Argue With Yourself

One of the best ways to learn Fighting Games (and honestly anything for that matter) is to argue with yourself.

What do I mean by this exactly? As an example, take this piece of Fighting Game advice: “Your normals are just a way for you to reposition yourself.” At first glance, there might be some truth to this statement! It is definitely true that making someone block a normal pushes someone back, and it’s also true that the way they push someone back is consistent. 

Therefore, the statement has some validity to it, and you could definitely use normals as a way to reposition yourself. But there’s no way that’s the only thing they’re meant to do, right? If that was the case, then why use a normal at all? We could just walk our way into those positions instead! 

Well, can we? Does that idea apply to every character? Take Cammy for example, she can definitely get away with using her fast walk speed to reposition herself around the opponent and score whiff punishes. Sure, we might need to press some normals here or there, but that would only really be necessary once we want to actually do some damage to our opponent.

But what about a really slow character like Marisa or Zangief? Those characters have extremely poor walk speeds, but they have a lot of attacks that can move them forward really quickly. Zangief sHP for example lurches him forward, and can put him at a much more desirable range even when you space it at max distance. While less good, Marisa sHP and fHK can accomplish similar purposes. Once these characters make these normals land on their opponent’s block, they have access to a lot more options purely because they’re closer to the opponent.

Ok, so maybe for some characters, this statement holds up. But for Cammy it certainly doesn’t right? She can just walk around and wait for whiff punishes or go for counter poke attempts! But what about moves like Cammy sHK or sMK? Those moves don’t net a lot of reward for the character, but are also extremely long. Also, because they put a hitbox on the screen, we have the added benefit of checking the opponent for some chip damage if we think they’ll try to do something. But, it’s not like we can score game winning combos off of these normals. Does that mean we shouldn’t use them at all?

In order to show and not tell (which would completely defeat the entire point of this blog post), I’ll leave the rest of this “dialogue” for you to complete. This dialogue could continue and become a lot more complicated, but I really want to emphasize that the truthfulness of the statement doesn’t actually matter here. Instead, it’s the dialogue that you have with yourself the determines what you get out of it. 

For all you know, this statement could be completely wrong! But, at the same time, we were still able to create some (hopefully) meaningful bits of information. I think a lot of players fall short of what they want because they think that there is a step-by-step recipe to getting good at Fighting Games. Unfortunately, a lot of this success comes from intuition which is built from experience, reasoning, and an attempt to create something of your own.

Don’t just ask other people for Fighting Game information, ask yourself! You’d honestly be surprised with what you’ll come up with.

The runback doesn't exist

In my opinion, this new era of good online netcode, good ranked, and an insanely high amounts of online tournaments (at least for SF6) has fundamentally warped our understanding of what it means to get better at Fighting Games. Did you go 0-2 in your online tournament? Enter the next one tomorrow or play on ranked! Is something clearly not working during ranked? Keep rage queuing! You'll definitely get it next time. You just need to play more!!!! 

This extremely high amount of accessibility has not only led to the "just keep playing a lot" mentality (which in my opinion is already unhealthy), but it has also created a belief that there will always be a "next time". At some level, we all want to take another shot at things. Whether it be a failed test in college, or just another shot at making that dish you messed up. In some ways, this outlook is healthy. We're never perfect at stuff at first, and practice definitely makes perfect.

However, just because you are able to try something again, doesn't negate the fact that you failed the first time. While this may seem a little obvious, there are a lot of people who act as if this is not the case. Lost against someone in bracket? Money match them right after! Lost to someone in ranked? Play them in a custom room immediately! Sometimes, people actually do win in the runback, and then act as if all is right with the world once again. 

This mindset ignores losses for what they are: Losses. Losing is important, it tells you that you have more to improve on, or that something didn't play out quite like you expected it to. In order to learn, we have to make mistakes and find out what doesn't work. Therefore, losing is necessary in order to win. However, the feelings that come from a loss suck, and we often do things to make them go away. In some way, our desire for a runback is our way of trying to escape from the consequences of a loss. 

While winning the runback may feel good at first, running away from these emotions is the same thing as running away from the lessons that they provide. In my opinion, it's best to accept our losses and shortcomings for what they are, so that we can learn from them and become better versions of ourselves.

 

There's more to Fighting Games than ranks or tournament results

(Inspired by Terrence Tao's There's more to mathematics than grades and exams and methods. It's really good, please give it a read.)

As I get better at Fighting Games, I've noticed that there's this self-inflicted pressure to obtain good results in tournament, or to achieve some kind of strong rank (2k MR, anyone?). Apparently, there's something negative to be said about you if you can't obtain these kinds of things. Maybe you are the scum of the earth. Even worse, you might be bad at a video game.

This is not a cushy, fake positivity "your rank / tournament doesn't determine your personal worth! You can do it! Rank / tournament results don't mean anything!!!" Because at some point I would be lying. Unfortunately, you are not a "restrained genius," who is just one breakthrough away from becoming the next GOAT. You are at 1557 MR and you think footsies don't exist.

(No, your rank / tournament results don't determine your personal worth. Yes, you can do it.)

(There are a lot of nuances to this topic, but I don't really want to talk about them here. Maybe in another blog post.)

I would also be lying to you if I said these sorts of things meant EVERYTHING, because they simply don't. Think about getting an A in school: You can either get one with rote memorization (and then forget everything immediately after finals), or you can get one through a deep understanding of the material. Even though one of these students may actually be considered "smarter" than the other, we (unfortunately) evaluate the two equally. 

There are multiple ways to the top of the mountain, but getting to the top of the mountain might not actually mean anything ("when a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure"). So, there's really no need to rush. In my opinion, you will only truly enjoy Fighting Games when you take the time to actually learn them, and that the discoveries and "eureka" moments are far more valuable than any MR milestone will ever be.

Maybe you saw something really cool that another player did, and you want to be able to do the same thing.

Maybe you think a new skill will compliment your already existing game plan, and spend a really long time trying to learn it. Maybe that requires playing another character, maybe it requires playing a completely different game altogether. 

Maybe the way your opponent plays is really stupid and annoying, but for some reason you don't know what to do about it (trust me, I've been there).

But until you let go of the shackles of MR milestones and getting through pools, you'll never experience the real joys of discovery. Even more, you're never actually going to achieve those milestones or tournament results that you currently want. So, just have some fun and try to experience Fighting Games in their totality.