you forgot to say that Slayer being hit is actually he acting that he is being hit and actually dodging the atack. Nagoryuki is still not on that level
Also there is something similar with Rachel Alucard from BlazBlue. You literary never actually hit her. Her minions (I think is minions or something similar?) takes hit for her. And this is dope.
@@christianwright7581 the reason why slayer doesn't have a hunger for blood is because he has Sharon. He can drain her wife again and again and she will pop right back again bc she is immortal and invulnerable
2:16 For anyone who doesn't already know, that character (Bullet from Blazblue) is called Butt Floss by Ragna, the main character, as an insult when they first meet. If you just look at art of her, it's pretty easy to tell why he'd say that. I don't know why they call it an alias though, I think only he calls her that, and maybe one other person. As for the actual topic of this video, I think Blazblue does this pretty well with Terumi/Hazama, a character who is really strong in lore, but isn't invincible. For most of the story, he can't die, but he can still get hurt, and he tends to get pretty pissed about that. In his case, his victory animations tend to show that he doesn't respect his opponents, seeing them as wastes of time or weaklings, and his specials and supers involve doing crazy stylish flip kicks, over the top posing, and literally stomping the opponent into the ground over and over depending on which version of him you're playing as. His playstyle is annoying to fight too. Hell, a majority of characters who have special intros with him start off by attacking him. After a single fight with him, you tend to get the vibe that this guy is a total piece of shit. And I love him for it.
This is very true especially when it comes to Terumi. Terumi when wins has a very high chance to stomp on enemy that he just defeated or even kick out of arena
As a Terumi main myself, I definitely get that feeling out of him. He reminds me a lot of Add's Lunatic Psycher / Doom Bringer path in Elsword, which is very similar in both fighting style and personality. Also that's Cross Tag's biggest sin. Not having Terumi playable. Hazama is in, sure, but it's just not the same. Even worse, he does appear as a cameo in certain situations.
Blazblue (god what an amazing game btw) also has Rachel the immortal vampire which never takes a hit in the entire fight. Every time she gets "hit", it's actually one of her servants taking the damage for her. So she never actually loses the fight she just gets bored with you.
Props to Arcsys for making Slayer look at everyone with a "bitch, please" expression even when he's losing the match, like he doesn't give half a fuck about his opponent.
when it comes to the display of "power" in a fighting game, i think one of the most important (and overlooked way too often) aspects is sound design. for a lot of guilty gear's lifespan it's sound effects on hit felt squishy and a bit weird, and it detracted from the overall feeling behind an attack; conversely, with king of fighters 13 in specific, several hit sounds sound like downright gunshots and it becomes very easy to sell the impact behind a hit with crunchy and snappy sound design
This is something I'm actually glad they improved upon immensly in Strive. Sol's stronger attacks FEEL powerful. The screenshake is also a method that sells the weight of them
In Smash, Marth's sweet spots demonstrate the power of sound design beautifully. Besides being insanely strong, tippers make a sharp, visceral sound when you pull them off.
The show Fire Force punctuates the strongest attacks in the setting with dubstep sounds that feel like an auditory assault on sound system. The channel Drew Malou has done a few videos discussing and showing them, they're great.
The Slayer loss pose is also used in Blazblue and Persona 4 arena for characters who are similarly some of the most powerful in the lore like Rachel and Margaret it's something I've always. loved.
And you know what great and an underrated thing about Rachel? If you watch when fighting her, you never really hit HER. At all. You're beating up on her minions and if you DO manage to make contact with her, she tanks it without even flinching. Rachel losing is basically her getting bored of watching her minions getting the piss beaten out of them.
In the topic of being powerful, or feeling powerful, take a look at the MP40 vs Thompson debate in Return to Castle Wolfenstein Multiplayer. Essentially, both weapons have the exact same stats, but one sounds punchier than the other, so for the longest time, it was firmly believed that the punchier gun was in fact more powerful, solely because of sound design.
One fighing game mechanic that gives me a feeling of power is super armor. Starting up an attack and looking you're about to get countered only to tank the hit without even flinching and sending your opponent straight to death's door never gets old.
For those of you wondering why one of Bullet's aliases is "Butt Floss", it's because Ragna's memory blows. Bad memory with names is why another of her aliases is "Butt Lady", affectionately (?) given to her by Taokaka
The age of british fighting game video essays channels is here We got bigyellow, leon massey, theoryfighter and now this man. Sweet video btw, love the editing
Zato in Strive feels like he is an insurmountable force when I play as him and eddie is out, a massive wall of shadow is murdering my opponent while my mans is clapping. In general a good animation can really sell that feeling of power, and amorphous is the best overdrive for that in Strive, just is a 10/10 animation.
@@Zimx02 I reccomend some solid tutorials and really practice the overall flow of Zato, he plays totally different than other characters, and you are gonna need to clean your release inputs, but besides those hurdles he becomes very intuitive imo
Usually, when i get a perfect, it's because the opponent sucks. But there are times i just get one against hard opponents, and that props me up until i realize that it can really happen to anyone.
4:18 Yo is that my favorite GG song *FUGGA* Real talk I do think the feeling of power is an interesting topic... but at the same time I think it goes beyond just presentation (which is naturally easy to come to). UI Goku def embodies the feeling of “strength” via not just his animations but his kit: the ability to walk through Ki blasts, 2 DPs, a regular and super counter, flips, the list goes on, whereas Krillin has *r o c k s*. I think while the obvious point to make is that UI is actually a legitimately very good character, the way his kit is designed feels so... flawless that he feels so overwhelming. Rocks are actually unironically a pretty good assist but you definitely don’t get that feeling with Krillin. I think you can even feel powerful with characters that aren’t actually strong, and even in ways that aren’t tied to the lore; Akatsuki in UNICLR has a pretty big rep of being a fan favorite and “chad-like” despite being lower on the tier list, and Akuma in 3S still has that incredibly strong aura from his options and 2-bar supers even when Ken is actually stronger when it comes to tier placement. There’s layers to this and it feels really fun to discuss fr.
Game Maker's Toolkit has a good video on this called "Who Gets to Be Awesome in Games?". It compares the design philosophies of games that try to give the player a power fantasy immediately, versus making the player earn the fantasy. There's arguments for both sides in the video, as well as examples of how to do both. I recommend giving it a watch.
there's a lot that goes into selling how powerful something is with Juice™. you touched on it a little by mentioning things like hitstop and the parry sound effect, but juice (or making something 'juicy') encompasses pretty much everything the player gets as feedback from executing it: things like the animation itself (there's all sorts of pillars of animation dedicated to translating a feeling via animation) and the opponent's reaction (such as a guard stagger animation), hitstop, screen shake, camera effects (such as a dramatic cut-in or zoom), screen effects (such as altering the background with a "super flash"), particle effects/hitsparks, stage impact (like background objects or characters reacting), sound effects and sound design, and on and on. a couple of games that are great at leaning into those principles are (of course) fighting games, as well as things like monster hunter and Lethal League (especially once you get to higher speeds in the latter)
Honestly the best way fighting games make me feel powerful is through super moves Literally nothing makes me feel better than hitting some dumbass with everything my character has, which is way it's so fucking disappointing to me when supers aren't very good, you're hitting your enemy with full strength and it not feeling very rewarding God bless Art of Fighting for coming up with this idea
It's part of why a lot of games' supers feel very flaccid for me. You have all this stuff happening on screen, but since it's all scaled due to the combo it does squat for damage. This was especially the case in SF4. Meanwhile, in KOF good supers will often have unscaled hits that'll always take a fat chunk of health, makes it satisfying to land.
The thing that makes me feel most powerful in a fighting game is finding spots to taunt in a match. It functionally does nothing but prevent you from doing anything, and executing a full taunt without interruption from an opponent's attack is essentially telegraphing a "I can handicap myself and still win" sort of atmosphere.
I also wanna point out the importance of SFX more specifically in how you can really sell the impact and power of a character for example as of writing we recently got the first Melty Blood Type Lumina patch where they changed Kouma's throw sounds from simple bursts of fire to EXPLOSIONS and it makes the character so much pleasant to use
One of my favorite characters that just make me feel amazing is Azrael from Blazblue, from how he looks like he’s fighting so effortlessly, his walking back animation where he just leaves his hands to his side ready for an attack to come but also his teleport Dash and how he’s not a magic user or anything like that it’s pure speed that he owns. He’s a dragon ball Z character in the middle of a magical world and it’s amazing. Only uses magic to limit himself and when he takes off all of his limiters and can throw you a mile into the air and then punch with the force of a nuclear bomb or a volcano going off nothing feels better.
His projectile is cool, too. Powerful, but you need to successfully absorb one of your opponent's projectiles before you can use it. Really sells the fantasy of tanking whatever people throw at you and just responding with something better, while still having to work for it.
I'm surprised you never mentioned izanami or susanoo when it came to feeling powerful, they're literal gods that end up feeling so damn satisfying to play either from their damage or their mechanics.
Whenever I land a good read on my opponent in any game I go on a power trip, the feeling of having your opponent figured out and being in their head is amazing. Other than that, landing Bullet's 720>720>1080 super also makes me feel really powerful, mostly because it's REALLY hard to hit and to meet the conditions for the full follow up, but when you do it feels so amazing.
I think Azrael from Blazblue is another great example of this. His forward dash, while not exceptional mechanically, is some peak *teleports behind you* anime bullshit that makes a somewhat sluggish character still feel frighteningly fast. When he's not actively using his hands, he keeps them in his pockets, giving you the sense that he's holding back - which, canonically, he almost always is. And finally, in one of his winposes, he starts floating and engulfs himself in a red aura, all while the screen shakes and rumbles, as though it's failing to contain him. It all adds up to a character who basically embodies raw power, and it's incredible.
my favourite sense of power comes from tandems in hftf mashing 5 to 6 reps of abc over and over with all the inputs making a ding during the super flash than seeing two dude both sides of a guy pushing his shit in like a goddamn worldstar video makes me happy
Something I've noticed is that the majority of core FG players want to feel powerful, more than anything else. If they can't press a lot of buttons and run their offense on a locked-down opponent, so many people complain about a lack of 'player expression or just get bored due to having a tiny attention span. They want the power trip of a single-player action game in a competition 1-on-1 PvP genre, which has lead to devs creating games with long uninteractive combos, overtuned offensive pressure, and that try to compensate via multiple defensive mechanics (which does a poor job, since each mechanic is highly circumstantial and created a huge required mental stack + over-dependence on knowledge checks). But as shown by half the examples on this videos, strong defense l3ads to some of most empowering feelings in the genre. Nothing makes you feel more powerful than shutting down an opponent's off3nse and making them pay from pressing a button at the wrong time. Parry in 3rd Strike, counterhits in Tekken 7, Shield in MBTL, Guard Impact in SoulCal, Holds in DoA. Heck, the Daigo Parry was only possible because 3rd Strike only needed a single defensive mechanic to supplement blocking, so that mechanic was strong enough to allow that sequence to even be possible. Unfortunately, the majority are so allergic to strong defense to the point that they now complain about it, just narrow-mindedly wanting more offense and to press more buttons per second. Except when they get what they want and complain about defense being too weak in Strive. Lol
And that's why I play keepaway zoners and puppeteers. You always win if they ragequit :) ofc if they manage to get in and win well, we're playing nonstop til one of us breaks. Having a rivalry like that is considerably more fun than annoying them and is my main reason for playing fighting games
One of my favorite ways of making you feel powerful is Smash, you hit them so hard that they get sent flying off the stage of the screen and explode into a brilliant flash of light
There's also just... damage. Like, the sheer amount of damage a single strong move can do. Like god DAMN landing a Potemkin Buster feels satisfying, and a Heavenly Potemkin Buster? Better than a nut. And then there's Samurai Shodown, which is like that but all the time forever.
@@MatthewCJoy AFAIK, the most recent, believable leaks show us that Slayer is coming back. The remaining three characters for this DLC wave are apparently him, Baiken and Happy Chaos.
I was in a pot mirror against a celestial player I lost six games in a row but did a raw read and got a HPB and still lost the match. Safe to say I got the moral victory on the set though
On the topic of Guilty Gear, another thing that conveys power is breaking the wall, but not just actually breaking it. The build-up really sells it for me, due to the MASSIVE amounts of hitstop, combined with how every hit keeps your opponent stuck longer. It doesn't feel like throwing them through a glass window, it feels like drilling through rock until you've exploded out of the other side
What got me absolutely hooked on fighting games was Orochi Yachiro in KoF 02 UM. Just absolutely yeeting somebody with one punch or throwing them so high they leave the screen and crash back down a few seconds later was what my ten year old brain needed to wanna play fighting game and sadly I never left. KoF is the kings of making chatacters feel unique through animations (besides 14 looking like a ps3 game) and I just love that series so much.
Arcsys just in general are gods at this sort of stuff because from the start they focus so much on personality. Guilty Gear and Blazblue have absurdly complex stories while treating said story as being just as important as the actual gameplay, something no other traditional fighting game does (and when they do it’s not even close, you absolutely cannot compare Netherrealm’s “cinematic experience” to a straight up anime movie like GG Sign) while even a more cult-hit series like Under Night has a story focused experience kinda like an anime VN. In fact personally it almost feels more like a Fate style take than the actual Fate fighting game. This is all to say nothing of how they absolutely nailed turning a very story and character heavy series like Persona into a fighting game. The only games i can think of that compare in story focus ARENT traditional fighting games, things like the Ninja Storm series and Dissidia 012. Basically most Arcsys games have by default a level of character depth, story, and lore what their peers need spinoff movies and side-comics and such to even reach a fraction of said level. So conveying something like a sense of power through animation is something that’s hard-baked into their work from the start.
honorable mention to adachi feeling more powerful to play than narukami on account of just having the shoto moves but EvilTM and supers as normals/specials and it feels weird because i think alot of people have forgot about this one, especially because p4au dropped more than half a decade ago and the last time p4au was relevant its bbtag being dogpiled on twitter but it still serves as a pretty good example i hardly see used thank you for coming to my ted talk play melty
My favorite approach to this is the budokai tenkaichi 3 approach. Balance doesn't matter, SSJ4 Gogeta has like seven healthbars, and you can pit him against a single frieza soldier if you feel like it. It doesn't make for a good competitive fighting game, but boy is it fun
Conditioning an opponent, the battle of attrition, the thought provoking interactions, playing my characters to the best of my ability, it all adds up to a feeling like I’ve scaled a mountain or some shit. I’m playing and I do something sick and I just go, “Damn, he’s good!”
very interesting topic :0 for me one of the things that makes players feel powerful is simply getting better at it. learning about it and doing things they didnt understand or didnt know existed at first. pulling off the combo youve been practicing, seeing youre dealing better with zoning, etc :)
I started fighting games with Melee and then moved to Tekken and Guilty Gear. I can say it started with the feeling hitting captain falcon’s knee because of the load boom and the hit stop. Then it turned into EWGFs in Tekken and Pile Bunkers in Guilty Gear. Characters with moves like that are a must for me because it’s so satisfying letting your opponent know they just got rocked.
There was no better feeling than in rev2 as slayer and just being able to rush down and control the situation, it definitely made him my favorite guilty gear character
Fighting games make me feel powerful by letting me shmix my opponent so when I hit them I get to say "Oh you got hit and it was *entirely* your fault!"
Playing Tager or Waldstein and throwing someone into the blender of command grabs feels so good. Especially when you do a hard read and slam someone out of the air
Just discovered ur vids and they are not only interesting and informative but very entertaining. Dunno why ur running a small channel this content is great! Subbed :)
I've always loved how Dragon Ball FighterZ is able to display multiple characters being extremely powerful in different ways through their character animation. Like, Kefla for example, really moves like someone who's just gained all the power in the world and is still getting used to it, throwing her power around and seeming to enjoy every bit of her new strength. Meanwhile Beerus feels like a character that's been powerful for eons, seeming to put little to no effort into his attacks even for his supers. Then you got Broly and Broly, who both feel like these hulking unstoppable beasts with such immense power that even they struggle to control it. All four of these characters are able to express so much about themselves through the in-game animation, and even though they all feel powerful on that same level it doesn't feel repetetive nor does it take the spotlight away from less powerful characters like Videl and Yamcha
Dota 2 does a great job at this, so many of the moves feel powerful because of their sound and visual design. I love how laguna blade crackles, how mana void sparks with color, the chopping sound of an Axe dunk, and how global silence mutes game sounds for the duration.
As someone who knows all the BB lore, 2:10 gave me flashbacks to learning everything and playing through all the story modes, and yes, butt floss is an alias lol, it's ragnas special insult for her
Everything about Sol in Xrd makes me feel powerful and his animations look the part too. Especially dragon install with it's entire soundtrack change to ride the fire.
Dragon install makes you feel powerful in Xrd through being able to use it. Outside of it dragon install has Ride the fire to make you feel powerful as well. In strive Sol's dragon install is shown but doesn't make you feel powerful because it doesn't show the potential or impact of Dragon install
I absolutely love the Nightless from a design perspective. I play Nago exclusively because he's just such a cool, powerful looking character. Aside from what you've said, seeing this slow, lumbering character teleport into the opponents face and just fucking faceslam them into the ground somehow manages to make me giddy every time. Slayer for Strive 2023
you should have went into how characters like neco-arc, lucky chloe and may prey on the opponents power fantasy to generate tilt. i think its interesting how there are characters that use their animations, voice lines, etc to do the opposite of what you described.
Acceleration. Moves that have a slow starting animation that speeds up. For an example, look ssbu dr mario backthrow. It makes me feel like I've just committed a hate crime with the feeling of absolute violence of the thing. For a more conventional example, enkidu, uniclr, 236C. A bit less violent, but still quite a bit. You don't need crazy zooms and shit when you've got something that genuinely looks nasty. Imagine a sweep that would force your knee to bend the wrong way. Added with a bit of hitstop so that you can realize what you just did. I don't know of one but that shit would hurt my soul to watch.
This was something I did with the family all played fighting games with the family each of us would take turns and they often had a rank of who was the best which is funny as my dad being an expert always was on top, I was second, and my sister was third and my brother was last. Thing was even when I didn't do many combos I was great at blocking and even slipping out of a ultra move where you get low health and can use a move to deal damage and I often still lost to my dad but the feeling each time of using just combos and even blocks to weasel out of taking huge damage was just the best ever and I'd argue is why I find now playing other games it's always fun having mechanics where you can avoid damage through skilled blocks, skills, or parries
you feel the most powerful in fighting games when you're beating someone's ass and they ragequit halfway through your combo that is the essence of strength
There is nothing that make me feel more powerful in fighting game than a successful bait, parry or some other form of outsmarting the opponent. After all, this is that fighting games is about - a elaborate game of rock-paper-scissors.
The thing that I like is taking a big risk and getting a big payoff. For example, just as a laugh, doin rams hs finishing special as a hard read is just the best.
Exactly this video is how i decide to play characters, looks, if the moveset is powerfull, if the character looks like is powerfull is wat drives me to try em and fun, but power alone is no the sell point as u said in the video they have to make feel the weight behind the moves, nagoriyuki is a great recent example he doesnt look monstrouly strong inngg therms, but the way he swings the sword, the slashes firm single moves that blow ur rival away and their hp bar the heavy slashes ohman the HS 6H is the most satisfying move to press
For me it's when I finally make that SNK boss my bitch after numerous attempts or find someone of a significantly higher skill level and fight and fight and fight until I finally figure them out and get their number. Makes me feel like the Slayer of Gods. One of my proudest accomplishments in fighting games was reaching the point where I could consistently 1CC DoA4 including beating Alpha first try.
I like to play heavys in all the fighting games out there, etalus in rivals of Aether, bowser and king k.rool on smash, potemkin on guilty gear bc man the sound efects the powerful moves the armor moves makes me feel like a crazy animal while I'm only doing potemkin buster and saying goodbye to the half of they healt bar
![โรงเรียนห้ามรัก โดนจับได้ตาย...!! [เอิร์นไดเม่]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/4u02Sbr556Q/mqdefault.jpg)
I feel the most emotion when landing a raw Heavenly Potemkin Buster off a read in Strive.
HEAVENLY!!!
POTEMKIN!
BUSTAAAAH
SLASH!
hpb reads are a close second to heavy mob for me, i cant get enough of the dragon hug
you forgot to say that Slayer being hit is actually he acting that he is being hit and actually dodging the atack. Nagoryuki is still not on that level
For what I remember it's hinted that slayer is Nagos teacher so I'm hyped wen he gets announced
Also there is something similar with Rachel Alucard from BlazBlue. You literary never actually hit her. Her minions (I think is minions or something similar?) takes hit for her. And this is dope.
So what's with the blood rage?
@@107zxz3 Nago most likely isn't as in control of his bloodlust as Slayer is.
@@christianwright7581 the reason why slayer doesn't have a hunger for blood is because he has Sharon. He can drain her wife again and again and she will pop right back again bc she is immortal and invulnerable
2:16 For anyone who doesn't already know, that character (Bullet from Blazblue) is called Butt Floss by Ragna, the main character, as an insult when they first meet. If you just look at art of her, it's pretty easy to tell why he'd say that. I don't know why they call it an alias though, I think only he calls her that, and maybe one other person.
As for the actual topic of this video, I think Blazblue does this pretty well with Terumi/Hazama, a character who is really strong in lore, but isn't invincible. For most of the story, he can't die, but he can still get hurt, and he tends to get pretty pissed about that.
In his case, his victory animations tend to show that he doesn't respect his opponents, seeing them as wastes of time or weaklings, and his specials and supers involve doing crazy stylish flip kicks, over the top posing, and literally stomping the opponent into the ground over and over depending on which version of him you're playing as. His playstyle is annoying to fight too. Hell, a majority of characters who have special intros with him start off by attacking him. After a single fight with him, you tend to get the vibe that this guy is a total piece of shit. And I love him for it.
This is very true especially when it comes to Terumi. Terumi when wins has a very high chance to stomp on enemy that he just defeated or even kick out of arena
Terumi mains rise up!
As a Terumi main myself, I definitely get that feeling out of him. He reminds me a lot of Add's Lunatic Psycher / Doom Bringer path in Elsword, which is very similar in both fighting style and personality.
Also that's Cross Tag's biggest sin. Not having Terumi playable. Hazama is in, sure, but it's just not the same. Even worse, he does appear as a cameo in certain situations.
And then he gets into the Susan Armor.
Blazblue (god what an amazing game btw) also has Rachel the immortal vampire which never takes a hit in the entire fight. Every time she gets "hit", it's actually one of her servants taking the damage for her. So she never actually loses the fight she just gets bored with you.
Props to Arcsys for making Slayer look at everyone with a "bitch, please" expression even when he's losing the match, like he doesn't give half a fuck about his opponent.
oh if you could see him now bro its even more saucy.
Only thing I need is for Zamasu to lecture my opponent for the entire match about his overwhelming greatness
it would be funny if they wrote a several paragraph long spiel for each character on the roster
when it comes to the display of "power" in a fighting game, i think one of the most important (and overlooked way too often) aspects is sound design. for a lot of guilty gear's lifespan it's sound effects on hit felt squishy and a bit weird, and it detracted from the overall feeling behind an attack; conversely, with king of fighters 13 in specific, several hit sounds sound like downright gunshots and it becomes very easy to sell the impact behind a hit with crunchy and snappy sound design
I think an amazing example of this is JoJo's "shotgun punches," or alternatively Yang Xiao Long's actual shotgun punches
This is something I'm actually glad they improved upon immensly in Strive. Sol's stronger attacks FEEL powerful. The screenshake is also a method that sells the weight of them
In Smash, Marth's sweet spots demonstrate the power of sound design beautifully. Besides being insanely strong, tippers make a sharp, visceral sound when you pull them off.
The show Fire Force punctuates the strongest attacks in the setting with dubstep sounds that feel like an auditory assault on sound system. The channel Drew Malou has done a few videos discussing and showing them, they're great.
The Slayer loss pose is also used in Blazblue and Persona 4 arena for characters who are similarly some of the most powerful in the lore like Rachel and Margaret it's something I've always. loved.
And you know what great and an underrated thing about Rachel? If you watch when fighting her, you never really hit HER. At all. You're beating up on her minions and if you DO manage to make contact with her, she tanks it without even flinching. Rachel losing is basically her getting bored of watching her minions getting the piss beaten out of them.
@@HoodWeegee "nago, you'll be punished later"
@@HoodWeegee Rachel also falls asleep when you’re crouching long enough which is kinda cool
"the Nether realm stanky leg " finally have a name for that limb kick, thank you
In the topic of being powerful, or feeling powerful, take a look at the MP40 vs Thompson debate in Return to Castle Wolfenstein Multiplayer. Essentially, both weapons have the exact same stats, but one sounds punchier than the other, so for the longest time, it was firmly believed that the punchier gun was in fact more powerful, solely because of sound design.
One fighing game mechanic that gives me a feeling of power is super armor. Starting up an attack and looking you're about to get countered only to tank the hit without even flinching and sending your opponent straight to death's door never gets old.
I agree, even as a platform fighter player
I keep forgetting Nagoriyuki inherits a bit of Slayer's chill
And then that defeat pose gets me
For those of you wondering why one of Bullet's aliases is "Butt Floss", it's because Ragna's memory blows.
Bad memory with names is why another of her aliases is "Butt Lady", affectionately (?) given to her by Taokaka
Soooo, like Luffy?
@@marvelinopanjaitan6076
Basically.
Luffy and Tao also share a great love for stuffing themselves with meat.
Possible reference?
@@chazaqiel2319 Can Tao stretch her limbs?
@@marvelinopanjaitan6076
No, she's an hyperactive cat lady with a hoodie and probably ADHD
Ragna also calls her that because in the gag reel he mentioned how impractical her shorts were.
The age of british fighting game video essays channels is here
We got bigyellow, leon massey, theoryfighter and now this man. Sweet video btw, love the editing
Hitting a counter hit pilebunker makes me feel like the best player ever
Know whom is gonna talk about the satisfaction of the counter in strive
Zato in Strive feels like he is an insurmountable force when I play as him and eddie is out, a massive wall of shadow is murdering my opponent while my mans is clapping.
In general a good animation can really sell that feeling of power, and amorphous is the best overdrive for that in Strive, just is a 10/10 animation.
I've been thinking about playing Sato, now I may just have to.
@@Zimx02 I reccomend some solid tutorials and really practice the overall flow of Zato, he plays totally different than other characters, and you are gonna need to clean your release inputs, but besides those hurdles he becomes very intuitive imo
very interesting topic! I feel as another good example would be Xrds slow hitting Fafnir and literally all of Sols Dragon Install.
Nothing makes me feel more powerful than a perfect in a fighting game
Usually, when i get a perfect, it's because the opponent sucks. But there are times i just get one against hard opponents, and that props me up until i realize that it can really happen to anyone.
4:18 Yo is that my favorite GG song *FUGGA*
Real talk I do think the feeling of power is an interesting topic... but at the same time I think it goes beyond just presentation (which is naturally easy to come to). UI Goku def embodies the feeling of “strength” via not just his animations but his kit: the ability to walk through Ki blasts, 2 DPs, a regular and super counter, flips, the list goes on, whereas Krillin has *r o c k s*. I think while the obvious point to make is that UI is actually a legitimately very good character, the way his kit is designed feels so... flawless that he feels so overwhelming. Rocks are actually unironically a pretty good assist but you definitely don’t get that feeling with Krillin. I think you can even feel powerful with characters that aren’t actually strong, and even in ways that aren’t tied to the lore; Akatsuki in UNICLR has a pretty big rep of being a fan favorite and “chad-like” despite being lower on the tier list, and Akuma in 3S still has that incredibly strong aura from his options and 2-bar supers even when Ken is actually stronger when it comes to tier placement. There’s layers to this and it feels really fun to discuss fr.
Game Maker's Toolkit has a good video on this called "Who Gets to Be Awesome in Games?". It compares the design philosophies of games that try to give the player a power fantasy immediately, versus making the player earn the fantasy. There's arguments for both sides in the video, as well as examples of how to do both. I recommend giving it a watch.
there's a lot that goes into selling how powerful something is with Juice™.
you touched on it a little by mentioning things like hitstop and the parry sound effect, but juice (or making something 'juicy') encompasses pretty much everything the player gets as feedback from executing it: things like the animation itself (there's all sorts of pillars of animation dedicated to translating a feeling via animation) and the opponent's reaction (such as a guard stagger animation), hitstop, screen shake, camera effects (such as a dramatic cut-in or zoom), screen effects (such as altering the background with a "super flash"), particle effects/hitsparks, stage impact (like background objects or characters reacting), sound effects and sound design, and on and on.
a couple of games that are great at leaning into those principles are (of course) fighting games, as well as things like monster hunter and Lethal League (especially once you get to higher speeds in the latter)
Honestly the best way fighting games make me feel powerful is through super moves
Literally nothing makes me feel better than hitting some dumbass with everything my character has, which is way it's so fucking disappointing to me when supers aren't very good, you're hitting your enemy with full strength and it not feeling very rewarding
God bless Art of Fighting for coming up with this idea
KA
ME
HA
ME
HAAAAAAAA
DESTRUCTIVE FINISH
It's part of why a lot of games' supers feel very flaccid for me. You have all this stuff happening on screen, but since it's all scaled due to the combo it does squat for damage. This was especially the case in SF4. Meanwhile, in KOF good supers will often have unscaled hits that'll always take a fat chunk of health, makes it satisfying to land.
The thing that makes me feel most powerful in a fighting game is finding spots to taunt in a match. It functionally does nothing but prevent you from doing anything, and executing a full taunt without interruption from an opponent's attack is essentially telegraphing a "I can handicap myself and still win" sort of atmosphere.
So like Big Band from Skullgirl can do a meme song mid-combo?
@@NeinKyori That's exactly right.
I also wanna point out the importance of SFX more specifically in how you can really sell the impact and power of a character
for example as of writing we recently got the first Melty Blood Type Lumina patch where they changed Kouma's throw sounds from simple bursts of fire to EXPLOSIONS and it makes the character so much pleasant to use
One of my favorite characters that just make me feel amazing is Azrael from Blazblue, from how he looks like he’s fighting so effortlessly, his walking back animation where he just leaves his hands to his side ready for an attack to come but also his teleport Dash and how he’s not a magic user or anything like that it’s pure speed that he owns. He’s a dragon ball Z character in the middle of a magical world and it’s amazing. Only uses magic to limit himself and when he takes off all of his limiters and can throw you a mile into the air and then punch with the force of a nuclear bomb or a volcano going off nothing feels better.
Finally a man of culture, nothing feels better than flying to someone you kicked into the corner and mauling the shit outta them.
His projectile is cool, too. Powerful, but you need to successfully absorb one of your opponent's projectiles before you can use it. Really sells the fantasy of tanking whatever people throw at you and just responding with something better, while still having to work for it.
I'm surprised you never mentioned izanami or susanoo when it came to feeling powerful, they're literal gods that end up feeling so damn satisfying to play either from their damage or their mechanics.
Whenever I land a good read on my opponent in any game I go on a power trip, the feeling of having your opponent figured out and being in their head is amazing. Other than that, landing Bullet's 720>720>1080 super also makes me feel really powerful, mostly because it's REALLY hard to hit and to meet the conditions for the full follow up, but when you do it feels so amazing.
I think Azrael from Blazblue is another great example of this. His forward dash, while not exceptional mechanically, is some peak *teleports behind you* anime bullshit that makes a somewhat sluggish character still feel frighteningly fast. When he's not actively using his hands, he keeps them in his pockets, giving you the sense that he's holding back - which, canonically, he almost always is. And finally, in one of his winposes, he starts floating and engulfs himself in a red aura, all while the screen shakes and rumbles, as though it's failing to contain him. It all adds up to a character who basically embodies raw power, and it's incredible.
my favourite sense of power comes from tandems in hftf mashing 5 to 6 reps of abc over and over with all the inputs making a ding during the super flash than seeing two dude both sides of a guy pushing his shit in like a goddamn worldstar video makes me happy
Something I've noticed is that the majority of core FG players want to feel powerful, more than anything else.
If they can't press a lot of buttons and run their offense on a locked-down opponent, so many people complain about a lack of 'player expression or just get bored due to having a tiny attention span. They want the power trip of a single-player action game in a competition 1-on-1 PvP genre, which has lead to devs creating games with long uninteractive combos, overtuned offensive pressure, and that try to compensate via multiple defensive mechanics (which does a poor job, since each mechanic is highly circumstantial and created a huge required mental stack + over-dependence on knowledge checks).
But as shown by half the examples on this videos, strong defense l3ads to some of most empowering feelings in the genre. Nothing makes you feel more powerful than shutting down an opponent's off3nse and making them pay from pressing a button at the wrong time. Parry in 3rd Strike, counterhits in Tekken 7, Shield in MBTL, Guard Impact in SoulCal, Holds in DoA. Heck, the Daigo Parry was only possible because 3rd Strike only needed a single defensive mechanic to supplement blocking, so that mechanic was strong enough to allow that sequence to even be possible.
Unfortunately, the majority are so allergic to strong defense to the point that they now complain about it, just narrow-mindedly wanting more offense and to press more buttons per second. Except when they get what they want and complain about defense being too weak in Strive. Lol
And that's why I play keepaway zoners and puppeteers. You always win if they ragequit :) ofc if they manage to get in and win well, we're playing nonstop til one of us breaks. Having a rivalry like that is considerably more fun than annoying them and is my main reason for playing fighting games
Also honourable mentions to tanks in MMOs and MOBAs. I wish I could play Vanguard in DNFduel but oh well
One of my favorite ways of making you feel powerful is Smash, you hit them so hard that they get sent flying off the stage of the screen and explode into a brilliant flash of light
There's also just... damage. Like, the sheer amount of damage a single strong move can do. Like god DAMN landing a Potemkin Buster feels satisfying, and a Heavenly Potemkin Buster? Better than a nut. And then there's Samurai Shodown, which is like that but all the time forever.
I can’t wait for Slayer to come back in Strive, I’m hoping he actually takes some notes from UI Goku this time around to just sell how insane he is
All DLCs were leaked and hes not coming back. I'm sorry, Slayer was my friends main and it sucks that hes not coming back.
@@MatthewCJoy AFAIK, the most recent, believable leaks show us that Slayer is coming back. The remaining three characters for this DLC wave are apparently him, Baiken and Happy Chaos.
@@MatthewCJoy have you actually checked the leaks?
@@MatthewCJoy you spittin this bullshit but the leaks LITERALLY confirm that he's coming back
@@MatthewCJoy Citation needed. Citation absolutely fucking needed.
I was in a pot mirror against a celestial player I lost six games in a row but did a raw read and got a HPB and still lost the match. Safe to say I got the moral victory on the set though
On the topic of Guilty Gear, another thing that conveys power is breaking the wall, but not just actually breaking it. The build-up really sells it for me, due to the MASSIVE amounts of hitstop, combined with how every hit keeps your opponent stuck longer. It doesn't feel like throwing them through a glass window, it feels like drilling through rock until you've exploded out of the other side
inject fighting game analysis videos into my veins brother
"Fighting game characters are designed to have weaknesses"
Strive Sol would like a word with you, sir
What got me absolutely hooked on fighting games was Orochi Yachiro in KoF 02 UM. Just absolutely yeeting somebody with one punch or throwing them so high they leave the screen and crash back down a few seconds later was what my ten year old brain needed to wanna play fighting game and sadly I never left. KoF is the kings of making chatacters feel unique through animations (besides 14 looking like a ps3 game) and I just love that series so much.
I don't care if it doesn't kill, landing Jack-O's FED always makes me go _"heehehehe, you FELL for it, FOOL!"_
THUNDER CROSS SPLIT ATTACK!
When you get a counter hit with Nagoriyuki's 2H and the whole screen slows down. It's like "oh, NOW you fucked up"
this dude got to the point so quick I feel like I walked in on the middle of a conversation
Arcsys just in general are gods at this sort of stuff because from the start they focus so much on personality. Guilty Gear and Blazblue have absurdly complex stories while treating said story as being just as important as the actual gameplay, something no other traditional fighting game does (and when they do it’s not even close, you absolutely cannot compare Netherrealm’s “cinematic experience” to a straight up anime movie like GG Sign) while even a more cult-hit series like Under Night has a story focused experience kinda like an anime VN. In fact personally it almost feels more like a Fate style take than the actual Fate fighting game. This is all to say nothing of how they absolutely nailed turning a very story and character heavy series like Persona into a fighting game. The only games i can think of that compare in story focus ARENT traditional fighting games, things like the Ninja Storm series and Dissidia 012.
Basically most Arcsys games have by default a level of character depth, story, and lore what their peers need spinoff movies and side-comics and such to even reach a fraction of said level. So conveying something like a sense of power through animation is something that’s hard-baked into their work from the start.
honorable mention to adachi feeling more powerful to play than narukami on account of just having the shoto moves but EvilTM and supers as normals/specials and it feels weird because i think alot of people have forgot about this one, especially because p4au dropped more than half a decade ago and the last time p4au was relevant its bbtag being dogpiled on twitter but it still serves as a pretty good example i hardly see used thank you for coming to my ted talk
play melty
My favorite approach to this is the budokai tenkaichi 3 approach. Balance doesn't matter, SSJ4 Gogeta has like seven healthbars, and you can pit him against a single frieza soldier if you feel like it. It doesn't make for a good competitive fighting game, but boy is it fun
Conditioning an opponent, the battle of attrition, the thought provoking interactions, playing my characters to the best of my ability, it all adds up to a feeling like I’ve scaled a mountain or some shit.
I’m playing and I do something sick and I just go, “Damn, he’s good!”
nagos air grab animation is so satisfying for being such a little thing. he just tosses them and they spin around in the air like losers, i love it.
i fell in love with the video idea when i first saw it, and the video itself definitely lived up to those expectations, it was a joy to watch
very interesting topic :0
for me one of the things that makes players feel powerful is simply getting better at it. learning about it and doing things they didnt understand or didnt know existed at first. pulling off the combo youve been practicing, seeing youre dealing better with zoning, etc
:)
i feel the most emotion when i do the same thing 5 times and my opponent doesnt expect the sixth
I started fighting games with Melee and then moved to Tekken and Guilty Gear. I can say it started with the feeling hitting captain falcon’s knee because of the load boom and the hit stop. Then it turned into EWGFs in Tekken and Pile Bunkers in Guilty Gear. Characters with moves like that are a must for me because it’s so satisfying letting your opponent know they just got rocked.
I love that fighting games even the field. Nothing makes me feel as powerful as beating gods and Jiren as Yamcha
“You’re mocking me, aren’t you?”
Everyone to Slayer.
The best feeling in fighting games is "I GOT YOU YOU FUCKING IDIOT". And that's why I round start Heat Knuckle
oh yeahhh gekko squirrel hit me with these game design video essays mmm oh yeaaahh WOOOO OHHH YEAAAHHH
Amazing video! Definetly would like to see more of this type of content, keep it up!
There was no better feeling than in rev2 as slayer and just being able to rush down and control the situation, it definitely made him my favorite guilty gear character
Fighting games make me feel powerful by letting me shmix my opponent so when I hit them I get to say "Oh you got hit and it was *entirely* your fault!"
Playing Tager or Waldstein and throwing someone into the blender of command grabs feels so good. Especially when you do a hard read and slam someone out of the air
Just discovered ur vids and they are not only interesting and informative but very entertaining. Dunno why ur running a small channel this content is great! Subbed :)
I love that you put the name of the song when it comes up
Also the outro is Tohru Adachi's theme from persona 4 arena
When I play UMVC3 and use anchor Vergil and decimate any and all opposition while listening to bury the light makes me feel like I am GOD
I've always loved how Dragon Ball FighterZ is able to display multiple characters being extremely powerful in different ways through their character animation. Like, Kefla for example, really moves like someone who's just gained all the power in the world and is still getting used to it, throwing her power around and seeming to enjoy every bit of her new strength. Meanwhile Beerus feels like a character that's been powerful for eons, seeming to put little to no effort into his attacks even for his supers. Then you got Broly and Broly, who both feel like these hulking unstoppable beasts with such immense power that even they struggle to control it. All four of these characters are able to express so much about themselves through the in-game animation, and even though they all feel powerful on that same level it doesn't feel repetetive nor does it take the spotlight away from less powerful characters like Videl and Yamcha
Always love the video essays from this channel!
Dota 2 does a great job at this, so many of the moves feel powerful because of their sound and visual design. I love how laguna blade crackles, how mana void sparks with color, the chopping sound of an Axe dunk, and how global silence mutes game sounds for the duration.
As someone who knows all the BB lore, 2:10 gave me flashbacks to learning everything and playing through all the story modes, and yes, butt floss is an alias lol, it's ragnas special insult for her
but it was fun wouldn't you say?
DBFZ really sells the idea of power when every characters gets powerful mechanics like reflects, counters, flight, the spark AND A GOD DAMN TOD.
How do I feel power? Command Grab.
Broly grabbing and throwing people across the screen and super armoring through as they try to counter is great.
Very well made point, if only videos are fantastic as this could be made by anyone and more often.
Pretty good videos! I see a lot of narrative potencial! keep it going!
Hard reads
Nothing hits that power trip like downloading a dudes entire psyche, and then slapping him with the slowest most reactable move ever
You started with MvC2 music, you gained my like.
So happy there’s blazblue jokes 2 minutes in, you’ve earned my like and sub
I honestly think that, other than the character making us powerful, we as players make ourselves powerful trough learning these characters
"UI Goku you don't need to think because it's just like the show" They implemented it too well
Everything about Sol in Xrd makes me feel powerful and his animations look the part too. Especially dragon install with it's entire soundtrack change to ride the fire.
Dragon install makes you feel powerful in Xrd through being able to use it. Outside of it dragon install has Ride the fire to make you feel powerful as well. In strive Sol's dragon install is shown but doesn't make you feel powerful because it doesn't show the potential or impact of Dragon install
I absolutely love the Nightless from a design perspective. I play Nago exclusively because he's just such a cool, powerful looking character. Aside from what you've said, seeing this slow, lumbering character teleport into the opponents face and just fucking faceslam them into the ground somehow manages to make me giddy every time.
Slayer for Strive 2023
When my control does a strong vibration, during a powerful move
you should have went into how characters like neco-arc, lucky chloe and may prey on the opponents power fantasy to generate tilt. i think its interesting how there are characters that use their animations, voice lines, etc to do the opposite of what you described.
I thought this was gonna be a core a parody. You had a perfect opportunity.
Acceleration. Moves that have a slow starting animation that speeds up. For an example, look ssbu dr mario backthrow. It makes me feel like I've just committed a hate crime with the feeling of absolute violence of the thing.
For a more conventional example, enkidu, uniclr, 236C. A bit less violent, but still quite a bit. You don't need crazy zooms and shit when you've got something that genuinely looks nasty. Imagine a sweep that would force your knee to bend the wrong way. Added with a bit of hitstop so that you can realize what you just did. I don't know of one but that shit would hurt my soul to watch.
Words said before disaster. NO ROOM FOR MODERATION
I thought this was a video about how characters yelling makes their attacks feel powerful
I came here looking for one lesson and found a different one so now I still seek my path.
Geese Howard has my favorite one where he gets up and laughs at you don’t know remember which version of Geese it was though
This was something I did with the family all played fighting games with the family each of us would take turns and they often had a rank of who was the best which is funny as my dad being an expert always was on top, I was second, and my sister was third and my brother was last. Thing was even when I didn't do many combos I was great at blocking and even slipping out of a ultra move where you get low health and can use a move to deal damage and I often still lost to my dad but the feeling each time of using just combos and even blocks to weasel out of taking huge damage was just the best ever and I'd argue is why I find now playing other games it's always fun having mechanics where you can avoid damage through skilled blocks, skills, or parries
you feel the most powerful in fighting games when you're beating someone's ass and they ragequit halfway through your combo
that is the essence of strength
There is nothing that make me feel more powerful in fighting game than a successful bait, parry or some other form of outsmarting the opponent. After all, this is that fighting games is about - a elaborate game of rock-paper-scissors.
The thing that I like is taking a big risk and getting a big payoff.
For example, just as a laugh, doin rams hs finishing special as a hard read is just the best.
"big risk" as if the move isn't a full screen and usually safe attack
Exactly this video is how i decide to play characters, looks, if the moveset is powerfull, if the character looks like is powerfull is wat drives me to try em and fun, but power alone is no the sell point as u said in the video they have to make feel the weight behind the moves, nagoriyuki is a great recent example he doesnt look monstrouly strong inngg therms, but the way he swings the sword, the slashes firm single moves that blow ur rival away and their hp bar the heavy slashes ohman the HS 6H is the most satisfying move to press
4:37
you can't possibly understand how hard I laughed at this
Terraria is basically all about growing and breaking a god complex and this cycle is awesome
How FG make me feel? 3 words mate.
Heavenly Potemkin Busta
Vergil came at the mere sight of this video
3:53 you just had a Core-A moment
For me it's when I finally make that SNK boss my bitch after numerous attempts or find someone of a significantly higher skill level and fight and fight and fight until I finally figure them out and get their number. Makes me feel like the Slayer of Gods. One of my proudest accomplishments in fighting games was reaching the point where I could consistently 1CC DoA4 including beating Alpha first try.
I like to play heavys in all the fighting games out there, etalus in rivals of Aether, bowser and king k.rool on smash, potemkin on guilty gear bc man the sound efects the powerful moves the armor moves makes me feel like a crazy animal while I'm only doing potemkin buster and saying goodbye to the half of they healt bar
Is that Rivals of Aether music I hear? That’s some good taste
Naoto kurogane is how fighting games make me feel powerful