Fighting game theory discussion

[Jihnsius]

I've put a lot of my free time in the past to designing and coding a clone of Melee, but for the past year or so I haven't even touched it. I'm considering taking the project back up again and have been thinking a lot about the theory behind it. Don't get me wrong, there's very little I'd actually change in the engine if anything at all, but there is one area that I'd like to get some feedback on.

EDIT: I'd like to add in the fact that I have no intentions of recreating Melee, I just think the general concept of it is brilliant and would like to see it implemented in a more balanced and fighter-friendly way. Also I'd like to note that I have no intentions whatsoever of making this game 3D, as art is second to last on my agenda, right above audio.

As far as how stale moves work in Smash I've always thought of it as a failure in what it's trying to accomplish. It's a very simple concept, but it just doesn't work out how it's supposed to. Here is what I've thought up to replace it: somewhere near the percent damage would be a see-saw gauge. On one side would be a DI modifier and on the other would be a stun modifier. They would work inversely proportional to eachother, like a see-saw. As soon as 3 consecutive hits take place, the gauge begins turning with each new hit. DI potential will slowly increase and stun time will slowly decrease. Any grab during stun would have to be considered a continuation of the combo, unlike how it currently is. The gauge will stop when the combo stops, and only after a short period of time (a second or two) of not hitting the enemy would it start to move back up.

Example:

1st hit, DI perpendicular for a 45 degree variation, full stun time
2nd, 45 degree DI, full stun time
3rd, 48 degree DI, stun time - 3 frames
4th, 51 degree DI, stun time - 6 frames
5th, 54 degree DI, stun time - 9 frames
...
10th, 75 degree DI, stun time - 24 frames

It would have to max out around here for the DI to make sense, anything passing 75 degrees of the original angle will probably start to look awkward, much like Falco's upward hitting forward smash hitbox.

Now, in addition to these sections of the gauge will be the opposite effect heading in the opposite direction on each side: additions to stun time and subtraction from DI. This part of the gauge would only be accessible if it were already at neutral and the enemy applied shield pressure to you. Each hit to your shield would move your gauge up slightly. The cap to this would be much lower than the normal affect, maybe going only as far as 35 degree DI and + 6 frames stun or 30 degree + 9 stun, for obvious abuse-preventative reasons.

I think this would work out for most characters in that all long combos (pillaring,) infinites (drillshines,) and chaingrabs would only be executable to a certain point (see also: cheap.) Slower characters tend to have a lot of trouble with shield pressure against fast characters, and this would help give them an edge when otherwise they wouldn't stand a chance. I've also put some thought into having the upwards end of the gauge have an effect on your shieldstun time, to help with the OOS game when you probably otherwise wouldn't have one.

As far as balance is concerned, I can't think of any situation in which it would give a character an unfair advantage over another. Often times faster characters tend to shield less than slower ones and already have a good OOS game. Also, if the scaling is ever seen to severely gimp a character and limit his combo abilities (I'd imagine this would limit Falco quite a bit,) the gauge could always be rescaled to better suite that character's play style.

Discuss.

 

[LLDL]

Is ee where you're going. I think that would work out fine. The only thing I don't agree with is the potential stun drecrease. The D.I. increase, I like, because it'll give people more of a chance. But the stun time should stay the way it is.

 

[Jihnsius]

Yeah, I'd imagine implementing something like that would make your max guard state something like powershielding every hit. Is there anything that could be done along the same lines to help take a little pressure off easily shieldpressured characters?

EDIT: I'm looking too far into the theory of shieldpressure. Currently in Melee there really isn't that bad of shield pressure aside from constant shines against your shield or Peach's pillar on grapple characters, all of which can be rolled, jumped, or dodged out of given the right timing. If we were to simply have DI increase and stun time decrease I don't think we'd need the meter display at all, it'd probably become second nature to most players since the effects can be readily seen in-game.

 

[Overload]

How far along is the game? Looking forward to seeing how it turns out.

 

[AltF4]

Hmmm... this certainly doesn't belong in the Computer Cafe.

I can move it for you. Would you prefer it to be in the Brawl or Melee subforum? I couldn't really tell right off the bat which from context.

 

[noradseven]

yeah this needs to be moved but it still is interesting, also if possible if you can detect a shield hit you can make it not effect this or rather undo the loss effect to punish blocking, if you are aiming the game to be less defensive however this will greatly buff moves good on hit and shield like f-air, but whatever another idea.

 

[Jihnsius]

Sorry for the long delay of not responding, I forgot I even brought this up here. This isn't a matter of Melee or Brawl, it's a matter of fighting game theory and implementation.

EDIT: I'd like to add in the fact that I have no intentions of recreating Melee, I just think the general concept of it is brilliant and would like to see it implemented in a more balanced and fighter-friendly way.

I've actually lost all of the original files for the engine I had started, but I was planning on starting over from scratch, anyhow. I'm thinking of starting the engine with state mechanics and then moving into physics, rather than vice versa.

As for the pressure/defense gauge, exactly what I'm trying to accomplish is a generalized method of not necessarily stopping "gimping" altogether, just limiting how long it can go on for. Example: Peach vs Link, Peach can float cancel nair to double jab and repeat for an infinite shield pressure. If Link does anything whatsoever during this time he takes a hit, there's no two ways about it. Fox can also do this to many characters with shines. If a shield taking successive hits with the shielder not being able to (or refusing to) do any actions, each hit on the shield will inflict less shield hitstun, eventually allowing the shielder to escape. The same would be inversely true for combos: the longer you remain in hitstun, the less time hitstun will last on the next hit (and DI potential will also be slowly added,) giving you more options to escape the combo. Mind, the effects would be -very- small, but that's probably all it would take.

I've also been putting a ton of thought into the okizeme system. Melee undoubtedly has the most complex wakeup game out of any fighter. From a knockdown, there are 8 total actions the person being knocked down can take: tech up, tech left, tech right, do not tech and stand up, rise attack, roll left, roll right, or do nothing at all. Every other fighting game has at most 3 options: forced getup = block high, block low, or block grabs by jumping on frame 1. The only exception I know of is Tekken and BlazBlue, but even then they don't quite reach the same amount of depth as Melee's oki system.

Chaingrabbing is easily diminished by the DR (diminishing returns, as I'll henceforth call it) gauge explained above, but techchasing is a different story. I honestly don't know offhand, but is it possible to 100% guarantee a grab in Melee if you grab a techroll before they have the chance to spotdodge, or are you still invincible all the way into the shield? Even if it is a 100% guaranteed extra grab if you're fast enough, in Melee it's not seen very often, but even still I'd like to make a system to get rid of that possibility of a frame perfect player being invincible in certain matchups because of guaranteed techchases. Your thoughts?

One other topic I'd like to shed light on is the size of a character in relation to their circular shield. The only thing I can possibly think of to make most characters have an even ability to shield is either don't make characters vary up to 5x in size or whatever (Pichu:Bowser, or something ridiculous like that,) or make every shield bigger to accomodate... Or both. Or we could just ditch the circular shield concept altogether and go with a different system (please, anything other than block high/low, though.)

 

[Jihnsius]

Is ee where you're going. I think that would work out fine. The only thing I don't agree with is the potential stun drecrease. The D.I. increase, I like, because it'll give people more of a chance. But the stun time should stay the way it is.

Even with improving DI with each successive hit, chaingrabbing would still be a huge problem. Sheik's downthrow sends the enemy nearly straight up and she's fast enough to cover almost any distance needed from DI. Unless we were to allow DI to go from Melee's 45 degree variance to 90 degrees, it'd probably still be nearly inescapable, and 90 degree variance is absolutely ridiculous anyway. Finishing a combo with a perfectly horizontal trajectory for the kill and the enemy goes straight up with good DI?

 

[Supermodel From Paris]

I like the circular shield system. I even like shield breaks. What sucks is that once the shield is reduced to a certain level, it becomes mostly ineffective. Basically, you'd give your shield a certain amount of "health" and once it drops to 0, it breaks. Also, no character should outright blow out of shield.

hay hay hay 900

 

[noradseven]

I like the circular shield system. I even like shield breaks. What sucks is that once the shield is reduced to a certain level, it becomes mostly ineffective. Basically, you'd give your shield a certain amount of "health" and once it drops to 0, it breaks. Also, no character should outright blow out of shield.

hay hay hay 900

You mean the system other fighters use haha, or you could steal GG's guard meter system actually that is a p. cool idea, add in extra knockback as well as damage though as well, it would also limit the gayness of combos, actually it might even solve the problem you have with degrading too.

 

[Jihnsius]

I'm imagining that the best way to solve the problem would make shields start white and instead of shrinking, they stay the same size, but it turns black until it breaks.

I also got another idea: smash canceling (much like roman canceling.) I think it'd add a lot more to certain characters, but a character like Marth that can cancel his forward smash mid-charge would be utterly broken. In order to add some sort of balance to an idea like that would require a meter that you'd have to use, and I'm trying to avoid meters altogether. Perhaps if I were to go with the DR guard gauge shown onscreen we could have smash cancels require a neutral meter and set it all the way down so any attacks you do thereafter will have diminished stun and improved DI. That'd probably make it less useful for fakeouts to start a combo and make it more of a finishing technique.

IASA frames: I was thinking that certain attacks could only be interrupted into specific other actions, but that just might make a character less "free" and restrict them, possibly removing from the total depth of that character. But what about IASA frames as they are in Melee with the addition of certain attacks having IASA only if they connect.

Do you think additions like this would take away from the soul of Melee's engine?

Also, for obvious reasons, any characters that were to be designed would have to be completely original, though I'd like some basic setups to feel very similar to certain characters in the Smash series. A character with float cancels and the ability to summon a single shot projectile is a must, as is a character with the ability to combo up and down the stage with "pillars," etc.

Speaking of spikes, I think it's given that all spikes should be a variation of meteor smashes - none of them can immediately be jump canceled out of, but each would have a certain set knockback before it can be jced.

 

[noradseven]

Lol make it guilty smash, just shove in bursting, guard meter, RC,FRC, air dashing, and Force(EX) moves.

 

[Jihnsius]

Lol make it guilty smash, just shove in bursting, guard meter, RC,FRC, air dashing, and Force(EX) moves.

As amazing as that would be, that'd be way too much technicality for a fighter.

 

[noradseven]

As amazing as that would be, that'd be way too much technicality for a fighter.

You mean too hard to implement and I agree.

As far as overly technical though not really alot of the newer fighters have even more than that.

 

[Jihnsius]

You mean too hard to implement and I agree.

As far as overly technical though not really alot of the newer fighters have even more than that.

Implementation isn't too much of a concern since Melee's mechanics are incredibly technical as is and adding more **** on top of it wouldn't be too much of a difference. I mean gameplay technicality. Smash is supposed to be very simplistic, and that's one of the reasons I think it's such a brilliant game: it's simplicity in gameplay and ingenuity in fighting game style make it extremely deep. The main reason this project exists is because what Nintendo could have learned from a near masterpiece, they went the exact opposite direction with Brawl. Character balance and system balance was within their grasp and they could have easily made the most perfect and balanced fighter ever (at least it would've been in my eyes,) but they didn't. They pretty much threw their amazing system in the garbage. And if nobody else is going to pick it back up out of the rubbish bin, it's up to us, it's biggest fans.

 

[Jihnsius]

State mechanics so far:
Global gravity will remain mostly similar to Melee's, as will global weight.
All methods of movement will remain the same as Melee's, including the ability to airdodge into the ground. Usefulness will of course depend solely on a character's jump and traction.
All types of attacks will remain the same: jab, tilt, smash, B, grab.

Stun and knockback will work slightly differently. Diminishing Returns Gauge: For every subsequent hit after the first that takes place during previous hitstun will add 1 to a counter. Each counter tick will increment 1 or 2 degrees total to how much the attack can be DIed, starting at the base 45. Each counter tick will also decrement total stun time that attack inflicts by 1 or 2 frames. This will be effective to each attack aside from any smash attacks. Exactly how much each counter tick will add to the gauge will be character dependent. The counter will not reset as soon as the combo is dropped, it will slowly return to normal after a certain amount of time of not hitting (as for exactly how long we'd have to do some experimenting and debating as to what feels like an appropriate amount of time.)

Shielding will work slightly differently. All shield mechanics will work the same except for as follows: Shields will no longer shrink in size. They will, however, change in color to give a visual as to upcoming shieldbreaks. After a tech (in place or roll) a buffered shield will give invincibility to grabs until it is fully out to help escape otherwise inescapable techchases. The above described Diminishing Returns Gauge will also work to the opposite effect during shieldpressure to make each subsequent hit to a shield deal 1 or 2 frames less, exact amount being character dependent.

All unintentional character specific techniques that are considered vital to that character's gameplay or feel will be compensated for in some way.

Characters will more than likely be designed artistically to look completely different and will undoubtedly have some sort of overall change to their play style while still trying to accommodate to their influential respective character's feel.

There will no longer be any 1 frame active attacks or 0 frame auto canceled attacks. Aside from the obligatory 2-4 frames of land lag, all land auto canceled attacks will also inflict at least 1 extra frame of land lag, exact amounts dependent on the attack. All 1 frame attacks will be at least 3 frames

I would also like to implement character specific differences to overall game mechanics, such as possibly adding the ability to airdodge twice for select characters or having characters with three jumps or multiple recovery attacks.

 

[CJTHeroofTime]

What do you plan on running this engine? Computer? Or maybe create an iso and have it run on the wii?

 

[TheBuzzSaw]

This sounds a lot like what I am trying to accomplish in Zero2D.

 

[Jihnsius]

This sounds a lot like what I am trying to accomplish in Zero2D.

Elaborate.
This would be PC only for the time being.

 

[TheBuzzSaw]

http://www.smashboards.com/showthread.php?t=240227

I'm creating a PC-based smash. Granted, my goal is not to perfectly mimic actual smash physics; I just want to create a balanced/competitive system.

 

[Jihnsius]

I demand to be part of this project.

 

[Jihnsius]

This conversation is being moved to http://zero2d.smashnexus.net/index.php