Fighting games

[Prpl_Mage]

Not sure if I made one of these types of threads earlier.

As you know there are tons of fighting games out there of all different types. But what types of fighting games - or should they be called beat 'em ups - do you like most?
Being a person owning a PS3 it isn't all that surprising that I tend to spend some time playing fighting games, especially with friends when they have time.
I won't lie. I grew up with Tekken, but I was late to the whole playstaiton 2 party so the first tekken that I actually owned was Tekken tag tournament. I had played it at some friends earlier. Tekken 3 I believe. There was an orange dinosaur that everyone thought was Augomon and some volleyball minigame. Anyway.
Loved this game, perfect amount of skills and flashy effects.

Then came soul calibur 2 to many platforms, got it for the ps2 though. Loved the **** out of it. Namco did a good choice getting link in the GC version though. A lot of my friends got into the series thanks to that. Fighting game, stats? abilities? holy **** yes! Man I loved that game. And especially SC3, awesome story mode and tales of sword. Then they released SCIV, improved battle system and more characters, still a great game. New stats and ability-system was a bit wonky though.
And at last there was SCV, kicked a lot of players but improved the battle system much. Just wish that guard impacts remained. I still play VS in SCIV because of just that. The guard impacts.

Then we have mortal kombat. I have this vague memory of me playing this at a cousins house and then my parents entered the room and told me to leave. I have an older brother and my cousin is older as well so all that blood and gore might have been inappropriate for me at that time. We are talking the SNES version. MK2 3? something like that. It was awesome but the AI was ridiculous. VS with friends is the way to play it. Then I played deception, I liked it. But it just didn't feel like the classic mortal kombat. It did have an awesome thing though - a story mode but best of all : puzzle kombat. A mini game that returned to the Mortal kombat remake for DS. It's the classic mortal kombat (2 or 3, I don't know) and puzzle kombat. Man, those retro games. Love it.

Next up is dead or alive and street fighter. "Why both?" you might ask. Well it's because I only played those on arcades.
Boats. Yes boats. Or maybe cruises is more correct. The point is that those usually have all these slot machines and an arcade hall just so that people can spend their money. And it works. It works good as well, me and my brother (and a bunch of other kids) were playing those machines. One of them I think was dead or alive or virtua fighter or such. I mostly just remember that it was hard. Then there was street fighter. And it rocked.
I just never saw those games beside arcades though.

Super smash. Maybe not a fighter, but a beat em up nevertheless. First one is just so rad that I had to download it to my wii. My N64 controllers are pretty broken by now so I can finally replay this with my friends. Melee was awesome as well, from Smash 64 to melee. holy ****, such a difference of pace and style. Kinda like pokemon gold > pokemon ruby.
Brawl is also a great game, prefer to play this one over melee since my friends got into that whole jumping - air dodge to the ground thingmajing that they call wavedash or something like that. Not cool to be spammed by fox's reflector.

Dissidia /12 - perhaps not a fighter either because of stats and equipment and such. But a fighter nevertheless. I just ****ing hate this game. But then I love it. It's a great game but have such an easy time making me pissed. Enemies AI, the strength gap between me and my enemy. Everything.
I love how they managed to make a battle system that doesn't force you to spend more than 30-60seconds in battles. So friggin smooth.

And that's probably it. The games I can think of.

So what games do you prefer? Got any fancy story to tell?
Which ones should I get for christmas?

[Archem]

Beat 'em ups are the side-scrolling brawlers, like Double Dragon, Turtles in Time, and Castle Crashers.

That's all I have to say about that.

[Prpl_Mage]

Oh come on.
Can't you guys at least say something about fighting games?

Like that fate/unlimited game? Capcom vs whatever? Street fighter X tekken?
It's impossible that I am the only person playing these types of games.

[Meiscool]

imo fighting games can be put into three categories:

2D arena style (1-4 players typically on a 2d map with elevations. SSB and tons of japanese DS fighters)
1v1 Left/Right screen fighters (SC, Street Fighter, DoA, King of Fighters, etc)
and 3D arena style (Generally no 'platforms', just flatness with some height elevations here and there. Dynasty warriors, FF Dissidia, etc)

You named the major ones. Not much else to talk about.

[Archem]

I don't play many fighting games because they mostly don't appeal to me. I enjoy Smash Bros., I enjoy Soul Calibur, and I'm sometimes interested in Dead or Alive (but not most of the time).

• Smash Bros. is good fun because it's simple, yet deep, something that Nintendo seems to be amazing at doing. I can pick it up, learn the basics about how attacks work, and then play nearly any character with a minimal learning curve (plus items, platforming, and other players help make the game more interesting). I don't need to learn button combos, I don't need to practice counter timing, I don't need to know how the enemy plays. I just have fun, and let the very forgiving health system and level layouts give me all I need to pick up how to play anything in no time flat.
• Soul Calibur is just something I love, even if it's a more normal style of fighter. I'm not quite sure what it is I like about it, but it's just something I enjoy.
• Dead or Alive is something I used to play with friends. There are bouncing tits. I think I know why I play it sometimes.
• Marvel vs. Capcom is that game I forgot about, and am terrible at. There is absolutely no reason for me to enjoy it, but I do anyway. Maybe it's because of the colors, and because I used to pretend to play at the arcade cabinet when I was growing up.

[Grandy]

I dislike Fighting games in general. I find they focus much more on memorizing long strings of combos than on strategy, and that turns me away.

Because I can't combo to save my life.


I like playing with friends, tho, when we all are just having fun. But I'm never touching online again on any of them.

[Archem]

That's another point I sort of made but not as clearly. I hate how a lot of it is a matter of who can do the best combo moves the fastest. Actual duels kind of fall apart, and if your opponent knows a lot more than you, there's basically no way to win. The games tend to be too up their own asses about combos, meaning you can't do simple things that easily in some of them.

If I hit down and kick, why the hell am I not kicking low? Who designed this ****?

[Prpl_Mage]

That's another point I sort of made but not as clearly. I hate how a lot of it is a matter of who can do the best combo moves the fastest. Actual duels kind of fall apart, and if your opponent knows a lot more than you, there's basically no way to win. The games tend to be too up their own asses about combos, meaning you can't do simple things that easily in some of them.

If I hit down and kick, why the hell am I not kicking low? Who designed this ****?

This is why I liked the latest mortal kombat. It's kinda easy to get into, some tag skills, some specials. Press R2 when doing specials to make them stronger. You can break out of combos with a little timing and R2+forward.
Also, all moves actually work like you press. Well beside down+triangle which is the global code for uppercut.

[Prpl_Mage]

Just wanted to point out that Mortal Kombat is a great game. So nice to see it return to it's more nostalgic style, it's on the PS3 but still a platformer in that fashion. Awesome.
We have the exaggerated blood and gore effects back, we now have some semi-special attacks that gives you "xray" images of how body parts are damaged during it and a surprisingly good story mode. Nothing feels too forced (like the last couple of tekkens). You are given a character to control, there's a couple of battles for that one, then you get a new one. ect ect.
The story progress is fluent and there's no loading time whatsoever, nothing between movies and fights or anything.