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Post by asiacatdogblue on Sept 6, 2011 17:34:55 GMT -5
So, what do the people here think about the competitive aspect in video gaming?
Have anyone ever had any experiences with competitive gaming?
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Post by Nester the Lark on Sept 6, 2011 17:54:25 GMT -5
If you mean from a spectator's point of view, I think whether you enjoy it depends on how much you understand what's going. If you have a basic idea of the strategy behind Street Fighter or Starcraft, then you might find higher-level competition to be at least vaguely interesting to watch. I saw a bit of the EVO championships this year, and altho I wasn't familiar with all of the in-depth strategy the players were using, I found it somewhat entertaining. The commentators helped, tho. On the other hand, I know nothing about Starcraft, and find it incredibly boring to watch. I haven't had any personal experience with competitive gaming, unless you count Nintendo Powerfest 1990.  |
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Post by 8bitretroshit on Sept 6, 2011 18:31:04 GMT -5
I play plenty of Starcraft and I find Starcraft matches incredibly boring to watch. I suck shit at fighting games but I like seeing videos of pro's pulling these fancy combo's. Go figure.
I never bothered with competitive gaming myself, too serious for me. I play games for the fun of it (not meant as a burn tho, I can see how good players enjoy fighting other pro's in a serious competition)
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Post by Manspeed on Sept 6, 2011 23:22:15 GMT -5
In my experience, competitive gamers drain the most important aspect of GAMES from the actual games: FUN.
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Post by Shadrio on Sept 7, 2011 0:59:35 GMT -5
The two games I can currently remember (Pokemon and SSBB) in which I mainly play competitively, I can say that the most fun that could be had totally depends on each group.
It really sucks when one group says that their way of playing the game is correct and thinks that the other way is lacking in the fun factor. For example, I really enjoy playing SSBB against people in the most competitive, item-less, balanced stage brawl possible. But I also enjoy item fests (they were a thousand times better in Melee, the item drop chance in Brawl is horrid when compared to Melee) every now and then. But when someone, who avidly hates competitive Smashing, jumps up and starts wailing on how SSB should not be competitive, but purely an itempalooza, then I cannot respect said person for not respecting my primary way of enjoying the game.
Competition, when done right, has its own merits and is easily within the territory of "fun". Young gamers just rarely, if ever, have codes of etiquette, like Martial Artists and Olympians do, and respond to the surge of adrenaline gained through said competition, hence the generally barbaric and demeaning nature of the competitive young ones. Just compare a 12-19 year old playing your generic online shooter (TF2, Halo, CoD, etc?) to an older, 20-30 year old playing an online shooter. I'll bet you that in the first group, you'll find a whole lot of more generally annoying gamers than in the second one (wtf? you can't snipe him from that distance! n00b! vs We lost, but man was that a tough battle, Good game).
tl;dr: Competitive gaming FTW, but that doesn't mean I can't enjoy a noncompetitive bout.
And once I participated in a Brawl tournament in Chile, in the biggest Smash community it has, Smash Bros. Chile (OMFG, redundant). It was god forsaken horrible, I had to wait 4 hours for the Brawl tournament to start, while the Melee (I'm all for competitive Melee, but Wavedashing can suck my hairy ass, it's a glitch and it's broken) and Brawl+ (basically a Melee-ification of Brawl via hacks and mods, for those who don't know) Tournaments were going on, which they didn't say would go first, the place in which the tournament took place was almost in the middle of no where in the City and what seemed like a some dank chapel and the lingo used by the guys around seemed either too dorky or too meatheaded. Haven't gone to another one, hoping to go to one in the US some day and praying it's not as bad.
As for pokemon, nothing big, JN and his friends from Guatemala sometimes make tournaments among themselves and they invite me. Or at least it was that way in 4G, I've barely made any 5G pokemon and I'm quite reluctant on transferring them, since Black/White really ruined 2 aspects of competitive battling for me, the whole thing that your enemy's team is a surprise and how you can either go 3 vs. 3 with no items or 6 vs. 6 with a chance to use certain items. Zoroark's surprise factor has been made completely useless!
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Post by asiacatdogblue on Sept 10, 2011 20:08:40 GMT -5
If you mean from a spectator's point of view, I think whether you enjoy it depends on how much you understand what's going. If you have a basic idea of the strategy behind Street Fighter or Starcraft, then you might find higher-level competition to be at least vaguely interesting to watch. I saw a bit of the EVO championships this year, and altho I wasn't familiar with all of the in-depth strategy the players were using, I found it somewhat entertaining. The commentators helped, tho. On the other hand, I know nothing about Starcraft, and find it incredibly boring to watch. I haven't had any personal experience with competitive gaming, unless you count Nintendo Powerfest 1990. It can go both ways. Those that are observing expert gameplay would probably find some matches(with or withour a set of rules) boring... until they try it themselves. Those that are perticipating... I'm not sure how to describe it. |
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Post by kirbychu on Sept 11, 2011 4:42:59 GMT -5
In my experience, competitive gamers drain the most important aspect of GAMES from the actual games: FUN. This is how I feel whenever I hear competitive players talk about Smash Bros. or Pokémon. People who always use the same character, the same stage, remove any elements of chance... you may as well be playing a spreadsheet. I train Pokémon for battles against my friends, so I know all about IVs and EVs and so on... but I make a deliberate effort to ignore the existance of the competitive community and train things that I think are interesting to have interesting movesets instead of the kind of dull, repetitive things suggested on Serebii. |
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Post by 8bitretroshit on Sept 11, 2011 5:35:37 GMT -5
Well that's the whole point of competitive gaming. Remove all elements of chance so it all comes down to who has the better reflexes/insight.
Pokemon tournaments having the same damn teams is more Gamefreak's fault for not giving a shit about balance. Though apparently there's also a under-used pokemon competition where people only use low tier Pokemon, which makes for some goofy matches with silly tactics.
Also I pretty much ignore all that Serebii pro junk and train whatever I want too. FEAR MY LVL100 SHUCKLE
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Post by kirbychu on Sept 11, 2011 11:38:41 GMT -5
Well that's the whole point of competitive gaming. Remove all elements of chance so it all comes down to who has the better reflexes/insight. It comes down to that either way. It's just so much more fun with the chance elements on. Pokemon tournaments having the same damn teams is more Gamefreak's fault for not giving a shit about balance. Though apparently there's also a under-used pokemon competition where people only use low tier Pokemon, which makes for some goofy matches with silly tactics. Yeah, I've read about this tier stuff... but personally I think it's a load of bollocks. Mostly because I've managed to pretty easily power my way through the various Battle Frontier and Battle Subway facilities using bottom-tier stuff like Castform and Pachirisu. Sure, it'd be different if I was fighting a competitive player with a full team of pseudo legendaries, but from what I've seen competitive players are so predictable it wouldn't be worth my time. (Before that last remark gets taken the wrong way, I'm not saying I could easily beat a competitive player, I'm just saying they pretty much all use the same small group of Pokémon and moves, and I like my games to be more interesting than that.) |
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Post by 8bitretroshit on Sept 11, 2011 14:05:11 GMT -5
Well that's the whole point of competitive gaming. Remove all elements of chance so it all comes down to who has the better reflexes/insight. It comes down to that either way. It's just so much more fun with the chance elements on. It is, especially when you're just goofing around with a group of players. But when you're being competitive and have a one on one match to see who's the better player ofcourse you're gonna remove all elements of chance (if possible) so the other one isn't DA VERY BEST just because of constant luck. Sure Smash Bros without the random factor is super dull but hey, more power to them |
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Post by TV Eye on Sept 11, 2011 18:56:07 GMT -5
I decided to look up what people consider low-tier Pokemon...and they're basically my entire B/W team  |
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Post by asiacatdogblue on Sept 11, 2011 23:11:47 GMT -5
I decided to look up what people consider low-tier Pokemon...and they're basically my entire B/W team It sucks, doesn't it? Some tiers tend to screw over fan-favorites. Remember Mewtwo in SSBM? |
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Post by Evie ❤✿ on Sept 12, 2011 11:05:56 GMT -5
I decided to look up what people consider low-tier Pokemon...and they're basically my entire B/W team It sucks, doesn't it? Some tiers tend to screw over fan-favorites. Remember Mewtwo in SSBM? I think people should take tiers with a pinch of salt and be creative. Some people seem to rely on sites like Smogon too seriously, so many competitive battlers take advantage of that with their own anti meta-game teams. In the 2010 Pokémon Video Game Championships, Parasect with Dry Skin ability ('NU' tier) was used effectively because of the abundance of Choice Scarf/Water Spout Kyogre. |
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Post by Shadrio on Sept 12, 2011 15:36:59 GMT -5
Tiers are there to classify pokemon on terms of which has an easier time of doing their job than others. Take Garchomp, of example. I know it's been said everywhere, but that guy has just enough bulk, just enough power and speed, the right moves and the correct ability to basically get in, set up a Sword Dance or carry a Choice Scarf and proceed to eat almost ever pokemon out there. You can also give it a Yache berry and watch as how it now survives your Ice Beam or Ice Punch (it survives a max Attack IV & EV'd Weavile's Ice Punch with the Yache Berry).
Aggron, a lower tier Pokemon, is slow, has low Special Defense and HP, sky High Defense but is very weak to the most common type of physical attacks (Fighting and Ground) and heavily relies on team support and/or a turn to set up to become good. An example of how weak it is to Fighting, for example is how even without a turn to set up Bulk Up (or lacking a Choice Band), Conkeldurr can easily OHKO with Drain Punch and recover back whatever damage it took (since it is slower than Aggron, but will not take much damage from any of Aggron's attacks).
But of course, as most of us know, some follow Smogon's Tiers like a bible, and therefor are predictable. Others take advantage of that and personalize their teams and pokemon. A few examples come from a few battles I've been in. One example was from an online tourney in which this guy pulls out his Alakazam against my . I'm faster (which was already strange), and strike with Stone Edge, completely confident that it would make short work of his Alakazam, but then it's HP stops at ~20% and his Alakzam KO's my Sweeper. The other example is actually the mind games that pokemon plays on people. I take out my Slaking, a very low Tier Pokemon, and who's most common moveset is Choice Band, against some really fast pokemon JN has out. Mine has Choice Scarf, but I knew that JN thought that it had Choice Band. I attack and KO whatever it was he had out and he says, with a hint of suspicion "Whoah, what a fast Slaking". He send out a Houndoom, and since I know Houndoom isn't that strong and has a pathetic movepool, I expected it to use Nasty Plot (either way, Slaking was a max health, so nothing would OHKO it), so I stay, surprising him. I then OHKO'd that fragile little hound before it even gets a chance to move, surprising JN once again for its speed.
tl;dr Tiers are very useful, but not nearly as useful as mind games. As long as your using something you enjoy, and it has a good (enough) movepool, ability and stats, along with partnership between the pokemon on your team, then enjoy yourself (note: this doesn't mean you will win, but you will have fun, and if you're mature enough, even when losing). And whenever I make a Team, I just grab a few pokemon I feel like using, I completely suck a team making.
I could go on about tiers, or talk about tiers in Super Smash Bros. games, but I've written enough for now. Plus, I'm pretty sure most of this will fall on deaf ears (or as the saying goes, but since this is a written medium, you know what I mean) anyway, seeing as how most of you are all anti-comepetitive. All I'll say that if I'm going to play an item battle, it'll be in Melee, Brawl sucks for item battles, and Brawl is much more balanced than Melee when it comes to competitive play, as long as you rule out Metaknight, in my opinion.
Oh, and Tripping sucks in competitive and non-competitive play. Hands down. How many times have I tripped into one of Ike's Forward Smashes? I've lost count.
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Post by Shrikeswind on Sept 23, 2011 4:51:58 GMT -5
I don't get why people take games so seriously. The example I hold to is Smash Bros. Think about it. You can play a medieval swordsman. He can face off against a gorilla wearing a necktie. You can put a laser gun in his hands to do it. Then he can fail to beat the ape because he got pushed into heavy explosives by pure tree-lung power alone. I dunno, I'm a bit of a magic-chaser, but it seems to me that, with many competitive gamers, there is no part of them that appreciates the absurdity of the fact that you can smack an iron-clad bounty hunter with a paper fan.
Wait, don't we have this conversation every few months?
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