Easy Allies Podcast #142 - 12/12/18

Ben you named a versus fighter (dbz) and two 3d fighters as “better” than sf5 when those games play completely different. King of fighters, guilty gear, fexl are games more similar to street fighter. The problems people have with street fighter 5 is that they stripped a lot of mechanics from sf4 to make it simpler in order to make it more accessible to casuals, it’s full of easy to exploit 50/50’s, comeback mechanics which are too powerful, crush counters which hurt the neutral, not enough defensive mechanisms, and too many scrubby unreactable moves. Having said that it’s still street fighter and nothing else out right now really comes close to how it feels or plays. Besides most of these issues only pop up when ur in the higher levels and shouldn’t discourage new players. Sf5 actually fixed a ton of stuff this year the input lag is gone, wait times between matches has been reduced, plenty of added single player content, and the player base is still strong and it’s easy to get matches. It’s still a fun game despite its faults most people criticizing it online don’t really know how to play fighting games or only know street fighter 4.

A Joker Fan

So let me get this straight capcom who pumps millions of dollars a year promoting and supporting the fighting game community gets crapped on for this relatively benign thing which you can voluntarily just click no in the options and never deal with, yet no one says a thing when namco awards their Tekken champ 7500 dollars and their pros start dropping out of the game because it’s unsustainable. Look the fgc cannot rake in the money that other esports gets, it’s forever going to be a niche genre because most “gamers” are too uncoordinated to input a shoryuken and get their fee fees hurt when they lose online. Capcom is at least growing and supporting the scene and yes they are also a business not a charity and they do need money and investors to keep funding their prize pools which ultimately allows the pros to travel and do this for a living. I think the ad thing is tacky and not well implemented, I turned it off and forgot about it. I think ultimately as long as capcom only uses it to promote tournaments or pro teams like echofox etc. it’s fine, as long as you have the option to turn it off I fail to see the need for outrage especially when capcom is the only big company that is investing any serious money into the fgc.

A Joker Fan

Correction: Hello Neighbor: Hide and Seek is currently available on all consoles.

I also heard the same DOA2 rumour about age and I’m pretty sure it was true. At least in the Dreamcast version I noticed a difference! That sneeze rant made me laugh out loud in public. Great episode guys!

Man, I think it is a little unfortunate that SFV made such huge moves to improve itself this year and the thing that gets a big mention from the podcast is the, admittedly gaudy, optional ad content. They fixed the survival mode. They have given players tons of cool Capcom crossover costumes that are easy to earn and cost very little FM. More impressively, they reduced the input lag dramatically, bringing it in line with some of the best games in the genre (lag wise, that is). Right now the Capcom Cup is going on and well over forty thousand people are watching it live. It has been a bumpy ride at times, but SFV is still the premier fighting game and has really gone a long way to smoothing out the rough spots. The ad content is a little unfortunate, but SFV has still mainly made good moves this year. Also, like it or not, no other fighting game brings anything close to the Street Fighter style to the table. Tekken, Smash, Dragon Ball Fighterz, and Soul Calibur are very, very different games.

James Kennedy

Kyle, the PS2 Mortal Kombat games were hugely successful. MK Deception won fighting game of the year, and was the first fighting game with online play. To say they were "kind of a joke" might be a bit hasty.

aguynamedjosh

I think you missed the catch in voting for the Recruit Me character. If you've got a thief that disappears if she is not observed, she'll disappear if she does her job well :P

Zkarts

Not sure if you guys were aware, but the guy who voices Joker is also the announcer in Smash Bros. Ultimate.

My question was more aimed at highlighting the model they are using i.e. ads = more fight money, rather than just pointing out the existence of ads in the game, because like you say, that's nothing new.

BeatenDownBrian

CORRECTION from around the 17:00 mark: no way is it too late to get mad at pre-order stuff. If you see a problem, and it sucked before, and it sucks now, you can be mad! Time doesn't heal all flimflam.

DaleBastion

I've totally had that happen where friends I've had for years - when it comes to the moment to introduce them my brain just decides to blank out. I know their name. 100% . 30 seconds later their name will be back in my brain, but its just in that moment it will be gone because everybody's attention is on me. Its the worst, but its totally a thing.

More of a fun fact than a correction, but the NBA is currently into the second year of ad sponsored jerseys. It is the only professional league of the major four in the US (NFL, MLB, NHL) to do this. The ads are small patches located on the left shoulder of the jersey. Yes, it is very gross, especially considering the forced timeouts for commercials.

Joshua Turner

to add to the in game ads i just want to remind everyone that TMNT 2 on NES had Pizza Hut ads littered throughout the whole game.

Sean Dupree

CORRECTION: The Zoomed in view for the Ultimate Alliance 3: The Black Order was NOT just for the trailer. It's since been clarified as the following: "In addition to the series’ traditional perspective, the new entry will let players select a dynamic, zoomed-in heroic view, allowing for a more immersive play style for single-player or multiplayer when using multiple systems." -mynintendonews.com <https:></https:>

drd7of14

To add to this, it's believed that Neanderthals and Homo Sapiens even existed at the same time. There are theories that say our species may have been partially responsible for their extinction.

William

After hearing your true thoughts on the Persona 5 thing put my mind at ease, I was so afraid that most of you were genuinely in love with that game, good to hear it was because the possibility that it represents rather than the game itself, sympathetic or not, the execution of P5 can be so much better if the developer was more competent at their craft.

BHL

CORRECTION: If you forget someones name it DOES show that you don't care for that person, sorry Kyle, Merry Christmas

Sean Dupree

Correction: When Ben was mentioning better new fighting games he forgot to mention the best one, Blazblue Cross Tag Battle. It might not be as pretty as dbz fighters but it is way better. It got robbed at the game awards. L&R Bryan.

NowHoldOnaMinute

Also, Jones you HAVE to finish Abzu. It's a masterpiece imo.

Térence Caron

correction: Year Walk is not really a horror game, it's mostly regarded as an kind of tranquil interactive narrative game.

irene035

CTR remake is a bigger deal than Crash Bandicoot Nsane trilogy. At least imo. I hope they consider it a platform and people play online for years with a few new charaters maybe.

Térence Caron

I watched a video about anime platforms buying up exclusives, and now I've got a hate boner against exclusives in general. Not nearly as egregious with the Epic Store as with stuff like Crunchyroll, but still not good. I like other things like the revenue split but buying up exclusives rubs me real wrong.

Not really a correction just an addition. Sports games have had ads for quite a while now. I specifically remember a scene in the NBA2k17 career where your character starts plugging Mt. Dew. It was weird.

Deepest of sighs... <a href="https://twitter.com/ChrisCCH_/status/1072737782571851776" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">https://twitter.com/ChrisCCH_/status/1072737782571851776</a>

Raven Perez

STREET FIGHTER V: Gotta 100% agree with Ben. I was a SF fan since SF2 in the arcades and SFV has killed my love away entirely with the insane level to which they chopped up the game. Costumes. Colors. Stages. All for sale. Some only looking their coolest in costumes you have to pay for (Birdy). Yeah you can earn fight money.. but I'm busy all week with work. I got a buncha other games I wanna play as well. Normal life stuff. Grinding for fight money just doesn't feel awesome. Especially when ya got amazing bountiful games like Smash, Tekken 7 and hell even SNK Tag Team Heroines (which I know I know.. but it's content rich!). Anyway. Just agreeing mostly. It's hard to love SFV. :(

Raven Perez

I'm gonna 2nd that magazine theory because I ALSO thought that was correct and recalled it being in some magazine!

Raven Perez

Correction: Lucy is not a Neanderthal, she is an Australopithecus, and one of the earliest known human ancestors at about 3.2 million years old. Neanderthals, on the other hand, are farther up the chain and are estimated to have appeared between 300,000 and 200,000 years ago.

V8 Dave

2x sneezer over here.

Michael Miller

Imagine waiting till Friday

Mac

Kyle, I also thought the age 99 for more jiggle physics was a thing for dead or alive. It might have been in a magazine or something because it definitely was a thing people thought was real.

Joey and Cait

First Huber calls Ben blood now Kyle forgets jones lol

Soul

Aw man, the panel didn't recognize the red lyrium idol (from Dragon Age II) being in the teaser for The Dread Wolf Rises. As a DA fan, I am hyped for this and I hope it succeeds. Take your time, BioWare

jif52

Pretty sure SFV had more EVO attendees than SFIV at any time of its life time.

Congrats Blood for making it into the end blurb. Good stuff.

I sincerely doubt it. PS and XB overlap in terms of hardware and Marvel owed Sony a deal due to the Spider-man movie license. The Switch is an untapped market that does not overlap the other two, so it made sense to expand there. Unless Microsoft specifically sinks a ton of money into buying Marvel's favour, it's not happening.

Star Tsurugi

Good to see Blood appearing in more of these!

John

With this Ultimate Alliance 3 announcement, I'm starting to wonder if Xbox has an exclusive Marvel game under their sleeve? Sony has Spiderman, and now Nintendo has UA3...I wonder 🤔

William

Battle passes are different from season passes that just include 4-6 characters. They have like a hundred tiny things to unlock per season.

Easy Allies

a season pass like BR games?? is in interesting trend for a fighting game to adapt? is that a troll or a sleepy kyle

sam