How NOT To Learn A Fighting Game

Combo trials remind me of that infamous "Techniques on how to punch and strike fast Method One" video and its comment: "What if my opponent has arms?"

This is one of those things that once made me believe that I could never really be good at fighting games. If part of winning is doing this specific series of inputs on command, and I have to try for half an hour to do it once successfully, staring at the list on the side, then obviously I'll always lose to a player who can do it reliably, right? Which, presumably, is everyone "serious" about it. But I can play fighting games. I can make decisions, react, plan things on the fly, and predict what my opponent is doing. As I get comfortable with a character, I start stringing moves together as well. Playing matches is fun and educational. A combo trial will just tell me I'm wrong. Crap, gotta start over again!

Personally I find that I spend some time doing some of the xrd combo trials and end up forgetting the combos afterwards. I can literally think of one combo that I remember how to do

There’s one thing I noticed with my friends who are new to fgs do in combo trials. They tend to not even look at the characters themselves and just hit the direction and buttons on the list as it scrolls down. It’s such an odd thing because they can finish most of the trials but they never remember them because they kinda don’t know how it looks in a real match because they are too busy staring at the combo list lol.

I remember teaching my brother sf3, I had him do the oe trials and even though Akumas trials are easy, he couldn't use it in game. He started getting alot better when I told him to stick to cr:medium>short tastu>fierce dp. Once he learned his opening he instantly got better.

This is why the Lesson Mode in Rival Schools for the PS1 is a stellar fighting game tutorial: It doesn't make you learn combos specific to each character, it makes you learn the core fundamentals of how fighting games work. And it's all broken down into easy to digest sections built for learning. There's 6 Lessons with 5 sections in each lesson, built around a core theme. For example, Lesson 1 is built around basic movement and attacks, while Lesson 2 is built around defense and recovery options. However, instead of assuming you've mastered an input after you do it once, you can't clear a section until you complete 10 inputs that the game tells you to do, stressing repetition and ingraining how the moves look and feel to the player. There's usually multiple actions in a section as well, like Light and Heavy attacks in the same section, and the game tells you how to perform each action before the section starts. Furthermore, each section is graded based on how fast you complete it, how fast your reaction time is to the commands, and how accurate your moves are. You won't get an S rank for a section until you're able to pull off these basic moves by sheer instinct, which is the speed and precision you need for an actual fight, and the game shows where and how you need to improve on each section. And the final section of each Lesson is a final exam where you have to do 10 random inputs that were already taught to you by the rest of the Lesson. These final exams are still graded, and test just how well you've instinctually mastered the moves in each Lesson. All of the Lessons build off of each other as well. Mastering basic movement and attacks in Lesson 1 gives you the framework to learn defensive options in Lesson 2, then basic combos in Lesson 3 after mastering defense, which naturally leads to Supers and Counterattacks in Lesson 4. And this means in Lesson 5 when the game asks you to do Counter into Super, you've already mastered each individal step of that process by itself, you just have to put it all together for what the game wants. All the sections in Lesson 6 are built to cover everything you've already learned, but with randomized commands per section so you have to quickly react to what the CPU is doing with the appropiate action. And finally the last part of Lesson 6 isn't a tutorial at all, it's a Combo Lab: Deal 30 hits to the CPU as fast as possible. You're free to do whatever you want here, the game doesn't care how you do it, but it's *still grading you*, so you're finally free to go creative mode on the CPU until you've mastered your own style now that you've mastered all the fundamentals. Lesson Mode touches all the points you made with the other sucessful fighting game tutorials you mentioned, and I've basically been spoiled by it when picking up new fighting games since I haven't found something that comes close to how well Rival Schools did it's tutorial. tldr: You're right, fighting game tutorials can do better, they have done better, and should do better.

This is how I felt learning combos in Dbfz / Tekken 7. Once I entered a match I realized, I didn't know any blockstrings, safe pokes, etc. I would freeze up and default to mashing, due to not understanding the fundamental contexts.

Thats why I think Strive's tutorial is so good, because it actually makes an effort to teach you when certain moves are useful. The move list also comes with accurate descriptions and a video showing how it works

When I use combo trials I am rarely trying to learn the combo being taught and more often trying to learn the mechanics of how a character combos. Sometimes I learn things about a characters moves that I wouldn't have realized otherwise. Going through the trials helps me not only get a feel for how certain moves link together, but also can act as a jumping off point for experimentation and optimization. For example I try using different moves in the combo or change their order to see if the combo still works and if it changes the damage. Lastly once I know a combo with a character I have a goal that I can build my game plan around. After all I can't start a combo if I can't land a hit whether it be in neutral or while pressuring, and even if I do land a hit I need to be able to hit confirm.

as an experienced fighting game player and as a dedicated life student, this is an excellent 10/10 video. not even just for fighting games, but for learning in general. I have been sick to death of "combo tutorials". they can be somewhat useful in helping you figure out what to use if you do a combo, but... the most useful skill in a fighting game.... is the ability to fight. doesn't matter if you can do a 0 to death combo, if you can't fight, you're not gonna be able to land it easily on someone who's actively trying to resist you. but even if you can't combo, if you can fight, you can deal damage even to professional players if more fighting games taught people how to fight, they'd be interested in fighting. which is the issue, no one's interested in putting in all this work and THEN getting their ass kicked and having no idea why it happened. they're interested in fighting. and for it to be a fight, they need to actually having somewhat of a chance. that comes from knowing how to use the moves as per situation

I agree that combo trials definitely aren’t perfect, but one thing I really like about the combo trials I’ve done is how they show the building blocks of a character’s/the system’s combos. As an example, when I (somewhat) recently tried out enchantress from dnf duel, the game made me do a lot of small, easy to hit combos. But as the trials went on, I saw those same combos in the context of longer ones, giving me insight on a lot of her combo tools at once and how they interact with one another. Her combos also explored the use of microdashes for both combo consistency and screen positioning in a fairly understated way that made me feel accomplished when I noticed and incorporated it. Combo trials like this make for a good jumping off point as long as you engage with them correctly. An experienced player especially should not look at these combos as optimal ways to damage the opponent, nor should they look at it as simple busy work before they look up their character’s optimal routes. Instead, if they take time to assess why the game is making them do certain combos along with the nuances to how they’re done, I think they can get a more intimate experience with the game/character than if they went on dustloop and copied down every combo there. As a note, I have been playing fgs for a long time at this point, so I’m not sure how a beginner feels about combo trials or what they take away from it. But like you said in the video, as long as the game gives a breadth of trials in various contexts with sufficient feedback, I think everyone can win in terms of learning from combo trials.

I always liked combo trials. For me, it's fun to do the execution challenge to fill a page. When I was a beginner, I used the combo trials to work on my execution. They're probably the least stressful thing to do in a fighting game. You have infinite time to do cool stuff. It's hard for a beginner to do that through normal gameplay. In fact, some games I only play for the combo trials. I really dislike Under Night, but the combos are so flashy and fun I sometimes boot up the game to continue my progress. Some games do have challenging combos that feel awesome to beat. XRD has ton of unique characters I wouldn't want to play outside of combo mode.

I agree so much with the message of this. Too often I go in the combo trials or look up combos for characters online and wonder "why do I do that move specifically?" It's a big issue that needs to be worked on and solved, and you did an excellent job bringing that exact issue to light

hey, the Kyo combo you talked about at around 5:40 is pretty darn practical and serves as an effective teaching tool for getting players comfortable with dream cancels. Chaining one super into a larger super is something every character has access to, and while raw max mode activation may seem impossible to pull off at first glance, theyre always usable after you block a DP, giving you time for a max damage punish. kyo may have more optimal combos and sequences, but trials are a good way with getting someone comfortable with common strings in those combos and feeling the general routing out

I never even knew combo trials existed. I just looked up one or two combos on the internet (which explained why I used each move) & figured out some of my own combos.

I'm a fan of making my own combos as well as learning my opponent's style of approach. Trials help but definitely a tool instead of a way of life. Get in their heads and have fun no matter what 🎉

As someone who doesnt really play fighting games or watches any content about them I was really suprised when I had your video "Whis is mexico so good at king of fighters" But I decided to watch it and really liked it and then saw this video as I thought it might be a good way to get interested in trying out fighting games and I was right, this video and the previous one I watched were really well done even in a way that someone with little knowledge on fighting games ore the community around them could understand and enjoy them. This video is almost 2 weeks old so idk if youre still looking at the comments but I am now pretty interested in trying out a 2d fighting game so I was wondering if anyone who sees this comment would be kind enough to recommend one for a new player, I would be playing on PC if that really affects anything like what games are even available to me or how active that platform is for multiplayer, I was thinking Guilty Gear Strive since the training was praised in the video and I like anime artstyles but I would still like to hear some peoples thoughts and also just wanted to mention how much I liked the two videos I watched and that youre doing a good job at spreading your love of fighting games to others :)

I think that's why i took to platform fighters first at a high level instead of more conventional fighters. It felt organic, then the technical nature took over later

This reminds me of a moment in Blazblue Chronophantasma where I was learning Tsubaki Yayoi and one SPECIFIC combo was outdated due to changes to her frame data. So it was never able to be completed and because of that dissapointment, I actually gave up on the trials and in turn eventually, on her.

Nice video. I will say that with strive being my first fighting game, I still found the mission mode a little confusing. There is just so much information in there and it was hard to know what was important and what wasn't. For me it still feels like just finding a good YT tutorial to get you started on a character/game is the best way to start out which is weird and unfortunate that I have to go outside the game for help