Perfect Reflexes

#1

I wonder what would happen to our favourite fighting games, if someone with absolute perfect reflexes (but only basic knowledge of the game) tried to play them?

A casual player, who knows the moves, basic combos, basic strategy etc, but he can literally freeze time or go slow-motion at any speed he chooses.

Which games would become totally broken in the hands of such a player? In which games would he not find any advantage at all? Can he still be defeated by top players? How?

What kinds of systems and features would become broken? 3S Parry, perhaps? What kinds of systems would work well?

(for those wondering why I’m making such a silly thread, I’ve been thinking about a design for a FG-style combat system, built for high-ping online environments, such as MMOs etc. In such a high-ping environment, the game shouldnt rely on reflexes, almost to the point of being turn based or something. This is a thought experiment to get ideas.)

#2

You don’t even need to get theoretical about it. There are enough examples in the genre of practical reactionary solutions which kill the depth of the situations they take place in.
An example would be Ryu vs Abel- Stuff happen at midscreen+
After Abel gets an ultra- Stuff stop happening at midscreen+ since Abel can ultra a FB on reaction at that distance.

#3

With perfect reactions you win in every game and every sport where reaction matters (read: not chess, poker) every single time.

#4

3S comes to mind, because parries are stupidly powerful in that game. Parrying in the air and out of blockstrings. lololol

#5

This reminds me of hate mail I get for “blocking too much” lol

Ok, let me block less so you can hit me and win? STFU lol

#6

At high level, a lot of parries aren’t done on reaction. They’re basically guess parries.

#7

True, but this thread is about “perfect” reflexes. I think my point still stands.

#8

This is stupid. Have you ever played the ST computer?

With perfect reaction, someone would just uppercut every move on reaction, even jabs and shorts. You would never hit them.

#9

Yeah, that. Guy can just walk towards you; you cant do shit other than walk yourself in the corner, then when you’re there he throws one fireball to get some chip in and after that can just SRK whatever you do, or let the timer run out. And as I said, this is the case with whatever said person would do. Heck, they’d win 100% at RPS.

#10

Heh, so the obvious answers of reversals and parries are broken, of course.
Throw breaks also become broken. Arguably blocking becomes pretty broken too.

Mixup goes the other way - hi-low games are useless when the opponent has perfect reflexes. Unless the mixup is so instant that it basically forces a guess.

Hah, I wonder if there are enough mechanics left over to have a FG feel, after you remove all of these mechanics?

#11

Basically in Tekken 6, if you can block everything and break throws, nobody’s touching you with lows.

Duck high moves and punish with WS launcher lol

#12

It probably wasn’t an intentional design choice to begin with, but virtually all of the strategy in fighting games hinges on players having imperfect information because things happen too fast.

So, I would guess that one frame grapples could still work. You can just aggressive block against almost anything (although it’s now not in your favor), and you can beat a normal or fireball with a guess after he’s already committed to it. At melee it’s basically just guess spd versus guess dp/jump, which is still not great, but better than unwinnable.

#13

Actually, you can bait people into parrying and subsequently punish them. Take Hugo for instance, he can bait you to parry one of his claps and if you do he can cancel into sa1 or sa3. Quite a few characters can do stuff like this.