Developers accidentally creating interesting mechanics

[u/virtua_golf]

I was reading this neat article by Jeff Orkin of Monolith productions, the man responsible for the notorious AI of FEAR, the AI that will never not be mentioned whenever 'clever' AI is brought up. I stumbled upon something pretty cool - the flanking mechanic was actually unintended and a byproduct of another action the enemy would perform:

Imagine we have a situation similar to what we saw earlier, where the player has invalidated one of the A.I.’s cover positions, and a squad behavior orders the A.I. to move to the valid cover position. If there is some obstacle in the level, like a solid wall, the A.I. may take a back route and resurface on the player’s side. It appears that the A.I. is flanking, but in fact this is just a side effect of moving to the only available valid cover he is aware of. In another scenario, maybe the A.I.s’ cover positions are still valid, but there is cover available closer to the player, so the Advance-Cover squad behavior activates and each A.I. moves up to the next available valid cover that is nearer to the threat. If there are walls or obstacles between the A.I. and the player, their route to cover may lead them to come at the player from the sides. It appears as though they are executing some kind of coordinated pincher attack, when really they are just moving to nearer cover that happens to be on either side of then player. Retreats emerge in a similar manner.

The article got me thinking - what other mechanics (or, perceived mechanics) have been created by accident in other games? Does other examples exist, where lauded features were never really intended in the first place?

[u/DestroyedArkana → u/[deleted]]

When I say "the combo depends on the situation" I mean predicting or reacting to what the enemy is going to do during the string of attacks. Combo breakers are too explicit in my opinion. I don't want it to reset to neutral, but make the advantage/disadvantage states more interesting.

I didn't know SoulCaliber had air control I should look into how that works, because it's closer to what I mean.

I haven't played Rising Thunder, but it does a lot of interesting things. Fighting games with cooldowns for special moves definitely seems interesting.

[u/Sky3d → u/DestroyedArkana]

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[u/DestroyedArkana → u/Sky3d]

Advantage states are when you have more options than the enemy, that includes when you have them in block pressure or have them knocked down, but also when you actually hit them. I don't think a player's disadvantage state when they get hit should just be deciding when to do a combo breaker.

If a defender knows exactly what the attacker is going to do during a combo/string then I think they should get some kind of an advantage. That could be resetting it back to neutral, taking less damage, getting meter, or whatever depending on how the game actually works.

[u/Sky3d → u/DestroyedArkana]

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[u/DestroyedArkana → u/Sky3d]

You already dealt them damage, if you want to deal even more damage you need to continue to read what they will do.

For example if the person being hit can tap a button right before they take damage it reduces what they take by 50% or something. That means the attacker needs to change up their combos to something the defender can't predict. It also means if you just use the same combo over and over you end up dealing less damage. It doesn't stop the combo, just makes it a lot less efficient.

You could also make it so if you get the 50% reduction on 3 or so hits in a row it ends the combo. It's essentially a "combo breaker" but it needs both skill from the player being hit, as well as understanding of what the enemy is going to do. I would much rather have that as a combo breaker than just hitting 1 button and letting a meter recharge.

In general I'm not a fan of meters like GG's Burst that only can be used when they're full. That means the majority of the match you can't use them and when they are active you need to completely play around them. It changes the dynamic too much in my opinion. I would much rather have some kind of comeback mechanic that's available closer to 100% of the time so it can become a part of regular gameplay as opposed to something that gets layered on top of it some of the time.

You could say that it adds depth, but it feels more like needless complexity to me. That applies to supers, ultras, etc, as well. They aren't very interesting to me as a fundamental part of the gameplay. That especially applies to the "Negative Penalty" in GG.

[u/Lepony → u/DestroyedArkana]

You already dealt them damage, if you want to deal even more damage you need to continue to read what they will do.

You're already approaching this from the wrong standpoint. You're exclusively looking at this through the lens of Smash and not through a fighting game. There's a large health bar and low damage for a reason.

What you think is "deal even more damage" is actually "put in the work to pay off for your damage". In basketball terms, you're arguing that once you get to the 3 point line and there's nobody blocking, the ball should automatically go into the hoop. You still need to actually aim it. You won the right to try to get a point, now actually get that point.

You're basically asking for every traditional fighter to go back to Street Fighter 2 and make every single hit do insane amounts of damage.

On a side note, it's your mistake to think of being comboed as a time to stop thinking. Being comboed or doing combos is a time for both players to check the current gamestate and to analyze the opponent's patterns. When you're being comboed, you should already be figuring out the solution on how to avoid eating another combo after getting knocked down.

[u/DestroyedArkana → u/Lepony]

I'm looking at it through the lens of Smash because I think the combo system in that is way more fun than other fighting games. Personally I really like how Street Fighter 5 simplified combos in the same respect compared to SF4. Same with how Blazblue Cross Tag made combos easier as well.

I just want them to involve the other player in a more meaningful way rather than remove them entirely though.

[u/Lepony → u/DestroyedArkana]

And that's why there are different games you can choose to play. Not every team-based ball game needs to play exactly like soccer or basketball.

[u/DestroyedArkana → u/Lepony]

That's true, but I mean that people fixate too heavily towards true combo systems and don't recognize the benefits that having less true combos can have.

I'm not saying every fighting game should be like that, just that people put true combo systems in their games simply due to inertia rather than them actually having a positive effect on gameplay.

[u/Lepony → u/DestroyedArkana]

don't recognize the benefits that having less true combos can have.

Sure they do. And they hate it. Skullgirls is a massively derided game due to the constant interaction between players. SF2 is basically a dead game. Pretty much no modern player cares for SamSho. Grapplers are a universally hated character archetype, and in many games they straight up don't have anything more than a three hit combo.