Category: Entertainment & Lifestyle

The big one has arrived

Black Friday deals are now out in full force, but PC players had been waiting for their turn, which has officially arrived today.

The Steam Autumn Sale is now underway offering up the best fighting game discounts of the year for a limited time.

Compared to Xbox and PlayStation’s Black Friday Sales, Steam is carrying most of the same big draws on recent games along with a much wider array of titles to pick from and save big on.

Mortal Kombat 1 is probably the largest deal of the bunch with the base game discounted 60% down to just $20 while the Khaos Reigns Kollection, bundle and expansion are also all half off — so you can get all of the current content for $45.

Tekken 8 and Street Fighter 6 are both 50% off as well as running discounts on their deluxe versions though there’s still no sale for SF6’s Year 2 Character pass yet.

There’s also the likes of Guilty Gear Strive, Under Night In-Birth II, Dragon Ball FighterZ, and just about everything you can think of among the 100 fighting games and DLC we’ve included here.

Granblue Fantasy Versus: Rising, The King of Fighters 15, the Marvel vs. Capcom Fighting Collection, Dragon Ball: Sparking Zero and DNF Duel, however, are among the few noticeable absences that are apparently sitting this big sale out.

Dragon Ball: Sparking Zero is on sale for the first time on console at least currently.

These Steam Autumn Sale deals are slated to last until December 4 at 10 a.m. PST though note these prices reflect the store in the United States. Availability may differ elsewhere.

You can check out the top 100 fighting game deals for the largest PC sale of the year below.

• Arcana Heart 3 Lovemax Sixstars!!!!!! Xtend – $6

• BBTAG Special Edition – $12.50

• Blade Arcus – $7.50

• Blade Strangers – $13.20

• BlazBlue: Central Fiction – $10

• BlazBlue: Continuum Shift Extend – $3

• BlazBlue: Cross Tag Battle – $5

• Brawlhalla All Legends Pack – $20

• Breakers Collection – $10

• Capcom Fighting Bundle – $19.80

• Capcom Fighting Collection – $16

• Chaos Code – $4

• Checkmate Showdown – $5

• Dragon Ball FighterZ – $9.60

• DBFZ FighterZ Edition – $14.40

• DBFZ FighterZ Passes & DLC – 50-72% off

• DBFZ Legendary Edition – $39.60

• Dead or Alive 6 – $12

• Dead or Alive 6 Digital Deluxe Edition – $16

• Fight of Animals – $7

• Fighting EX Layer – $8

• Footsies Rollback Edition – $3

• Garou: Mark of the Wolves – $1.50

• Guilty Gear – $3.20

• Guilty Gear Strive – $20

• GGST Season Pass 2 – $12.50

• GGST Season Pass 3 – $17.50

• Guilty Gear Xrd REV 2 – $9.90

• Guilty Gear XX Accent Core Plus R – $3.44

• Injustice 2 Legendary Edition – $6

• Injustice: Gods Among Us Ultimate Edition – $4

• JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure: All-Star Battle R – $10

• JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure: All-Star Battle R Deluxe Edition – $19.60

• JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure: All-Star Battle R Ultimate Edition – $29.74

• JJBASBR Season Pass – $10

• JJBASBR Season Pass 2 – $10.50

• Killer Instinct: Anniversary Edition – $7.50

• Lethal League Blaze – $10

• Marvel vs. Capcom: Infinite – $8

• Marvel vs. Capcom: Infinite Deluxe Edition – $12

• Melty Blood: Type Lumina – $20

• Merfight – $4.80

• Million Arthur: Arcana Blood – $8

• Mortal Kombat 1 – $20

• MK1: Khaos Reigns Bundle – $30

• MK1: Khaos Reigns Collection – $45

• MK1: Khaos Reigns Expansion – $25

• MK1: Kombat Pack – $15

• Mortal Kombat 11 – $5

• Mortal Kombat 11 Ultimate – $9

• Mortal Kombat 11 Ultimate Add-on Bundle – $5

• Mortal Kombat X – $5

• Mortal Kombat XL – $6

• NeoGeo Pocket Color Selection Vol. 1 – $6

• Nitroplus Blasterz – $5

• Persona 4 Arena Ultimax – $9

• Phantom Breaker: Omnia – $5

• Rivals of Aether – $15

• Rivals of Aether 2 – $24

•
• Samurai Shodown Kiwami Pack – $11.83

• Samurai Shodown NeoGeo Collection – $6

• Skullgirls 2nd Encore – $6.24

• Skullgirls 2nd Encore + Season 1 Pass – $24.51

• Skullgirls Season 1 Pass – $21

• Slap City – $10

• SNK Heroines Tag Team Frenzy Deluxe Pack – $9

• SNK vs. Capcom: The Match of the Millennium – $1.20

• Soul Calibur 6 – $6

• Soul Calibur 6 Deluxe Edition – $14.40

• SC6 Season Pass 1 – $9

• SC6 Season Pass 2 – $13.60

• Street Fighter 30th Anniversary Collection – $9.90

• Street Fighter 5 Champion Edition – $10

• Street Fighter 5 Champion Edition + Season 5 Premium Pass – $20

• Street Fighter 6 – $30

• Street Fighter 6 Deluxe Edition – $42.50

• Street Fighter 6 Ultimate Edition – $52.50

• SF6 Year 1 Character Pass – $19.50

• SF6 Year 1 Ultimate Pass – $32.50

• Tekken 8 – $35

• Tekken 8 Deluxe Edition – $60

• Tekken 8 Deluxe Upgrade Pack – $30

• Tekken 8 Ultimate Edition – $66

• Terrordrome – $10

• The King of Fighters ’98 Ultimate Match Final Edition – $2.24

• The King of Fighters 13 – $3

• The King of Fighters 14 Ultimate Pack – $13.50

• The King of Fighters 2002 Unlimited Match – $2.24

• The Last Blade 2 – $1.50

• The Rumble Fish+ – $4

• The Rumble Fish 2 – $9

• Them’s Fightin’ Herds – $5

• Them’s Fightin’ Herds Deluxe Edition – $10

• Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3 – $7.50

• Ultra Street Fighter 4 – $3.90

• UNDER NIGHT IN-BIRTH Exe:Late[cl-r] – $5

• Under Night In-Birth II Sys: Celes – $25

• UNI2 Deluxe Edition – $42

• Yatagarasu – $7.50

• Your only move is Hustle – $4

Last night, we learned Street Fighter 6 was going to receive a new update to kick off December, and now we know more about what it’s going to contain.

Capcom just announced the incoming update for SF6 will be bringing with it a brand new balance patch.

According to the official post from Capcom, every character will be receiving changes across the board including the newest additions in Season 2 with M. Bison and Terry Bogard.

They do note, however, this update will not be as large as the balance patch that released with Akuma earlier this year, so we shouldn’t expect massive changes to how characters function.

This isn’t too surprising considering we’re still technically in the midst of a competitive season though players have certainly been wishing for some more tune ups (or toning down) of fighters given their performance and prominence.

The prime candidates for nerfs are likely M. Bison, Ken, Cammy and Ed given their strong and consistent results, especially when it comes to the Capcom Pro Tour and Capcom Cup qualifiers as of late.

But they aren’t the only ones players have been taking issue with.

We also wouldn’t be surprised to see other fighters like Zangief and Rashid along with potentially Akuma in Capcom’s crosshairs too.

As for those hopefully getting buffed, Jamie, Marisa, Kimberly, Lily and E. Honda are looking like the most in need of attention along with potentially Manon and Ryu.

Outside of JP, it feels like Capcom has struggled a bit with figuring out their approach to balancing the newcomers, which has been compounded lately by existing / DLC characters fulfilling their same role but arguably better like Bison, Ed and Akuma.

Although they haven’t confirmed it yet, this update will presumably also contain a new Fighting Pass for SF6 that’ll likely be holiday themed, which should be revealed soon.

December 1–2 also marks the one-year anniversary since the first wave of Outfit 3 DLC released for the base cast, but we shouldn’t expect Outfit 4 to pop up here too.

Capcom has yet to even officially confirm their existence, so players will probably be waiting a while longer still before they can dress up their favorite characters in new costumes again.

We’ll learn more about what all the update contains when they release the patch notes around 8 p.m. on Sunday.

And let us know what you hope to see out of the new balance patch in the comments.

There will be a Battle Balance Update on December 2 for #StreetFighter6!

Although this won’t be a major update like the Akuma one, all characters will receive changes.

We’ll publish the Battle Change List when maintenance starts on Dec 1 at 8PM PT. pic.twitter.com/7GHEUnc04e

— Street Fighter (@StreetFighter) November 27, 2024

Of course it’s only for Japan like all the other cool things

Marvel vs. Capcom is finally back, at least in its classic form, and that of course means you can expect some new merchandise to be coming out for the series too.

There’s of course the exclusive Marvel vs. Capcom comic book that came with the pre-orders of the physical release of the MvC collection (and was smaller than expected), and the developer is also running a special giveaway to celebrate the ocassion as well.

Capcom is giving away prizes to 20 lucky fans in total it seems, but you probably won’t be one of them for a few reasons.

The prize is actually pretty cool too with a keychain of the collection cover an acrylic stand featuring some of the classic game portrait art for Ryu, M. Bison, Sakura, Zangief, Ken, Cyber Akuma, Dhalsim and even the joke character Norimaro, interestingly.

All you’d have to do to enter is simply follow the StreetFighterJA account on X / Twitter and retweet their giveaway post, but therein lies the problem.

Just like their recent Nijisanji Vtuber collaboration, the prize is limited to only people in Japan, which probably comes to little surprise for fans at this point.

Click images for larger versions

At least the e-Capcom store is slowly being opened up to international shipping like for the cute Cammy Capcom Figure Builder, but most of it is still locked in Japan.

That’ll probably continue to expand at this seemingly glacial pace. Maybe someday we’ll be in a world without borders… at least as it pertains to cool stuff that’s been exclusive to Japan.

And hopefully we’ll see some new official Marvel vs. Capcom merch come westward much sooner than that.

An actual new game would of course also be very welcome too.

https://t.co/ptJO0q7iMS

— ストリートファイター / STREET FIGHTER (@StreetFighterJA) November 22, 2024

For those who can enter, the MvC giveaway is open until December 5, and winners will be contacted through direct messages from Capcom.

Bandai Namco has announced via X that Dragon Ball: Sparking Zero servers for all platforms will be going down this Thursday evening (Friday morning if you’re in Japan) for some important maintenance for online modes.

The official Dragon Ball Games account shared the news early Wednesday morning across two X posts, the first announcing the maintenance and projected 5-hour down time, the second clarifying exactly what changes are rolling out.

Developers will be taking Sparking Zero offline on Thursday November 29, starting at 9 p.m. Pacific Standard Time. Both Custom Battle: World Library and ranked matches will not be available during this maintenance period as developers are recalibrating point totals that have gone awry.

You can view the pair of posts embedded here:

The DRAGON BALL: Sparking! ZERO servers will undergo maintenance on all platforms on November 29th at 06:00 CET | 14:00 JST | 28th 21:00 PST and will last around 5 hours.

Unavailable modes:
Custom Battle: World Library
Ranked Match

Thank you for your patience. #DBSZ

— Dragon Ball Games (@dragonballgames) November 27, 2024

This update comes less than a week after developers made changes to more effectively punish rage quitters (those who disconnect from online bouts prematurely to avoid losing). It’s unclear as to whether these two pieces of maintenance are directly related since details are sparse, but re-tweaking point totals for nefarious online actors and those they’ve robbed of points does fit the bill here.

This all comes under the shadow of a more conspicuous issue distracting fans from enjoying Dragon Ball: Sparking Zero right now as last weekend’s French leg of the Dramatic Showdown Tournament circuit concluded in controversy.

As the game exists now, the most effective strategy in Sparking Zero involves spamming evasive maneuvers in efforts to score 10-minute time outs. The action is horrific to watch by competitive fighting game standards, and so right now many in the community are eagerly awaiting Bandai Namco’s plan to fix this, which is currently expected to roll out in a promised December patch.

These early issues may point to why Dragon Ball: Sparking Zero has already gone on sale, though we are entering the Black Friday/holiday season.

A recent clip making the rounds on X has poured a splash of gas on the ongoing debate about throw loops in Street Fighter 6, fueling some intense reactions from community members.

The clip itself sees Master-ranked Ken and Luke players exchanging “that’s so Street Fighter 6” bursts of offense, making for a relatively easy target for those eager to point out “everything wrong with Street Fighter 6.” Others, however, have come to the game’s defense.

The round begins with three seconds of neutral before the Luke player Drive Rushes forward, scores a hit from mid-stage, and carries Ken to the left corner where he gets a safe jump set up and proceeds to start throw loop pressure.

After landing four throws in a row, the Ken player wakes up with a Drive Reversal that affords him some breathing room. He then proceeds to take his turn with a Drive Rush that results in pressure and the eventual opening up of his opponent.

This opening is enough for Ken to carry Luke to the opposite corner with a single combo and begin throw loop pressure of his own. Three consecutive throws are followed by a fourth separated by some jab string pressure, after which Luke guesses for game with a futile wake up level 3 Super:

I love street fighter 6 pic.twitter.com/oMuYqOoYKH

— Thunder DeLangis (@ThunderFGC) November 25, 2024

The majority of the ensuing thread consisted of comments decrying loops and more casual players asking why the game lacks a counter to throws, though the clip started getting enough attention to prompt re-shares with other points of view.

One such voice was that of SoCal competitor Anton “Filipinoman” Herrera, who responded to a particular post that insinuated the clip was evidence of an unhealthy game.

“I’ll be the one that does,” he said of players who might deem Street Fighter 6 health. “I seriously don’t get why it’s unhealthy. He guessed wrong like 5 times, lol. One forward throw in SF4 was me putting you in the nastiest mix possible for 40%.”

This points to a general defense retort for Street Fighter 6 that emphasizes the game’s wealth of options against even the most powerful tactics. It’s true that defending players can go for a reversal attack, a Drive Reversal (as seen in the clip), or tech the throw to escape these scenarios. That said, risk vs. reward of these options compared to the risk vs. reward of the throw looping aggressor are notably incongruent.

Perhaps the debate here could be generalized to a question of whether or not players can find excitement and enticement in exploring the revolving doors of options in these kinds of scenarios, or if the emerging top tactics in SF6 are simply as boring as they are efficient.

We ran a poll earlier this month asking players what they felt the biggest issue affecting Street Fighter 6 right now was.

“Amount/release time between DLC characters” came in first with 35.5% of the 2,000+ votes, but the comments section put forward the notion that the game had become a relatively stale and boring experience, in no small part thanks to repetitive top tier tactics, namely Drive Rush and throw loops.

Ultimately, the throw loop debate highlights a larger conversation about the balance between offensive and defensive strategies in Street Fighter 6.

While the game offers a range of tools for players to defend against or break free from these loops, the prominence of this tactic in the current meta raises questions about whether it creates an unbalanced, less enjoyable experience for everyone involved.

As the community expresses discontent and more clips like this make the rounds on social media, it will be interesting to see how Capcom responds. For now, the potency of throw loops will continue to define a significant part of the game’s meta, and it’s clear that the Street Fighter 6 community will have to continue to grapple with them.

Though he seems to have some pressing issues when it comes to overpowered gameplay, Ghostface is proving to be one of the best-implemented guest characters in Mortal Kombat, which is saying something considering how many such guests developer NetherRealm Studios has brought in over recent years.

The Scream franchise has been around for nearly 30 years and has been in recent active production, making for an nigh endless goldmine for Easter eggs and fun references. Fans of the first Scary Movie film (a horror parody whose main focus centered on Scream) were surprised and sad to see that amid all Ghostface’s alternate masks the iconic “Wassup” face was not included. Lucklily modders have implemented a few lines of dialogue to remedy the lack of references, and GamelutioN has rounded them up for us.

The single most memorable image from the first Scary Movie has to be when Ghostface is wrapped up an a quick spoof on one of Budweiser’s most famous ad campaigns: The Whassup string of commercials that aired from 1999 to 2002.

The killer and a few of the film’s main characters share a phone call that sees the former’s face twisted into a goofy, substance-induced expression complete with nearly-closed eyes and floppy tongue.

The lack of a Scary Movie Whassup face was quickly rectified by fans with modding talents, and you can see images and video of the mod in action in our previous showcase story.

While such a face is not officially available as an alternate piece of gear in Mortal Kombat 1 (at least, not yet) additional mods have been paired with the visual one to give Ghostface a few Scary Movie lines when he faces off with various MK1 foes for pre-fight smack talk.

Most of these are somewhat crude, but that’s expected given Scary Movie’s crass nature. The opponents Ghostface talks to play their own parts in the referential dialogue, and don’t worry, if you don’t recall the exact moments from the film each quote comes out of, the video will fill you in.

Although there’s over 180 fighters if you count all of the different transformations, the world of Dragon Ball has just as many if not more who are not available in the latest game.

That includes a ton of the weirder and more oddball fighters that fans don’t have access to now in Dragon Ball: Sparking Zero.

This is why MrTopTenList recently dropped his latest video going over his picks for the top 10 goofy characters needed in Sparking from across the wider franchise including some early Dragon Ball reps who were present in previous Budokai Tenkaichi entries to the modern day.

Kicking things off is more the latter with the large Magetta being left out next to his other Universe 6 compatriots from Dragon Ball Super.

We do already have some big robot representation with Dr. Wheelo, but this metalman could bring more interesting ideas to the table like eating ki attacks and using fire / molten powers.

Next up is a character that probably very few people would vote for or even remember being the villain from Dragon Ball GT: A Hero’s Legacy, Mamba.

While this teal-skinned witch may appear cute, she eats people and can use her hair as a weapon along with magic and shapeshifting that could give Mamba a more interesting moveset compared to most of the cast.

And so far it seems Mamba has only appeared in Dragon Ball Z: Dokkan Battle for games.

She’s not exactly goofy, but Android 21 would certainly scare Dragon Ball FighterZ players as the game-original fighter, who’s now been somewhat worked into the canon thanks to Dragon Ball Super: Super Hero.

Her humanoid and Majin forms each have unique and defined movesets already in place as well as being a pretty popular character among the fans though the developers would have to work to maybe try and make 21 not quite as busted as her original showings.

We’re not going to sit here and spoil the whole list, but you can expect to see some old school Dragon Ball favorites, overlooked villains that aren’t just Super 17 and the most fitting crossover that’s not really much of a crossover at all.

So we recommend checking out MrTopTenList’s full video below to get the breakdown on all 10 and what they could bring to Dragon Ball: Sparking Zero (or really any other DB fighter).

Don’t expect Outfit 4 as your stocking stuffer though

It’s now been two whole months already since Terry Bogard dropped as the latest DLC character for Street Fighter 6, and while Mai Shiranui still seems to be a ways out, there does look to be a new update on the horizon.

Capcom just announced Street Fighter 6 is set to receive a new round of server maintenance to kick off December along with a patch though what is it going to be for?

According to Capcom’s official post, SF6 is scheduled to go offline on Sunday, December 1, at 8 p.m. PST / 11 p.m. EST and run through approximately midnight PST / 3 a.m. EST while the game updates to Version 1.0800.000.

During this maintenance, all online features will remain unavailable including matchmaking, Capcom Fighters Network, the Battle Hub and in-game store.

Said maintenance and update is coming exactly one year since Capcom released Outfit 3 DLC for the base SF6 cast, but don’t expect to get an Outfit 4 drop out of nowhere here.

The developers have been very quiet on that front since the extra costumes released for the Year 1 fighters back in May, and they almost assuredly would have released a showcase if a new wave of outfits was finally on the way in just a few days.

[Notice] #StreetFighter6 server maintenance will take place at the time below. This maintenance is expected to last around 4 hours.

December 1 at 8PM PST
December 2 at 4AM GMThttps://t.co/4W36PbJ5oQ

— Street Fighter (@StreetFighter) November 27, 2024

All the team leads have spoken on the subject is relaying that they’re basically not ready to talk about Outfit 4 yet, but they are aware that more are wanted and people are waiting.

Heck, we’re still waiting on any information regarding Outfit 3 for M. Bison and Terry as well as Mai and Elena, so hopefully we don’t have to wait until the end of the season again for them.

The in-game notification does confirm an update is coming December 1, but it doesn’t say what it’s for yet with details to be “announced at a later date.”

So the most likely answer here is SF6 is probably getting another new Fighting Pass, and it’ll presumably be holiday themed.

That would come packing new avatar and other customization options for the wintery season, but not full on holiday character costumes like we got in Street Fighter 5.

Who knows, maybe Capcom does have a surprise and are ready to share some holiday cheer with their players.

But there’s probably just going to be socks in that present box.

Plus get the Tekken 8 Premium Collector’s Edition for 50% off

Dragon Ball: Sparking Zero exploded onto the scene just over a month ago and proved to be an outstanding success for Bandai Namco immediately.

Now, however, interested fans can pick up Sparking Zero for cheaper already through Black Friday sales.

Currently, the still new Dragon Ball arena fighter is discounted across multiple retailers for the holiday season.

So far, we’ve seen the likes of Walmart, Amazon, GameStop, Best Buy and likely others all carrying the same deal in the United States.

Both the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S standard versions of Sparking are available for $50 USD, which is 30% off of the retail price of $70.

This deal seems to largely or exclusively apply to the physical disc versions of the game, so Xbox Series S and PS5 digital owners will not be able to take advantage of the deals.

• PS5 / Xbox Standard Edition – $50 (30% off)

They aren’t on sale for the console digital stores or Steam currently either, but Xbox and PlayStation are running their own Black Friday sales with discounts on other titles like Street Fighter 6, Mortal Kombat 1: Khaos Reigns and Tekken 8.

Dragon Ball is also available with the sale on the official Bandai Namco Store where they have the big Tekken 8 Premium Collector’s Edition for 50% off down to $100 with the game, Jin statue and everything else.

These deals will only be around for a limited time and may vary by retailer, and it may be quite a while before Sparking Zero goes on sale again.

So now might be the time to pull the trigger if you’ve been on the fence about picking it up before.

He also gives an interesting lesson on how hitboxes and collision works in 3D fighting games

Fighting game development has become exponentially more complicated in the past few decades, and sometimes not everything comes out right as it should.

One of the most infamous examples of such in recent memory came from a big Tekken newcomer, who released in a pretty messed up state, and now we have the story as to how and why that happened.

Longtime Tekken Director Katsuhiro Harada is talking quite a bit about characters and development stories lately like why Eliza is hard to bring back again and how the team made a last-minute change to Josie that kinda backfired.

He also recently discussed at length what happened with Fahkumram’s launch in Tekken 7 that still gives players nightmares.

Although it feels like the “new” Muay Thai fighter just dropped into the series not that long ago, Fahkumram hit Tekken 7 back in mid-2020, and there were quickly some big issues discovered.

Players found that the massive fighter appeared to have something wrong with his hurtboxes because it could be extremely difficult to hit Fahkumram using certain attacks because they’d simply miss him even though they visually connected.

This was especially a problem around his head and legs.

It got to the point the latest DLC character at the time was starting to get banned from tournaments, and Bandai Namco had to take multiple attempts to fix him since the first update didn’t fully solve the conundrum.

Harada pulled back the curtain in his own breakdown, and he confirmed there were issues with his hurtboxes or what he calls the “hit decision collision box” for 3D fighting games.

Unlike 2D games, hurtboxes aren’t actually boxes, but Harada shows examples of them actually being cylinders that account for positions in 3D space.

He shows how Tekken attacks can be viewed as line segments that represent the limb being used, and if the line connects with one of those cylinders, the move hits in simple terms.

Click images for larger versions

The problem with Fahkumram was his “hit decision collision box” made for a larger character was somehow mistakenly swapped out with a smaller one in the release build.

This means those cylinders covered up less of his body and left gaps where he essentially couldn’t be hit correctly.

Unfortunately, he doesn’t show what Fahkumram’s messed up hurtboxes actually looked like, though.

Harada claims this was not an issue during the character’s development, but rather an error that occurred in the final data conversion and compilation phase.

He describes how the testing team found the issue immediately after launch, however, it takes time to release a game update on modern systems even if the developers have already fixed something in-house.

Ultimately, the Director is glad they can respond to issues much easier now than in the past where fixes could only really come in whole new release and production versions.

There have been rumblings that Fahkumram may be returning to Tekken 8 as DLC for quite some time now too, so it’ll be interesting to see what the community reaction is if that does come to pass.

You can find Harada’s full discussion about Fahkumram’s launch issues in Tekken 7 below.

There are so many requests for LORE on each of the characters, but I will take a separate time since there are so many characters and episodes for the past 30 years.

As for Fahkumram, I will mention one point about a story that I can tell you now because it is in the past… pic.twitter.com/aKqZhApNrZ

— Katsuhiro Harada (@Harada_TEKKEN) November 19, 2024

There are so many requests for LORE on each of the characters, but I will take a separate time since there are so many characters and episodes for the past 30 years.

As for Fahkumram, I will mention one point about a story that I can tell you now because it is in the past (sometimes these episodes can only be told when it is in the past). Just before we released him, he had a major problem.

Or rather, it was discovered after we released him. There are many reasons why it was not discovered, but it is probably because the bug did not occur until just before the release, and it happened in the last data conversion & compilation.

The tuning team noticed the problem immediately after the release.

Of course, you all felt the strength of Fahkumram immediately after his release due to his long reach, but after a little more time passed, you began to realize that the secret of his strength lay in another factor, not just his reach (The length of his reach was as we had intended).

3D fighting games have various different internal systems from 2D fighting games. If you know the difference between these systems, you can say that they are not the same fighting game, but almost different genres. But I won’t go into details.

In Tekken and Virtua Fighter, there is a collision that judges the collision box of characters’ bodies with each other, and another collision box that judges the hit of the opponent character’s Arts (in addition to this, there is a judgment of the hit line of the technique and the trajectory of the Arts by the player who performs the Arts).
Looking at this element alone, it seems like there is no difference between 2D and 3D, but if you look at the pic we will be referring, you will notice the difference.

I have included only three pages of Power Point excerpts for reference in this area. These three images will help you understand the explanation of this post’s episode (but this is only a very small excerpt of the material, so this is not all of it).

Each character has a different physique, so every character has an original, personalized polygon model, Skeleton(Bone Rig), Body collision box, and hit decision collision box for their unique physique.

Fahkumram naturally has its own “hit detection collision box”.

Since Fahkumram is tall and has a fairly large build, the body collision box and hit decision collision box are also larger. For example, Marduk is one of the larger characters, so his hit decision collision box is naturally larger, and his body collision box is also larger (and his joint bones are longer, so he has a longer reach for the same animation).

But somehow, at the time, Fahkumram’s “hit decision collision box” – the collision box needed for him to take a hit from his opponent – had been replaced with a [small hit decision collision box] instead of the “hit decision collision” applied to the larger character. On the other hand, the [Body collision box] was correctly applied with a larger one for the system.

As a result, Fahkumram was released in a very troubling way: “During close combat and Air Juggle, the opponent’s character would be far away from Fahkumram, and furthermore, Fahkumram’s hit judges were small, making the opponent’s Arts hard to hit.”

These problems, as I mentioned earlier, were far from the original design and tuning stage, and were unforeseen troubles.

Of course, the problems were fixed in later patches. However, the difficulty with these problems is that they cannot be fixed immediately after release, because even if they are fixed within a few hours on the development side, they must go through the default re-debugging period and checks before release, and then go through the platform-side checks and approvals.

Still, we are now in an era where we can respond much more quickly than in the past.
As every player of the generation who knows the heyday of arcades knows, there was a time when many games and many fighting games had some problems, which were solved either among players or by arcade (game center) house rules, right?

Oops, once again the LORE character has become a failure story. Success stories are inevitably quickly forgotten…

I will tell you another time about the episode that led to his creation.