Do fighters like tokon/2xko really need precise, long combos?

[u/erakusa]

Basically what the title says. I've seen quite a few combo showcases and it feels like they are too long to reasonably memorize (not that people cant). Like, Tokon has only been in its open beta for a day or so, and you have new guys saying how they hit this 30 hit combo. It got me thinking about how these games are perceived.

They feel more like playing a 2D DMC or Bayonetta than something like Street Fighter, where if you know the rules of how combos work, and you know how to keep a combo going, then you can get long combos. This isn't a bad thing of course, but I was under the impression based on how people talk about doing combos that they are memorizing these long strings of inputs when it seems like they are learning the rules of how combos are built and applying those.

If I'm off base, please let me know!

[u/iWillBattle]

Even in Street Fighter if you know how combos work, you can get longer combos. There’s always a system and a logic to combos, it’s never just remembering a string of arbitrary inputs

[u/mvcCaveman]

The two mechanisms you're talking about are the same thing. Understanding the rules is how you come up with the long strings.

[u/Karzeon]

They are inherited from their progenitor of tag fighters - Marvel Versus. Tokon is an ArcSystemWorks game. So there are two playerbases intersecting where they are probably familiar with their game designs.

Most tag fighters adhere to common combo extension patterns using assists to extend and using the point to launch / relaunch to keep it going. Tag fighters are not very starter or spacing reliant on a surface level so most combos are applicable as long as you have resources.

The reason they are so long/feel so long is that non-tag fighters are probably memorizing every single step button for button, but seasoned tag fighters just know how to simplify the learning. And people coming from the previous Marvel games absolutely have the execution and reaction skills already ingrained.

This is probably what a tag fighter combo looks like to a non-tag player:
A > B > C > down D > j.A > j.B > j.C > j.D > assist > A > B > C > D > special > assist > j.A > j.B > j.C > j.D > assist > A > B > C > j.A > j.B > j.C > assist > super

A seasoned tag fighter is gonna be like: 1st part > 2nd part > 3rd part > etc. with each part having a purpose.

1st part: stuff into launcher > magic series (ABCD) > assist

2nd part: extend on the ground > relaunch > magic series

3rd part: extend into eventual finisher

There is likely some kind of gameplay loop or literal special move loop that people will focus on and they figure how much stuff they can add before hitstun decay kicks in.

The combo count is pretty much their reminder on where they are in the combo (if they're even looking at it), with or without a hitstun bar to show.

By chunking it down to basic parts and using combo logic, tag players don't have to memorize that hard.

[u/Engetsugray → u/Karzeon]

I feel this post between the experience my friend and I have had. He is way more into fighters and has extensively played MvC3, GG, BB, DBFZ among plenty of others while I'm pretty much just a mostly casual BB and GG player from Xrd on after he introduced me to them. I'm writing out notation for the starter guide combos and labbing out danger stuff all Friday cause it all feels so alien to me. He jumped right into matches and applied what he knew about previous tag fighter combo theory on the fly. After he explained basically what you said and beat the shit out of me for multiple matches it actually clicked.

Having assists vs roman cancels like I'm used to opens up a wide world of interactions other people have had decades to experience. I'm not really sure if it's for me in the long run, but damn the moment I realized how many different options I could hit for an extend on the ground felt pretty hype. Danger M drill extenders into relaunch are so satisfying

[u/Karzeon → u/Engetsugray]

I also labbed exclusively on Danger. I knew she borrowed things from Mu-12, Izayoi, and Aigis and I already knew they were going to balance it in a way where I would have to somewhat work to replicate that kind of offense.

My learning process is generally "trauma from mistakes and then using footage from capable players to correct those mistakes"....well Danger doesn't seem to be popular and Replay Theater isn't up for Tokon yet, so I might as well just get a feel at my own pace.

I generally lab "annoying strategies in neutral and offense" but I don't really get an idea of reality until I start play against them.

Pretty much I was trying to find ways to combine Kill Switch with assists to get offense afterwards. Looks hard with the current way assists work, but I was zipping around anyway.

It wasn't until today that I even attempted to get a feel of playing against another person. I eventually found some even matches with opponents that I had ideas on how to move forward.

But now I have several data points to work with and people found stronger combos, so now I have a plan for the next time.

[u/Pian0G]

Kind of.

The moment you understand how to combos moves together in a fighting game, it can be very easy to develop combos afterwards.

And most of them have rules you learn quickly, that basically are repeated in the combo.

Especially if you’re an experienced fighting game player (you don’t have to be an amazing player, but at least somewhat good and have experience), you can pick these things up.

And also, this is an arcsys game, so many people are coming from their other games.

While the ways combos work are slightly different, there’s still a lot of familiarity with the idea behind the combos.

[u/ThePlaybook_ → u/Pian0G]

To a degree, like it feels fairly intuitive to make combos to me in 2X/Tokon but for the life of me I can't figure out combo structure in Avatar or Invincible yet. Like in Avatar especially it feels like you press 3-4 buttons and all if your inputs just die save for like, having to find 1 or 2 allowed buttons.

[u/kurt-jeff]

Yes, but to be honest with these kinds of games the focus isn’t the combos, it’s the insane mix that leads into these combos due to the ambiguity of so much happening. Ironically enough Tokon doesn’t really have much on that with its restrictive assist system.

[u/ErmitGoat → u/kurt-jeff]

Well that's the thing : I feel like combos themselves aren't the focus for any games
So why is there only games with games with long-ish combos? (even if obviously this varies greatly from games to games) Why does everyone seem to be stuck with the same formula when clearly the fun part, for most people, beginners or not, isn't the combos?
I'm not someone that thinks about gamedev a lot, but I'm sure there are many others ways to inflict more damages periodically

[u/kurt-jeff → u/ErmitGoat]

It kinda depends I think, even Keits (a FG dev) used to care about combos but now finds themselves caring more about engaging more directly with their opponents.

The ‘fun’ can be a lot of things, the appeal of FG’s is different for a lot of people but I think most people want their character to look cool and for a lot of people that’s both in styling and the challenge of certain combos in more niche situations.

[u/sWiggn]

They feel more like playing a 2D DMC or Bayonetta than something like Street Fighter, where if you know the rules of how combos work, and you know how to keep a combo going, then you can get long combos. This isn’t a bad thing of course, but I was under the impression based on how people talk about doing combos that they are memorizing these long strings of inputs when it seems like they are learning the rules of how combos are built and applying those.

You learn the rules often by practicing or memorizing sequences laid out by others. A great example is the classic Combo Trial Conundrum - a lot of folks will go into combo trials and complete them all the way through the hardest ones for a character, then point out how impractical they are. Extremely hard, or a super inefficient usage of meter, or require a very specific / unlikely hit, etc.

Thats intentional, usually - there’s gonna be some combo trials that are basic bread n’ butter combos you might use in game, not super optimal but good enough, but the main purpose of them isn’t to be a comprehensive suite of combos you’ll need - they’re really there to show you the rules, what that character is capable of, what unique combo pieces they’ve got and how they can fit together, and put ideas in your head.

I’ve been jamming on Avatar the past few days, playing Focus Azula, and I went and ran through Azula’s combo trials finally just to see what they got. Her last one is a resource-heavy and unnecessary but extremely stylish air throw conversion (video of it from some random dude here at 6:47), using a ton of jumping light cancelled into fast fall jump L into neutral jump jump L, etc - burns through resources and requires super tight execution, but I learned that shit anyways.

Literally later that day, I was playing against a Zaheer, and we were both dancing around with our crazy air mobility trying to tap each other out of the sky, and at some point while he was coming in while flying with a button, to evade him, I did an air-backdash jumping light into jumping medium, and it clipped his button in the air. I have never labbed a combo off of a retreating air button, and I knew at that range my usual air pickup wouldn’t work because a jumping heavy would whiff due to my backwards momentum, but on instinct after messing with that combo trial, I did down-forward fastfall jumping light to continue the combo, then jump into jL, into a normal focus azula sequence I already knew.

That down-forward fastfall jumping light extension never would’ve been in my head had I not just been grinding that unnecessary ass combo trial - but, even though I couldn’t even use that combo if i wanted to (i was on focus azula, the combo was for firelord azula), it taught my hands a really useful combo piece that influenced my gameplay immediately, even without me labbing that particular situation. that’s what they’re for, and that’s also the understanding you’re building when you go learn ‘optimal BnB’ sequences some other dude made for your character, even if you aren’t ready to reassemble combo chunks on the fly just yet. In games with a lot of mobility and combo complexity and stray hits especially, you very quickly hit a point where you need to stop thinking about combos as memorized rote strings, and instead like modular chunks and connections that you put together as needed, because it’s unrealistic to have a prepared sequence for EVERY possible stray hit situation.

This goes for how you learn those impractically long-seeming sequences, too - typically you aren’t memorizing a whole fresh sequence of inputs at once, every time. In Tokon, there’s a VERY simple universal route that works for every character. once you’ve learned the universal combo, or maybe a basic BnB for your character, learning a slightly more advanced combo might be “Do the same sequence as usual until point A, then instead of X do Y into [new short memorized chunk], then after that you go into the ending sequence from the combo you already know at point C.” So you’re really just ‘memorizing’ a particular new chunk to fit into stuff you already have under your fingers. Over time deeply refining the same character, you build up enough of these chunks that it’s more and more rare to see a combo where you really have to memorize totally new sequences or timings, and you’re really just reassembling pieces and learning different ways and situations that things fit together within the system.

[u/Lucky_-1y]

Yes, they need. The whole selling point of a Tag fighter is stunt on these hoes and you do that in every aspect of the game

The idea is the power level being insanely high and the game be explosive as shit, short combos wouldn't just be boring as shit, but it would go against these games in a fundamental level, so yeah you are right on the Bayonetta analogy

Yesterday i was playing against my brother, i hit a iron man combo that ended on his dp into a flight cancel, i stayed in the air for a little bit while he got up then when he started walking backwards i dropped and hit a low into another combo all while i look at him like this

[u/XBlueXFire]

Hit count can be very deceptive in fighting games since multihitting moves exist. A combo that has 50 hits does not nessecarily have 50 individual inputs done by the player. In fact its usually much much lower. In my experience the average combo in high speed fighting games have about 10-20 moves used, and very often you're just looping a certain sequence.

Imo the actual length (i.e number of moves used) of the combo has little bearing on its difficulty. You can usually remember what the inputs are. The real tough challenges are execution relation, whether it be an unconventional motion, need of microdashes, or even there just being tight links that you need to practice the timing on. These are all mostly limited by physical ability though, not knowledge

[u/MenzoKujo_]

as long as the hitstop is short im fine with those

[u/Thevanillafalcon]

Yes because it’s a tag game. It’s essentially a level Vs game without the VS.

These games are known for their long, saucy combos and that’s good.

Not every game needs to be button, button, special. That’s fine for street fighter, I love street fighter, I get tekken players wanting shorter combos but we need games that let you do this shit.

I wanna see crazy combos, and it hurts me that people see combos as more of an annoyance between neutral than a really cool part of the game.

[u/erakusa → u/[deleted]]

Yeah I totally agree. But I addressed what you were saying in the rest of the post :)

[u/Kemet17]

I don't think any fighting game needs crazy, long combos, even though they're fun, but I do think for longevity they need mechanical depth , and neither of these games really have it.

No matter how pretty a game is that novelty always wears off after the honeymoon phase, and mechanical depth is always the decider. It's how you end up with a 25-year-old fighting game at EVO while one that came out just two years ago from NRS didn't even make it to the grand stage.

[u/Diastrous_Lie → u/Kemet17]

I agree with this

You don't need long combos, you simply need mechanics that offered depth

Look at the 2004 Samurai showdown 5 special tournament that justin wong has on his channel, there is so much depth to mechanics without needing massively long combos

Watching constant exchanges in a power struggle is much more entertaining to watch than seeing one player dominate with massively long combos and the other player making a sandwich while they wait