My gaming blog devoted to fighting games such as Tekken 6 and Tekken Tag Tournament 2.
For non-fighting games (such as Diablo III & Risk 2210 A.D), FGC related articles, game balancing and theory,
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posted May 19, 2013, 12:55 PM by Tyler Bustinza
posted May 17, 2013, 6:08 PM by Tyler Bustinza
I've been getting quite a few questions lately about half dead projects, namely if there's any plans for future releases. There's really no short answer but I'll provide the old road map for my projects leading up to a few months ago and hopefully it'll make sense.
Dragunov Practical Series - There was a good amount of theory crafting with new tech actually being discovered quite frequently. I wanted to prove that, regardless of the opinion of a few posters, certain pieces of tech were match viable and as such I recorded them from real matches. The "Practical Series" continued on past the creation of the Sergei Manifesto and was filled over the course of a year. The Sergei Manifesto - My original write up specific to the character Sergei Dragunov, took about two months to complete. Dragunov Tutorial - A general clean up of the Serge Manifesto, added some sections of my blog writings as well took a few sections out that weren't necessary. Changed the format so it's in a more progression based system, beginner to expert, all topics in between organized as such. Took about a month to complete. Tutorial Series - I realized that there was a pattern on repetitive questions coming up and decided that it was up to me to squash them in the future, the community deserved a better class of videos than what was currently out. So I created the Tutorial Series towards the end of BR about half a year before Asian release of TTT2. The tutorial series, as it stands, took three months to complete. Beginner Series - Rather than focusing on a particular, mid/high level system mechanic (such as iWS or CDc) I decided to go to the core basics of Tekken by breaking down key mechanics of the game. The original plan was to explain nearly everything in detail such that nothing was left out. The video series would be a one stop shop for all pertinent information without the need to read a detailed write-up, unfortunately the series was VERY time intensive and a couple of computer problems doomed it from the get go. I put about four months of work into the Beginner Series before it was put on indefinite hold. Tekken Isn't Hard - With the release of TTT2, there was a good portion of people playing the game just to drop it later. Some lasted longer than others but in the end the retention of new players was nearly non-existent. I decided that the main reason was the game was just too hard for beginner players, too much to know, too much to get used to, just plain too much everything. I currently have three parts of an episode done but has also been on indefinite hold simply because it takes so much time.
Well that has been the story for a few months now and it wasn't going to change until a few days ago. So let me announce that: TEKKEN ISN'T HARD IS NO LONGER DEAD |
posted May 5, 2013, 1:15 AM by Tyler Bustinza
Although slightly delayed, my Dragunov wish list is now complete. Not too much has changed from my T6 to TTT2 wish list but the problems I was addressing were never fully dealt with in TTT2. I feel like I should add more, although there's not much more I could think of that wouldn't be imbalanced one way or another. In case you missed it, be sure to check out my Jinpachi wish list from a week ago and I plan on finishing up the Raven wish list in a couple days. |
posted Apr 30, 2013, 2:15 AM by Tyler Bustinza
The turnout at NCR was disappointing, to say the least. I know I didn't help out the situation by effectively not attending but it does raise questions about the future of Tekken. While TTT2 is a great game, the cross over rate (from other games) was not nearly as much as I had expected. Many of those who made the original push to put time into the game fell by the wayside and once again we're reaching stagnation.
It's funny because a few "key", not to be named, community members made a late push for a scene revival but have been effectively AWOL ever since. Even the prior strong online play has been lately hampered by terrible lag, it's extremely hard to find competition with acceptable latency now. I might get 1 out of 20 games without noticeable latency, where only a few months ago was closer to 1 out of 5, with probably 5 out of those 20 games being near unplayable. So while online is now plagued with lag switchers and general piss-poor connections, offline has slowly been agape with lack of participation and elitism.
Short story, during my WoW "career" I played from TBC to MoP, so I saw the supposed heyday to "this is the worst expansion" followed by "this is the worst expansion" followed by "this is the worst expansion", ad nauseum. I'll actually quote a post of mine from almost two years ago when Cata was reaching a fever pitch of elitism.
"There's actually an incredibe amount of elitism now, I understand where it started from, but I can't understand why it's so prevalent now. I've played since TBC and I can honestly say that it's at an all time high. With RBGs favoring premade teams, who don't want to lose 15+ points carrying lower rated RBG players. With one lockout raids favoring guild runs over PUGs to fully clear content. Arenas favoring FotM classes so incredibly much now, notably in 3s where it never used to matter so much, e.g. Shammy heals notably trumping in 3s. If you don't fit this incredibly tight requirement in practically every aspect of the game, you're immediately shunned. IMO that's really killing the game."
A little background for non-WoW/MMO players, the second expansion "Wrath of the Lich King" (usually shortened to Wrath/WotLK) an infamous add-on was created called "Gear Score" that would tally the then invisible score of your gear, find the average, and then present you with a simple value. With this number it was pretty easy to calculate how well a player would theoretically perform in PVE/PVP content. The idea was simple, the higher the number, the better you could be. What people lost sight of almost instantly was that "could" is very different than "should" and would blindly value gear score over experience. Come the next expansion Cataclysm (usually shortened to Cata) Gear Score became a default add-on and all gear now showed their "iLevel" (or Gear Score weight). Everyone had become "theoretical" crazy.
The gears were in motion and the first of very questionable changes to come, all strengthening favoring the elite over the common. Raids were now segregated 10 vs 25 men, but instead of running your 25 man raid and then running a 10 man version, you must choose one or the other as the "lockout" is shared between the two. The addition of Rated Battlegrounds (RBGs) made it that you'd need to (originally) build a 15 man team to now PvP at high levels, instead of being thrown into a pool of contestants, but would later change the rating system to heavily favor high rated players as carrying new players would have adverse affects on everyone else's rank. Certain classes simply became unplayable in Arenas while others would be incredibly strong and constantly teeter-totter as drastic balance changes were made. So much so it wasn't unusual to see a top player simply re-roll to a completely different character instead of sticking it out and suffering.
The air was hostile. You were either what was needed or you weren't. There was no more middle ground. "Bring the player, not the class", became the laughing stock joke as Blizzard's strange decisions kept coming down the pipe. So came the mass exodus as the casual players simply had no place to go. Low/Med pop servers quickly died off as there was no more competition, you were either Group A or Group B, the only competitive groups left only competing against themselves. If you couldn't get into A/B, you'd leave the server or completely leave the game. This of course would only remain true as long as the distinction between A and B wasn't too dissimilar, once one group was clearly ahead, the other would utterly fail. And so ended the life of A or B, killed by its own quest to remain segregated from the pool of players not in either group.
But that's the point, maybe participation and elitism aren't so different. The creation of elitism leads to the lack of an adequate participant pool, which then in turn leads to Group A and B eventually collapsing upon itself as the weaker group is unable to keep up with the stronger. Of course there are exceptions to every rule. Look at two-time MK9 Evo champ Perfect Legend who turned his back on the community after his first Evo win only to come back the next year to win again. What's interesting to think about is maybe the lack of his presence made him harder to play against during Evo, as information about him was purposefully low, the old adage of "save it for tournament" pulled through. There are a lot of "what ifs" but I can honestly say this is definitely not the first time I've noticed this trend in a communal setting.
Now please don't misunderstand me, I'm in no way saying, "elitism is why NCR had such a low turnout" and instead am saying it's part of the reason the game is dying.
PS: Dragunov wish list will be released tomorrow. |
posted Apr 24, 2013, 12:51 PM by Tyler Bustinza
I know I've been neglecting the Tekken side of my site so I decided to make a "wish list" for Jinpachi similar to the one I made for Dragunov in T6. You can read the wish list here. I'll also be creating a new wish list for Dragunov later this week as well as creating one for Raven probably sometime next week. |
posted Apr 14, 2013, 8:40 PM by Tyler Bustinza
Spent the last few hours doing a major overhaul on my twitch channel ( www.twitch.tv/tyler2k/) adding information to the bottom of my channel. The hardest part was definitely figuring out how to add it, as it's not as intuitive as pre-"new" twitch, but once I figured it out I was on a roll.
I'm also announcing a new series "Big Book of Battlefield 3", no real relation to Alex's original, which will be placed on my .info site. It'll discuss various BF3 things that are fresh in my mind before BF4 is released later in the fall. More info to be released later. |
posted Mar 26, 2013, 6:01 PM by Tyler Bustinza
I just started a mini-AMA and Q&A about Tekken on Reddit ( http://goo.gl/AOG0A) and hopefully it'll be as successful as the non-public one I did in the Dragunov thread. I'm also using this time to officially announce my Jinpachi perfect guide (basically frame data on everything and every bit of information you would possibly want to know about his move list). I probably will just stick with doing it for Jinpachi as the longer the move list, the more complicated these get, and luckily Jinpachi's isn't too long.
Also I really, really hope on having the Jinpachi Android app done within two weeks, so I'll keep you posted here about that. |
posted Feb 23, 2013, 12:17 PM by Tyler Bustinza
While Tekken may not be hard, making new content is. Like I said before, I have about four parts of the first video lined up but have to record sound/audio, which is much harder than it appears. The other reason the video series has been delayed is that I've been working on an Android app that should hopefully be done by early next month. I don't want to give away the juice quite yet, but let's just say that it has something to do with one of my mains. |
posted Feb 4, 2013, 9:02 PM by Tyler Bustinza
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updated Feb 23, 2013, 12:17 PM
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One of the hardest parts of creating content is just starting out and the second hardest part is finishing, everything else in between is cake. In the past whenever I've written something noteworthy, on TZ for instance, I would elaborate tremendously on this site. So a small blurb could turn into a full fledged article, instead of trying to pull an idea out of thin air. Since I tend to post far more often off-site than on my sites, I decided the best way to approach this would be to simply port and link to what I've written elsewhere.
So I added "Off-site Discussions" to my navigation where I discuss TTT2 and other games and/or eSports. I've trimmed the fat and have only posted my best writings regarding a good deal of different subjects. I'll eventually be getting around to reading my TZ posts from 2012, the ones that didn't make my site, and post them as well but that's very low priority for me as I'm wrapping up the first two parts to episode one of "Tekken isn't Hard". |
posted Jan 25, 2013, 11:40 AM by Tyler Bustinza
Apart from "Tekken Isn't Hard", I'll be updating the character pages for Dragunov and Jinpachi. I'm not saying I'm going to make an in-depth guide for Jinpachi, similar to "The Sergei Manifesto", but it's very possible that it will slowly build up to that length over time. I might also port my Dragunov guide and convert it to TTT2 eventually, although it's very, very low priority for me right now.
After someone posted the community combo list videos in the beginner's lounge, there has definitely been increased demand for the videos because it helps out players with timing and execution. I'll be making some new ones for TTT2 (solo) in the same format probably within a few weeks which will give me time to compile a fuller list and record. |
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