The Philippine Narutimate Community - A History

Perhaps I find it fit that I give my retirement/hiatus address for the community by telling you guys all how it all began:

Beginnings

The Narutimate Community of the Philippines was born from the popularity of Narutimate Hero 2 sometime in 2005. The widespread fanbase of Naruto in the Philippines and the accessibility of NH2 led to many people playing the game informally.

On December 22, 2005, Narutimate Hero 3 was released. It was overall a fun game and sold really well, but the RPG mode was a problem to many players. Due to this mode, many gamers flocked to the Gamefaqs boards of NH3 to get help on that aspect of the game. Decal, one of the largest contributors to the (now stickied) NH3 help topic, was one of the pioneers of the NH3 scene. Together with a number of other Filipino players, they decided to hold gaming sessions together at DLSU's University Mall. The very first Narutimate Hero tournaments were held here. During these sessions the strength of the Itachi playstyle was discovered.

The Golden Age

The Narutimate Community soon moved from Gamefaqs to Team Crooked Jester's forums, based in the US. The Narutimate Scene in the US was already in place in the US, and there gaming sessions continued to be planned. As NH3's popularity grew, many players joined the forums to contribute their own tips and strategies and learn about the Narutimate series at a competitive level.

The last classic tournament of NH3 was also the last held in the University Mall. With footage taken from a cellphone, the Naruto Scandal Tournament also produced the first ever match vids from the Philippines in a competitive setting.

The players who played in this tournament soon held regular sessions together. It was soon decided by the majority of the players to form the first Philippine Narutimate Team. Tentative names for the group included "Team Balisong Warriors," among others. But soon, due to the popularity of the Itachi playstyle among Philippine players, the players settled on "Team Tsukuyomi."

During the first half of 2006, gaming sessions were done at almost a weekly basis. At this time, other teams began to hold sessions of their own and offered challenges to Tsukuyomi. The next major tournament saw players from Team Jinchuuriki and players from non-affiliated teams battling it out. This was no longer a one man show.

By the start of June 2006, most of the Philippine Players of Accel returned to work or school, and the community was silent. The last NH3 tournament was held in Quezon City. By then, playstyles had moved far beyond the Itachi playstyle during the early months of the community, and new teams such as Akatsuki Cavite brought on innovations in character play and strategic diversity.

Frenzy

After the last NH3 tournament, sporadic gaming sessions rounded up 2006. NH3 began to stagnate. Added to this was the slight decline in Naruto's popularity as fillers dragged the anime on for more than a year. Less players began playing NH3. With no new Narutimate Games in sight, players decided to move on to other games. The rising popularity of Bleach led to a short-lived stint with the PS2 game Bleach Blade Battlers, of which one tournament was held. But the inherent flaws of the game as a competitive fighter did not make it last that long.

This lull period would last a year. During this time, players moved on to other games or played sporadic sessions with each other. That all ended with the end of the fillers and the announcement of the new TV series, Naruto: Shippuuden, and the new Narutimate Series game that accompanied it, Narutimate Accel. Immediately after the game came out, all the Philippine teams tested it for play.

Only a few days to a week after the game was released, a large tournament was held for the new game to test it out for competitive play. This was the very first 16 man tournament of the Narutimate Series in the Philippines, although it would not be the last. Once again, stalwarts from Akatsuki Cavite would push the community to the limit with their Yondaime usage. The nerfed version of Itachi meant that some players had to rely on another character for their main. Although many settled on PTS Lee, or Yondaime, 2 certain players were beginning to uncover the flaws NA1 had under its shiny exterior.

Risk used TS Shikamaru, and using his very strong awakening and hard to counter playstyle, he defeated defending champion eunisesa in that tournament, the first (and only) time anybody would defeat the champion in a tournament he attended. At the same time, as the tournament winded down, I would begin experimenting with another character: Hiruko Sasori.

At the same time, the American NA community would hold a tournament of their own, hereafter known infamously as "Shikamania." Immediately they knew the inherent imbalance of Shikamaru and Sasori, and banned the two characters from further play.

On the other side of the world, the Philippine community took a relatively conservative stance and continually playtested the two characters and their imbalances. Another tournament was proposed to test out matchups now that played the game a considerable amount. The two characters were used extensively in this matchup, and although eunisesa won the tournament by beating a Hiruko Sasori user (not using Shikamaru) the community decided to ban Shikamaru's awakening and Hiruko Sasori altogether.

Afterwards, the community reached higher levels, acquiring more members and holding tournaments on a monthly basis. This would continue until July, when the last tournament for Accel 1 was held. Sessions would still be continued on a semi-monthly basis, but school and work again got in the way of a tournament being held. But the greatest times of the community were ahead.

Go With a Bang

December 2007 would signal the release of Narutimate Accel 2. A far more polished version of the series, its relative ease of play attracted a whole new generation of players. The first 8 man tournament held for the series was on January 2008. One of the original players of the Narutimate Scene in Late 2005/Early 2006, yashamaru, would join. The NA community, which had partially stagnated as a result of NA1's flaws, was slowly regaining strength.

New players were appearing left and right. a member named foreverrasengan made his antics known by posting in the SSR forums like crazy. Team Jinchuuriki's new acquisition, narutimate_hero, was making his presence known as a formidable Narutimate Accel player. New players, unaffiliated with any team, were beginning to make themselves known; the single biggest boom since late 2006 and early 2007. Tsukuyomi would head to these locations and hold sessions with them, training for large tournaments to come.

Tsukuyomi members then had contact with a group of players from Antipolo, Rizal. In response, Dragonthorn and eunisesa went to Antipolo for a session. Having played NA games in their shop continuously, they were one of the strongest overall teams the community had ever seen. They were then invited to the next tournament.

With all the pieces of the puzzle in place, it was time for what would be a milestone in the Philippine Narutimate community: A large tournament with all of the top players from the Philippines competing for a singular prize. Although it is known by many names, it will forever be remembered as the Maria Ozawa Cup.

With 20 attendees from many teams, this proved to be the largest Narutimate tournament in the Philippines at the time. With new members came a diversity of new playing styles and new tactics, and a refinement of previous ones as well.

But this would prove to be the last NA tournament to be held; real life caught up with many of the players, leading to their permanent retirement. Others would go into hiatus, but would play occasionally and sporadically over the rest of 2008 and 2009. Some would stop playing but would not retire.

As the community subsided, another group of Narutimate players were making their presence known, albeit in another manner. This group of players were based in Bulacan. Having been unable to participate in the tournament, they found themselves without any worthy opponents, with the rest of the community retired or on hiatus. They then conducted themselves on a wild trolling spree on the SSR forums; proclaiming themselves the greatest while looking down on anyone else. With the forum moderation lax due to the international community's loss of interest with the franchise, this would go on unimpeded for the better part of 2 years. This was led by Gary Tuazon.

As the once thriving Philippine thread began to decay under his increasing posts, more than 90% of the posts in that thread belonged to him. Other forum members who wanted to stick it out decided that this was the time to step down, rather than to play some fool with no idea of class or sportsmanship.

This was truly the dark ages of the Narutimate community; if you could call it any kind of "community" at all. But in the provinces, NA2 was beginning to pick up a second wind...

Rebirth

By 2009 the PS2 was obsolete, despite its long tenure as the dominant console of the age. The PS3 brought forth a new era of games, including the spiritual successor of the Accel series, Ultimate Ninja Storm. Although the international community would try out the game (and ultimately hold a tournament for it) it was not the game everyone hoped it would be. The unavailability of the PS3 for most Filipinos made the game simply out of their reach. Narutimate Accel 3 for the PSP was competitively unplayable as well, and although the PSP could be seen far and wide, not everyone played it. The Philippine NA community remained in the shadows.

But NA2 and the relatively cheap PS2 console was picking up steam. It was still large in the provinces, where games were cheap and players could play the game on coin operated or rental based game stations for a cheap price. Around this time the Laguna NA2 community was beginning to shine. Money matches and sessions raised the competitive level of players from the area. Jigen, the representative of one of the Laguna based teams, tried to reach out to the near-dead SSR community and gave it a spark of life.

Although the response was not immediate, a line of communication was formed between the few members of the old community that remained to monitor SSR. Thus, the first NA2 session in almost 2 years was held in a small computer store near Tsukuyomi HQ.

This led to an invigoration of the NA community, seeing many players come out of retirement. Soon monthly or even weekly sessions were held; some sessions were held in the background of anime conventions to facilitate a common meeting ground. The excitement reached its peak when the first ever NA2 tournament in 2 years was announced, to be held in conjunction with a major anime convention in SM Megamall.

The tournament was a success, despite not all of the members attending the tournament (and attending the convention instead.) Tournaments and sessions increased in frequency, and new features such as match commentaries, recording hardware and software for matches, and a more streamlined system of posting matches on the net, improved the tournament experience.

There was still the matter of the Bulacan players. 2 years had also taken their toll on the team; many members were also unable to play or had retired. Ever since the community was resurrected by Jigen and the others, Gary Tuazon and his team were banned from any tournaments. The community then decided to nip this in the bud once and for all.

The August 2010 Green Peace Tournament saw an attendance from as many members as there was in the 2007 NA1 tournament. Here Gary Tuazon would see himself soundly defeated in the tournament, losing all but one match. He was then permanently banned from any future tournaments for his previous misdeeds. But beside that was the increasing eagerness of other teams to return. The players from Antipolo had been revitalized and restored their number, attending almost in full force.

The Future

More sessions were held in the meantime for the last tournament of 2010, one that would rival the 2008 Maria Ozawa Cup in size and scope. All of the provincial teams were represented, including a revitalized Jinchuuriki and Akatsuki-Cavite.

The 2010 Ninja World War was held in the 7th floor of Robinson's Place Residences. With an attendance of 23 members, it was the largest ever tournament of Narutimate Hero/Accel. Technological advances had led to match commentary, and easy recording of matches.

The first Philippine team was represented by only one member; myself. It has been a long time since I had started getting involved in the community. I was just a student then, playing weekends during my spare time. Now a professional, and having served the community in its revival over the past year, I believe it is apt to hand over the responsibilities of the community to someone else.

I find it amazing that a 3 year old game could be so enduring and resilient after all that has happened. With the turn around time some games have it's amazing a game and a community could have lasted this long. But it is indeed the community that has made the Philippine NH/NA scene as it is today, and it is the community that will make it last for many more years to come.

-hfolkner, Team Tsukuyomi R&D Division

Narutimate hustle and flow: from opener to endgame

Okay, I'm going to talk about the structure of a match of Narutimate Accel or Hero. Now the discussion and the elements I'm talking about are applicable for any fighting game, but the article will be centered on a match of Accel or NH.

For reference, we're going to be talking about a match between myself and Dragonthorn below:



Part 1: Before the match even starts

Before the match starts, lots of things are going through a player's head. Character selection is a very important part of the process, and choosing the right character determines what kind of opening move they will perform. I'm going to write a whole article on the topic of character selection, so I'll leave it at that. NH/NA players usually have more than one character that they use, so they'll have a character that they'll use for certain situations. Some only have one character for use and use only that character for any situation; instead of changing character, they change playstyle (or just go ahead and overpower the opponent with superior technical ability.)

In this match, Dragonthorn and I preferred to do a classic PTS Lee - PTS Sasuke matchup. Now in theory PTS Lee trumps PTS Sasuke in all aspects; but Dragonthorn had played many (more superior) PTS Lees before, and was accustomed to the chains and fighting style. In previous matchups against PTS Sasuke, I decided on using PTS Lee as a counter. I'm not that high level a player so I don't kawarimi his chains that easy, making pressure through pokes and ground chains a problem for me. To compensate, I chose to use a character with a significant poke and ground game advantage.

Part 2: Opener

Like in chess, the opening sequence of moves is a determinant of the eventual flow of the game. Now ask yourself: what is the first thing you do once the match starts? I guarantee that you will get different answers based on the character used, the predominant style in the community or the player's own fighting style. Let's go through a number of possibilities.

A quick attack is warranted to players that have the ranged attacks fast enough to get an opponent on the fly. PTS Gaara, Gai and TS Naruto are examples. Some wheel out an instant jutsu to try to get some good damage early on. Some even wheel out an ougi, but ever since ougi startups slowed down in NA (from NH3, where instant ougi from Itachi was possible) this hasn't been used that often.

Jumping is an effective way to gauge the opponent's first moves while not getting hit yourself. In the Philippines, players tend to do this along with shuriken to play defensively first and get in an attack later. In this matchup, given that taijutsu takes a lot of spacing and maneuvering to do, we do this strategy.

Rushing forward aggressively is an opener used by chakra denial characters and Yondaime. This is dangerous considering a knj or blocked attack can leave your character open.

X-dashing is unsafe and generally not recommended. X-dash startups can be read, and x-dash on block is very dangerous, even on shuriken cancelled 'safe' x-dashes.

Changing planes is a defensive opener used to counter opponents that quick attack once the match starts (like TS Naruto.)

Part 3: Midgame

Welcome to the meat of the match, the midgame. Midgame depends on attack flow and again on the characters involved. Since both the characters in this match are taijutsu based, they both have the same aim in the match.

As PTS Lee, I tried to "jump into" Dragonthorn's poke-eable range using jump shuriken, which is relatively safe if timed right. Once in range, I would poke to start a combo. If the poke connects, block or not, I have the advantage unless DT decides to kawarimi. Dragonthorn is doing the same, although he has less changes to do damage due to the fact that he doesn't have a guard breaking attack other than an easy to knj throw and a very slow down circle move. Instead of just jumping in, he reacts to my moves (hence his usage of mindgames like the chidori trap) in order to get an advantage where I would slip up.

At the same time, in the air, we're doing the same thing. We both use aerial attacks to catch our opponent off balance and attack from there.

While all of this is happening, I'm trying to run around and try to "push" Dragonthorn towards the wall in order to do a wall slam into Konoha Reppu. This is the bread and butter of Lee's damage making abilities, other than his solid taijutsu. I don't do Lee's string with the slam because it takes more hits (and more chances to knj) and I know that Dragonthorn can knj it.

Dragonthorn's trying to prevent this by jumping, catching me through aerial hawks and by restricting my lateral ground movement (by using caltrops, as you can see at around 70 seconds game time.)

Part 4: Endgame

Now this goes on up until 15 seconds game time. At this time, I'm in a minor health advantage, and I can do one of three things: 1) turtle up and finish the match on time out 2) be aggressive and use Lee's damage output to finish things immediately, 3) or do something funky like an ougi.

Endgame is one of the most important phases of a match. In a Narutimate match, chakra is everything in Endgame. Chakra determines how many jutsus you have left, if you can do an awakening, and how many kawarimis you have left (thus determining how many strings you can ideally escape from.)

Had Dragonthorn's chakra been extremely low or at a disadvantage to me, I would go aggressive and finish the match as I would be in a better overall position to cause more damage. Had I been in the chakra disadvantage I could go both ways: I could fight it out, or decide to turtle and charge some chakra. because a life advantage means nothing to a chakra disadvantage. (This time, DT would have been the aggressive one, trying to maximize his damage output.)

If I knew my opponent was trying to finish me by ougi, my strategy would be to deny chakra and do something like an aggressive approach. The more my opponent kawarimis, the more chakra he would lose, and if that chakra goes down the reversal ougi level (usually level 2 or 3) ougi is out as far as endgame options go.

In this matchup, I had a chakra disadvantage, but (I thought) it was enough to kawarimi enough strings to win the game. I was also wary of the fact that DT had more or less full chakra and a chance for either a reversal ougi or to chip the hell out of me with Chidori on block, so I chose to be aggressive. I managed to catch PTS Sasuke in a string that slammed him to the wall, and I ended the game with okizeme. Match over.

That's only one dimension of a Narutimate Match. Characters with keepaway or chakra denial strategies can have very different match structures. Once I get good matches with those I'll post an example to show you all. But till then, have a blast.

Learning to Fight: Your Brain and Fighting Games

So you've decided to play a new fighting game and you're learning the ropes. How do you get to learn to play these kids of games?

The piece I wrote below applies not only to fighting games, but to many other genres of games. There's a lot of technical stuff in here so get ready. I'll try to make it as simple as possible.

Learning those moves: Muscle Memory

So you've started out your fighting game career: you have your character chosen and you're starting out by playing a few matches. It's time to start learning those moves. Practice takes a lot of repetition; in the Narutimate games, this includes timing for KnJ and techs. In other combo based games, it's the timing and order of attacks in a combo that matter.

For techs and KnJ, muscle memory is what matters a lot. Ever saw a shuriken thrown at you and you block instinctively, effectively knjing to the other side? Or have you ever instinctively knjed at the very first hit of a counterattack, as if you had expected that counterattack to come? That comes from muscle memory. You had experienced that hundreds if not thousands of times, and your brain has stored the information.

On the other hand, you learn combos or setups partly due to procedural memory learning, especially when learning combos, which are composed of the initial setup, the followup and possible finishers. Soon you will be able to do this unconsciously, by instinct. Example: when the Passion Setup for Itachi was discovered, people started doing this setup really fast when there was a possibility for an x-dash exploit. It was instinctual, it was hard to predict, and it made Tsukuyomi more dangerous.

There are three phases of learning a procedure, said some guy named Fitts in 1954.

Cognitive Phase - here is you start to learn what a sequence of steps in a pattern are composed of. Some people do this by breaking down the procedure into components and trying to link them together. This can include a long combo in a fighting game, a sequence of moves in the Narutimate series, or a hard section in a rhythm game. Here, just study the move and practice each section at a time.

Associative Phase - in this phase, you repeat the above actions over and over until you get it down pat and it becomes second nature. You gain this in fighting games by encountering the same situation again and again. In a BnB combo, you get to do this all the time since that combo is your bread and butter.

Autonomous Phase - here is where you perfect the sequence you just learned. You start doing the sequence with less thought, and you can concentrate more on other things, like alternative strategies or mixups. And if you learn those, the greater the capacity of the game for mixups, the larger the procedural "tree" becomes. How do you get this? Just lots of experience.

Like learning normal memories, muscle memory has both a short term and long term component. You can use this knowledge to help improve your game (I will be talking about how short term muscle memory can make you do mind games in a later article.) The more you practice a given task, the more you learn.

Memory Encoding

Memory is imprinted into our brains by encoding. In the Narutimate games, we encode muscle memory through various stimuli.

Visual Stimuli - for example, seeing a sequence of moves and knowing exactly what kind of string they are performing.

Acoustic Stimuli - when teching, I time my techs by listening to the sound of the tech hit and pressing X by the rhythm. as the action gets more familiar, anticipating the tech just by the sound.

Tactile Stimuli - thanks to the Dualshock controllers, Narutimate players use tactile encoding to learn tech timing. One anecdote I can share was in an earlier tournament, one player wanted to switch controllers because the available controller had no vibrating function. It turned out that he timed his techs by noticing the timing of the moves.

How to Improve?

So, armed with this information, what can you do to improve your game?

The Superstar effect - some have shown in studies that, in a competition, when there is a super good badass performer in the competition, his mere presence causes the other competitors to underperform, as if the outcome was predetermined. This bodes even worse with veteran players. Against a player with a skill set way higher than their own, veterans break their composure and tend to overthink things to much, to the detriment of their game.

We know, it's not fun to get pwned by people whose skill is much higher than yours. But to overcome it, you can: 1) start off by playing people of your skill level then work your way up, or 2) forget the star status of your enemy and focus.

I personally advocate playing "superstar" players to gain their strategies and use those against them. But why does the superstar effect work in the first place?

Stress - part of it is due to stress. Once stress takes over, you tend to double think things. Your capacity to learn or execute learned actions decreases. This is what is known in competitive games as choking. So calm down before starting that match, ok?

Alcohol - alcohol screws with long and short term memory. It changes the structure of the brain. Alcohol also leads to thiamine deficiency, which can lead to disturbances in the nervous system.

Sleep - it's well known that sleep improves memory formation, as it is a major period in the formation of memories. So maybe those 24 hour nonstop sessions weren't so nifty after all. Also, sleep deprivation impairs memory as well. So sleep well.

Playing with a Friend - it's almost a standard answer in fighting games that playing with a friend beats playing with a CPU. But there is actual scientific evidence for this. A couple of dudes in MIT compared the spatial response times and threat and challenge appraisals when playing against a computer, a stranger, and a friend. The study found that playing against a friend had the best data. So who you play with matters as much as how.

So to all the competitive gamers out there, make friends with your fellow colleagues. Because if you tend to make enemies of everyone, no one will play with you. Heh.

References:

Wikipedia articles:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muscle_memory
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Procedural_memory
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memory_encoding


Madigan, Jamie. (2010) Zerg Rushed by a Tiger? Just give up.
http://www.gladwell.com/2000/2000_08_21_a_choking.htm
http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/abs/10.1162/pres.15.4.381

NA3: what went wrong?

For another view on NA3's place (or non-place) in competitive gaming, American Narutimate player Forte has this to say:

Breaking Down NA3

With the PS2 dead in the eyes of many developers, CC2 either had to stick with the Accel PS2 format, or make a move to either the PS3 or the PSP. In the end, it did both: Narutimate Storm was the spiritual successor of the game series on the PS3 and Narutimate Accel 3 made its way to the PSP. Everyone's hopes were up as new characters and gameplay were on their way. 4 player support? No more annoying assists? The possibility of online battles? It all looked promising.

What went wrong?

After some play testing among the community it was evident that this was a revamp of the existing system, and although it was fun, it was not geared to be played in a competitive manner. How so? In my opinion, here are the reasons why:

1. 4 player balancing removed the 2 player game

Let's face it, mechanics that were valid with two players become invalid when you can potentially have three characters surrounding your ass. Dashing out of chains makes it easier to get out of a situation where your opponent and his teammate are wailing on you with hits, but at the same time it makes the majority of chains and infinites worthless, upsetting a precarious state of balance that had previously been achieved with the knj/tech system. Getting interrupted by 2+ characters in performing moves is no longer a problem because jutsu have a more invulnerable startup. On the other hand, it screws the balance of jutsu in 2p play. With 4p, knj-ing 2+ characters takes a lot of chakra, and taking 3 people out in a 3 v 1 takes a long time had the old system stuck. CC2's solution? Increase damage output and make a system where chakra can serve as a trump card. The problem with that? Well, see below.

2. the awakening system partially invalidates the chakra system

Before, awakenings were activated on a set of conditions that were mostly fit towards the character's fighting style. It took a while to activate them through taunt (making the player revolve around a playstyle where you can get an opportunity to activate) or took some time to get through combo (making the player orient his or her playstyle at getting jutsu or combos that do the necessary damage.) Now, awakenings are triggered after taking or dishing out a set amount of damage, has no startup time and gives you free chakra (full!) at little to no cost (before, activating an awakening could cost you all your chakra or a good chunk of your own life.) The standardized activation system retards the diversity of fighting styles, making you play the same way for characters that aren't supposed to be played the same way. And what of this free chakra and chakra denial characters? It renders chakra denial next to useless with a few exceptions.

3. ridiculous imbalances

For one thing, POISON. The increased frequency where you could activate awakenings makes poison more of a problem. And some characters have heal status on top of that! Imagine fighting Oro/Kabuto. You unleash damage on Kabuto, activating his awakening where he gets heal AND poison for every time he touches you. Now Kabuto goes all aggressive, taking you down with perpetual poison, while healing himself. If you somehow manage to survive, you're back to zero. If you manage to inflict enough damage again, you're facing the possibility where Kabuto can reactivate his awakening and heal all the damage you caused him (while causing poison damage to you!) There's also 4 Tail Naruto. Jutsu damage on block exceeds ougi damage. (And remember, awakenings give you max chakra.) And for some characters...

4. jutsu spam for the win

As I said before, jutsu are invincible to shuriken on startup. Now shuriken were important in that they were a source of interrupting the opponent at whatever he was going to do, making post-knj a little safer (and inventing the whole post knj retaliation mindgame.) And now? Well, you don't have to worry about that, since you can pull out jutsu whenever you have the opportunity. That's because shuriken cancels aren't that useful in this game. Running out of chakra isn't that much of a deal, since awakening gives it to you for free. Some characters have really good jutsu that can be spammed over and over again post knj or whenever you want.

5. nitpicks
- they removed time out wins! Playing to a time out win was a huge part of a NA/NH player's endgame, and a significant part of a defensive playstyle. It also offered a win opportunity for characters with severe character disadvantages, given that NA/NH was a character based game. Now if you run out of time, the game considers it a draw. It oversimplifies the defensive game by taking out that opportunity.
- nothing is ever set in stone. Chains don't work on walls, some moves don't work all the time, everything feels like a huge black box that you can't definitively decipher and analyze.
- pressure on block doesn't matter anymore. Alpha counters and dashing out of chains removes that threat.

All in all, NA3 turned out to be a very different game. Although innovation worked to the NA/NH series' benefit in the past, this time it took a whole step backward. In creating a fun 4 player game, NA3 turned into a dismal 2 player competitive game (although still a fun game.) Only time will tell if CC2 decides to go back to the beaten path or go forward and continue to overhaul a system that frankly needs little to no tweaking at all.

there's always one of those in a crowd...

In my experience in organizing and hosting tournaments, I've met a number of different people, both good and bad. That's basically what you get when you have a game that a lot of people are interested in - you get a lot of different personalities. So here's my list of 'people you can expect to see in a fighting game tournament.'Of course this applies to all players of all genders, races, and creeds and one person doesn't necessarily fit into one single category. Moving on...

The Genius - the Genius is the Tiger Woods of your little game circle. He wins almost every tournament and game seemingly effortlessly and crushes his opponents without mercy. He emanates the genius aura (see here) that causes otherwise worthy players to underperform. Everyone wants to beat him for personal glory, because to beat him in a battle is a sign that you are personally a higher tier than the rest of the group. Or you just got lucky. He's the player who has attained the highest level of game sense and player sense. He may be usually unassuming, and if he's watching a match, he's probably absorbing those tactics into his genius head. Don't be surprised if he suddenly pulls out your own freaking strategy in the middle of your own match.

The Genius' rival - the Genius' rival is a player with almost the same (or the same) skill level as the Genius, but isn't recognized as the top person in the game circle. Every tournament you see him and the Genius in first and second place. In a tournament, the metagame is usually up to who can beat the strategies of these two players. The Genius' rival is full of sheer determination powered by balls of steel.

The Comedian - it's always a fun tournament or session with one of these guys around. Ever had a grim tourney where no one ever talked and the mood was worse than the atmosphere in a funeral? That sucks. Recruit a comedian in your group and expect fun times ahead. Have more fun at the game and you learn more, so it's all good.

The Guy with the Food - he either supplied the food for the tourney or he's cooking for all of you sorry bastards. Give him props. Not only is he probably a good player, he has kitchen skills that can pwn your ass.



The Noisy Guy - if you were to transcribe what he was saying during tourneys, you can expect them all to be in CAPS LOCK. May or may not also be the comedian of the group. Sessions and tournaments become wild and boisterous with this guy.


The Professor - this dude knows everything about the game and the game system. He might not be the best player in the group, but he has a grasp of all aspects of the game that not even the Genius possesses. Tends to overthink things and that's one of the reasons why he might lose in matchups. Can also be a Genius, in which case you can call him a Genius Professor.
The know-it-all - this is a much more annoying version of the Professor. While the Professor only gives data when he is asked to, the know it all volunteers information in an annoying way. Like during a match with another player he says something about the priority of x-dash blah blah blah. Since he knows his shit anyway, just take in the information. Or just say an annoyed "I KNOW BITCH" and keep on playing.

The asshole - this kind of player is argumentative, is usually BM to other players, and doesn't care about what you think. Sometimes the drivel he spouts is actually constructive and you should take everything he says with a grain or salt. Or maybe a whole sack of salt. Tournaments with him are not that fun. Inviting him or not is up to you.


The troll - the asshole version 2.0 beta. He might not actually be an asshole overtly, which is way more freaky. He seeks fights to troll and if he wins against you, he uses that win as gratification and shoves it in your face. It he loses, it's not because of him, it's because of you. Somehow. Tournaments with trolls are generally less fun than tournaments with assholes, because at least assholes had something constructive to say.
The Weirdo - an eccentric player comes up every once in a while. Some of his comments during a tourney are astounding for their ability to make you say "what... the... FUCK!?" in no time. Has a low EQ. You may have trouble with these kinds of players at the start, but once you get used to their weirdness it's all good. IF that ever happens.

The eager newbie - Fresh from his first few bouts from the CPU, the eager newbie is always eager to absorb whatever information he has and catch up to the scene. For the lulz, he is sometimes paired up against a Genius during a tourney and we watch him get completely steamrolled. But it's okay, because these guys do catch up. Thinking about it, we were all eager newbies once.

The dude who didn't take a bath - Seriously dudes. Take a bath. Seriously.







The organizer - they guy who fixed the whole event. Will act like the host and answer the door or something everytime someone comes in. He usually has the pen and brackets in his hand unless he's the one fighting. He can also be one of the above. lol at the prospect of a Troll Organizer.



Well there you have it. I'm sure there are a few more that I haven't covered. Till next time.

A look at Narutimate Accel 1 and 2

Narutimate Accel Series

It took almost forever for a successor to NH3 to arrive, partly due to the extremely long time it took for the first part of the Naruto anime to end. The long wait finally ended with the release of Narutimate Accel, the first Narutimate game to feature characters from the timeskip era. This entry is about my perceptions about Accel and its successor, Narutimate Accel 2, which is currently the most popular and playable of the series.

Narutimate Accel 1

Accel 1 was pretty much a work in progress. Adding to the difficulties in topping whatever advances NH3 had was the fact that the programmers had to add 16 new characters. That's a lot of characters to balance and fit to the new system. With Accel, the games began to stray from the conventions of NH3. That makes for a lot of good stuff and a lot of bad stuff.

First off, the teching system was made less streamlined. Some attacks didn't connect as reliably as they used to after a hit. This made gamers seek different attack options in battle. Jutsu could still be used but you couldn't just append a jutsu at the end of a hit anymore. This led to more tech traps, untechable combos and combos straight into jutsu without finishers involved.

Second, the new characters introduced were still suffering from imbalance issues. This either made some characters completely overpowered or extremely weak. Take TS Shikamaru. His awakening special status goes up so fast, deals tons of damage on hit, was hard to knj and was a definite advantage against any other character. Shikamaru dominated tournaments here and abroad, leading to his eventual ban (or at least the ban of his awakening status.) On the other hand we go to Kisame. Kisame was a monster in NH2 and NH3. He could drain chakra extremely easily and did tons of damage even on block lock (leading to the first "block lock infinite.") In NA1, he was barely playable. He was slow as hell, his chakra drain status was nerfed so much as to become negligible and, even when his moves hit, they did lesser damage.

Third, speaking of awakening statuses, these special statuses were no longer activated solely by hitting an ougi. In previous games, at a high enough level of play, hitting an ougi became exceedingly rare. That would translate to less opportunities to get into a special status. Now, awakenings could be activated by doing certain things, tailored to the individual character. This was a huge and beneficial leap forward in the series, as it made awakenings a more integral part of game strategy. On the other hand, some awakenings were much too powerful, or gave the character a steeper curve to learn to beat. One case in hand is TS Naruto. By himself, TS Naruto by himslef was a powerhouse with his many tools. But when he reached low life, he would activate his special awakening status, which constituted a buff to all stats (attack, damage and speed.) It often happened that when playing against an experienced Naruto Player, people had to get their own character at least 75% life by the time the attack hits. This wan't the worst of the awakening statuses, but I'm citing this one as the best example.

Fourth, they revamped the ougi system. They took out the customizable ougi system, which never really worked, and replaced it with a situational ougi system. This added another dimension of tactics to the game. Reversal ougis are pretty powerful, but they take up a lot of chakra, and they can only be used at half life or less. Players could get beaten to lower than half life, then do the ougi and catch up. Their opponents would then do everything they can to drain chakra, which is used for the reversal ougi. Some players would do an ougi-based playstyle on their normal level 1 ougis (available at above half life and without special statuses) and continue to do ougis. Some would work towards getting an awakening to be able to perform an awakening ougi and hit the enemy for massive damage. (hihi)

In the end, NA1 ended up feeling like an NH3.5 - it really wasn't a complete game, and there were certain aspects to the game that did not translate well or were not fully refined. Moving on...

Narutimate Accel 2

Accel 2 was a true sequel to NH3. It included a lot of new characters, made fixes to the NH3 characters that made them still viable contenders to the new roster, and made various changes to the system that improved the overall gameplay.

There was one thing, however, that would potentially have brought it all down - the Assist System.

In theory, the assist system was a good thing. It was semi-implemented in NH2, and it gave assists a limit based on the number of assist items in the inventory. If balanced correctly, it offered another means of escape to the player, in a game that emphasized escape.

The problem was that the finished product emphasized escape way too much.

Like I said before, the Narutimate series always made a fine balance between attack, defense, and escape. In attack the NH/NA player proceeds to disrupt enemy flow, pin them in a state of continuous defense (for example, pinning them via block lock) and cause as much damage to the enemy as possible, both to the chakra and life bar. The endpoint is either a KO or an infinite combo. In defense, one tries to minimize the damage by blocking or backing off. In escape, one tries to break enemy momentum via attack (through KnJ or techs,) counterattack, and basically avoid getting hit (as opposed to simply reducing damage.)

The new assist system destroyed this very delicate balance. It was spammable, it destroyed the game mechanic and some combinations brought imbalance to relatively balanced characters. It interferes with attack (making infinites impossibly hard to perform, defeating block lock in some cases.) It also interferes with escape, making escape too prominent, straying into the "get out of jail free card" status. It was too much of a good thing. There was no penalty with using it, as opposed to KnJ, which ate up the chakra bar. Chakra management necessitated judicious use of KnJ and jutsu. But with assists, it could be spammable all day long. If it were up to me, I would always choose the best combination and use assists over and over again. No flow or rhythm would be materialized within a match: if played as is, NA2 would devolve into a button mashing fest.

Thankfully, the scene for NA2 unilaterally banned this system in competitive play.

Some of the imbalances in NA1 characters were removed in NA2. But some characters were still hard to play. If anything, the imbalances between some NA2 characters were more pronounced than those with NH3 characters. My NH3 Itachi and Lee have both lost to an insanely skilled Kurenai, but rarely could any Kisame beat a high tiered character in NA2.

Then there's the issue of Gai. I'm going to devote two whole entries on this subject, so watch out for that.

NA2 was a good game, a fun game even up to now. More than three years after its release, the scene is alive and a lot people still play it today. It's easy to pick up and doesn't have NH3's high learning curve for fighting against certain characters.

Again, it took a long time for the next, and probably last Accel game to be released. The community as a whole waited on it with baited breath. But was Narutimate Accel 3 worth it? That's for the next entry.

a look at NH3

The Narutimate Series experienced the largest change with NH2 and NH3. What was once a simple brawler type game gained surprising depth and developed into a game that can truly be played competitively. While NH2 added a lot to the existing system, it was NH3 that added concepts making it, in my opinion, a cornerstone of achievement in the entire series of games so far.

In this piece lets see the pros and cons of NH3 as a fighting game and as a part of the Narutimate series in general, and see why this is still one of my favorite games.

Pros:

1. NH3 fixed some of the imbalances of NH2

NH2 was an okay game for its time, and is still fun to play even now. In some ways it can be played competitively, but there were some disadvantages to that game that brought it down.

First of all, characters in NH2 gain too much chakra. Too much chakra can lead to increased use of jutsus, so much so that it becomes customary in some games to use jutsu over and over, and then retreat. Charging time for chakra was extremely fast, so it was easy to gain chakra, then reuse jutsu. Integrating the concept of escape (as I mentioned in my previous post) was crucial to achieving the unique gameplay mechanic of the Narutimate series. This chakra imbalance in NH2 caused the game to overemphasize this strategy.

Second, the above issue is compounded by the fact that KnJ was way too easy to use. KnJs work by allowing you to press the appropriate button before you are hit by whatever move the enemy does against you. If used incorrectly, this leads to faster chakra drain, which balances out the chakra issue, on the other hand, if used wisely, it confers some difficulty in getting damage. Some parameters were predictably increased to get higher damage output, and that led to...

Third, poison was way too imbalanced in NH2. The effect lasts forever and could drain your life so much that you take a large hit to your life before you could do anything about it. Add to the fact that poison jutsu were spammable thanks to the high chakra availability, and you have a bunch of banned characters.

These are basically the three things that NH2 did wrong. How did NH3 fix this?

First, NH3 scaled back the way you get chakra to the way it should be. Chakra in NH3 is a precious resource. Charging it takes a long time, and lull periods in NH3 are rare. It is easy to run out of chakra in NH3, so the emphasis on chakra conservation is made greater. This created a very good balance between escape and defense. Too much escape is a bad thing; with it, players don't get damaged enough. Too much defense is a bad thing too for the same reasons, which was why...

Second, it is harder to KnJ moves in NH3. That scales up the damage factor and makes spamming jutsu less important. Jutsu costs chakra, so they become a weapon a skilled player uses sparingly. This usage inpsires tactics to use jutsu as efficiently as possible. In addition, it places emphasis on attack, but attacking the right way.

Third, poison damage was scaled down in NH3, but not to the point where poison was more or less harmless. Poison could still cripple a foe used properly.

2. NH3 added a lot of new things... and they were good

NH3 was the origin of a lot of gameplay mechanics that we can still see today in recent games. Here's what I thought up:

• Command-style ougi seal inputs - before, when you were hit with an ougi, you took the damage whether you liked it or not, you mashed buttons or spun the sticks to possibly reduce the damage (and destroy your controller in the process) and aside from the button mashing there was no skill involved. The Command inputs changed all that. Command inputs gave the player a means to turn the tables on his opponent by putting in more seals (escape!), it didn't ruin your controller, and skill was a large part in doing it. If you were better in seal inputs than your opponent, you could dominate him. In NH3, strategy and an actual metagame formed during the whole process of getting hit by an ougi. You can 1) cancel the ougi, draining your opponents chakra, 2) get hit but reduce the damage, wasting away one or two of his bars, hoping to get him thanks to the chakra advantage you now have after getting hit, or 3) get hit by an ougi and allow a cancel to nullify an undesirable enemy power-up effect.
• Button Locks - this was probably a programmer bug. A certain sequence of moves renders an enemy character unable to use most buttons except to run and kawarimi. Button locks were an indispensable part of an NH3 player's arsenal. It provided a player a setup to get in attacks, jutsu, ougi, anything. Much effort was made by both players to prevent such setups from happening to themselves and making the same setups work against their enemies. It was an added option for attack potential, and in my opinion it improved the game a lot. The newer games may not have these locks in their current form, but strategies and tactics are still being created for the ones that still remain.
  
• Customizable Ougi - there were many special character effects in NH3. NH3 was also the first game to be able to make you choose your ougi. You can choose how much chakra your player used for an ougi. Players used level 1 ougis for either an ougi based playstyle or a consistent offensive weapon, level 3 for maximum damage output, and level two for a good balance. You could also determine if your ougi had an effect to it. Example: Sasuke had a level 1 ougi with no effect, a level 1 with Curse Seal Level 1, a level 2 with Sharingan status, and a level 3 that leads to Curse Seal Level 2. Although many players used the level two, there were some that used level 1 because it suited their playstyle more. The bottom line is, players could customize their strategy and tactics by choosing their respective ougis.
  
• Accessible infinites - not exactly new to NH3, the infinite is the one endpoint in a NH player's game. Using an infinite usually ends the match - it's almost equivalent to a KO. NH3 made the infinite a staple for many characters instead of just a handful. It emphasized the importance of chakra conservation, making an empty chakra bar extremely punishable, effectively making it a second life bar. It further balanced attack, defense and escape. Up to NA3, infinites are a dangerous weapon and an essential part of a player's arsenal.
  
• the teching system - before NH3, there were only two things your character did after getting hit by a combo finisher or a jutsu: get splatted to the wall or ground, or get launched. A spin was inescapable and was guaranteed damage to many followups. NH3 introduced the wall spin, the bounce and the vertical launch. With this, it also introduced a way for characters to escape from this: the wall tech, the launch tech and the bounce tech. Spins and bounces made it easy to connect moves together, but is balanced out by teching. If you tech and recover, you usually cannot get hit by the follow up. It added other defensive options in addition to KnJ. Plus, it added the opportunity to do mindgames.

Cons:

NH3 isn't without its faults.

1. Some characters were nightmares to fight against for noob players

My personal opinion for NH3 (or any game in the Narutimate series) is that any character, given enough skill, can win against any other character. The game is still relatively balanced, and I know a lot of people will disagree with me on this.

The fact is, that for a handful of characters, the skill curve needed to fight against them could at times be too steep.

Take Itachi. Itachi had an awesome two-bar ougi (Magen: Kuroyume) that gave him Tsukuyomi as a status. Because of the unbelievably fast animation, the ougi could be hit in any number of ways; players from both the US and abroad had ways to use the Ougi in battle, so much so that one could get hit by the ougi by as much as three or four times. And after that damage was over, the opponent had to go through Tsukuyomi mode, which gives Itachi priority over almost everything AND potential for extra damage, leading to a total damage potential of around 80% of your life.

Was Itachi impossible to beat? No. In fact, knowing his strategy made him completely manageable by many characters. Was he considered bannable? It depends on who you ask. Personally I didn't think that these character traits were enough to get him banned.

The problem was, many players new to the game would have the hardest time trying to beat him. The learning curve to beat them was quite high. That's why some communities at least soft banned the character.

And Itachi is only one character among many with ridiculous damage potential. Kisame, Jiraiya, Lee, a lot of characters did a ton of damage. This led to many players choosing only from a few characters instead of from the complete list. This was a perceived imbalance, in my opinion, but nevertheless it led to the game stagnating. The game at a competitive level was not receptive to new players, and it would hurt the recruitment of new players if they kept on losing to the same guy. Counterpicking would be a possible outcome of this. On the other hand, communities learned to adapt to the character before picking up a newer guy. The issue is a point of division among many players of the game/game series.

2. Miscellaneous stuff

• Customizable Ougis - huh? Wasn't this a pro instead of a con? Well, the thing is, most players tended to stick to the best ougi for their character. With only a few minor exceptions, many players chose the same ougi for their character, as the other ougis didn't really have that much advantage over the "standard" ougi. So there really wasn't that much customization at all. Despite the choice being available, the other choices kinda sucked.
• Unlocking the Characters was a damn chore - yes, there is a code to unlock most characters. But unlocking all these characters was hard, and most players, who genuinely wanted to play the game had problems with unlocking. Look at the gamefaqs forum for the Japanese game and see how many questions there were for the RPG mode which was cumbersome to begin with. Thus, most players settled on playing with an incomplete roster and an incomplete selection of ougis, which didn't hook them into the game that much.
  
• Customizable Jutsu - nobody used this feature because it really wasn't thought out, as some jutsu could harbor great potential for insane damage by switching to jutsus they shouldn't have access to in the first place.
  
• Maito Suit Naruto - Maito Suit Naruto is basically an NH2 character trapped in NH3. NH2 in the fact that he can get chakra like in NH2: very easily. Compare it to the scarcity of chakra in NH3 and you get a recipe for disaster.
  
• P1/P2 inequalities - this is a mortal sin in a fighting game. In a fighting game, all fighting gameplay mechanics should be equal to both players. There should be no handicap whatsoever to ensure a fair fight. In NH3, some button locks were P1 only, some moves could only be KnJed by P1 and so on. Rules had to be made to prevent a P1 advantage in a competitive match. The point is, this shouldn't have happened in the first place.

That's pretty much it. NH3 was a great game, and it endured so well here in the Philippines that some people still play it today. But then newer games came along and that really led to an explosion in the number of players for the game. Next up is the Accel series.