DLC 5 tournament

[Cmdr_King]

Honestly from reading the Tsukihime spoilers, I'm not sure you can spoil it; it's too crazy madcap alt-dimensiony for anything but a comprehensive plot summary to intelligently explain.

On Brawl/whatever Smash ends up in use- I like attack items and weapons, but if we're going for Brawl specifically I'd have to say avoid Pokeballs/Trophies; too many of the effects create stage hazards which is alright for lolz/fun/etc but would just be annoying in a game you were really trying to win.  Ditto bumpers and explosives.  'shrooms, shrink bombs, and the like... could be fun though?  Although they DO draw out matches.

[DjinnAndTonic]

Hmm... Just looking at MC's suggestions based on the early numbers... If we went with Melty Blood and 2v2 Smash... and then added MvC2 to that... well, that's already two 2D Fighters that I want to see, so I wouldn't cry over BlazBlue being out of the tourney so much (though I still want to set some time aside for it, Xer!).

If we used those specific games and that gave us enough time for me to check out a series I haven't played in ages (Tekken 6), then I'd definitely be satisfied.

For the Tekken 6 people - how does it compare to Tekken 1-3 and Tekken Tag?

[Xeroma]

A lot has changed since Tekken 3/Tag, so this is going to be a bulky post.

1. Lifebars are larger now. An attack that did 50% life in T3 does more around 25% now.
2. Lots of character movelist changes. Though generally speaking most characters have kept their moves from back then, or if they haven't there are characters around who have the old movelist[IE; Devil Jin is like Tekken 3 Jin and the normal Jin is completely different].
3. Walls. Not all stages have them, but they exist. When you do an attack that knocks someone backwards, they can get pushed into a wall. This leads to some combo oppurtunities, how much so really depends on the character. Unlike Tekken 4 Wall Damage is gone though, so you're not going to magically do twice as much damage with a normal left-right jab combo to someone on a wall like then.
4. Bounding. Some attacks bound enemies to the floor for a followup on aerial opponents.
5. Stricter damage scaling. With the addition of walls and bounding, this was a necessity to keep damage from going out of control.
6. Gameplay pace has increased significantly since the old days. Everything is faster.
7. Sidestepping doesn't go quite as far as it used to. It's still pretty handy though.
8. Cast. There's 40 characters in T6[though two of them are gameplay clones with slightly different move/hitbox properties and one of them is mokujin, so 38 is more correct], more than Tekken Tag Tournament.
9. Breakable floors and walls. Only one stage has a breakable wall and... three? stages have a breakable floor. Despite what it sounds, it is honestly very minor.
10. Rage mode. When you hit 20% life in a round, you start doing 20% more damage per hit.
11. And the most important of all, character customize mode. No, there's in-game stats or anything you change outside of the 1P mode, but instead you have the ability to dress up characters. This can lead to ridiculous stuff[making Kazuya from T1/T2 look like Dan from Street Fighter for instance], kinda comparable to Soul Calibur's dressup option.

[DjinnAndTonic]

They sound like good changes for the most part. Though larger HP bars = longer matches... I guess the increased speed would help mitigate that.

40 characters is... a -lot- for Tekken. Geez. >.>;;

[Xeroma]

60 second timer in matches >_>; As long as it's kept to best of 3 rounds it wouldn't be so bad at the worst case scenario.

[Yoshiken]

Rankings~!

1. Smash. Ideally, I'd like to see Melee/Brawl, since I'm more familiar with those, but I guess I could go with one of the others. I'd say Brawl > Melee > B+ > 64 for me.
2. Street Fighter. I'm used to SF2 (& remakes) and Capcom vs. SNK 2, so whichever games are similar to those, sure. No idea on things like MvC and TvC, though, and can't check right now.
3. Mario Kart. Some form of it - Wii would be ideal if possible, but DS maybe? Since it only requires one game cart and all. ;o Happy with SMK/64/DD too, though. Perfect game for spectators, but still (usually) gives the victory to the most skilled player.
4. Tekken 6. Mostly from Xer's little list of updates - actually seems pretty interesting to me now, although I still don't like the Tekken control system too much... That said, Tekken 3 was amazing, but too slow - Win? <3
5. Soul Calibur, I guess? I like SC2/3, haven't played the others enough to know, but I don't really know anything else here, and nothing particularly stands out as looking amazing.

Not: A puzzle game. As has been said, not exactly great for spectators. >.>

[Dark Holy Elf]

Switched my puzzle game support to Mario Kart support, after seeing general reactions.

[metroid composite]

They sound like good changes for the most part. Though larger HP bars = longer matches... I guess the increased speed would help mitigate that.

Hmmm...

Tekken 3
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fD01xRA-U48
(Average of 28 seconds per round)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lz_XoXdCWcw
(Average of 38 seconds per round)


Tekken 6
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uEQ9g6BZXPM
(Average of 40 seconds per round)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BhjuT-Rgps4
(Average 32 seconds per round)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SmsUguErW-M
(Average of 48 seconds--though note that they watch all of the round-end replays)


What I'm not finding to be clear here is...are these people really good and thus dealing damage much faster than a button mashing newbie would?  Yes, there is a match timer capped at 60 seconds, but if we're hitting the match timer all over the place then Tekken 6 is going to take nearly twice as long as I initially guessed.

[metroid composite]

I think that Double Dash on regular racing mode, maybe have 4 people in a race and send the top two on or something.

Okay, since Mario Kart seems to be gaining in popularity, I should analyze it seriously.

My major concern is this: people who are not used to Mario Kart take a looong time to finish.  I tried to replicate this by using characters and Karts I've barely ever touched, and using a third party controller, and holding it upside down.  My time on a few courses in time trials:

Luigi Circuit: 1:58
Baby Park: 1:43
Daisy Cruiser: 2:28

But...these are also time trials.  You can get slowed up a lot more by items, hypothetically.  So...Miror cup, controller upside down in left hand only...

Luigi Circuit: 1:55 (6th baby!!)
Peach Beach: 2:03 (The ducks.  THE DUCKS!)
Baby Park: 1:47 (I was in not last for the first few laps >_>)
Dry Dry Desert: 2:36 (7th baby!!)

Hmm...on the one hand, these numbers look perfectly reasonable, especially if two people are going to be eliminated per round.  On the other hand, I'm not sure that I was doing a perfect approximation of a newbie (in that I wasn't always getting last, and still know where to go in the courses, etc).  On the third hand, it's only the second-slowest person who will delay the tournament (in 4-way player races the match ends when 3rd place crosses the finish line).  So...yeah, MK:DD looks logistically doable.

[Luther Lansfeld]

3. Mario Kart. Some form of it - Wii would be ideal if possible, but DS maybe? Since it only requires one game cart and all. ;o Happy with SMK/64/DD too, though. Perfect game for spectators, but still (usually) gives the victory to the most skilled player.

I recommended Double Dash over Wii because it is more skill-based and, well, it's more well-liked by most MK fans. DS is pretty fun too but I don't know how viable that is.

[Tonfa]

Well, I'm 50/50 about attending the con but since the discussion is active right now...

1. Tekken 6 - Flashy yet pseudorealistic (well there are exceptions like the bear ok) fighting styles makes it an interesting watch. Very few if any high skill level players. Game accessible on multiple platforms and prequel knowledge alone is sufficient for the basics of many characters.

2. Melty Blood: Actress Again - Flashy with extremely distinctive character designs. Skill gaps exist though, there are a few upper mid and a bunch of mid level players in the DL. Game itself hard to access, sadly. MBAC knowledge translates to a certain extent.

3 ... I've got nothing here, really. Something completely different?

Strong dislike: Street Fighter(any) - Good to watch but terrible to play.
MvC2 - Roughly as balanced as SO3 versus mode.

I want Dissidia to happen but it's a logistics nightmare and favors players with prior experience like nothing else. It is extremely stylish with more variance in how rounds play out/look like than any other fighting game, though, and looks great when spectating. Oh well.

[metroid composite]

More Double-Dash data.  Decided to do Star Cup--with controller backwards this time so I don't get too used to the upside down.  Mirror mode

Sherbert Land: 2:21
Mushroom City: 2:24 (6th baby!!)
Yoshi Circuit: 3:06 (Yeah, hardest course in the game and stuff).
DK Mountain: 3:04

Hmm...turns out DK mountain is a rather long course.  (I was thinking it's the single most exciting course to watch, but yeah even the first place computer was like 2:40)

[Cotigo]

DK mountain's quick if you do the shortcuts (there are like two).  Even then you're still waiting for the computers to finish up.

Incidentally, 8 player DD is not impossible or even that hard to do, if a couple people feel like buying the Ethernet port expansion for their cube.  The longer matches could be evened out by the virtue of more people participating at once.  This is assuming, of course, that nobody wants to partner up, which, for a tournament, I doubt anyone wants to do.

It's also probably pretty entertaining to watch, once you've got the 8 player chaos going on.

EDIT:  Hell, if I don't go, I'm willing to mail off my Ethernet expansion provided I can find the cube all boxed up wherever it is.  Small chance my friend might have sold it when cleaning out his house, but I doubt it.

[Talaysen]

We should get 8 player DD going even if it doesn't get in the tournament.  Though I have no objections to it being in the tournament either (well, I thought it might be too long but apparently it's not too bad?).

For Brawl, 2v2 is good.  Low items, turn the match lengthening items off.  I prefer no team attack honestly.  Team attack annoys me to no end.

Kind of a side thing: If we can get Dissidia working on screens, that would be awesome.  Not for the tourney, but just to play.  Dissidia may not be a tourney-friendly game, but there's nothing stopping anyone from just playing it in the other however many hours we have there.

[Hunter Sopko]

Can we please stop looking at match times as a qualifier? The problem wasn't that the individual games ran long, it's that we did everything at once. As people have said, the DL by and large aren't fighting game fans. Do you really expect them to be able to sit down and watch for 4-5 hours straight? Keep it at 5 games and split it into two days. It'll keep it fresh and not make people feel forced to sit and watch things long after they've lost interest.

[metroid composite]

DK mountain's quick if you do the shortcuts (there are like two).  Even then you're still waiting for the computers to finish up.

Well...right, I'm assuming worst-case scenario of a player who hasn't played much Mario Kart and doesn't know the shortcut--how long will that take to finish?  Those are the people we're going to be waiting on for the round to end.

Can we please stop looking at match times as a qualifier?

Nope.

This is a planning topic.  I want to plan as much out as possible in advance.  Part of planning is scheduling.  Seriously, regardless of what we do with the information, knowing match length ahead of time is just useful.  Even if we did "5 games split over 2 days", I'd imagine we'd still want to know which games take more time (so that we don't schedule the three longest games on one day and the two shorter games on the second day, for instance).

[Meeplelard]

I want Dissidia to happen but it's a logistics nightmare and favors players with prior experience like nothing else. It is extremely stylish with more variance in how rounds play out/look like than any other fighting game, though, and looks great when spectating. Oh well.

I'm thinking that, best we can do with Dissidia, is hook it up to a TV and show some exhibition matches, just so people can see flashiness, and possibly other silliness involved (maybe we'll get a JUST/NOT AS PLANNED moment with Emperor!?)  But yeah, for a tournament, bad idea.

Might as well toss my game ideas in:

No particular order, just listing things:

1. Melee/Brawl.  Don't largely care which, just don't want 64 cause when its said and done, its out dated and too limited a cast; Brawl+ I've gone over.
2. Mario Kart.  Not a fan of the series, but for varieties sake, this is probably the best idea.
3. Street Fighter.  Be it HD Remix, SF4, SSF4, Alpha 3, the ORIGINAL Street Fighter 2 with only 8 characters and totally primitive gameplay, I don't care (The latter game is mostly joking; I naturally assume we'd be intelligent enough to choose at least a modernized version of that game, if not just go HD Remix.)
4. Tekken 6.  Yeah, been convinced its a good idea, why not.  Alternative to Soul Calibur, which I think could use a rest.
5. KoF.  Which one, dunno, but its a popular series not yet seen at a DLcon Tournament, and its not that different from Street Fighter on basic fundamentals, so it works as an alternative 2D Fighter. 

Against: Blazblue.  Others have been over it, won't repeat.

[metroid composite]

Okay, several people independently have brought up the idea of splitting the tournament over two days, a couple hours each day.  I have some serious reservations about this, but it's popular enough that I feel I should address the disadvantages directly and give the supporters a chance to respond.

#1. Which two days would we do this, exactly?
If it's anything like past cons, there will be people flying in Friday night, and there will be people flying out early Sunday afternoon.  The only day when everyone tends to be there is Saturday (the day we've always run the tournament).  So...if we're running the tournament across two days...which days, exactly?

#2. This will take more total time than running it all in one day.  Are people okay with that?
Gathering the DL in one place can take half an hour; we would have to do so twice with the two-day plan.  Not to mention, tournament requires equipment setup, and we will never know -exactly- when it's going to end, so we can't schedule, say, bowling immediately after it.

#3. To the "casual" people this is meant to placate: would this actually placate you?
The theory seems to be "some people want less than four hours, so let's do two 2-hour sessions!  That'll make them happy!"  I'm not entirely sure it works that way.  So...if you're in the "shorter" crowd, would this be better for you?  Alternatively, would this be worse?



I really don't have answers to #1 or #2.  I have some hypothetical theories on #3.  Mind you, I can't speak from personal experience on #3 (I'm hardcore and have gone for 16 hours in one day at a tournament when the rest of the crowd was still excited) so these are really, really hypothetical.  First hypothetical situation--I enjoy the short amount of bowling we do at DLC as a social exercise, but I don't inherently enjoy bowling.  Let's say we went bowling on Saturday, then on Sunday people were like "let's go bowling again!" I'd be like "wait, really?  We just went yesterday.  Maybe I'll skip this one."  Second hypothetical situation--let's say someone doesn't like horror movies and gets dragged to one...and it turns out it's a 3-hour movie.  She probably sticks it out anyway as she agreed to come.  By contrast, same person gets dragged to a horror movie that's normal running length (1:30) then the very next night her friends are like "let's go to a horror movie tonight, too", she'll probably say no.  Same total time of actually sitting in a movie theatre.

[Yakumo]

From what I can tell, you're worried about people getting bored with playing and spectating because it goes too long.  If that's the reason you're qualifying games with match times(yes, knowing the times is important for scheduling purposes too but it sounds like you're disqualifying some games just because they're too long), then switching to a split session will be more likely to hold interest than playing and watching the same things for something like five hours in a row. 

I'll point at pretty much any other activity we do at the con.  Can you name a single other thing that a group of people were doing for more than an hour or two at a time before they split off to do something else(there's probably something but nothing comes to me off the top of my head)?  Even the things that go that long almost everyone is actively participating as opposed to watching.  We just don't have that long of a collective attention span. <_< 

Also, the split sessions don't even have to be on separate days.  Fit part of it between breakfast and lunch, then finish it off when we get back from whatever outing we plan that day, or something similar.  Friday night also tends to have almost everyone there so you can start then and finish on Saturday most likely.

[AndrewRogue]

To throw my hat in the ring, as the dude who won at DLC4, I'd like to offer to run it this year. Makes some amount of sense to me. Lemme know if you have any thoughts there, though.

On the subject of #1: Spread it a bit through Saturday and toss some either late Friday or early Sunday, pending people's plans.

#2: Less of a big deal, honestly, I feel. All that DL organization actually requires is an Alpha to direct the Betas. The people who want to participate and watch could be mobilized pretty quick if we said "We're starting Melty Blood at XXXX" and then actually start. Really, there is no reason gathering people should take any time at all unless we have to travel to an alternate locale for the tourny. If its just something like Meeple's/the Beach House then there's really no excuse to not be able to get to another room and sit your hind end in a chair within a couple minutes. I also don't really think equipment set-up is that big a deal.

#3: This is actually more to placate the hideously short attention span of the DL on the whole. It really just amounts to watching multiple games in a row getting tiresome. Your example... kind of falls flat because we aren't really looking at a way to help out the people who dislike fighting games. They have a perfectly valid option: chill and socialize while this goes on in the background. This is more to help out the people who are interested in the event, but don't want to block out four straight hours for it.

*shrugs* Personally, I think clipping a game or so and spreading it throughout the weekend is a good idea.

[Grefter]

To throw my hat in the ring, as the dude who won at DLC4, I'd like to offer to run it this year. ...
#2: Less of a big deal, honestly, I feel. All that DL organization actually requires is an Alpha to direct the Betas.

This is a well made plan (I kid)

Bought Tekken 6 after this topic, I will give it a fiddle and see what I think of it before throwing in a vote.

[AndrewRogue]

Speaking of. Filler votes while I debate the merits of what has been suggested.

1. Killer Instinct. C-c-c-combo breaker.
2. Primal Rage. Dinosaurs vs Giant Monkeys. Hell yeah.
3. Mortal Kombat. Classic.
4. World of Warcraft level 1 duels. PvP is serious business.
5. Left 4 Dead 2 No Shooting Advanced Distance Runs. Remember, you only need to run faster than your friends.

Will edit in some serious thoughts a bit later.

[Ranmilia]

I'll point at pretty much any other activity we do at the con.  Can you name a single other thing that a group of people were doing for more than an hour or two at a time before they split off to do something else(there's probably something but nothing comes to me off the top of my head)?  Even the things that go that long almost everyone is actively participating as opposed to watching.  We just don't have that long of a collective attention span. <_< 

Arkham!  People sat and watched Arkham games they weren't playing in at DLC3, too!  Interest in subject is a huge thing.  

Judging from DLC2, I think people could easily maintain interest in Mario Kart matches (even waiting for slower players to finish) where they'd get bored with a fighting game with similarly long match times.  I could stand watching it, and I like Mario Kart... about as much as Elfboy likes Blazblue.

[AndrewRogue]

Alex: Arkham suffered pretty heavy at DLC4 even though people wanted to play. It was pretty common for people to be away/not paying attention on their turn.

[Hunter Sopko]

Yeah. Non-seperate rooms for the most part hurt the board game crowd.