mohab

@mohab@piefed.social

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨A Modern History of Fighting Game Releases | Sajam⁩ ⁨⁨6⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  Man, every once in a while I used to jump at them when they’re in the air as if I’m going for air-to-air but do Shadow Gallery instead: I disappear, they whiff, and I get a knockdown. Is this practical to do every time? No, because if they can see it coming, I’m fucked. They can easily grab me out of it, but it did catch much better players than I’ll ever be off guard because they did not see it coming.

  Plus R is littered with shit like this that doesn’t have any equivalent in Strive.

  I won’t defend Melty because most of my experience was playing MBAACC not Type Lumina, and there’s an argument to be made that what TL did compared to MBAACC is a lot similar to what Strive did compared to Xrd/Plus R. It does look like they’re expanding movesets though, which I would say is a step in the right direction.

  I also trust French-Bread more RN because what they did with Under Night, IMO, was chef’s kiss. The fanbase were just happy to get rollback with Sys:Celse and they threw in a bunch of new moves and systems on top of that, and they’re all pretty fun. It seems like they align more with what I find fun than ASW right now.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨A Modern History of Fighting Game Releases | Sajam⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  OK, I believe the following:

  1. Characters in Strive are still categorically different from one another.
  2. Characters in Plus R are more unique and distinguishable in more ways from one another than characters in Strive.
  3. Depth is unrelated to breadth.
  4. Accessibility is great.
  5. Accessibility does not have to come at the expense of variety, but it can.
  6. Cutting down moveset size limits variety, especially when the majority of the moves have legitimate use cases and different from one another, as is the case in Plus R.
  7. Limiting variety eliminates knowledge gaps, which limits surprises and upsets; ergo, it makes games more accessible for newcomers.
  8. Strive is guilty of implementing accessibility at the expense of variety.

  Let me demonstrate this:

  Character X can anti-air using moves A, B, and C. Each move is applicable in a different scenario and leads to a different juggle combo.

  Character W can anti-air using moves X, Y, and Z. Each move is applicable in a different scenario and leads to a different juggle combo.

  If I’m counting differences between these two characters, in terms of how the anti-air and those juggle combos work, specifically the conditions for the antiair to hit, move variety and systems used in the subsequent combo, I have 2 more points of difference than I would if each character just had 1 anti-air move and 1 combo route; ergo, they can be considered less homogenous and more different.

  Also, 1 anti-air when 1 route to follow is a lot less for a newbie to deal, which in turn makes the game more accessible at the expense of variety, but not necessarily at the expense of depth because, at the end of the day, it’s an anti-air and a juggle combo that follows, so not much was lost on that front.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨"Why should we just give up the entire month of November?" – The indie games going head to head with GTA 6⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  Well, Airplane and Naked Gun are surely less grounded than Tenacious D, and I love those.

  I don’t think anyone is going to argue Pick.of Destiny is funnier than these two perfectly put together joke machines, TBH. Not even Jack Black would.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨A Modern History of Fighting Game Releases | Sajam⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  I played plenty of +R. A lot of Strive’s roster is the same characters using the same or slightly-tweaked gimmicks, and other than like Unika and Ky, for lore reasons, I think you’d have a tough argument to make that there’s much of any overlap between any two characters in the roster. A strong, diverse roster is an important quality to me, and it’s why stuff like Strive and Skullgirls have worked for me for so long.

  You’re not looking at it from the perspective of a Plus R player though. As a Zato player, I lost almost all of my unique strings. The potential openings, exclusive to my character, are a lot fewer. IIRC, devs said the reason gatlings are fewer and standardized across characters now is they want characters to be easy to pick up and defend against.

  What they clearly did is strip Zato, and other characters, of a lot of cool shit that made them unique in an attempt to make them more accessible.

  In other words, that breadth is part of what gave them that unique identity, and a lot of it is gone now.

  You can be like “Yeah, but it’s not like he plays exactly like Sol Badguy now. At their core, they’re still different.” and I’d say “Yeah, but he used to be way more unique than this, and they used to be more different than this.”

  This is what I mean by a push towards homogeneity and moving further away from unique identities.

  If you’re BlazBlue fan, there’s a new character on the way in 2027, and in addition to the community revival that will bring along with it, that probably means they’re testing stuff out for a sequel. I doubt they’d make said sequel too much like Strive when Strive already exists.

  I’d love to buy into that, but the big man himself said Strive was a move in the right direction, and he would like to make their future games even more accessible if he can. It also sold well, and I imagine they wanna keep that going.

  Honestly, I get it. I think Plus R is peak weird and Xrd is middle ground perfected. I understand the gradual move towards accessibility because they hit their limit in any other direction. It’s just not for me.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨"Why should we just give up the entire month of November?" – The indie games going head to head with GTA 6⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  Yeah, Walk Hard is dope, but it’s a bit more grounded and obviously meant as a parody of the rockstar mythology.

  The Big Short is possibly the most serious Adam McKay has been in a film. Like, it’s a dramedy, but I’d say it’s a lot more elevated than something like Anchorman, for example.

  I would say Tenacious D is less grounded and looser than these two, so from that perspective I can understand why you didn’t enjoy it.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨A Modern History of Fighting Game Releases | Sajam⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  Homogeneity? Strive’s got one of the most diverse rosters in the genre.

  You’d have to be comparing it to SF6 or something to say that because there’s no way you’re comparing it to Plus R or even Xrd.

  Did you try Avatar for your air dasher needs? There’s no air blocking, but it’s built around aerial movement.

  I don’t trust the people behind this game seeing how they fucked over Them’s Fightin’ Herds, or at least have strong ties to that entity. Would rather wait a bit more before giving it a shot.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨"Why should we just give up the entire month of November?" – The indie games going head to head with GTA 6⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  I hate smoking and I don’t do drugs. Absolutely love The Pick of Destiny. Like, I watched the HPO show, the outtakes, listened to the live albums, and would love a sequel.

  Your calling it bad makes me curious: what’s are your favorite comedies? Tenacious D is basically an Adult Swim concept (see Your Pretty Face Is Going to Hell, for example) that somehow ended up on HPO.

  I’m curious if you enjoy this style of comedy at all.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨A Modern History of Fighting Game Releases | Sajam⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  I honestly just don’t care for what comes next any longer unless it’s developed by French-Bread or we get a new Darkstalker from Capcom (or new airdasher IP)

  And on that note: new Melty looks nice.

  ASW will obviously double down on accessibility and homogeneity after Strive’s success, and I never really enjoyed standard Capcom/SNK output anyway. 3D fighters aren’t for me either.

  I would welcome new blood to the airdasher sungenre though. ASW propping up a new Japanese indie studio would be a perfect surprise.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Perfectly Functional⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  IDK what OP meant, but you’re making one too many baseless assumptions.

  1. The review OP mentioned did not explicitly bring up fun:

  After spending paragraphs describing Wolverine’s combat as lacking weight, challenge, and eventually leaving him so disengaged that he lowered enemy health just to end fights faster, GameSpot’s Tamoor Hussain does clarify: “It may be hard to believe but all of that doesn’t mean the combat is bad. It is perfectly functional.”

  1. For all we know, “perfectly functional” could mean “After lowering lowering enemies’ health, the game was actually kinda fun!” I don’t think we have any strong reason to assume “perfectly functional” was used in a literal sense here.

  2. We don’t know how experienced the reviewer is with the genre. As someone who almost exclusively plays 3D linear action games or adjacent genres, I can tell you their description fits what I would describe as a mediocre game, which I can confidently say are the meant and potatoes of the genre and one of the main reason it does not typically sell well. Then again, we don’t know what their background is.

  3. There’s a lot more to action games than weight and challenge. A game could lack both and still end up mediocre.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Perfectly Functional⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  So often I find that functionality has the power to rescue something from being bad even after the critic has described the experience as bad.

  That’s… what? Isn’t this pretty obvious, or did I misread this? Like, yes, mediocre does not equal bad.

  If there’s an epiphany here, I don’t see it.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Hellblade developer Ninja Theory heading towards closure in new wave of Xbox cuts, as two separate agreements collapse⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  You gonna also comment on how mind-numbingly pedestrian the combat was? The uninspired puzzles? Or did you just watch the game on YouTube?

  Like, I’m glad the game changed your life, but we’re hear to discuss video games and you’re surprised someone called a glorified walking simulator boring?

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Lollipop Chainsaw Back2Back coming to PlayStation 5 in 2027. A brand-new entry starring Juliet⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  Yeah, but they do not own this IP nor the studio making it.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Lollipop Chainsaw Back2Back coming to PlayStation 5 in 2027. A brand-new entry starring Juliet⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  I don’t see any indication Sony own or funded this. It’s probably not releasing on other platforms for lack for funding or any similar reason.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Lollipop Chainsaw Back2Back coming to PlayStation 5 in 2027. A brand-new entry starring Juliet⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  It’s not exclusive though. They’ll probably release it on PC later, just like they did with the first game.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Insomniac's Wolverine hits 1.9 million sales despite controversy, becomes Sony's top first-party game of 2026⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  It’s not on PC.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Insomniac's Wolverine hits 1.9 million sales despite controversy, becomes Sony's top first-party game of 2026⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  Do the math. If this game actually cost 300M, selling 2M copies at $70 does not even break even.

  This shit flopped.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Insomniac's Wolverine hits 1.9 million sales despite controversy, becomes Sony's top first-party game of 2026⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  I mean, if you care that much about character or story in an action game, it’s probably a good idea not to pick it up to begin with, yeah.

  The genre typically has bad to mediocre stories because the selling point is the gameplay anyway.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Insomniac's Wolverine hits 1.9 million sales despite controversy, becomes Sony's top first-party game of 2026⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  What?? 2M is not a good number for a first-party Sony game. For example, God of War 2018 estimated to have sold 4M on PC alone.

  They’re just having a shit year overall, so 2M is their best.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Denuvo sues anonymous game cracker ‘voices38’ over alleged DRM circumvention — seeks damages after Anti-Tamper protections bypassed in 26 games⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  They could be working on both, but it’s a seriously bad look anyway. Companies should switch off autopilot mode and stop using Denuvo.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Arc System Works bounces back to profitability following previous year’s net loss⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  I don’t even remember what they released last year? But they seem to have been more active this year, so it makes since they made more money.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Blizzard is reviving StarCraft as an open-world shooter, but it'll be a long wait⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  I am reviving Quake as a fighting game.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨I do not recommend: Marvel's Wolverine (Review) - Skill up⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  Please go ahead and walk me through how making Ratchet and Clank qualifies Insomaniac to make a good linear action game… you know, like Ninja Gaiden II or Bayonetta. Blow my mind, please.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨I do not recommend: Marvel's Wolverine (Review) - Skill up⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  They thought they could just copy and paste whatever they did in Spiderman, an open world game, into a linear action game… and it’ll “just work”

  I think this arrogance is born out of the misconceived belief that linear games are inherently inferior and easier to design than open world games. I’m glad it backfired; they earned it.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨I do not recommend: Marvel's Wolverine (Review) - Skill up⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  ACG, gameranx, and even IGN all reported it’s mid.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨I do not recommend: Marvel's Wolverine (Review) - Skill up⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  In case anyone is unfamiliar with Evil West, here’s Skill Up’s review: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3cMczlbmBFw

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨I do not recommend: Marvel's Wolverine (Review) - Skill up⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  Called it. Insomniac aren’t qualified to make this. In fact, very few western developers are.

  Most just suck at making linear action games.

  Insomniac’s combat is fine in an open world game, but strip everything else and put all focus on it, and it becomes obvious it’s mid at best.

  Flying Wild Hog could’ve killed it going the Evil West route.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨I do not recommend: Marvel's Wolverine (Review) - Skill up⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  Action game fans and critics have been complaining about this for like a decade and a half.

  See TGBS talking about this 10 years ago: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JmxQG6Cfyr4

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Ubisoft begin removing Ubisoft Connect from Steam with the new Ubisoft Connect Services⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  I’m glad it’s highlighted on Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown in particular, because that was the first game I’d bought from Ubisoft in years, and the extra launcher deterred me from considering buying any of their other games for a long while still.

  This is like the only good game they put out in forever. Great combat, I had fun coming up with combos in it, but I dropped it eventually because it dragged on for too long, and the further I progressed, the fewer enemies I could juggle, so I was having less and less fun.

  That clone fight was peak though. Reminded me of an almost identical fight in F.I.S.T: Forged in Shadow Torch—yet another metroidvania with awesome combat and combo system.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Hideo Kojima's PHYSINT Game Moves to Xbox From PlayStation⁩ ⁨⁨4⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  Why does this dude get backstabbed on the regular 😂

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Palworld lead worries Steam early access has "lost its meaning": players treat it like "a normal game" and the program has been "abused for a lot of reasons"⁩ ⁨⁨4⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  I currently have 5 early access games in my library and I’m happy with all:

  1. Genokids
  2. Spirit X Strike
  3. Counterclocking
  4. Kings of Hell
  5. Dead as Disco

  All 5 were a “proof of concept” when they started and are building on top of it. I bought these games understanding they may take years to get to 1.0, but I also was conscious of the 2-hour refund window when I bought them and decided they offered me enough to keep them and look forward to their full release.

  I also looked up everything I could about their developers and publishers and how they communicate with the community just to be safe.

  It’s not an ideal scenario for either: the developer, provided they’re honest, or the player; however, extreme conditions demand extreme responses. Not many developers make this kind of action game any longer, so if the player needs to shoulder some of the risk, that’s only fair.