Recently I've been playing EFZ again, after watching some of the new videos that the Kaori player Nagisa put up on his mylist. I forgot how hype this game was. Sadly, playing the game is a pretty mixed bag for me, probably because 1)I hate the command interpreter and 2)My character Akane is really really hard. Especially since nobody plays this game in SoCal anymore, I pretty much have to netplay it, so it just makes the experience really not enjoyable. The EFZ netcode was considered pretty good way back when it was first made, but it's pretty dated nowadays with stuff like GGPO and Caster available. I wonder if the game would get a revival if there was an EFZCaster.
bell has recently been doing a lot of work on Mizuumi, nearly tripling the amount of wikis that were originally there, upgrading Wordpress and getting a really nice theme, and restructuring the forums. It kind of inspires me to go work on my own sites more, since I've been neglecting them recently.
And some nice covers that I've found since the last update
Calc.
Vocaloid: Hatsune Miku
Music and Lyrics by: ジミーサムＰ(JimmyThumb)
うさ(Usa) cover
Calc. is a really cool song, but I haven't really found any covers of it that really stand out significantly over the others. Usa's cover is really popular, though.
Sing my Love
Vocaloid: Hatsune Miku
Music and Lyrics by: 40mP
【蓮】(Ren) cover
Sing my Love is a somewhat obscure song, though I never really understood the reason why. There aren't many covers of it, and even though it's originally written for a female(Miku), Ren does a really nice job with the song.
SPiCa -HPT ReACT-
Vocaloid: Hatsune Miku
Music and Lyrics by: Headphone Tokyo
MARiA cover
MARiA is pretty amazing, and she's supposedly a professional singer under the name Mizuhashi Mai. I actually don't like the original SPiCa that much, but this rearrangement is great.
ローリンガール (Rollin' Girl)
Vocaloid: Hatsune Miku
Music and Lyrics by: wowaka
yonji cover, Guitar Rock arrange
I have no idea what this song is about, but it's very popular and there are a lot of good covers for it. This is probably my favorite one, and the rock arrangement is a really nice touch.
さよならメモリーズ (Sayonara Memories)
Original Artist: supercell
irony cover
irony is a pretty obscure nico singer. Her most popular cover is for the opening theme of the Ore no Imouto ga Konna ni Kawaii Wake ga Nai anime, which shares the same name as her alias. Her voice has a really eerie resemblance to Gazelle/nagi's, and if it wasn't obvious in her other covers it's definitely obvious in this one. I couldn't even tell the difference from the original song from the first few seconds.
Sunday, November 28, 2010
Friday, September 10, 2010
More utattemita
Some cool covers that have come out in the last few months
トリノコシティ (Torinoko City)
Vocaloid: Hatsune Miku
Music and Lyrics by: 40mP
ENE cover
I haven't done any research as to what this song is about, but it sounds wonderful and ENE easily has the best cover of it. ENE is a somewhat obscure nico artist, as she usually covers some of the less popular songs. She also has a Youtube account under the name enedayo, and she actually responds to comments in English!
お断りします (Okotowari Shimasu)
Vocaloid: Hatsune Miku
Music and Lyrics by: あたたたP (AtatataP)
ろん(Lon) cover
Really cute PV, this song is hilarious. It's basically FML the song. I'm actually not a big fan of Lon but this song was basically made for her type of voice.
輪舞-revolution (Rinbu Revolution)
Original Artist: Masami Okui
花たん (Hanatan) cover
Revolutionary Girl Utena was one of the few shoujo anime that I actually liked, and the great opening theme was probably one of the reasons why. Can't think of anything else to say, Hanatan is a great singer and she does this song justice.
メランコリック (Melancholic)
Vocaloid: Kagamine Rin
Music and Lyrics by: Junky
ENE cover
My favorite Rin song, I'm not a big fan of the twins, but this song is pretty awesome. For whatever reason, most nico artists use a vocoder when covering this song, and I can't stand vocoders, so ENE's cover is one of those rare non-vocoder ones that happens to be really good. I think Usa's cover of this song is the most popular, but I actually don't like it that much.
トリノコシティ (Torinoko City)
Vocaloid: Hatsune Miku
Music and Lyrics by: 40mP
ENE cover
I haven't done any research as to what this song is about, but it sounds wonderful and ENE easily has the best cover of it. ENE is a somewhat obscure nico artist, as she usually covers some of the less popular songs. She also has a Youtube account under the name enedayo, and she actually responds to comments in English!
お断りします (Okotowari Shimasu)
Vocaloid: Hatsune Miku
Music and Lyrics by: あたたたP (AtatataP)
ろん(Lon) cover
Really cute PV, this song is hilarious. It's basically FML the song. I'm actually not a big fan of Lon but this song was basically made for her type of voice.
輪舞-revolution (Rinbu Revolution)
Original Artist: Masami Okui
花たん (Hanatan) cover
Revolutionary Girl Utena was one of the few shoujo anime that I actually liked, and the great opening theme was probably one of the reasons why. Can't think of anything else to say, Hanatan is a great singer and she does this song justice.
メランコリック (Melancholic)
Vocaloid: Kagamine Rin
Music and Lyrics by: Junky
ENE cover
My favorite Rin song, I'm not a big fan of the twins, but this song is pretty awesome. For whatever reason, most nico artists use a vocoder when covering this song, and I can't stand vocoders, so ENE's cover is one of those rare non-vocoder ones that happens to be really good. I think Usa's cover of this song is the most popular, but I actually don't like it that much.
Monday, August 9, 2010
MBAA Full Moon
The moon phase styles in MBAA are easily what makes the game interesting and distinguishes it from other fighting games. However, I don't think the moons are completely equal, and I do feel that my favorite moon style, Full, is actually the weakest in game.
Full Moon as a style kind of makes characters play in a more traditional fighting game setting. Melty is mostly known for its extremely freeform chaining system, where everything chains into everything up and down. Full Moon turns that back into the traditional weak->medium->strong chain sequence. Most Melty chars don't have +f on block and hit normals, since their chain options are so numerous, but since Full Moon chars are more restricted, they do have lots of +f on block normals and specials. This actually worked out pretty well and it did a nice job of making up for Full Moon's limited chain options, but Full Moon has a bunch of other weird restrictions that make it the weakest groove.
1)Limited meter. Crescent Moon has the most control over its meter, since c moon chars can heat activate anytime they have over 100%. Heat moon technically has the least control over their meter, but h moon chars make up for it because most of them have 6aa combos, which are longer than combos in other grooves. These combos generate more meter and thus it's very easy for h moon chars to get to Auto Heat more than once per round. For Full Moon, getting to MAX is a once a round thing, as circuit charging isn't really all that useful and practical. F Moon combos are also shorter in general so meter generation is limited.
2)Dodging. F moon is the only groove that cannot ground and air dodge. For ground dodging, it's not really that big of a deal because they're pretty limited in use except for chars that have roll dodges, like Kohaku and Mech. However, not having air dodge is a huge weakness. Air dodges actually aren't used to "dodge" things: they're more used as another jump in the air, as they delay a character's falling momentum. Also important is that they turn your character in the right direction in the air if you were facing the wrong direction. Some characters can even use air dodge as a left/right mixup. F moon chars not having air dodges basically means they all have less mobility compared to other moons.
3)Air dash cancelling. C and H moon can airdash cancel all air normals on block and hit, with a few exceptions. F moon characters can only airdash cancel j.a's. F moon can still do a similar technique for j.b and j.c attacks by doing an IAD cancel, which is cancelling the air normal into a double jump, and then immediately cancelling the double jump into an airdash. However, this requires the F moon character to have a double jump available, so it's more limited compared to C and H.
4)Empty cancelling a attacks. Throughout Melty's history, using EX moves as reversals was always bad because of the ability to cancel the recovery frames of whiffed a attacks into anything. Most notably, you could even cancel a whiffed a attack into a shield. So it was extremely easy to go for a meaty 2a/5a, and just react to superflash and cancel to a shield if opponent did a wakeup super. However, F moon for whatever reason can't cancel whiffed a attacks into shields. So they're more vulnerable to wakeup EX moves than the other grooves.
There are definitely some strong Full Moon characters, like Nero, the Maids, Miyako, and Akiha, but in general the groove is significantly weaker than Crescent and Full.
Full Moon as a style kind of makes characters play in a more traditional fighting game setting. Melty is mostly known for its extremely freeform chaining system, where everything chains into everything up and down. Full Moon turns that back into the traditional weak->medium->strong chain sequence. Most Melty chars don't have +f on block and hit normals, since their chain options are so numerous, but since Full Moon chars are more restricted, they do have lots of +f on block normals and specials. This actually worked out pretty well and it did a nice job of making up for Full Moon's limited chain options, but Full Moon has a bunch of other weird restrictions that make it the weakest groove.
1)Limited meter. Crescent Moon has the most control over its meter, since c moon chars can heat activate anytime they have over 100%. Heat moon technically has the least control over their meter, but h moon chars make up for it because most of them have 6aa combos, which are longer than combos in other grooves. These combos generate more meter and thus it's very easy for h moon chars to get to Auto Heat more than once per round. For Full Moon, getting to MAX is a once a round thing, as circuit charging isn't really all that useful and practical. F Moon combos are also shorter in general so meter generation is limited.
2)Dodging. F moon is the only groove that cannot ground and air dodge. For ground dodging, it's not really that big of a deal because they're pretty limited in use except for chars that have roll dodges, like Kohaku and Mech. However, not having air dodge is a huge weakness. Air dodges actually aren't used to "dodge" things: they're more used as another jump in the air, as they delay a character's falling momentum. Also important is that they turn your character in the right direction in the air if you were facing the wrong direction. Some characters can even use air dodge as a left/right mixup. F moon chars not having air dodges basically means they all have less mobility compared to other moons.
3)Air dash cancelling. C and H moon can airdash cancel all air normals on block and hit, with a few exceptions. F moon characters can only airdash cancel j.a's. F moon can still do a similar technique for j.b and j.c attacks by doing an IAD cancel, which is cancelling the air normal into a double jump, and then immediately cancelling the double jump into an airdash. However, this requires the F moon character to have a double jump available, so it's more limited compared to C and H.
4)Empty cancelling a attacks. Throughout Melty's history, using EX moves as reversals was always bad because of the ability to cancel the recovery frames of whiffed a attacks into anything. Most notably, you could even cancel a whiffed a attack into a shield. So it was extremely easy to go for a meaty 2a/5a, and just react to superflash and cancel to a shield if opponent did a wakeup super. However, F moon for whatever reason can't cancel whiffed a attacks into shields. So they're more vulnerable to wakeup EX moves than the other grooves.
There are definitely some strong Full Moon characters, like Nero, the Maids, Miyako, and Akiha, but in general the groove is significantly weaker than Crescent and Full.
Friday, July 16, 2010
Evolution 2010
Really cool EVO this year, unfortunately I couldn't go because the family has a vacation planned for Taiwan during November so money is really tight. Had to watch everything on stream pretty much. Historic event for Melty players, as it was the first time MB was a major event at Evolution.
Melty had 146 entrants, so it was divided into 4 pools. Unfortunately Pool 1 and 4 were extremely stacked, so many good players weren't able to make it to Top 8. Sadly Melty got no stream time at all pre-Top 8, which was expected, but EVO also did not let the community set up their own personal streams because of G4 or something like that... pretty dumb if you ask me.
Garu and Chelsea from Japan were able to make it over for this event, which is pretty amazing. On Thursday night, Tempered set up a casuals stream and Garu basically ran a train on everyone, only losing once to Brandino during a 4-5 hour period. Before coming over, Garu stated on IRC that he was starting to play H-Kohaku more than his main(H-VSion), but I was expecting him to play HVS over here since he would be more familiar with the character. H-VSion is also considerably easier to play, and I thought that Garu would get frustrated over the PS2 input buffer and not play H-Kohaku. But he proved me wrong and stuck to his guns, and also played a bit of H-Shiki as well.
Chelsea is Garu's friend, and is nowhere near as well known but he has appeared in a couple of videos. He plays F-Arc in videos, but he was able to run a bunch of characters at EVO like C-Shiki, C-Arc, and C-Sion. I was expecting him to be a bit stronger, but he ended up being about mid-level by US standards. Chelsea however was hilarious and provided some amazing commentary, and it seemed like everybody really enjoyed hanging out with him.
The final top 8 for Melty was pretty much what I expected, although I was expecting bell and sp00ky to get farther in their pools. Top 8 for Melty was unfortunately streamed first on Sunday at 10AM in the morning, but people were able to get up for it and I think it peaked at around 14K viewers. Stream was handled very well, though apparently the player camera was broken so we couldn't get shots of player reactions and the commentator's table like all the other games. bell did a great job commentating and keeping it clean for the EVO stream, but Sp00ky was obviously very tired from streaming SSFIV the previous night so he was pretty quiet. Some people captured some of the matches of the stream and put them on Youtube, but the vids are mostly 1)incomplete and/or 2)bad quality. Luckily someone saved it on JustinTV.
http://www.justin.tv/unowner/b/266597281
http://www.justin.tv/unowner/b/266603408
Very exciting Top 8, as almost every match was amazing. Unfortunately the Grand finals between LordKnight and Garu was terrible as not only was it an H-Kohaku mirror, both players' execution just went down the drain so it was dropped combos everywhere. Very ugly finals, and sadly it gave the impression to many non-MBAA players that the game was very broken. I feel that LK should have chosen a different character, like C-Warc, after he lost the first set, since Garu plays regularly with the best Japanese H-Kohaku, Hagi. It would have also made the grand finals a lot more interesting as well.
Melty getting into this year's EVO was kind of a miracle, and I don't see Melty getting back in ever again, but it seems like the game was able to make an overall good impression. From what I heard, Garu and Chelsea seemed to have a very good time so maybe they can encourage more Japanese players to travel over here in the future.
Melty had 146 entrants, so it was divided into 4 pools. Unfortunately Pool 1 and 4 were extremely stacked, so many good players weren't able to make it to Top 8. Sadly Melty got no stream time at all pre-Top 8, which was expected, but EVO also did not let the community set up their own personal streams because of G4 or something like that... pretty dumb if you ask me.
Garu and Chelsea from Japan were able to make it over for this event, which is pretty amazing. On Thursday night, Tempered set up a casuals stream and Garu basically ran a train on everyone, only losing once to Brandino during a 4-5 hour period. Before coming over, Garu stated on IRC that he was starting to play H-Kohaku more than his main(H-VSion), but I was expecting him to play HVS over here since he would be more familiar with the character. H-VSion is also considerably easier to play, and I thought that Garu would get frustrated over the PS2 input buffer and not play H-Kohaku. But he proved me wrong and stuck to his guns, and also played a bit of H-Shiki as well.
Chelsea is Garu's friend, and is nowhere near as well known but he has appeared in a couple of videos. He plays F-Arc in videos, but he was able to run a bunch of characters at EVO like C-Shiki, C-Arc, and C-Sion. I was expecting him to be a bit stronger, but he ended up being about mid-level by US standards. Chelsea however was hilarious and provided some amazing commentary, and it seemed like everybody really enjoyed hanging out with him.
The final top 8 for Melty was pretty much what I expected, although I was expecting bell and sp00ky to get farther in their pools. Top 8 for Melty was unfortunately streamed first on Sunday at 10AM in the morning, but people were able to get up for it and I think it peaked at around 14K viewers. Stream was handled very well, though apparently the player camera was broken so we couldn't get shots of player reactions and the commentator's table like all the other games. bell did a great job commentating and keeping it clean for the EVO stream, but Sp00ky was obviously very tired from streaming SSFIV the previous night so he was pretty quiet. Some people captured some of the matches of the stream and put them on Youtube, but the vids are mostly 1)incomplete and/or 2)bad quality. Luckily someone saved it on JustinTV.
http://www.justin.tv/unowner/b/266597281
http://www.justin.tv/unowner/b/266603408
Very exciting Top 8, as almost every match was amazing. Unfortunately the Grand finals between LordKnight and Garu was terrible as not only was it an H-Kohaku mirror, both players' execution just went down the drain so it was dropped combos everywhere. Very ugly finals, and sadly it gave the impression to many non-MBAA players that the game was very broken. I feel that LK should have chosen a different character, like C-Warc, after he lost the first set, since Garu plays regularly with the best Japanese H-Kohaku, Hagi. It would have also made the grand finals a lot more interesting as well.
Melty getting into this year's EVO was kind of a miracle, and I don't see Melty getting back in ever again, but it seems like the game was able to make an overall good impression. From what I heard, Garu and Chelsea seemed to have a very good time so maybe they can encourage more Japanese players to travel over here in the future.
Wednesday, July 7, 2010
BlazBlue
BB is Arc Systems Works' newest fighting game series. From the very beginning, it looked to be very Guilty Gear inspired, from the artstyle down to the character designs, Ragna and Jin being the most obvious. Many people thought it was going to be Guilty Gear's successor, but it turned out to be a very different game.
My opinion of BlazBlue is of intense disappointment. I really wanted to like the game, and I had a lot of faith that it was going to be great since the creators of Guilty Gear were making it. Anyway, I guess I'll start with what Blazblue did right.
The presentation and graphics. The game looks gorgeous, the sprites are really detailed, and like Guilty Gear there's an all-star voice acting cast to support the characters. All of the winscreens are voiced, and Rachel, Litchi, Ragna, and Taokaka in particular have great performances.
The amount of support that ArcSys and its American counterpart AkSys are pouring into promoting the game is amazing. I really wish that all fighting games had the same advertising campaign as BB. To mention only a few things, BB has a semi-frequent radio show called Bururaji, it has an official comic that is also translated, the BB website has 4komas and also has special images everytime a character's birthday comes up, and the limited edition American release of the game came with a tutorial DVD created by the top US Blazblue players.
BB also has, without a doubt, the best console port of a fighting game I have ever seen. The netplay is good(for console fighting game standards, at least), the training mode is great and has tons of options, and lastly I should mention the story mode. While BB's story isn't exactly a very deep one, it avoids the story that 99% of all other fighting games have, where someone organizes a big tournament to see who's the strongest warrior or whatnot. The story mode in BB is perfectly executed, as a somewhat complex plot like BB's is best told in the visual novel style. The Teach Me Miss Litchi tutorial segments are also golden.
Unfortunately, the good stuff ends here. BB fails in the most important department, which is its merit as a fighting game. As a fighting game, BB is terrible: it is not fun to play or watch, the gameplay is clunky, and characters spend way too much time in the air as opposed to the ground. The game honestly reminds me much more of Melty Blood than it does Guilty Gear. It's really clear that Mori wanted to make BB a very different game than GG; however, I get the impression that some of his design decisions were made just for the sake of being different, without really thinking them through. One prime example is being able to throw during hit and blockstun, which is pretty much unheard of in fighting games. While this doesn't seem like a big deal at first because of the much wider throw break window for these type of throws, it led to things like Carl's clap-loop infinite in Calamity Trigger. The burst system was horribly handled in CT, and the new bursts are just as bad in CS.
I also have to mention the ukemi system. There are no true knockdowns in BlazBlue, as every knockdown that can't be comboed after is ground techable and rollable, like Vampire Savior. While this doesn't seem like a problem at first, it is indeed one because BB is a very slow paced game. Many characters can't punish tech rolls, and the slow nature of the game makes it very difficult to maintain offense after an opponent rolling, in contrast to Vampire Savior where the attacker can still maintain pressure after a roll because of the frantic pacing. This pretty much makes BB have very little in the way of okizeme, with some exceptions. In an interview with Mori before the first iteration of BB came out, he stated that he did not want the game to center around okizeme and knockdowns, so it seems this was intentional. He probably wanted the game to not be as momentum based as Guilty Gear, and have the focus be in the neutral game. However, it doesn't work out because the neutral game is extremely shallow and sluggish, as jumping is way too strong and throws are terrible.
The balance in BB is also really terrible. In both Calamity Trigger and Continuum Shift, it's the case of the top tier characters being really good and braindead, while the bottom tier characters are horrible. The gaps between the tiers are huge and the tournament results are a good reflection of this.
BB is also pretty notorious for being an extremely easy game, lowering the execution requirements a la Street Fighter IV. While I don't exactly have a problem with making games easier, I do feel that BB went too far in lowering the execution barrier. Not every game has to be as hard as Hokuto no Ken or Eternal Fighter Zero, but being able to hold a button for 5 frames to get a repeat input is silly, and the easy barrier/throw option select on defense makes blocking way too strong in this already slow paced game.
I should also mention the sound in this game.. to be more specific, the voice looping. BB has the worst voice looping I have ever heard in any fighting game. Characters talk way too much, as they have voice clips every time they attack, move, and block. They even say stuff when they're idle. Voice clips repeat and cut each other off. For example, a character that has the clip "Muda yo" when blocking... if you made them block a multi hit blockstring, you would then hear something like m-m-m-mu-mu-muda yo. Rachel is easily the biggest offender, since there's basically three people talking everytime she does something.
So yes, disappointment. Or rather, wasted potential. There are so many good things about BlazBlue(like Litchi!), but unfortunately BB fails when it comes to the most important things about fighting games: the gameplay. I remember when people were just discovering the little details of the plot and the game presentation(like all the character specific quotes and the intricate story mode), calling BB a fighting game with visual novel elements. However, the way the game is now, it's really the other way around.
My opinion of BlazBlue is of intense disappointment. I really wanted to like the game, and I had a lot of faith that it was going to be great since the creators of Guilty Gear were making it. Anyway, I guess I'll start with what Blazblue did right.
The presentation and graphics. The game looks gorgeous, the sprites are really detailed, and like Guilty Gear there's an all-star voice acting cast to support the characters. All of the winscreens are voiced, and Rachel, Litchi, Ragna, and Taokaka in particular have great performances.
The amount of support that ArcSys and its American counterpart AkSys are pouring into promoting the game is amazing. I really wish that all fighting games had the same advertising campaign as BB. To mention only a few things, BB has a semi-frequent radio show called Bururaji, it has an official comic that is also translated, the BB website has 4komas and also has special images everytime a character's birthday comes up, and the limited edition American release of the game came with a tutorial DVD created by the top US Blazblue players.
BB also has, without a doubt, the best console port of a fighting game I have ever seen. The netplay is good(for console fighting game standards, at least), the training mode is great and has tons of options, and lastly I should mention the story mode. While BB's story isn't exactly a very deep one, it avoids the story that 99% of all other fighting games have, where someone organizes a big tournament to see who's the strongest warrior or whatnot. The story mode in BB is perfectly executed, as a somewhat complex plot like BB's is best told in the visual novel style. The Teach Me Miss Litchi tutorial segments are also golden.
Unfortunately, the good stuff ends here. BB fails in the most important department, which is its merit as a fighting game. As a fighting game, BB is terrible: it is not fun to play or watch, the gameplay is clunky, and characters spend way too much time in the air as opposed to the ground. The game honestly reminds me much more of Melty Blood than it does Guilty Gear. It's really clear that Mori wanted to make BB a very different game than GG; however, I get the impression that some of his design decisions were made just for the sake of being different, without really thinking them through. One prime example is being able to throw during hit and blockstun, which is pretty much unheard of in fighting games. While this doesn't seem like a big deal at first because of the much wider throw break window for these type of throws, it led to things like Carl's clap-loop infinite in Calamity Trigger. The burst system was horribly handled in CT, and the new bursts are just as bad in CS.
I also have to mention the ukemi system. There are no true knockdowns in BlazBlue, as every knockdown that can't be comboed after is ground techable and rollable, like Vampire Savior. While this doesn't seem like a problem at first, it is indeed one because BB is a very slow paced game. Many characters can't punish tech rolls, and the slow nature of the game makes it very difficult to maintain offense after an opponent rolling, in contrast to Vampire Savior where the attacker can still maintain pressure after a roll because of the frantic pacing. This pretty much makes BB have very little in the way of okizeme, with some exceptions. In an interview with Mori before the first iteration of BB came out, he stated that he did not want the game to center around okizeme and knockdowns, so it seems this was intentional. He probably wanted the game to not be as momentum based as Guilty Gear, and have the focus be in the neutral game. However, it doesn't work out because the neutral game is extremely shallow and sluggish, as jumping is way too strong and throws are terrible.
The balance in BB is also really terrible. In both Calamity Trigger and Continuum Shift, it's the case of the top tier characters being really good and braindead, while the bottom tier characters are horrible. The gaps between the tiers are huge and the tournament results are a good reflection of this.
BB is also pretty notorious for being an extremely easy game, lowering the execution requirements a la Street Fighter IV. While I don't exactly have a problem with making games easier, I do feel that BB went too far in lowering the execution barrier. Not every game has to be as hard as Hokuto no Ken or Eternal Fighter Zero, but being able to hold a button for 5 frames to get a repeat input is silly, and the easy barrier/throw option select on defense makes blocking way too strong in this already slow paced game.
I should also mention the sound in this game.. to be more specific, the voice looping. BB has the worst voice looping I have ever heard in any fighting game. Characters talk way too much, as they have voice clips every time they attack, move, and block. They even say stuff when they're idle. Voice clips repeat and cut each other off. For example, a character that has the clip "Muda yo" when blocking... if you made them block a multi hit blockstring, you would then hear something like m-m-m-mu-mu-muda yo. Rachel is easily the biggest offender, since there's basically three people talking everytime she does something.
So yes, disappointment. Or rather, wasted potential. There are so many good things about BlazBlue(like Litchi!), but unfortunately BB fails when it comes to the most important things about fighting games: the gameplay. I remember when people were just discovering the little details of the plot and the game presentation(like all the character specific quotes and the intricate story mode), calling BB a fighting game with visual novel elements. However, the way the game is now, it's really the other way around.
Thursday, July 1, 2010
Utattemita (Part 2)
Some of my favorite covers and originals are:
メルト (Melt)
Vocaloid: Hatsune Miku
Music and Lyrics by: ryo of supercell
ガゼル (Gazelle) cover, 3M mix
ちょうちょ (Choucho) cover, 3M mix
rockleetist cover, 3M mix and English translated lyrics
Gazelle's version is the classic one and easily the most well known cover of Melt. Melt is a ridiculously difficult song, and it's amazing how she can hit all the high notes during the chorus without destroying her voice. Choucho's cover is also amazing, though her voice does falter a bit during some of the high parts. I also included rockleetist's english cover because she does a good job singing it and the english translation is really good.
Just Be Friends
Vocaloid: Megurine Luka
Music and Lyrics by: Dixie Flatline
ちょうちょ (Choucho) cover
うさ (Usa) cover, Band Edition
rockleetist cover, English translated lyrics
Legendary Luka song, the song is about breakup if you can't tell from the title. Choucho's cover is my personal favorite, but Usa's is also really good as I love the Band edition. Also posted rockleetist's cover to see just how depressing the lyrics are! I could never have guessed how sad the song was before I read those lyrics, since the song is so upbeat. However, rockleetist did take a few liberties with the translation, since JBF is originally written from the guy's point of view, but she rewrote the lyrics from the girl's POV. Some people have a big problem with this, but I don't mind it since sometimes it has to be done to keep rhyme and meter.
ルカルカ★ナイトフィーバー (Luka Luka Night Fever)
Vocaloid: Megurine Luka
Music and Lyrics by: samfree
実谷なな (Mitani Nana) cover
Luka Luka Night Fever is a eurobeat song describing her nightlife. I'm not a big fan of eurobeat(I can't stand it, actually), but this song is pretty well written and it fits Luka rather well. This song got so popular that the people on nico actually went and created an elaborate dance routine for it. There's also a vid of Nana Mitani herself trying to dance to herself singing it(by recording, of course).
初めての恋が終わる時 (Hajimete no Koi ga Owaru Toki, or Hatsukoi)
Vocaloid: Hatsune Miku
Music and Lyrics by: ryo of supercell
ちょうちょ (Choucho) cover
IMO the best cover that Choucho has done and the best cover of this particular song. Not much to say, it's a beautiful song and Choucho's performance is spotless as always. I'm not really sure what the song is about that, since the lyrics are kind of vague.
MEGANE
Vocaloid: Megurine Luka
Music and Lyrics by: ultra-noob
ゆず茶 (Yuzucha) cover
Megane is a fairly obscure Luka song. If you think girls with glasses are hot, this is the song for you. I actually don't like Yuzucha very much, but her cover of Megane is pretty much perfect.
ブラック★ロックシューター (Black Rock Shooter)
Vocaloid: Hatsune Miku
Music and Lyrics by: ryo of supercell
ちょうちょ (Choucho) cover, Band Edition
Another legendary Vocaloid song from ryo, this song got so popular that there's going to be an anime about it.
ggrks-ググれカス- (Gugure Kasu)
Vocaloid: Megurine Luka and Kamui Gakupo
Music and Lyrics by: Aamin-P
ヲタみん (Wotamin) and clear cover
This is a really cute song about a guy hitting on a girl on the Internet, asking her silly and personal questions, while the girl responds everytime with Gugure Kasu(Just google it, you moron). Tsundere Luka is delicious, and so is Wotamin's performance.
ワールドイズマイン (World Is Mine)
Vocaloid: Hatsune Miku
Music and Lyrics by: ryo of supercell
うさ (Usa) cover
Quintessential tsundere Miku song portraying her as a princess falling in love.
恋は戦争 (Koi wa Sensou)
Vocaloid: Hatsune Miku
Music and Lyrics by: ryo of supercell
Fye cover
This is an intense song about Miku declaring that one must fight for love. The most popular cover of this song by a Japanese nico artist is Yamai's, but I actually don't like it all that much. I think the best cover is done by Fye, who is actually Russian. Her pronunciation is really good, though not perfect, but it's her performance that blows the other covers out of the water imo.
ニコニコ観測(ββ) (Nico Nico Kansoku)
Based on the song 天体観測 (Tentai Kansoku) by BUMP OF CHICKEN
recog
This is a hilarious song about the life of a nico addict. I can totally relate to it since I spend way too much time on nico myself.
Super Mario RPG Rawest Forest
Based on the song "Rawest Forest" by Martin Hagwell, video by Kirbopher15
"Rawest Forest" an arranged version of 森のキノコにご用心 (Beware the Forest's Mushrooms) on the Super Mario RPG OST
僕太 (Bokuta) cover
One of the coolest things ever. Rawest Forest was a song based on the Forest Maze music from SMRPG about the joys of playing the game. Kirbopher15 made a flash video of it that can still be viewed on Newgrounds, and this video apparently got so popular on Nico that people started covering it.
組曲『ウメハラ動画』 (Kumikyoku Umehara Douga)
Based on the song 組曲『ニコニコ動画』 (Kumikyoku Niconico Douga)
僕太 (Bokuta) cover
This is a hilarious song about the greatness of Daigo Umehara and his dominance in the fighting game scene. The song is based on the that big nico medley that was popular a few years ago. The modified lyrics were written by somebody else; Bokuta supplied the vocals.
メルト (Melt)
Vocaloid: Hatsune Miku
Music and Lyrics by: ryo of supercell
ガゼル (Gazelle) cover, 3M mix
ちょうちょ (Choucho) cover, 3M mix
rockleetist cover, 3M mix and English translated lyrics
Gazelle's version is the classic one and easily the most well known cover of Melt. Melt is a ridiculously difficult song, and it's amazing how she can hit all the high notes during the chorus without destroying her voice. Choucho's cover is also amazing, though her voice does falter a bit during some of the high parts. I also included rockleetist's english cover because she does a good job singing it and the english translation is really good.
Just Be Friends
Vocaloid: Megurine Luka
Music and Lyrics by: Dixie Flatline
ちょうちょ (Choucho) cover
うさ (Usa) cover, Band Edition
rockleetist cover, English translated lyrics
Legendary Luka song, the song is about breakup if you can't tell from the title. Choucho's cover is my personal favorite, but Usa's is also really good as I love the Band edition. Also posted rockleetist's cover to see just how depressing the lyrics are! I could never have guessed how sad the song was before I read those lyrics, since the song is so upbeat. However, rockleetist did take a few liberties with the translation, since JBF is originally written from the guy's point of view, but she rewrote the lyrics from the girl's POV. Some people have a big problem with this, but I don't mind it since sometimes it has to be done to keep rhyme and meter.
ルカルカ★ナイトフィーバー (Luka Luka Night Fever)
Vocaloid: Megurine Luka
Music and Lyrics by: samfree
実谷なな (Mitani Nana) cover
Luka Luka Night Fever is a eurobeat song describing her nightlife. I'm not a big fan of eurobeat(I can't stand it, actually), but this song is pretty well written and it fits Luka rather well. This song got so popular that the people on nico actually went and created an elaborate dance routine for it. There's also a vid of Nana Mitani herself trying to dance to herself singing it(by recording, of course).
初めての恋が終わる時 (Hajimete no Koi ga Owaru Toki, or Hatsukoi)
Vocaloid: Hatsune Miku
Music and Lyrics by: ryo of supercell
ちょうちょ (Choucho) cover
IMO the best cover that Choucho has done and the best cover of this particular song. Not much to say, it's a beautiful song and Choucho's performance is spotless as always. I'm not really sure what the song is about that, since the lyrics are kind of vague.
MEGANE
Vocaloid: Megurine Luka
Music and Lyrics by: ultra-noob
ゆず茶 (Yuzucha) cover
Megane is a fairly obscure Luka song. If you think girls with glasses are hot, this is the song for you. I actually don't like Yuzucha very much, but her cover of Megane is pretty much perfect.
ブラック★ロックシューター (Black Rock Shooter)
Vocaloid: Hatsune Miku
Music and Lyrics by: ryo of supercell
ちょうちょ (Choucho) cover, Band Edition
Another legendary Vocaloid song from ryo, this song got so popular that there's going to be an anime about it.
ggrks-ググれカス- (Gugure Kasu)
Vocaloid: Megurine Luka and Kamui Gakupo
Music and Lyrics by: Aamin-P
ヲタみん (Wotamin) and clear cover
This is a really cute song about a guy hitting on a girl on the Internet, asking her silly and personal questions, while the girl responds everytime with Gugure Kasu(Just google it, you moron). Tsundere Luka is delicious, and so is Wotamin's performance.
ワールドイズマイン (World Is Mine)
Vocaloid: Hatsune Miku
Music and Lyrics by: ryo of supercell
うさ (Usa) cover
Quintessential tsundere Miku song portraying her as a princess falling in love.
恋は戦争 (Koi wa Sensou)
Vocaloid: Hatsune Miku
Music and Lyrics by: ryo of supercell
Fye cover
This is an intense song about Miku declaring that one must fight for love. The most popular cover of this song by a Japanese nico artist is Yamai's, but I actually don't like it all that much. I think the best cover is done by Fye, who is actually Russian. Her pronunciation is really good, though not perfect, but it's her performance that blows the other covers out of the water imo.
ニコニコ観測(ββ) (Nico Nico Kansoku)
Based on the song 天体観測 (Tentai Kansoku) by BUMP OF CHICKEN
recog
This is a hilarious song about the life of a nico addict. I can totally relate to it since I spend way too much time on nico myself.
Super Mario RPG Rawest Forest
Based on the song "Rawest Forest" by Martin Hagwell, video by Kirbopher15
"Rawest Forest" an arranged version of 森のキノコにご用心 (Beware the Forest's Mushrooms) on the Super Mario RPG OST
僕太 (Bokuta) cover
One of the coolest things ever. Rawest Forest was a song based on the Forest Maze music from SMRPG about the joys of playing the game. Kirbopher15 made a flash video of it that can still be viewed on Newgrounds, and this video apparently got so popular on Nico that people started covering it.
組曲『ウメハラ動画』 (Kumikyoku Umehara Douga)
Based on the song 組曲『ニコニコ動画』 (Kumikyoku Niconico Douga)
僕太 (Bokuta) cover
This is a hilarious song about the greatness of Daigo Umehara and his dominance in the fighting game scene. The song is based on the that big nico medley that was popular a few years ago. The modified lyrics were written by somebody else; Bokuta supplied the vocals.
Tuesday, June 29, 2010
Utattemita (Part 1)
歌ってみた, or utattemita, was something I discovered last year. It roughly translates to "to try singing", and it's the category on ニコニコ動画(nico nico douga) where people record themselves singing popular songs. So it's like karaoke, basically. Supposedly in the old days, most people on utattemita did anime song covers, but nowadays it's mostly Vocaloid songs.
I'm actually not a fan of Vocaloid at all. Well, I really like Megurine Luka, but I can't stand hearing any of the vocaloids sing because well... they're computer programs. No matter how good the songs are, it sounds terrible to me whenever that robotic voice is singing. However, Vocaloid is remarkable because it allows people with a lot of talent to create songs and share their works with other people when they normally wouldn't have been able to, either because of the composer's own inability to sing or the difficulty in finding a person willing to sing. Similarly utattemita is great because it allows amateur singers a chance to shine with some really professional sounding works(it's not hard at all to record yourself singing and then layer it over an off-vocal track).
So I first discovered utattemita last year when I watched a really good Toradora Ami MAD, which can be viewed here. The song used in this video is "World Is Mine" sung by Usa. I was really interested as to who sung the song, so I did some research and the rest, as they say, is history.
Some of my favorite female singers in utattemita are:
ちょうちょ (Choucho)
Easily my favorite nico singer, she has a really pretty voice, amazing range, and she's quite cute to boot. Her most famous cover is Miku Hatsune's Last Night, Good Night, but I think the best cover that she's done is Hatsukoi.
うさ (Usa)
Another fairly famous singer, her range isn't on the same level as Choucho's, but she's a great singer and has some really good material. Her singing voice(which is somewhat high and cutesy) is actually really different from her normal voice(which is really deep), but there are some songs where she sings in that deep voice. She does doujin music work under the name Hana, and also has a band with Yamai, Tolie, and other singers called Usa Colony. Her most famous covers are of World Is Mine and Dear.
ヤマイ (Yamai)
Yamai is another very famous singer. She has a nice deep voice, but her range is pretty good and the image I get from hearing her voice is that of the beautiful older sister. She's done a lot of Meiko covers in the past, which might be the reason why some people call her the real-life version of Meiko. She and Usa do radio shows together pretty often, and they act pretty yuri together. Whether it's real or if it's just teasing the fans will never be known, but it's definitely delicious~ Yamai's blog is also really cool because she puts up lots of WIP pieces of her songs, so you can hear how much they change in the final product.
ガゼル (Gazelle)
Gazelle is a legendary nico singer that unfortunately doesn't upload any more covers because of some drama. She has a clear, beautiful voice, and has covered some great material. Her most famous cover is Melt, both the original and the 3M mix. Even though she's quit nico, she still does work as a doujin artist under the name Yanagi Nagi. But most notably, she's actually somewhat broken into the mainstream, being the vocalist for the group supercell. Bakemonogatari's legendary ending theme is sung by her.
ヲタみん (Wotamin)
Not much to say... she's a great singer, has covered A LOT of material and releases new covers pretty frequently. She seems to like singing Luka material. Her most famous song is actually a duet with clear on the song ggrks.
As for male singers
I don't actually listen to male singers, for whatever reason... it might be because I don't like any of the songs that were composed for the male vocaloids, and it feels weird to hear a male sing a song that was composed for a female vocaloid. So basically, all of the male singers I like are ones that do parodies or come up with original songs.
ヒャダイン (Hyadain)
Linked his user profile because there's no mylist that contains all of his songs. Hyadain is hilarious and mostly creates songs based on existing videogame pieces. Most of his works have become wildly popular everywhere, evidenced by the sheer amount of Youtube vids of his works with foreign language subs in them. He's a very good singer, and is also really good at singing as a female as well. His most famous song is his original composition about Street Fighter II, which incorporates various sound effects from the game and has him singing as every character in the game.
recog
recog is another great singer that mainly does parody songs. My favorite recog piece is Nico Nico Kansoku, a song about the life of a nico addict, parodying Bump of Chicken's Tentai Kansoku.
I'm actually not a fan of Vocaloid at all. Well, I really like Megurine Luka, but I can't stand hearing any of the vocaloids sing because well... they're computer programs. No matter how good the songs are, it sounds terrible to me whenever that robotic voice is singing. However, Vocaloid is remarkable because it allows people with a lot of talent to create songs and share their works with other people when they normally wouldn't have been able to, either because of the composer's own inability to sing or the difficulty in finding a person willing to sing. Similarly utattemita is great because it allows amateur singers a chance to shine with some really professional sounding works(it's not hard at all to record yourself singing and then layer it over an off-vocal track).
So I first discovered utattemita last year when I watched a really good Toradora Ami MAD, which can be viewed here. The song used in this video is "World Is Mine" sung by Usa. I was really interested as to who sung the song, so I did some research and the rest, as they say, is history.
Some of my favorite female singers in utattemita are:
ちょうちょ (Choucho)
Easily my favorite nico singer, she has a really pretty voice, amazing range, and she's quite cute to boot. Her most famous cover is Miku Hatsune's Last Night, Good Night, but I think the best cover that she's done is Hatsukoi.
うさ (Usa)
Another fairly famous singer, her range isn't on the same level as Choucho's, but she's a great singer and has some really good material. Her singing voice(which is somewhat high and cutesy) is actually really different from her normal voice(which is really deep), but there are some songs where she sings in that deep voice. She does doujin music work under the name Hana, and also has a band with Yamai, Tolie, and other singers called Usa Colony. Her most famous covers are of World Is Mine and Dear.
ヤマイ (Yamai)
Yamai is another very famous singer. She has a nice deep voice, but her range is pretty good and the image I get from hearing her voice is that of the beautiful older sister. She's done a lot of Meiko covers in the past, which might be the reason why some people call her the real-life version of Meiko. She and Usa do radio shows together pretty often, and they act pretty yuri together. Whether it's real or if it's just teasing the fans will never be known, but it's definitely delicious~ Yamai's blog is also really cool because she puts up lots of WIP pieces of her songs, so you can hear how much they change in the final product.
ガゼル (Gazelle)
Gazelle is a legendary nico singer that unfortunately doesn't upload any more covers because of some drama. She has a clear, beautiful voice, and has covered some great material. Her most famous cover is Melt, both the original and the 3M mix. Even though she's quit nico, she still does work as a doujin artist under the name Yanagi Nagi. But most notably, she's actually somewhat broken into the mainstream, being the vocalist for the group supercell. Bakemonogatari's legendary ending theme is sung by her.
ヲタみん (Wotamin)
Not much to say... she's a great singer, has covered A LOT of material and releases new covers pretty frequently. She seems to like singing Luka material. Her most famous song is actually a duet with clear on the song ggrks.
As for male singers
I don't actually listen to male singers, for whatever reason... it might be because I don't like any of the songs that were composed for the male vocaloids, and it feels weird to hear a male sing a song that was composed for a female vocaloid. So basically, all of the male singers I like are ones that do parodies or come up with original songs.
ヒャダイン (Hyadain)
Linked his user profile because there's no mylist that contains all of his songs. Hyadain is hilarious and mostly creates songs based on existing videogame pieces. Most of his works have become wildly popular everywhere, evidenced by the sheer amount of Youtube vids of his works with foreign language subs in them. He's a very good singer, and is also really good at singing as a female as well. His most famous song is his original composition about Street Fighter II, which incorporates various sound effects from the game and has him singing as every character in the game.
recog
recog is another great singer that mainly does parody songs. My favorite recog piece is Nico Nico Kansoku, a song about the life of a nico addict, parodying Bump of Chicken's Tentai Kansoku.
Monday, June 28, 2010
History of Melty Tiers
I'm mainly making this post because there's no page on the Internet out there that documents all of the "official" or accepted tier lists of the game, so hopefully the search engines will pick this up so that more misinformation doesn't get spread. But it's also interesting because it shows which characters have historically been favored by the designers.
I don't think there were any tiers in the very early versions of Melty Blood, because the game was full of so much broken stuff that no one really bothered. The earlist semblance of tiers I remember were in ReACT, a bit before Final Tuned 2.501b. Akiha was undisputed #1, as her high damage output, clash frames on 2c, high/low mixup, and best defense modifier made her easily the most complete character in the game. I remember watching tournament replays during this time and seeing that half of all vids were Akiha mirrors. Warc, Shiki Tohno, and the maid part were also considered pretty good during this time.
Now comes the main games, where MB was no longer a doujin game anywhere and became an arcade game.
Melty Blood Act Cadenza Version A
The only tier list made during this time was from Arcadia... forgot which issue it was from.
S: Warc Shiki
A: Sion Satsuki VAkiha
B: Arc Wara Nero Akiha Maids Nanaya
C: Aoko Kouma Mech Len Ciel VSion Miyako Kohaku Hisui
D: Neco
Pretty similar to the ReACT list... the main difference is Akiha moving down to B. Warc was S because of ease of use, very high damage, and unbeatable normals. Her j.b throughout the entire MB series is arguably the best, or one of the best air normals in the game, and it was at its peak in this version, with the fastest startup and containing clash frames. Shiki was also rated high because of high damage, ease of use, good normals, good defensive options(easily the best backdash in the game), and good defense modifier. Sion was interesting because she wasn't considered S tier, but was the only character in the game to have a reliable infinite. Satsuki was really silly in this version, as her normals had very little proration, so her damage potential was through the roof. She got minimum 4K damage from her antiair 5a mash into EX Tornado Grab. Finally, there's VAkiha, who had unparalleled rushdown, movement, and damage/lifeleech potential with her EX pits and throw.
Melty Blood Act Cadenza Version B
There were no official tierlists done for this version of this game as it was rather short lived. However, Sion and Kouma were undisputedly top tier because of an oversight by the game developers in superarmor properties. Specifically Sion 2c and Kouma 236 specials had superarmor that pretty much lasted the entire duration and started up immediately.
Melty Blood Act Cadenza Version B2
This version has several tierlists done for it, as the game lasted a long time and is the final game in the Act Cadenza series. Earliest list comes from Tougeki Damashii Volume 5.
A: Sion Akiha VAkiha Kouma Ciel Len
B: Hisui Mech
C: Everybody else
D: Necos
Main interesting thing to note here is Ciel and Len rising to top tier. Ciel in this version was pretty much the most well rounded character: she had an answer to everything. Len was a different case, as she gained some very strong tools in VerB2 and her gameplay was getting a lot of development(she was one of the more underused chars in previous versions).
The Japanese MBAC BBS eventually agreed upon another tier list some time later, which is:
S: Sion Len Ciel Warc Miyako Akiha
A: Hisui Kouma VSion Mech
B: VAkiha Arc Aoko Nanaya Shiki Nero Satsuki Maids
C: Kohaku Wara WLen
D: Necos
Main thing to note is Miyako rising to S. She gained some very good tools in VerB2, and people were finally beginning to understand how to play her.
Later on, around January of 2008 Tougeki Damashii published a matchup chart created by 46 top Japanese players. It can be viewed here.
The final official tier list for this game was made around May of 2008. Since I actually have the original text I thought I'd post it:
参加者 20人
かんな、すずめ、にく、ぶぶ、はぎ、ぼぶ、ゆとり、芳乃、SAT、スシ、ひでぶ、かいまーと、洋、レオ、はと、千神、あげは、丸やん、ねむとら、レイ
方式は前と同じで適当にS、A、B、Cで分けて貰ってSが4点、Aが3点、Bが2点、Cが1点といった感じでランク分けは四捨五入で
Ｓ:シエル(79)、レン(77)、シオン(74)、ワルク(73)
Ａ:都古(66)、秋葉 (64)、メカ翡翠(63)、軋間(57)、翡翠(55)、ネロ(51)
Ｂ:Vシオン(45)、七夜(42)、アルク(42)、さつき(39)、青子(37)、赤主(34)
Ｃ:ヒスコハ(25)、志貴(25)、ワラキア(23)、白レン(22)、琥珀(22)
Basically what happened is that top Japanese Miyako player Kanna asked 20 top japanese players to rank every character, and he averaged those results to make a tier list. Characters were rated from S(4 points) to C(1 point). The top JP players that participated were:
Kanna, Surume, Niku, Bubu, Hagi, Bobu, Yutori, Yoshino, SAT, Sushi, Hidebu, Kaimaato, You, Leo, Hato, Chikami, Ageha, Maruyan, Nemutora, Rei
S: Ciel(79) Len(77) Sion(74) Warc(73)
A: Miyako(66) Akiha(64) Mech(63) Kouma(57) Hisui(55) Nero(51)
B: VSion(45) Nanaya(42) Arc(42) Satsuki(39) Aoko(37) VAkiha(34)
C: Maids(25) Shiki(25) Wara(23) WLen(22) Kohaku(22)
Main point of interest is that throughout most of VerB2's lifespan, Sion was undisputed #1 for her unrivalled damage, strong pressure, good normals, and defensive options. Only in the final year of the game(when this list was released) was she considered lower than Ciel and Len.
Moving on to Actress Again...
Melty Blood Actress Again
Only one tier list for this game as it was incredibly broken and very much an incomplete game. This list made by Yukinose, and published in either Arcadia or Tougeki Damashii, I don't remember which.
S: H-Akiha H-Shiki H-Nero H-Wara H-Ries H-Aoko
A: C-Ciel C-Mech C-WLen F-Kouma H-Roa H-Sion H-VSion C-Arc H-Nanaya C-Warc H-VAkiha C-Kohaku
B: H-Hisui C-Maids C-Miyako H-Len C-Satsuki
It's very obvious that Half Moon is broken in vanilla MBAA. Instant life regen on autoheat and ridiculous meter gain on all 6aa combos made them way too strong.
Melty Blood Actress Again Version A
There are numerous official and accepted tier lists for this game, as it's been out for a while. The first one was made in February of 2009, and the process was very similar to the final tier list of MBAC. I also have the original text, so here goes:
キャラランク（そのキャラの1番強いと思うスタイルでのランク）
猫アルクは強い弱い関係なしに欄外
A、B、Cで分ける（個人的にVER.Bよりも差がないと感じるので）
Aを3点、Bを2点、Cを1点として加算。
A:Vシオン（59）、メカ翡翠（58）、志貴（54）、ネロ（54）、七夜（53）、琥珀（53）
B:都古（49）、ワルク（41）、ヒスコハ（40）、アルク（40）、白レン（38）、翡翠（38）、シエル（37）、軋間（36）、青子（36）、リーズ（35）、さつき（35）、赤主（34）、シオン（32）、ロア（31）、秋葉（30）、ワラキア（30）
C:レン（23）
参加者（敬称略）:かんな、レイ、かいまーと、うどんげ、丸やん、SAT、芳乃、がる、シュウ、めっしい、ジン、キリト、ぶぶ、平田、ぼぶ、するめ、にく、新屋、深空、洋
聞いてない人に会った際にランクを聞いてまた更新する可能性もありますが、おそらく更新はしないと思われます。
Compiled by 20 top jp players, characters were rated from A(3 points) to C(1 point)
Players: Kanna, Rei, Kaimaato, Udonge, Maruyan, SAT, Yoshino, Garu, Shuu, Messhii, Jin, Kirito, Bubu, Hirata, Bobu, Surume, Niku, Niiya, Misora, You
A: VSion(59) Mech(58) Shiki(54) Nero(54) Nanaya(53) Kohaku(53)
B: Miyako(49) Warc(41) Maids(40) Arc(40) White Ren(38) Hisui(38) Ciel(37) Kouma(36) Aoko(36) Ries(35) Satsuki(35) VAkiha(34) Sion(32) Roa(31) Akiha(30) Wara(30)
C: Ren(23)
Those characters in the top 7-8 would remain very consistent throughout the game's lifespan, the main exception being Nanaya who would eventually start moving down about a year later. Also notable is Akiha's extremely low ranking.
A month later, the first tier list that actually separated all the moon phase versions of the characters was made. I forgot who actually wrote it, though.
S: H-VSion C-Mech H/C-Shiki F-Nero H-Kohaku F-Miyako
A+: C-Nanaya C-Warc
A: F/C-Kouma C/H-Nero C/F-Kohaku F-Mech
A-: F-Maids C/H-Miyako F-Warc F-WLen H-Nanaya C-Ciel C-Aoko F-Arc F-VAkiha H-Roa C-Satsuki F-Shiki H/F-Sion C-Hisui
B+: Akiha C/H-Maids H/F-Ries F/C-VSion H-VAkiha F-Nanaya
B: H-Warc H-Hisui C/F-Wara H/C-Arc F/H-Ciel H-Mech C-Sion H-Kouma C/H-WLen F-Aoko
B-: H-Wara H/F-Ren C-Ries F-Roa H-Satsuki F-Hisui H-Aoko C-VAkiha
C+: F-Satsuki C-Ren C-Roa
Later on, Arcadia published a tier list made by MBAC top VAkiha/MBAA top Shiki player Hato in their August issue.
God: H-VSion
S: C-Mech
A: F/H-Nero H/C-Shiki C/H-Kohaku C/F-Miyako C-Nanaya C/F-Maids
B: F/H-Aoko C-Warc F-VAkiha H-Hisui F-WLen C-Satsuki C-Sion F-Arc
C: C-Ciel F-Kouma F-Ries C-Wara C/H-Akiha H/F-Roa H-Len C-Neco
There hasn't been an official tier list made after this, but the metagame has changed considerably. Most notably, H-VSion isn't undisputed #1 anymore, as there's a bit of debate as to whether H-Kohaku and H-Shiki should be ranked higher than her. The top 7 chars(VSion, Shiki, Mech, Kohaku, Miyako, Nero, Warc) are pretty much agreed upon by everyone, they just get shuffled around a bit sometimes. Akiha's ranking has also changed pretty dramatically: in the first few months of the game's release, she was often ranked as one of the worst characters or pretty low on the lists, but nowadays she's always considered mid-high at worst. Finally, there's also VAkiha, who was generally considered very good at first with her full moon style, but then went down. However, she is rising back up again as more people are playing her half moon style.
One thing to note from all these tier lists is that it becomes very obvious as to which character is consistently strong in every version. And that character is Warc. In nearly every single version of the game, she is either top or high tier. Whether this is because the developers like her or the nature of the game can be debated. However, Warc being consistently strong isn't a surprise considering MB's core gameplay. Probably about 85% of MB's game takes place in the air, and Warc is a character with nearly unmatched air mobility, with a good projectile and air projectile, good defensive options, the best air normals, and high damage. A character like Warc was pretty much made for this game.
I don't think there were any tiers in the very early versions of Melty Blood, because the game was full of so much broken stuff that no one really bothered. The earlist semblance of tiers I remember were in ReACT, a bit before Final Tuned 2.501b. Akiha was undisputed #1, as her high damage output, clash frames on 2c, high/low mixup, and best defense modifier made her easily the most complete character in the game. I remember watching tournament replays during this time and seeing that half of all vids were Akiha mirrors. Warc, Shiki Tohno, and the maid part were also considered pretty good during this time.
Now comes the main games, where MB was no longer a doujin game anywhere and became an arcade game.
Melty Blood Act Cadenza Version A
The only tier list made during this time was from Arcadia... forgot which issue it was from.
S: Warc Shiki
A: Sion Satsuki VAkiha
B: Arc Wara Nero Akiha Maids Nanaya
C: Aoko Kouma Mech Len Ciel VSion Miyako Kohaku Hisui
D: Neco
Pretty similar to the ReACT list... the main difference is Akiha moving down to B. Warc was S because of ease of use, very high damage, and unbeatable normals. Her j.b throughout the entire MB series is arguably the best, or one of the best air normals in the game, and it was at its peak in this version, with the fastest startup and containing clash frames. Shiki was also rated high because of high damage, ease of use, good normals, good defensive options(easily the best backdash in the game), and good defense modifier. Sion was interesting because she wasn't considered S tier, but was the only character in the game to have a reliable infinite. Satsuki was really silly in this version, as her normals had very little proration, so her damage potential was through the roof. She got minimum 4K damage from her antiair 5a mash into EX Tornado Grab. Finally, there's VAkiha, who had unparalleled rushdown, movement, and damage/lifeleech potential with her EX pits and throw.
Melty Blood Act Cadenza Version B
There were no official tierlists done for this version of this game as it was rather short lived. However, Sion and Kouma were undisputedly top tier because of an oversight by the game developers in superarmor properties. Specifically Sion 2c and Kouma 236 specials had superarmor that pretty much lasted the entire duration and started up immediately.
Melty Blood Act Cadenza Version B2
This version has several tierlists done for it, as the game lasted a long time and is the final game in the Act Cadenza series. Earliest list comes from Tougeki Damashii Volume 5.
A: Sion Akiha VAkiha Kouma Ciel Len
B: Hisui Mech
C: Everybody else
D: Necos
Main interesting thing to note here is Ciel and Len rising to top tier. Ciel in this version was pretty much the most well rounded character: she had an answer to everything. Len was a different case, as she gained some very strong tools in VerB2 and her gameplay was getting a lot of development(she was one of the more underused chars in previous versions).
The Japanese MBAC BBS eventually agreed upon another tier list some time later, which is:
S: Sion Len Ciel Warc Miyako Akiha
A: Hisui Kouma VSion Mech
B: VAkiha Arc Aoko Nanaya Shiki Nero Satsuki Maids
C: Kohaku Wara WLen
D: Necos
Main thing to note is Miyako rising to S. She gained some very good tools in VerB2, and people were finally beginning to understand how to play her.
Later on, around January of 2008 Tougeki Damashii published a matchup chart created by 46 top Japanese players. It can be viewed here.
The final official tier list for this game was made around May of 2008. Since I actually have the original text I thought I'd post it:
参加者 20人
かんな、すずめ、にく、ぶぶ、はぎ、ぼぶ、ゆとり、芳乃、SAT、スシ、ひでぶ、かいまーと、洋、レオ、はと、千神、あげは、丸やん、ねむとら、レイ
方式は前と同じで適当にS、A、B、Cで分けて貰ってSが4点、Aが3点、Bが2点、Cが1点といった感じでランク分けは四捨五入で
Ｓ:シエル(79)、レン(77)、シオン(74)、ワルク(73)
Ａ:都古(66)、秋葉 (64)、メカ翡翠(63)、軋間(57)、翡翠(55)、ネロ(51)
Ｂ:Vシオン(45)、七夜(42)、アルク(42)、さつき(39)、青子(37)、赤主(34)
Ｃ:ヒスコハ(25)、志貴(25)、ワラキア(23)、白レン(22)、琥珀(22)
Basically what happened is that top Japanese Miyako player Kanna asked 20 top japanese players to rank every character, and he averaged those results to make a tier list. Characters were rated from S(4 points) to C(1 point). The top JP players that participated were:
Kanna, Surume, Niku, Bubu, Hagi, Bobu, Yutori, Yoshino, SAT, Sushi, Hidebu, Kaimaato, You, Leo, Hato, Chikami, Ageha, Maruyan, Nemutora, Rei
S: Ciel(79) Len(77) Sion(74) Warc(73)
A: Miyako(66) Akiha(64) Mech(63) Kouma(57) Hisui(55) Nero(51)
B: VSion(45) Nanaya(42) Arc(42) Satsuki(39) Aoko(37) VAkiha(34)
C: Maids(25) Shiki(25) Wara(23) WLen(22) Kohaku(22)
Main point of interest is that throughout most of VerB2's lifespan, Sion was undisputed #1 for her unrivalled damage, strong pressure, good normals, and defensive options. Only in the final year of the game(when this list was released) was she considered lower than Ciel and Len.
Moving on to Actress Again...
Melty Blood Actress Again
Only one tier list for this game as it was incredibly broken and very much an incomplete game. This list made by Yukinose, and published in either Arcadia or Tougeki Damashii, I don't remember which.
S: H-Akiha H-Shiki H-Nero H-Wara H-Ries H-Aoko
A: C-Ciel C-Mech C-WLen F-Kouma H-Roa H-Sion H-VSion C-Arc H-Nanaya C-Warc H-VAkiha C-Kohaku
B: H-Hisui C-Maids C-Miyako H-Len C-Satsuki
It's very obvious that Half Moon is broken in vanilla MBAA. Instant life regen on autoheat and ridiculous meter gain on all 6aa combos made them way too strong.
Melty Blood Actress Again Version A
There are numerous official and accepted tier lists for this game, as it's been out for a while. The first one was made in February of 2009, and the process was very similar to the final tier list of MBAC. I also have the original text, so here goes:
キャラランク（そのキャラの1番強いと思うスタイルでのランク）
猫アルクは強い弱い関係なしに欄外
A、B、Cで分ける（個人的にVER.Bよりも差がないと感じるので）
Aを3点、Bを2点、Cを1点として加算。
A:Vシオン（59）、メカ翡翠（58）、志貴（54）、ネロ（54）、七夜（53）、琥珀（53）
B:都古（49）、ワルク（41）、ヒスコハ（40）、アルク（40）、白レン（38）、翡翠（38）、シエル（37）、軋間（36）、青子（36）、リーズ（35）、さつき（35）、赤主（34）、シオン（32）、ロア（31）、秋葉（30）、ワラキア（30）
C:レン（23）
参加者（敬称略）:かんな、レイ、かいまーと、うどんげ、丸やん、SAT、芳乃、がる、シュウ、めっしい、ジン、キリト、ぶぶ、平田、ぼぶ、するめ、にく、新屋、深空、洋
聞いてない人に会った際にランクを聞いてまた更新する可能性もありますが、おそらく更新はしないと思われます。
Compiled by 20 top jp players, characters were rated from A(3 points) to C(1 point)
Players: Kanna, Rei, Kaimaato, Udonge, Maruyan, SAT, Yoshino, Garu, Shuu, Messhii, Jin, Kirito, Bubu, Hirata, Bobu, Surume, Niku, Niiya, Misora, You
A: VSion(59) Mech(58) Shiki(54) Nero(54) Nanaya(53) Kohaku(53)
B: Miyako(49) Warc(41) Maids(40) Arc(40) White Ren(38) Hisui(38) Ciel(37) Kouma(36) Aoko(36) Ries(35) Satsuki(35) VAkiha(34) Sion(32) Roa(31) Akiha(30) Wara(30)
C: Ren(23)
Those characters in the top 7-8 would remain very consistent throughout the game's lifespan, the main exception being Nanaya who would eventually start moving down about a year later. Also notable is Akiha's extremely low ranking.
A month later, the first tier list that actually separated all the moon phase versions of the characters was made. I forgot who actually wrote it, though.
S: H-VSion C-Mech H/C-Shiki F-Nero H-Kohaku F-Miyako
A+: C-Nanaya C-Warc
A: F/C-Kouma C/H-Nero C/F-Kohaku F-Mech
A-: F-Maids C/H-Miyako F-Warc F-WLen H-Nanaya C-Ciel C-Aoko F-Arc F-VAkiha H-Roa C-Satsuki F-Shiki H/F-Sion C-Hisui
B+: Akiha C/H-Maids H/F-Ries F/C-VSion H-VAkiha F-Nanaya
B: H-Warc H-Hisui C/F-Wara H/C-Arc F/H-Ciel H-Mech C-Sion H-Kouma C/H-WLen F-Aoko
B-: H-Wara H/F-Ren C-Ries F-Roa H-Satsuki F-Hisui H-Aoko C-VAkiha
C+: F-Satsuki C-Ren C-Roa
Later on, Arcadia published a tier list made by MBAC top VAkiha/MBAA top Shiki player Hato in their August issue.
God: H-VSion
S: C-Mech
A: F/H-Nero H/C-Shiki C/H-Kohaku C/F-Miyako C-Nanaya C/F-Maids
B: F/H-Aoko C-Warc F-VAkiha H-Hisui F-WLen C-Satsuki C-Sion F-Arc
C: C-Ciel F-Kouma F-Ries C-Wara C/H-Akiha H/F-Roa H-Len C-Neco
There hasn't been an official tier list made after this, but the metagame has changed considerably. Most notably, H-VSion isn't undisputed #1 anymore, as there's a bit of debate as to whether H-Kohaku and H-Shiki should be ranked higher than her. The top 7 chars(VSion, Shiki, Mech, Kohaku, Miyako, Nero, Warc) are pretty much agreed upon by everyone, they just get shuffled around a bit sometimes. Akiha's ranking has also changed pretty dramatically: in the first few months of the game's release, she was often ranked as one of the worst characters or pretty low on the lists, but nowadays she's always considered mid-high at worst. Finally, there's also VAkiha, who was generally considered very good at first with her full moon style, but then went down. However, she is rising back up again as more people are playing her half moon style.
One thing to note from all these tier lists is that it becomes very obvious as to which character is consistently strong in every version. And that character is Warc. In nearly every single version of the game, she is either top or high tier. Whether this is because the developers like her or the nature of the game can be debated. However, Warc being consistently strong isn't a surprise considering MB's core gameplay. Probably about 85% of MB's game takes place in the air, and Warc is a character with nearly unmatched air mobility, with a good projectile and air projectile, good defensive options, the best air normals, and high damage. A character like Warc was pretty much made for this game.
Thursday, June 24, 2010
Melty Blood Actress Again (Part 2)
So MBAA came out in arcades sometime in the middle of 2008, after a very short period of location tests. And not surprisingly, the game was very broken. Many characters had infinites, and C-Ciel in particular had a handcuffs infinite involving looping her charged black keys. Meaning that doing this infinite would actually freeze the opponent in place and prevent him/her from doing anything, even sparking. It was ugly, and a revision called Version A was quickly released in the beginning of 2009.
How is it?
It's pretty much better than MBAC in almost every way. It's very obvious that the developers knew what the flaws of MBAC were and they probably listened to fan complaints as well, as they took multiple measures to fix everything they could. Let's run through the good and bad:
The Good
The screen is bigger
Bigger screen means there is finally a real midrange game, and that there are actually real zoning characters.
Nerf to A mashing
This was addressed in several ways. The most direct way was a new armor system, where if a b or c attack hit an a attack at the same time, the b or c attack would then win outright, instead of trading like it normally would in other games. The other way this was fixed was a universal nerf to j.a's across the board: they no longer have the ridiculous active frames that they had in MBAC. Meaning that in the neutral game there is now a reason to use air attacks other than j.a
Nerf to clash frames
Unfortunately, clash frames weren't completely removed, but most of them have been taken away, save for a few characters like F-Nero.
Guardbar
You still can't die by chip, but now there's a guardbar which means that people cannot simply block all day without consequence. Getting guard crushed is also really painful as the GCed character is stunned for a really long time, allowing all day for the opponent to get a full combo off.
Nerf to shielding
Shields no longer freeze the opponent in place so safe jumps are back in the game. In addition, a character whiffing a shield will be put in counterhit state and will also have his/her guardbar quality reduced, which discourages reckless shielding.
Airthrow whiff animation
They finally added these, so the old airthrow/shield option select is gone.
Varied combos/rewarding execution
Most characters now have new, varied combos that aren't just j.bc j.bc. In addition, they look pretty cool and require a good amount of execution. The old easy combos from MBAC can still be done, but they do very little damage. I think this was handled perfectly, as the game doesn't require the players to have ridiculous execution to even play the game on a basic level, since the easy mode combos can still be done. However, it rewards the players who do put the time into improving their execution with much more interesting and damaging combos.
Variety in characters
It becomes obvious very quickly when playing that the developers made sure to make the characters more unique from each other, compared to MBAC. The addition of the three moon styles also helps this.
The Bad
Neutral game
Unfortunately, what I feel was the biggest problem in MBAC wasn't really fixed in MBAA, although it's at least a little bit better. The neutral game is now more than just a j.a mash fest; however, jumping and chicken blocking are still way too strong. It's still overwhelmingly advantageous to be in the air than on the ground, and the across-the-board nerf to airthrows also means that getting "punished" for being in the air too much isn't that big of a deal.
Bigger screen
Yes, it's both a good and bad thing. Kind of related to the previous point, but the bigger screen size means that being in the air is even stronger than it was in MBAC.
Unbalance
It's the result of there being way more characters(23 chars x 3 styles = 69 characters, and that's not even counting the console chars), but the game is less balanced than MBAC. I feel that the unbalance in MBAA is not the result of the top tier being too powerful. Rather, it's that there are a good number of blatantly terrible characters. It's obvious that some characters had much less time put into them(like H-Wara) than the others.
In Closing
MBAA is a great update, and I'm very happy with the direction the series is taking. Sadly, the biggest problem with MBAC wasn't fixed in MBAA, but they fixed 6 out of the 7 problems I mentioned in the previous post, which is really impressive.
How is it?
It's pretty much better than MBAC in almost every way. It's very obvious that the developers knew what the flaws of MBAC were and they probably listened to fan complaints as well, as they took multiple measures to fix everything they could. Let's run through the good and bad:
The Good
The screen is bigger
Bigger screen means there is finally a real midrange game, and that there are actually real zoning characters.
Nerf to A mashing
This was addressed in several ways. The most direct way was a new armor system, where if a b or c attack hit an a attack at the same time, the b or c attack would then win outright, instead of trading like it normally would in other games. The other way this was fixed was a universal nerf to j.a's across the board: they no longer have the ridiculous active frames that they had in MBAC. Meaning that in the neutral game there is now a reason to use air attacks other than j.a
Nerf to clash frames
Unfortunately, clash frames weren't completely removed, but most of them have been taken away, save for a few characters like F-Nero.
Guardbar
You still can't die by chip, but now there's a guardbar which means that people cannot simply block all day without consequence. Getting guard crushed is also really painful as the GCed character is stunned for a really long time, allowing all day for the opponent to get a full combo off.
Nerf to shielding
Shields no longer freeze the opponent in place so safe jumps are back in the game. In addition, a character whiffing a shield will be put in counterhit state and will also have his/her guardbar quality reduced, which discourages reckless shielding.
Airthrow whiff animation
They finally added these, so the old airthrow/shield option select is gone.
Varied combos/rewarding execution
Most characters now have new, varied combos that aren't just j.bc j.bc. In addition, they look pretty cool and require a good amount of execution. The old easy combos from MBAC can still be done, but they do very little damage. I think this was handled perfectly, as the game doesn't require the players to have ridiculous execution to even play the game on a basic level, since the easy mode combos can still be done. However, it rewards the players who do put the time into improving their execution with much more interesting and damaging combos.
Variety in characters
It becomes obvious very quickly when playing that the developers made sure to make the characters more unique from each other, compared to MBAC. The addition of the three moon styles also helps this.
The Bad
Neutral game
Unfortunately, what I feel was the biggest problem in MBAC wasn't really fixed in MBAA, although it's at least a little bit better. The neutral game is now more than just a j.a mash fest; however, jumping and chicken blocking are still way too strong. It's still overwhelmingly advantageous to be in the air than on the ground, and the across-the-board nerf to airthrows also means that getting "punished" for being in the air too much isn't that big of a deal.
Bigger screen
Yes, it's both a good and bad thing. Kind of related to the previous point, but the bigger screen size means that being in the air is even stronger than it was in MBAC.
Unbalance
It's the result of there being way more characters(23 chars x 3 styles = 69 characters, and that's not even counting the console chars), but the game is less balanced than MBAC. I feel that the unbalance in MBAA is not the result of the top tier being too powerful. Rather, it's that there are a good number of blatantly terrible characters. It's obvious that some characters had much less time put into them(like H-Wara) than the others.
In Closing
MBAA is a great update, and I'm very happy with the direction the series is taking. Sadly, the biggest problem with MBAC wasn't fixed in MBAA, but they fixed 6 out of the 7 problems I mentioned in the previous post, which is really impressive.
Tuesday, June 22, 2010
Melty Blood Actress Again (Part 1)
So MBAA(the console version, at least) has been out for almost a year now, and I thought I'd post my thoughts on it. However, most of what I think about the game is a comparison of the game to MBAC, so this will also sort of be a retrospective of my experience with the series in general.
Anyway, I believe my first exposure to Melty Blood was in either 2006 or 2007. At this time, the latest version was MBAC Ver.A, but there was no console version yet so the only way for us non-Japanese people to play the game was to play an outdated version of it, Melty Blood ReACT Final Tuned. I stumbled upon the game when trying to google search a method to play Guilty Gear XX #Reload online, and I remember finding a random forum where someone said that #Reload had no netplay(on PC, at least), but there was a similar game called Melty Blood that did have netplay.
So I played it, and had a lot of fun learning the game at first. At one point I was actually considered a top player during MBAC's time, but I think this had nothing to do with me actually being good; it was more like the scene was just very weak. Nowadays the scene is much stronger and I can't quite keep up anymore. Anyway, after about a year and a half of playing the game, I got really bored of playing my character Akiha, so I started playing a lot more secondary characters, but it didn't matter and I just got really bored of the game. I had a lot of fun with the game in the beginning, but it was like the better I got at the game and the more I learned, the less I enjoyed it. Besides the game actually being pretty boring, the reasons which can be read in the previous post, MBAC had a number of problems which I will list here:
1. The biggest problem of the game was the extremely shallow neutral game. There was basically no footsies, as being in the air was much more advantageous than being on the ground. Chicken blocking was extremely strong, and there was very little blockstun off an air block. Most characters had ridiculous j.a's, as they were active for a very long time(Len's j.a had 12 active frames), so the spacing game for the most part was reduced to everybody just flying around mashing j.a.
2. The screen was too small. Because of this, there was basically no midrange game: it was only you and your opponent up close, or flying around mashing buttons. It also didn't help that most characters could traverse the entire screen very quickly with a single superjump. Naturally, zoning was almost nonexistant too.
3. Mashing. Mashing a was extremely strong in MBAC because a's were the fastest attacks, had good active frames, and unlike other fighting games starting a combo from multiple jabs didn't significantly decrease the amount of damage done. In some cases it actually increased it. Hitting a multiple times was very strong in neutral because of active frames, was strong in pressure because of how easy it was to create frame traps by simply delaying the a's, and was strong on defense because of how fast a's were and because full combo damage could be done from a multiple jab starter.
4. Clash frames. These were a weird mechanic where if a clash happened, then both characters could immediately regain all their chain options. The problem with clash frames is that they were everywhere: most characers had clash frames on their b and c attacks. In addition, clash frames mostly occured during the startup of moves. This basically encouraged mashing buttons on defense even more. MBAC is the only fighting game I've seen where the defender can actually get away with trying to attack at frame disadvantage because of clash frames saving them.
5. The strength of blocking. Retaining its doujin roots, MBAC did not have chip death in it. In addition, there was no guard bar like in many other fighting games, or a negative penalty system. Also, the way reverse beat worked in the game was that the more someone rebeat, the less damage their next combo would do. Basically there was no penalty for guarding all day, and the attacker was actually penalized because of how central reverse beat was to the game. I should also mention that mixup in MBAC was very weak, as overheads were mostly very slow and throws did very little damage.
6. Shielding. Admittedly MBAC's parry mechanic was much better than 3rd Strike's, but it had a number of problems. Shielding was too strong because it had very little recovery and it actually froze the attacker in place for a certain amount of time. This basically meant that in MBAC there was no such thing as "true" safe jumps: a safe jump would be safe to everything the defender did on wakeup except for a reversal shield. In addition, there was a built-in option select on airthrows: since throws were input with a+d, a whiffed airthrow would result in a shield. This basically disrupted the entire basic fighting game offensive triangle. Throwing is supposed to beat blocking and lose to attacking, but a whiffed airthrow results in shield which beats attacking.
7. Boring combos(and characters). It might have been intentional, but MBAC was a very low execution game. Most characters' combos were simply hitconfirm multiple jabs into a sweep, then a launcher, and then j.bc j.bc airthrow. There were of course more difficult and flashy combos that could be done, but for the most part, they either a)didn't do significantly more damage or b)did less damage.
The last problem is a really subjective one, so it's not numbered:
-Heat. I really hate the way heat was managed in MB. Letting people have a way to regenerate their health in fighting games is usually a bad idea. However, there are some games where I think life regeneration was handled very well, like IaMP for example. In MBAC regenerating life is a very easy thing to do as heat activation can be done anytime someone has 100 meter or more. I think heat activation is obnoxious and way too strong in MBAC because a)it has invincible startup and b)it's unblockable. I would be totally fine with it if activation was invincible OR unblockable, but not both. A defender spazzing on heat while getting pressured is also pretty strong because heats can't be baited like bursts in Guilty Gear where you just stop attacking and block: you have to actually get out of the way and then move in and attack.
Wow this post turned out way too long, so I'll continue in the next post, where I'll talk about how MBAA fixed (most!) of these problems.
Anyway, I believe my first exposure to Melty Blood was in either 2006 or 2007. At this time, the latest version was MBAC Ver.A, but there was no console version yet so the only way for us non-Japanese people to play the game was to play an outdated version of it, Melty Blood ReACT Final Tuned. I stumbled upon the game when trying to google search a method to play Guilty Gear XX #Reload online, and I remember finding a random forum where someone said that #Reload had no netplay(on PC, at least), but there was a similar game called Melty Blood that did have netplay.
So I played it, and had a lot of fun learning the game at first. At one point I was actually considered a top player during MBAC's time, but I think this had nothing to do with me actually being good; it was more like the scene was just very weak. Nowadays the scene is much stronger and I can't quite keep up anymore. Anyway, after about a year and a half of playing the game, I got really bored of playing my character Akiha, so I started playing a lot more secondary characters, but it didn't matter and I just got really bored of the game. I had a lot of fun with the game in the beginning, but it was like the better I got at the game and the more I learned, the less I enjoyed it. Besides the game actually being pretty boring, the reasons which can be read in the previous post, MBAC had a number of problems which I will list here:
1. The biggest problem of the game was the extremely shallow neutral game. There was basically no footsies, as being in the air was much more advantageous than being on the ground. Chicken blocking was extremely strong, and there was very little blockstun off an air block. Most characters had ridiculous j.a's, as they were active for a very long time(Len's j.a had 12 active frames), so the spacing game for the most part was reduced to everybody just flying around mashing j.a.
2. The screen was too small. Because of this, there was basically no midrange game: it was only you and your opponent up close, or flying around mashing buttons. It also didn't help that most characters could traverse the entire screen very quickly with a single superjump. Naturally, zoning was almost nonexistant too.
3. Mashing. Mashing a was extremely strong in MBAC because a's were the fastest attacks, had good active frames, and unlike other fighting games starting a combo from multiple jabs didn't significantly decrease the amount of damage done. In some cases it actually increased it. Hitting a multiple times was very strong in neutral because of active frames, was strong in pressure because of how easy it was to create frame traps by simply delaying the a's, and was strong on defense because of how fast a's were and because full combo damage could be done from a multiple jab starter.
4. Clash frames. These were a weird mechanic where if a clash happened, then both characters could immediately regain all their chain options. The problem with clash frames is that they were everywhere: most characers had clash frames on their b and c attacks. In addition, clash frames mostly occured during the startup of moves. This basically encouraged mashing buttons on defense even more. MBAC is the only fighting game I've seen where the defender can actually get away with trying to attack at frame disadvantage because of clash frames saving them.
5. The strength of blocking. Retaining its doujin roots, MBAC did not have chip death in it. In addition, there was no guard bar like in many other fighting games, or a negative penalty system. Also, the way reverse beat worked in the game was that the more someone rebeat, the less damage their next combo would do. Basically there was no penalty for guarding all day, and the attacker was actually penalized because of how central reverse beat was to the game. I should also mention that mixup in MBAC was very weak, as overheads were mostly very slow and throws did very little damage.
6. Shielding. Admittedly MBAC's parry mechanic was much better than 3rd Strike's, but it had a number of problems. Shielding was too strong because it had very little recovery and it actually froze the attacker in place for a certain amount of time. This basically meant that in MBAC there was no such thing as "true" safe jumps: a safe jump would be safe to everything the defender did on wakeup except for a reversal shield. In addition, there was a built-in option select on airthrows: since throws were input with a+d, a whiffed airthrow would result in a shield. This basically disrupted the entire basic fighting game offensive triangle. Throwing is supposed to beat blocking and lose to attacking, but a whiffed airthrow results in shield which beats attacking.
7. Boring combos(and characters). It might have been intentional, but MBAC was a very low execution game. Most characters' combos were simply hitconfirm multiple jabs into a sweep, then a launcher, and then j.bc j.bc airthrow. There were of course more difficult and flashy combos that could be done, but for the most part, they either a)didn't do significantly more damage or b)did less damage.
The last problem is a really subjective one, so it's not numbered:
-Heat. I really hate the way heat was managed in MB. Letting people have a way to regenerate their health in fighting games is usually a bad idea. However, there are some games where I think life regeneration was handled very well, like IaMP for example. In MBAC regenerating life is a very easy thing to do as heat activation can be done anytime someone has 100 meter or more. I think heat activation is obnoxious and way too strong in MBAC because a)it has invincible startup and b)it's unblockable. I would be totally fine with it if activation was invincible OR unblockable, but not both. A defender spazzing on heat while getting pressured is also pretty strong because heats can't be baited like bursts in Guilty Gear where you just stop attacking and block: you have to actually get out of the way and then move in and attack.
Wow this post turned out way too long, so I'll continue in the next post, where I'll talk about how MBAA fixed (most!) of these problems.
Thursday, June 17, 2010
Two balancing philosophies
The inspiration for this post comes from the GGXX Slash vs Accent Core debate, and to a lesser extent, the MBAC vs MBAA one. For those that don't know, about a year ago the Maryland GG scene decided to stop playing GGXX Accent Core, which was the most recent version. Instead, they used the GG Generations mode available in Accent Core Plus, which allows you to play the old #Reload and Slash versions of characters. Their reasons for doing so were that AC was not fun and very broken, while the previous two versions, especially Slash, were much more balanced. This sparked a bit of a debate on the Dustloop and SRK forums, getting people from outside Maryland involved too. Naturally this leads into the discussion of whether GGXX Slash or Accent Core is more balanced, and the different design philosophies that went into those games.
Slash was a pretty big departure from the older games, as a lot of the brokenness was either removed or toned down. The basic idea was that almost every character got nerfed, as nobody could reliably do 50%+ life combos. The harder characters in the game were also really bad, while the easier characters were extremely good. Accent Core on the other hand, is a very high damage game, and pretty much every character has something very broken about them.
So this leads into the 2 different balancing philosophies. The Slash method of balancing is to basically nerf every character, keep the game as modest as possible, and take out as much as of the silliness as possible. The Accent Core way of balancing is to make every character really strong and broken, and have tons of silly stuff. There's probably another name for these two balancing philosophies, but it's the name that I like to use, and it's also special since these two philosophies were used in two consecutive versions of the GG series. These balancing methods are also reflected in Melty Blood Act Cadenza and Actress Again, with MBAC being like Slash and MBAA being like Accent Core.
Personally, I prefer the Accent Core way of balancing, as even if it leads to games being less balanced it makes them more fun and last longer. A perfect example of this is what happened to the GG and MB scenes when Slash and MB Act Cadenza were the most recent versions. While Slash was definitely a much better game than #Reload, it became stale in the US scene very quickly, and many people around the world stopped playing GG during this time. For MBAC, the US scene stagnated a year after its release. There's still a bit of debate over what caused this, the most popular opinions being that netplay destroyed the scene and the game being on PC made it too big of a hassle to run tournaments. However, I believe the reason was just that MBAC was a bad and very boring game, and it just took about a year for most people to get tired of it.
There are actually still a couple of people in the US that prefer MBAC to MBAA, and for some reason many people in Europe still play MBAC as well. The main reason I hear for this is that MBAC is more balanced and they prefer the much lower execution requirements of that game. I actually agree that MBAC is more balanced than MBAA, as the gaps in tiers are smaller and almost every character is viable. However, the game is just really boring after a while. I remember how sad I was during 2007, the year that Tougeki was getting streamed. When watching the Tougeki 2007 MBAC stream and the DVDs later on, it became readily apparent during the top4 live segments that the audience was just not hype at all. Arturo Sanchez was actually at this event and he recounted that the audience for MBAC was really silent and they basically had to be pushed by the Tougeki announcer to cheer during the games.
As for whether GG Slash or Accent Core is more balanced, I believe Accent Core is more balanced(and more fun!) for a number of reasons. The gaps in the tiers in Slash were pretty big, as the bottom tier in Slash was reaaaaaaally bad. Slash Dizzy, Robo, and Order Sol were pretty much considered unplayable. In AC the gaps in the tiers are small, as pretty much every character is viable. However, one very noticeable difference is that the top tier in Accent Core can all do very silly things, like multiple high-damage unblockable setups or 70%+ life combos from one hit or counterhit, while the top tier in Slash can't do anything like that. Some people would probably say that Slash is more balanced purely based on that, but I think it's important to make a distinction between silliness and balance. While the top tier in Slash didn't have anything silly, they were still overwhelmingly stronger than the rest of the cast in that game. The top tier in Accent Core has tons of silly stuff, but most of the cast does too so it balances out. And indeed, the best testament to the balance of AC is last year's Tougeki results, as a bottom tier team of Satou Johnny, Mugen Bridget, and Chonari Zappa made it to finals. Although they didn't win, it went down to the final players of both teams with Chonari Zappa vs N-O Venom.
This silliness that I talked about is also very much absent in MBAC, but very much present in MBAA. And not surprisingly, MBAA is a much more fun game(in my opinion, at least), evidenced by how much louder the crowds are in both US and Japanese tournament videos.
In the end, while balance is definitely a very important thing in fighting games, the most important thing is still for the game to be fun, and if balance has to be sacrificed for it, then so be it.
Slash was a pretty big departure from the older games, as a lot of the brokenness was either removed or toned down. The basic idea was that almost every character got nerfed, as nobody could reliably do 50%+ life combos. The harder characters in the game were also really bad, while the easier characters were extremely good. Accent Core on the other hand, is a very high damage game, and pretty much every character has something very broken about them.
So this leads into the 2 different balancing philosophies. The Slash method of balancing is to basically nerf every character, keep the game as modest as possible, and take out as much as of the silliness as possible. The Accent Core way of balancing is to make every character really strong and broken, and have tons of silly stuff. There's probably another name for these two balancing philosophies, but it's the name that I like to use, and it's also special since these two philosophies were used in two consecutive versions of the GG series. These balancing methods are also reflected in Melty Blood Act Cadenza and Actress Again, with MBAC being like Slash and MBAA being like Accent Core.
Personally, I prefer the Accent Core way of balancing, as even if it leads to games being less balanced it makes them more fun and last longer. A perfect example of this is what happened to the GG and MB scenes when Slash and MB Act Cadenza were the most recent versions. While Slash was definitely a much better game than #Reload, it became stale in the US scene very quickly, and many people around the world stopped playing GG during this time. For MBAC, the US scene stagnated a year after its release. There's still a bit of debate over what caused this, the most popular opinions being that netplay destroyed the scene and the game being on PC made it too big of a hassle to run tournaments. However, I believe the reason was just that MBAC was a bad and very boring game, and it just took about a year for most people to get tired of it.
There are actually still a couple of people in the US that prefer MBAC to MBAA, and for some reason many people in Europe still play MBAC as well. The main reason I hear for this is that MBAC is more balanced and they prefer the much lower execution requirements of that game. I actually agree that MBAC is more balanced than MBAA, as the gaps in tiers are smaller and almost every character is viable. However, the game is just really boring after a while. I remember how sad I was during 2007, the year that Tougeki was getting streamed. When watching the Tougeki 2007 MBAC stream and the DVDs later on, it became readily apparent during the top4 live segments that the audience was just not hype at all. Arturo Sanchez was actually at this event and he recounted that the audience for MBAC was really silent and they basically had to be pushed by the Tougeki announcer to cheer during the games.
As for whether GG Slash or Accent Core is more balanced, I believe Accent Core is more balanced(and more fun!) for a number of reasons. The gaps in the tiers in Slash were pretty big, as the bottom tier in Slash was reaaaaaaally bad. Slash Dizzy, Robo, and Order Sol were pretty much considered unplayable. In AC the gaps in the tiers are small, as pretty much every character is viable. However, one very noticeable difference is that the top tier in Accent Core can all do very silly things, like multiple high-damage unblockable setups or 70%+ life combos from one hit or counterhit, while the top tier in Slash can't do anything like that. Some people would probably say that Slash is more balanced purely based on that, but I think it's important to make a distinction between silliness and balance. While the top tier in Slash didn't have anything silly, they were still overwhelmingly stronger than the rest of the cast in that game. The top tier in Accent Core has tons of silly stuff, but most of the cast does too so it balances out. And indeed, the best testament to the balance of AC is last year's Tougeki results, as a bottom tier team of Satou Johnny, Mugen Bridget, and Chonari Zappa made it to finals. Although they didn't win, it went down to the final players of both teams with Chonari Zappa vs N-O Venom.
This silliness that I talked about is also very much absent in MBAC, but very much present in MBAA. And not surprisingly, MBAA is a much more fun game(in my opinion, at least), evidenced by how much louder the crowds are in both US and Japanese tournament videos.
In the end, while balance is definitely a very important thing in fighting games, the most important thing is still for the game to be fun, and if balance has to be sacrificed for it, then so be it.
Wednesday, June 16, 2010
Introductory Post
Obligatory first post!
Anyway, this will be my blog where I talk about stuff not related to my real life. Aka video games, anime, random stuff about the Internet, and music. I actually do have a super sekrit blog where I talk about real life(not really, but it hasn't been updated in a few years).
Anyway, for those who don't know me, I go by the name Psylocke on fighting game forums. I graduated from UCLA in Spring 2009 with a Bachelors degree in Chemistry and am trying to find a job, because I have too much time on my hands! Hopefully that will change soon. In the meantime, I am just taking classes at a nearby community college hoping to retake classes that I didn't get a good grade in undergrad, or taking other classes that would be relevant to my career, but it's hard because I have the worst luck with registration dates.
About the name and the URL of this blog, it pertains to an anime series that is airing this season called B型H系(B Gata H Kei). This show is hilarious and I highly recommend everyone to watch it. The main character Yamada in this show is like a female version of myself, and one random night when I was talking to my friends about this, one of them mentioned that Yamada would be my persona. If you're not familiar with the Shin Megami Tensei: Persona series, a Persona is basically someone's true inner self, usually manifested in the form of a demon, angel, or mythological creature, and they're all associated with the various arcanas in a tarot card deck. There's a cool little explanation of them in the game which you can watch here. Anyway, if Yamada was my Persona, she would have to be in the Lovers arcana; thus, the name of this blog!
In my free time I like watching videos on Youtube and Nicovideo, listening to all sorts of music, and playing video games. I do watch anime or read manga occasionally but not really that often. I did have a phase during high school and the 1st year of college where I probably spent more than 3 hours every day watching anime episodes but that time has passed and I don't think I could ever do that anymore.
Videogames are not something new to me, as I basically grew up on platformers like the Megaman and Super Mario series. I still have my old NES in my house somewhere too. I also played a lot of RPGs later on, and still do today. Fighting games are actually pretty new to me, as I didn't grow up on Street Fighter II like most other people in the fighting game community did. I did go to the arcade a bit as a kid, but I wasn't allowed to play since I didn't have money so I just watched people. However, just watching people play was pretty fun in itself to see the different personalities of the players and the styles. The first game that I actually played competitively was Super Smash Bros. Melee for the Nintendo Gamecube. This was during my 1st and 2nd year of college, and it was also before the Youtube era so match videos were extremely hard to find. I think the only reliable website that had Melee match vids at the time was the Japanese Sheik/DK player Captain Jack's webpage. The only other way to get match vids was through DC++, so I spent a lot of time idling there and watching everything I could.
The first real fighting game I played was Guilty Gear XX, and I have to thank the UCLA arcade for that in giving me the first real exposure to the game. I remember my first visit there, and how amazed I was with how the game looked. At the time, GGXX wasn't even the most recent version of the game, as #Reload was already out, and it had a PC port, which was good for me since I didn't have any consoles. So I had a way to practice, unlike Smash where I didn't have a GameCube. This was during my 2nd year of college, making it around 2006, so I've been playing fighting games for about 4 years now. From there I branched into other fighting games.
Nowadays, I mainly play GGXX Accent Core. It's still my all-time favorite fighting game and I don't think I could ever get tired of playing it. I also play Melty Blood Actress Again on the side and a bit of Eternal Fighter Zero, which is an old but very underrated game.
Immaterial and Missing Power is a game that I tried to play for a while. I think the game is brilliant and it's very fun to watch, but it's much too difficult for me and I actually don't like the command interpreter in that game(and all other Tasofro games for that matter). Vampire Savior is another game that I tried to play for a while: it's very fun and fast paced, but there's nobody around me that plays it and the balance issues in that game really annoy me. Finally, there's Super Turbo, which is a hilarious game and really fun to watch. I don't think I will ever play it though.
Anywho, this was probably too long for an introductory post, so more later.
Anyway, this will be my blog where I talk about stuff not related to my real life. Aka video games, anime, random stuff about the Internet, and music. I actually do have a super sekrit blog where I talk about real life(not really, but it hasn't been updated in a few years).
Anyway, for those who don't know me, I go by the name Psylocke on fighting game forums. I graduated from UCLA in Spring 2009 with a Bachelors degree in Chemistry and am trying to find a job, because I have too much time on my hands! Hopefully that will change soon. In the meantime, I am just taking classes at a nearby community college hoping to retake classes that I didn't get a good grade in undergrad, or taking other classes that would be relevant to my career, but it's hard because I have the worst luck with registration dates.
About the name and the URL of this blog, it pertains to an anime series that is airing this season called B型H系(B Gata H Kei). This show is hilarious and I highly recommend everyone to watch it. The main character Yamada in this show is like a female version of myself, and one random night when I was talking to my friends about this, one of them mentioned that Yamada would be my persona. If you're not familiar with the Shin Megami Tensei: Persona series, a Persona is basically someone's true inner self, usually manifested in the form of a demon, angel, or mythological creature, and they're all associated with the various arcanas in a tarot card deck. There's a cool little explanation of them in the game which you can watch here. Anyway, if Yamada was my Persona, she would have to be in the Lovers arcana; thus, the name of this blog!
In my free time I like watching videos on Youtube and Nicovideo, listening to all sorts of music, and playing video games. I do watch anime or read manga occasionally but not really that often. I did have a phase during high school and the 1st year of college where I probably spent more than 3 hours every day watching anime episodes but that time has passed and I don't think I could ever do that anymore.
Videogames are not something new to me, as I basically grew up on platformers like the Megaman and Super Mario series. I still have my old NES in my house somewhere too. I also played a lot of RPGs later on, and still do today. Fighting games are actually pretty new to me, as I didn't grow up on Street Fighter II like most other people in the fighting game community did. I did go to the arcade a bit as a kid, but I wasn't allowed to play since I didn't have money so I just watched people. However, just watching people play was pretty fun in itself to see the different personalities of the players and the styles. The first game that I actually played competitively was Super Smash Bros. Melee for the Nintendo Gamecube. This was during my 1st and 2nd year of college, and it was also before the Youtube era so match videos were extremely hard to find. I think the only reliable website that had Melee match vids at the time was the Japanese Sheik/DK player Captain Jack's webpage. The only other way to get match vids was through DC++, so I spent a lot of time idling there and watching everything I could.
The first real fighting game I played was Guilty Gear XX, and I have to thank the UCLA arcade for that in giving me the first real exposure to the game. I remember my first visit there, and how amazed I was with how the game looked. At the time, GGXX wasn't even the most recent version of the game, as #Reload was already out, and it had a PC port, which was good for me since I didn't have any consoles. So I had a way to practice, unlike Smash where I didn't have a GameCube. This was during my 2nd year of college, making it around 2006, so I've been playing fighting games for about 4 years now. From there I branched into other fighting games.
Nowadays, I mainly play GGXX Accent Core. It's still my all-time favorite fighting game and I don't think I could ever get tired of playing it. I also play Melty Blood Actress Again on the side and a bit of Eternal Fighter Zero, which is an old but very underrated game.
Immaterial and Missing Power is a game that I tried to play for a while. I think the game is brilliant and it's very fun to watch, but it's much too difficult for me and I actually don't like the command interpreter in that game(and all other Tasofro games for that matter). Vampire Savior is another game that I tried to play for a while: it's very fun and fast paced, but there's nobody around me that plays it and the balance issues in that game really annoy me. Finally, there's Super Turbo, which is a hilarious game and really fun to watch. I don't think I will ever play it though.
Anywho, this was probably too long for an introductory post, so more later.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)