Fighting games really suck if you ask me

Is it a strike first or strike second game?

One thing I did to improve was watching other people. Study how they do things, and what they do wrong. Rewind, watch again, do everything you can. These things should fall into your subconscious and make gaming much easier.

Step 1: Git Step 2: Gud It totally worked for me.

Honestly, you have to die a lot.

Aren't fighting games just sequence button mashers? I ask because that's what I remember them to be, and no longer play any for I dislike that form of game play. But if they are still that, you need to be able to remember what sequences do what and when, and you have to have dexterity to do the right button sequence when it is needed. I like triggers.

Basically learn that characters strengths and weaknesses and work your playstyle into that. Let's go for an example, injustice 2. I play a lot of black Manta. He's a character with high meter build and solid damage, as well as gpod combo potential, but you have to stay midscreen for him to get any damage. Also his fullsceeen moves are mostly all unsafe on block and punishable. The way I work around this is to use his few moves that are long distance or safer to provide pressure, and get the opponent to whiff a punishable move or open himself up, then punish with a nice combo. When you play a style like this effectively, you create a no win situation for the opponent, where he's fighting an uphill battle to get in. That's just one example but you want to learn the character, his weaknesses and strengths, test him against other characters and memorize a few good combos that you can use requently.

[quote]How does One "Get Good" at Fighting Games?[/quote] Patience, practice, and discipline. [quote]I understand the characters and the mechanics well enough. [b]What I'm struggling with is the whens and the whys.[/b][/quote] Then you probably don't understand the [b]game mechanics[/b] well enough. Fundamentals are where you begin, not characters. Movement, frame data, blocking, punishment, spacing, and stage control. These are all transferable between fighting games, and a necessity if you want to get good. Learning a character will get you a couple of rounds, but learning fundamentals will get you games. They're simply the most important part of fighting games. After those, you start delving into things like oki, and wake up options. Resource management. Hit confirming. Yomi. Mixups. When to do a move and why will come from understanding these concepts. Fighting games are full of unpredictable options.Understanding and applying these concepts will reduce the amount of options your opponent has, thus making them more predictable. Fighting games are as much about making the opponent do what you want them to, as it is about doing what you yourself want to. Recording and reviewing your matches is something I highly recommend. Being able to break down exactly what you did right and wrong without the pressure of being in a game is invaluable. Assessing those mistakes and actively looking at how you can correct them will take you very far. I also suggest three books... Fighting Game Fundamentals, by Gooteks. The Will To Keep Winning, By Daigo Umehara. Playing To Win, by David Sirlin. The last two books are aimed more at competitive players who are trying to reach higher placements - they still make for great reads for aspiring new players, though.

Short answer; Play Skullgirls! Long answer; Don’t jump in against players right away. Start with CPUs on normal difficulty. When it gets to the point you can beat them almost every time, bump up the difficulty. Rinse & repeat until you’re at max. You’ll start to just get a feel for the game, learn how to counter certain manuevers, etc. and by starting easier you don’t need to have as much mastery at first. Skullgirls balances its difficulties pretty well. A game with easier inputs is probably a better starting point than harder ones. I hate to say it but Mortal Kombat (ugggggggggh) is pretty good in this regard. However, auto-combo systems make you worse, by rewarding you for too easy of inputs, so turn them off if the game has them. Personally, I’d recommend Skullgirls here, because, aside from Parasoul, inputs are all pretty easy, and the game flows smoothly. A great tutorial system really helps, but unfortunately most fighting games fail in this regard. Skullgirls has a great tutorial, though. It helped me git gud! Also, try using the d-pad to start out, then switch back to the joystick once you’re better. D-pad lets you be more precise, but joystick lets you be quicker. Skullgirls has options for both! In conclusion, play Skullgirls, now available on Xbox One (BC360), PS4, and soon to be coming to Switch!

[quote]Smash Bros. Unsurprising. Learn Lucina, Roy, or Chrom (preferably Lucina, as Chrom and Roy have a little jank to them). Play her until you can reliably perform all of the following in an intense match: Grabs/Spot-Dodges Dash-Dancing Short Hops + Attacks Fast Fall Aerials Good Spacing Recovery (Includes air dodging, defensive aerials, High and Low recoveries, etc) Edge Guarding Proper Inputs (That means no mis-inputs) Combos/Strings (None of those three have combos past 3 hits unless you do some janky stuff with their Nair, or go for tipper hits on Roy, both of which some pros can't even do properly).[/quote] ^Wyoming

Spend a lot of time in training mode to familiarize yourself with hitboxes and frame data and to see what attacks can combo into each other under what conditions. Then just try stuff; be creative and try some combos out. Then spend some time against the AI to test those combos with resistance. Then get a friend and play friendlies to see if those combos can work against a competent player. Then you should be ready to try playing against tryhard randoms online

[quote]Assume I'm completely new to the genre. I have read up on advice already but I don't feel like I'm getting very far. In short - I know to have no more than three mains, I am well versed in those characters' moves, combos and traversal, and I understand the characters and the mechanics well enough. What I'm struggling with is the whens and the whys. Whens - Like I said, I understand my characters and their moves, I just can't figure out how I know when to use those moves. Like, I know (let's call it) Move A attacks directly above me, so I should use it when my opponent jumps, but aside from that I just don't know when to use each move, and when it's most effective. Whys - I usually lose fights, and I don't know why. Sometimes I win, and I still don't know why. Aside from being able to tell that a player is clearly better than me, I don't know [i]how[/i] or [i]why[/i]. It [i]looks[/i] like they're randomly choosing attacks, except I clearly know that they are not, because if they were it wouldn't be working this well for them. [b][u]Tl;dr[/u][/b] I suck at fighting games. How do I not?[/quote] Practice. Practice. Practice. When: learn by trial and error Why: you need to focus more on being better than your yesterday. It seems that you’re overthinking it. Why and when would you walk? Why and when would you use a car? Why and when would you choose to use a sword or a shield or a gun or a staff or your bare fists? You don’t really think about those things. You just are proficient at them (or not) and you use them as the opportunities present themselves. Just play. Practice tech skills. There’s a fight scene in a Sherlock Holmes movie staring Robert Downey Jr where he breaks down and thinks about all of his moves and when and why [u]in the middle of a fight.[/u] But you never do that in real life. You don’t have time in the middle of a fight to do that. That’s why you practice and train and study before hand. Doing so programs and drills all of that information into your subconscious and your muscle memory so that it all becomes natural.

In my experience, it takes a lot of time, practice, and experimentation. It took me [i]years[/i] to get good at Smash Bros.

Find the button that does the good attack and don’t stop

Jump Force?

Same as anything. Keep up with it until you get the hang of it. Maybe practice a few combos and after that, just trial and error.

Practice