Gameplay video critiques

[calibur753]

Mh, from what I could see from your third match you posted, you had some serious problems with Saiki playing Terry.

I would suggest that if you're in a fireball war, why don't you do C fireball. C fireball is very strong as an anti-fireball tool. It might be the delay, but I feel like you're not finishing your plate with your combos. If getting the df+C into burn knuckle is a problem, just cut it out of the equation and don't do it. Keep Saiki out from jumping with st.A or df+C. They're both equally fast and cover some serious air space.

Other than that, just work on your links.

Thanks =]

[AirLancer]

A lot of footage of me playing with Jaguar and Zerpin at the latter's (gigantic) house.

Other than a lot of inexplicable execution errors on my end (hd combos, kim s.D link...sigh), can y'all give me some advice? I'm mostly seeing a lack of anti-airing and cracking under pressure...

KOF XIII House Session Part 1

Whoops, hah, forgot the link...

[FM Sway]

So I finally found the place to get my video critiqued ><

KOFXIII SE Beta Thoughts and Gameplay Analysis

So that's my channel up there, and this one links to a video I just finished recently. I was SUPPOSED to go to Youtube but I forgot to press the record button and yeah, I'm not gonna redo 2 hours again. It's basically me analyzing my gameplay along with my friend's gameplay who is new to KOF. The original video was from his archive, which I took and analyzed pretty deep.

But still, I really want some help on my general gameplay. I feel like I lose a ton of pressure and I don't know how to fix it yet, even when I review it. Also my Kim matchup experience is terrible!

Please follow my channel and help me out, guys! I'll be streaming more now that SE Beta is extended and even beyond the Beta I'll be streaming. See you!

[Crazy Li]

Is this still a thing that anyone does? Because I'd like to get some help on how to improve based on my own match footage. I have a couple of replays saved here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AxAn2BaAbAY
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SIOMRHMaRXw

I'm the all blue teams

I'd like to post some from 2002UM as well but without a replay mode, I'm not sure how to go about recording it :x I certainly dun wanna try taking the recording live and lagging down the netplay...

[The Good Loser]

Is this still a thing that anyone does? Because I'd like to get some help on how to improve based on my own match footage. I have a couple of replays saved here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AxAn2BaAbAY
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SIOMRHMaRXw

I'm the all blue teams

I'd like to post some from 2002UM as well but without a replay mode, I'm not sure how to go about recording it :x I certainly dun wanna try taking the recording live and lagging down the netplay...

I don't play Kula so i can only tell you things that i notice when playing against them and why it works. The reflection part was good, and then you went in. So far so good. But then you stayed there, letting him grab you each time. Most Kulas i play against take a step back after cornering me and I'm knocked down (anticipating either a roll or a grab from me) and do the Ice Blow thing ( i think?) that keeps me pretty much on guard or at least that would have helped you against Saiki.

[Crazy Li]

That probably would have helped. Those vids are also a little old, so I'm hoping to eventually get some more recordings if I can find a good opponent to use for the playing. I've been criticized for using bad players to test against xp

[Emil_kof]

Yes...bad opponents generally don't block, can't punish you when they should be punishing you and can barely execute what they want to execute. Pretty much everything going on in these videos is meaningless, nonsensical. How should I say this...there isn't a logical flow in these matches, it's random buttons being pressed without thought on the consequences.

For pretty much everything that you do, you should ask yourself "why am I doing this?" Not everything you do should be with the purpose of it hitting the opponent (sometimes you know what you're doing will get blocked, but the purpose of it might be something else, such as beginning pressure). If the purpose of something that you're doing is to hit the opponent, you need to ask yourself WHY the opponent would ever get hit by it in the first place.

Like for example, Kensou fireball into that leaping attack. You do the leaping attack in advance before the fireball connects. Yes, it will combo if the fireball hits, but there is no reason for the fireball to hit except against someone who has no concept of blocking...so this "setup" you need to abandon. When you throw a fireball, you should be chasing after it (usually, depends on matchups) while keeping in mind all of the opponent's escape options (ex moves, jumpins, rolls) and reacting to what they do. If they do neither of those escapes, then you're now close to them and can do some closeup pressure.

You need to know, with each character, what you want to do in every situation. Suppose you do for example, get an opportunity to do some close pressure...do you know what that pressure could be? While being dynamic and freestyling should be a thing, it shouldn't be TOTAL freestyle...in the sense that you should have in mind certain things that you should be doing in a given situation. Making everything up on the spot, is no good.

Knockdowns is another thing...it seems like when you get a knockdown, you kinda just jump randomly at various heights and trajectories that seem unplanned and off the mark. Certain moves only give you enough time to set up certain kinds of safejumps and only at certain trajectories. You need to look into those things beforehand, so you have some idea of what oki options to choose from. If you don't, you're just going to get reversaled because your setups are unsafe on wakeup.

[Crazy Li]

Some of the stuff you said depends upon the character I'm playing. Characters I have a weaker grasp on will result in me doing things that appear more random, unplanned, and poor execution.

I don't make every attack with the purpose of hitting, but I guess I don't do a lot of attacks with the expectation of them being blocked either. This is probably because I don't play a lot of people actually block XD

One example of a move I toss out a lot without the purpose of hitting necessarily is Yuri's qcf+A at a distance. It usually whiffs if they stay away but those who are overly aggressive will run into it. This is also a move I use after knockdowns from a safe distance to beat people who try to AA on wakeup.

But it's true I don't know what to do in many situations where I have the opportunity for close pressure. This probably means I should stick to characters who do zoning or keep-away. A character like Athena, for example, doesn't want to be close anyway. I notice I tend to struggle a lot with characters who are supposed to rushdown or otherwise keep pressure on because I don't have the slightest idea what to do to apply pressure. In your Kensou example, the answer is no. If I chase his projectile and get close, I don't have the slightest idea what I can do with him. I've kinda dropped him from my XIII team for the moment until I can figure the answer to that question out.

I'm looking to pick up King who plays well to a keep-away game with her ground and air projectiles. I feel like she's a character who can work up-close as well, but I just haven't learned how to do that yet... but at least she doesn't fail if I can't rushdown well. This gives me a viable character to use and maybe even learn how to do stuff up-close over time as I use her. The only thing I know for King thus far is to slide and if it hits, cancel it to something.

Despite Athena being in-line with my style and the fact that I use her heavily in other games, I can't seem to work her in XIII. I guess I need to go back to the basics in learning how she operates in that game. I feel very limited, not really being able to do anything but shoot Psycho Balls and back up. When I try to poke with her, I end up eating moves far too often that I feel like I'm a sitting duck who has to block, run away, and projectile. It doesn't feel like I'm actually playing her if that makes any sense.

[Crazy Li]

Ok, here's some more recent gameplay: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q2AUfuasE1A

hopefully I've improved a little...

[The Good Loser]

Ok, here's some more recent gameplay: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q2AUfuasE1A

hopefully I've improved a little...

you definately upped the kula game, seeing as both Kula and King took out 1 1/2 characters. It also seemed as if the second guy wasn't blocking that much though.

[Crazy Li]

This is the best I could capture for 2002UM:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7L_0uxIHvN0

but trying to record live bogged my computer and caused a lot of lag, so I couldn't actually play properly :x

[Emil_kof]

your opponents again, don't know what they are doing...

you need to play someone that repeatedly punishes for your mistakes. In fact, that way you might not even need this gameplay critique thread because you would already know your mistakes from being punished for tem. Right now to list all the questionable things in these matches(many of which both players are getting away with), it would require a long post.

Just being real.

[Crazy Li]

It's hard to find opponents that are both capable of punishing my bad play but not so overwhelmingly good that I get discouraged from not being able to land anything on them at all.

I'm trying to learn to punish other people's poor decisions at least or exploit when people get predictable in their strategies. I can't say much about my own techniques. I mostly just poke around and hope to hit things.

I don't know if getting punished for my mistakes teaches me enough though to be honest. All it does is make me not do anything. If I get punished too much in a match, I just start blocking because I honestly don't know what I CAN do that won't get punished. But of course not fighting doesn't get you anywhere. It's really tough for me to learn what's safe to use and I haven't had a lot of help in that way. At best I get told to watch tournament videos but I don't really learn anything useful from them.

[BodyOrgan]

It's hard to find opponents that are both capable of punishing my bad play but not so overwhelmingly good that I get discouraged from not being able to land anything on them at all.

I'm trying to learn to punish other people's poor decisions at least or exploit when people get predictable in their strategies. I can't say much about my own techniques. I mostly just poke around and hope to hit things.

I don't know if getting punished for my mistakes teaches me enough though to be honest. All it does is make me not do anything. If I get punished too much in a match, I just start blocking because I honestly don't know what I CAN do that won't get punished. But of course not fighting doesn't get you anywhere. It's really tough for me to learn what's safe to use and I haven't had a lot of help in that way. At best I get told to watch tournament videos but I don't really learn anything useful from them.

I'd say that's the best description of the problem I've ever read. I'm a rather aggressive player when given free reign, but when shut down I tend to turtle up. I was playing Air Lancer the other day, and he described me as passive aggressive, which a lot of other people better than me also describe me as. It all comes down to what you've said. If I'm punished for going in every time, then I'm not going to go in because I get punished, and then the other player is going to tell me I'm not aggressive enough because I don't go in.

Anyway, it boils down to experience. The first time I played Air Lancer he destroyed me. I think every win was an OCV. This last time I played him I was usually able to get at least one character off him, and managed two at one point (I think he pulled his punches). This was probably only because I've played a lot in between then with people closer to my level which allowed me to figure out what can and can't be punished.

One large reason I get destroyed as badly as I do is because I drop a lot of potential combos. There were many matches where I had the chance to take one of his characters because I landed the combo starter, but failed to capitalize on it. Air Lancer doesn't make nearly as many mistakes. I think he only dropped 3 combos out of all the matches we played. Again, experience will improve my execution.

Crazy Li, we should play. I can't really say if I'm better or worse than you without actually playing, but if our connections allow it, then I'm up for my beating or my free wins

[The Good Loser]

Now this might sound a bit off coming from me who is also not that well versed but as far "If I'm being punished too much i don't know what to do anymore and just turtle" is concerned: I'd say there are three things (Or rather two major things) you need to study to avoid that, that is the universal mechanics of KoF (Guard cancels, rolls, safe jumps and other jumps etc.), character specific mechanics like how good is my character's light punch, can my character dodge a mid air projectile by sweeping, can my down+C stuff a jump in etc. / and at the same time, the characters you know you have problems against. You can be crafty and visit their Sub-Forums here and "Spy" on their tipp's and tricks ;D . (Check out Juicebox Abel's youtube for some more in XIII)

And lastly, but not less important, Player habits. Mostly if they have any noticable ones you can take advantage of it after maybe the first few rounds if you haven't already played them before. I casually play with a friend from Korea and his Robert, Ralf and King and Heidern drive me nuts. I know exactly what he is going to do but i rarely find the chance to take advantage of it, say for instance with his King against my Kim, i am definately forced to play a lot safer because Kim doesn't have a lot of meterless anti-projectile options. I am forced to risk and go in after i have seen or "think" i can predict his fireball pattern, and jump in. Now the first few times i do this he usually catches me with trap shot or he mixes a double venom shot in. A few games later and i get the jist of short hopping one projectile until i can get "in reach" (not too close, but not too far) and try and wait something unsafe from him. Then there's another King player i play and he plays her way more aggressively. (I prefer this because close range is my forte) Some things vary from player to player (variable) and some things are set in stone via frame data from your and your opponents character and the game mechanics itself.

This is just my opinion.