighting games perhaps; I suppose its because its very easy to attack and very hard to defend. Or if you like it takes 2 seconds to learn how to attack and many weeks to learn how to block, counter and evade.

Character balance is another point as well - its perhaps not the best, with Ryu having more abusable moves than the other characters combined. And as for the AI... Alpha 152 has a nasty case of SNK Boss Syndrome.

All in all, its not the best fighting game ever, but its loads of fun, the countering system keeps things interesting and its always ramed online, so plenty of people to play.

[sawyen]

Exactly the point.. But I did have loads of fun playing on the demo booth. .. playing scrubby and being a total jacka** can be pretty fun sometimes..

Having said that, DOA does get my vote for one of the most revealing chick vs games on the X360, very closely placed with cheap flick games like Rumble Roses XX thingy.

But again, back on topic.. unless they make something with an AAA branded versus game on it. I'll find it hard to pay my money on an X360.

Street Fighter Hyper Edition? Bahh.. I can play that all day long on my SNES.. .. BUt I do feel a little suss about versus online play.. what if the fella walks off the match while you're almost winning? Even if u did get the win, still.. it doenst beats the fun having to stare into the eyes of your opponent and saying 'you didnt stand a chance'.. or at least give them a handshake for playing a good game..

[Stewart]

Well, if they quit mid-game they I expect you'll still get the points. Its not specific to fighting games though, if someone quits in the middle of a Burnout race then you still get the points.

Street Fighter II Hyper with online play, quarter matches, lobby and fight chat for the trash talk and the like will be something else. I mean, I can sit back in my own front room, relax on my sofa with my wireless pad, and play Street Fighter II against people from all over the world, chatting, smack talking and having a laugh as I go, for a few pounds download on Xbox Live Arcade.

If you don't want to do that, then you aint a gamer.

DoA records how many times you've quit a match, by the way, so before you play someone you can see if they have a habit of running off if they are going to lose, so you can avoid playing them in the first place. Expect SF to have the same feature.

Oh, and just to be annoying, you can *almost* play it all day long on the SNES - this is the arcade version, with improved sound, the arcade bonus stages and no missing frames.

S'ave it!

[sawyen]

I must admit I cant bear having someone walking out on me during a match.. .. Thats why I spend more time in the arcade where I get to see that fella hard and cold.. And when I win, I win with an authority... and when they walk away.. my trash talk goes straight to their ears.. itching for a fight..

Ehh? I think when I'm not playing online.. it just mean that I'm not an online gamer, I'm still very much an advent gamer...

Ok nities Stewards..

[PenguinJim]

that's £600 of games i honestly can't see myself giving more than an hour to apiece.

£900. You need to buy the console as well.

I must admit, I'm tempted by Table Tennis, but can't justify a £350 outlay for one game.

[directhex]

I must admit, I'm tempted by Table Tennis, but can't justify a £350 outlay for one game.

i can, but not for table tennis

wake me when a game of Resident Evil 4's calibre gets released