I think the cost issue is quite relevant in the way that it limits the ability for people in poorer countries from playing the game because many fighting games release without region-specific pricing

"Thats besides the point" you cant just ignore how one of the best case scenarios for entering into fighting games got such a big decline in player activity. Big IP appeal, easy game, interesting character, free to play, one of the more engaging models in the genre, having various goals to interact with the game due to perk unlocks and others. And yet we have it there sitting in numbers below the games that you need to pay for to join.

If a fighting game doesn't have a competent single player, I simply don't bother. PvP is a bonus to me.

As a new player, I feel like motivation isn’t the only issue. I am incredibly motivated to improve, but for me the problem is that the path to do so is unclear

I like this analysis. I'm a hard-core Tekken fan and while I love the game I don't play it as long as other titles I just kinda like. And it's the "Fun" and incentive factors that are missing. The drive to be the best Tekken player burns out quickly after you start facing the best. It quickly becomes a source of stress and no longer fun. Other games have a way of stressing you out to WANT to get better but most fighting games fail to satisfy that after a certain level and a certain hours of play.

You were on-point in this video. Its frustrating when I hear things like "Players are too lazy to learn" when it comes to fighting games. Life is already hard. Most people have jobs and school, they want something they can pick up, play, and have fun right away.

Absolutely on-point take, and stuff I've been telling FGC people for a decade (mostly to receive flames due to their closed-mindedness and agressive resistance to new perspectives).

I think what's annoying about fighting games is that not all characters are available at the start

Just started watching the video but I'm at an awe at how it literally opens up with the point No intro, no context, just straight up the raw answer to the question in the title

I'm someone who isn't into fighting games but constantly is told by others that I'm the right kind of person for it. The reasons you gave are almost perfectly the reasons why I am still not into fighting games. The few people I know are far better than me and having had prior experience getting bodied I have no interest in reaching out for that experience, and I have no interest in paying for a game I may not even enjoy. Especially when I've paid for games I was certain I'd love but ended up completely hating (Elden Ring). DOTA2 has a new player mode. This shrinks the large roster down to help make learning the game easier, as learning 20 heros and their interactions is a much easier sell than learning over 100. It also has other features to smoothen the learning gap. *What if fighting games had something similar?* A free version of the game where you can queue for a new player mode, with a limited roster, and potential modifiers that you could opt into such as slowed time. An established player could bring their friend in, and make a custom new player mode lobby and put on some one sided handicaps to ease them into the experience. No payment needed, really low barrier to entry, and just like new player mode in DotA 2, most of the people there are going to be similarly new players, so after your friend shows you the ropes you can queue up against some bots and players and get a feel for things.

Pretty interesting watch. Great vid. I will say even in a perfect world where everything about fighting games was fixed, Single player, netcode, lobbies, UI, training/tutorial mode, F2P, etc. The fact that they are inherently 1v1 will always hold them back. I think the ability to deflect on losses is such a HUGE reason why many (not all) competitive games remain as popular as they are. Starcraft is one of the few exceptions to this that I can think of. Like did you go 0-20-1 KDA? "I would have done better but my allies never called out MIA's, my jungler never ganked, my character was hard countered in lane, their jungle camped my lane." I've heard dozens more excuses, but that's the gist of it. Hell, you can still win with a record like that by being carried. "Good thing all they did was focus on me. It let our DPS do their job." You can turn you massive L of a game into a small W like that. You just can't do that in any 1v1 game. I mean you can, but people generally won't. They always hyperfixate on the loss. When I'm teaching/coaching friends I always go over things that I liked seeing from them. "You had the right idea here, your timing was bit too early though", "Watch the meters more, you could have taken that round if you spent it on that throw combo", "You're getting the hits, but you are leaving some easy damage on the table. Try using this button instead to get better damage overall." Sometimes an opponent has a tool that's really frustrating them. I'll take it to the lab, sometimes together, via discord streams and look for an answer. It's fun and we both learn something.

I think it's worth noting that there are usually local fighting game communities in your area & that can be a great way to both find friends & motivate yourself to get better. FGs may be played by an individual but they were born in arcades where players could congregate and play together. Online has dampened it but that ethos still exists. Like you said, put yourself out there! Also, as far as incentive to get better goes, it's almost all intrinsic since you typically don't unlock anything other than better gameplay when you win. This definitely isn't enough to motivate everyone but if you like things like speedrunning there's definitely something for you there.

Free to play is the worst monetization model in the history of gaming.

I think you made your case pretty well because I've never thought of it that way, now I'm starting to wonder if SF6 will be able to break through this barrier even a little bit with the "battle hub" - but how to make a 1v1 game more social never crossed my mind since I'm such a loner (which is why I love these games and desperately tried turning off voice chat in MK11)

you are right on everything but you missed a big point, fighting games suck on a technical level: bad netcode, lobbies, ranking, unfinished games, bad servers, etc... You pay 60 bucks for buggy games that take too much time to get fixed plus all the extra issues you said

There are other factors, but fighting games difficulty is an important one, you should not dissmiss it. If you play Counter Strike, you can shoot a gun with just one button, there's no barrier, you may suck at the game, but you are already playing. The same thing aplies to games where you click on a skill, or map it into one button, it's not hard to play the game. In Street Fighter, if you can't do hadoken and shoryuken inputs... You will need to train first, and only then you will be able to play it. Doing these inputs is second nature for people in the FGC, but a beginner will not be able to do them for a while. Why would he play a game that requires a homework first, for MAYBE fun later?

"That usually entails fighting a guy who's been playing since before the year had four digits" LMFAOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

That last part about "not needing to change" ALL GAMES change when going more casual/ opening themselves up to the market for the sake of profit chasing versus appealing to the niche. You just haven't played said games long enough to see it.

Good stuff keep it up 👍

I get what you're saying. I got into competitive Smash because I grew up playing it as a kid, and so I was already familiar with the game and how it works.

I'm finally starting to do weekly content again but it might not last as i've got to go back to college soon, but I'll try. If you're new to the channel don't forget to like, subscribe and ring the bell!

im glad you made this video and that more people are realizing that making inputs or mechanics easier doesn't really do anything. even if the game has 1 button inputs if it's 60$ and there's nothing to do no one's going to bother.

Great Vid! Keep it up! 👍

Another reason why the FGs do not have many players is because the mentality of 90% of these is from 20 years ago or more and the same with the issue of servers like any other game uses dedicated servers and only now riot is going to do it, that is the only thing that interests me about project L what they do with the technical/service section

Thanks for making this video we agree on why fighting games remain niche. This video got a sub from me. Can't wait to consume more of your videos!

As a person who likes fighting games and is very bad at them ( I am incapable of doing a quarter circle motion) I can say for sure the motivation to improve is not my problem its the execution barrier. If I could do a Hadouken I would be having a better time

If I were to compare 'onboarding' time of league of legends vs any fighter, I can point exactly where LoL strikes to create addiction. Heck, the first quest in LoL after creating an account - is to login at 10 different days, while it shovels you with gameplay goodies and skins. "You may try our bot matches while you are here anyway" which you are undoubtedly going to win. During which you are measured and assigned a hidden rating afterwards. In fighters when you launch the game, you are presented with option to play locally, beat arcade/campaign mode and online versus. Best case, you will be given a couple bot matches to evaluate and assign you a starting rank before online! There's nothing that builds addiction, no daily quest for the first win, no rewards besides rank badges. (I'm not talking about multiversus here, haha). How about treating CPU matches similarly to PVP ones? I can easily see you being assigned a bot to play while there's few actual people at a particular time. And/or have a good bot that is programmed to counter whatever you spammed right now, gatekeeping your ranking up. So that you are forced to learn more than a few moves, naturally. I believe fighting games should embrace the new gaming worlds built upon addiction. That's all.

I'm actually quite excited for Project L due to pricing, as it's confirmed to be a live service game (meaning free to play), which should bring lots of people into the genre. Normally I'm not a fan of live service stuff, but Riot tends to do their stuff well. As long as it doesn't have an invasive anticheat I'm good lol

I disagree. COD is probably the most popular competitive video game out there "not necessarily as an esport" and it's infamous for its monetization and essentially required annual release purchase with $50 dlc map packs. Most people arent playing COD in a cooperative way either. I return to the skill thing, it's not that these games are more complex at a high level it's that they have a higher skill floor before you do anything interesting. If you toss someone familiar with games a controller and tell them to go around in valorant the basic control scheme is super intuitive. The basic control scheme for fighting games is far more complex than others. Fighting games force you to learn complex fine motor skills on the controller as well as strategy whereas most other games don't. I mean think about it, fighting games are the only genre where people are specifically buying more ergonomic controllers. And if you don't learn these motor skills the game isn't fun, all you can reasonably do is have your character spam a couple moves until either you or your opponent dies first. Fighting games are the only genre where you MUST spend time offline practicing your skills to he even remotely competitively viable online. I can be a reasonably good fps player without ever practicing my aim offline but this is not true at all with fgs.

This is one of the reasons I so strongly wished that the Konquest modes in Deadly Alliance, Deception, and Armageddon were good. *That,* right there, is a great framework for how to teach players and encourage them to get better. However, they executed it...really badly. All of the stuff meant to teach you was basically a glorified movelist that wouldn't let you proceed until you did the move, and did nothing to teach you *when* to use them. Hell, Deception made it so that when you were exposed to a new character, you switched to their moveset, and as far as I remember, no way to switch back. Nevermind that you wanted to actually *learn* that character, nope, time for something new. It's infuriating to see such a good idea messed up.

Your points about social part are valid and I want to add more. As a fighting game hater who still spent 1k hours in SF5 (ultra gold scrub) and 500 hours in Tekken 7/8 combined, I assure you that the main issue lies in the core mechanics of fgs. They're just too nerdy. When we talk about League with friends who are lower mmr (I'm plat btw), we can discuss various interesting skills, tactics and mechanics, because holy shit Morde can pull you into his own personal dimension, Akali can become invisible in her shroud, Jhin snipes everyone a mile away, Renata make your allies hit you, etc. So even the basic champions skills are INTERESTING to talk about. You can even tell this to someone who doesn't play League and pique their interest. Yes, there is some obvious nerdy stuff as well like skill cooldowns, wave management, gold values, gank timers, etc. But fighting games mechanics are PURE nerdiness - frames, frame traps, pushback, mixups, buffering, kara cancels, etc. You can't just talk about this shit with your friends who don’t play fgs. There is nothing to talk about. Who the hell cares that in GGStrive Chipp's alpha blade is now a cross up? Who cares that if you jump after a specific knockdown, you get a safe jump? And even I, who spent so much time on these games, find the mechanics too boring and constantly memorizing new nerdy information a torture.

0:42 Thank you 3:57 4:59 5:48 6:05 That is a good reason. 7:18 Well said.

It will be interesting to see how much project l would change the way fighting game works when it is released.

It can be how high the price is. For instance DOA has a huge DLC and season passes with costumes that cost almost $100.00. Also a lot of fighting games do not have a 1p vs CPU mode which needs to have if you do not have siblings, enough friends, family members or a good internet connection to play online. And if the game is hard in the beginning, the game needs the player to feel proud and accomplished. If Street Fighter 2 had players play in easy and earn small rewards and give tips based on the players performance. instead of saying try on a harder difficulty to see the ending but rather saying thanks for seeing how the mechanics are other things worked. For training/practice, it needs to show in a more in depth way to pull off moves or just assign harder moves to however the player wants to use it. More fighting games need to have more modes such as ratio mode, 2 on 2 and 3 on 3 mode, and single match which is what Capcom VS SNK 2 did. And we needs to have a story mode like what MK Deception and Armageddon did with its Konquest mode having players roam around and than do a beat-’em up style until you fight your next opponents. And you can even an RPG style beat ‘em up like Marvel Ultimate alliance in some fighting games with a story mode. Also for story, for instance if DOA was rebooted or basically what MK9 did, just remake DOA Dimensions and retell event of DOA1-DOA4 with Code Chronos but keep the good parts from previous games. And have more tag team for Vs series like add a mode to where you can have your friend play by your side against the computer so they can learn the controls and not get upset when fighting against you or a opponent. And for each fighting game, they need to have a game in a franchise similar MK Trilogy and Armageddon and Super Smash Bros Ultimate, and Budokai Tenkaichi 3 where you have every character, every stage, song, everything from previous games in one. The older a franchise gets a story needs to be retold in cinematic style for newcomers to understand and care just like how MK9 retold MK1-MK3 but in a rebooted fashion. Its also possible they can remake MK1-MK3 story with same endings but updated lore and better graphics and improved gameplay and balanced difficulty. And Tekken, Street Fighter, Mortal Kombat, Smash Bros, and the Marvel Vs Series are mainly the ones a lot of people play that I know because of good reputation, pioneering, and how easy it can be for some compared to other fighting games that haven’t reached their scene yet. Back to DOA topic, it has a tag mode as co-op that you probably do not see often in other games. MVC should adopt that co-op team battle along with Tekken Tag and others.

Price is a huge factor, as is in-game content. If you're asking people to drop $60 and commit hours of playtime to your game, you have to make it worth their while in more ways than just getting curbstomped online over and over again.

Really good point of view

Dude...so true..as I was watching this video I was playing SF4 and my opponent was doing word for word what u said in this video mid fight!!...lol..WOW

Great vid dude

Great video and I agree with every single point however... every goes on and on about making it rewarding for new players and thats the big issue, but how do they do that. I hear about it alot, but never any suggestions. Players are always gonna run into the same 2 problems in every fighting game. 1-That its 1v1 so loss is gonna be more frustrating since its on you. 2-You are gonna run plateau at some point. You will hit a rank where you just get murdered and thats very difficult to get through.

Price n friends aside, I played a few of fighting games in the past, I still like platform fighter more then traditional fighting games, but I'm not a fighter fan n never was, I'm single player oriented player, I like RPG, adventure n platform mostly, I can have fun with multiplayer at some times but it's not my focus as I like the progression on my single player games, but I mostly would play casual Smash then SF if I wanted a multiplayer session, otherwise mostly will find me into single player games

Perhaps with games like SF6 that seem to have actual content other than 1v1 for their price, the fighting games will come back. There seems to be a turn in that trend overall. I didn't test it out yet, but I think Rushdown Revolt has some modes other than 1v1. Granblue Fantasy also did a step in right direction, but the pricing just kicks people in the balls...

It is not possible to have team battles or coop in fighting games? Most team sports (not just games) have a much larger audience than single sports too.

I don't think getting a good free fighting game will be enough. As many comments pointed out already, pvp fighting games are hard right out of the bath. As a newcomer, I went "Try character's moveset -> Go pvp -> Can't analyze the situation, forget about specials and grab, try jumping and normals, get obliterated" Even though the lack of info in FGs are often compensated by detailed user-generated content, I had no idea of what it'd take just to be ready taking online matches. I gradually learnt about neutral, footsies, okizeme and all that stuff, but that's just the appetizer. Contrary to other Riot's games, in fighting games, actions are coming at an absurd rate. Enemy makes a move. Gotta react. Too late, it's been 0.3 seconds. Even though most fighting games share similarities, getting into a single one is a big investment. It implies to learn the game's specific mechanics and characters, and everything that comes with these. It's even more of an investment when you yet have to learn the core fighting game principles along with processing speed. Personnaly, I think we don't need a free fighting game. We need one rather cheap, but with a stupid amount of content for beginners in the genre to train in a safe environment.

Yeah. I also noticed this weird thing about members of the fIghTinG GÄm cOmUnitY: Some think it's a privilege to play fighting game. Because EVERYONE wants to play fIgHTiNg gÄm, because they are the best. EVERYONE wants to be Diego from evo moment 69. YOU need to prove your worth to the game. I didn't even know what they meant with evo moment, when I started with fighting games. But every time I stated my opinion about the controls, questioning WHY there are arcane runes that I need to draw before a move comes out or strict cancel windows that NO OTHER GAME GENRE HAS, people piled on me, saying I saw the Justing Wrong vs. Diego clip and I'm mad because I'm not instantly good like them. Dude, NOBODY OUTSIDE THE BUBBLE CARES. Personally, I really hope Street Fighter 6 has something like Shadow-Mode from Killer Instinct. Because regular CPUs suck.

6:37 Multiversus player base took a literal nose dive, proving your point WRONG.

Iv collected fighting games since the early 90s. I have a different outlook on it than most. I buy them more in the sense that they are unbeatable, and look forward to checking out their system mechanics, along with their beautiful artistic merits. Both of those things are crucial for me to buy a fighting game. Being great at the game or being tournament competitive ready is a after thought to me.

Great Video

As an old dude, I gotta say that this issue predates the advent of online and the ability to play with your friends. I'm sure that aspect doesn't help, but its not the sole reason either.

Cool video. The only fighting game that I play is chess on my phone.

This definitely is one of the bigger issues for Fighting games, but of course, it's never as simple as just one problem being why Fighting games are still small. Price is one of them, but mediocre games and the lack of good tutorials or singleplayer content also hinders the genre greatly

To be honest, money wise it's really not an issue and you shouldn't wait until sales season; some sites even offer games at a bargain price which goes even cheaper than the sales itself

i think its a combination of availibilty, importance and learning curve and other things that just make it hard to get into. i dont agree with the notion that casuals stay casuals because the games fail to teach how to play. i think that this is false for the most part. every good fighting game worth its price has a tut that explains the core mechanics like its meters, how the health works and any comeback mechs that it has and might tell you a deeper mechanic that you have to search for. casuals are casuals because they dont want to get good. id say the first thing that separates the casuals from anyone good and or progressing is that the good players actually WANT to learn the game.

I bought copies of Tekken 7, DBFZ, and SoulCalibur 6 for all my friends on steam on Nov 21, 2022. No one gave any of them a chance

Street Fighter Alpha 3 tried but well asking a new player to do a combo is either gonna make them buttonmash to a barely good enough combo (and forget immeditately) or give up

For me the two things holding me back to really get into fighting games are the price of the games and motion inputs.

There's intrinsic and extrinsic motivation. Only people driven by intrinsic will play FG. Anyone that's extrinsically driven is not going to be interested. There's nothing fundamental about fg that makes it less able to have these treadmill levels and xp to have the extrinsic, i like it this way, but most probably need this +50exp when you get a round to motivate. Not to mention to even attempt this you need to fork out 60$.

It’s because there’s no forfeit button.

Why has there never been a modern (sf 2D or tekken 3D style) fighting game that let you play team matches and had ranks for those! That’s the huge difference between fighting games and other big esports titles. When we get a fighting game where players can tag there partner in in real time and play other teams or randoms ALONG with single play. I think it’ll leave a huge mark:

The big issue i Have is how little Single Players modes they have now took at Tekken 6 in Modes Compared to 7 its a total joke. Then they tried to add some in there asking extra money for them along woth charging money for fighters that was free on every game in the series before 7. What i dont get is Soul Calibur 6 had loads of single player content yet every other fighting game for years did mostly the oppsite.

thank you for the video slightly

thank you, someone else who understands, fighting games should have a free version and, or more single player modes

There's also the argument that fighting games require technical skill through inputs, whereas something like League of Legends is incredibly simple mechanically. League only gets in-depth once you start learning all of the builds and strategies. You can know fighting game fundamentals, like spacing and punishing, but you'll likely not get very far if you can't get your inputs right. It's for this reason that I think platform fighters are the best gateway games for people trying to get into the genre, as they're much simpler to pick up and play. A good example is Brawlhalla. Not only is the game simple, but the characters share movesets with one another, so it's a lot easier to learn each character and their match-ups. This, combined with a ton of casual gamemodes to play, makes it the ideal gateway game in my eyes. If only it had a better tutorial though, but thankfully they're working on it. FPS games are the same. There is technical skill in the act of aiming and shooting, but mechanically it's really just holding down one button and pointing at a target. Fighting games, on the other hand, are like a job. P.S. Street FIghter 6 looks so fucking good but it costs so much :(((((

I regret now that I never played fighting games before, although I always play alone even in multiplayer games.

Very simple. I don't need to spend hours, days, weeks, months, years to enjoy league of legends, starcraft, overwatch, or any other similar game (even WOW). With a fighting game, to start enjoying the game, it starts after hours upon hours, days after days, and probably weeks after week of training combos, moves, figuring things out, etc... every other game you can jump on and start having fun right away. It can't be called a game if it takes 80 hours a week to start having 'fun'.

7:23 i see what are you doing here

In my opinion, fighting games are just too much work for 99% of people, with no reward. So people give up. In a world with so many engaging options, fighting games just don't scratch that itch for most casual gamers. I used to play fighting games a lot, but now I put that work in at the gym, and on my business, which have tangible rewards for me.

I've got a fighting game that I've poured HOURS into, it all started with; Dragon Ball Z Budokai 3.

Ironically enough, it's because of the fact that fighting games are 1v1 compared to other multiplayer games that got me interested in fighting games.

For the algorithm!

i think fighting games need a story mode like beat em up

Me: Laughs in Smash Bros.

This is honestly very well said. I personally have not played a fighting game since mortal Kombat 10. And I didn't even own it just borrowed it from a friend. Between gaming being an expensive hobby, shity matchmaking, games coming out on finished, and constantly being thrown in matches with hardcore sweaty pros when you barely just put it up the game it's enough to chase me away from any game. Not just a fighting game but any game in general and that is exactly what has been happening lately. Call of duty, battlefield, Halo, Star wars battlefront 2 (although to be fair on that one it lost support a while ago and there's been a massive population decline), OverWatch, rainbow six siege, etc. I have played many of these games and completely given them up. Two of which a buddy of mine's literally bought for me just so we could play together only for us and barely ever play together. Because he was too busy being a competitive sweat that want nothing to do but cry until he was diamond level. Didn't even care to hop into a mattress me anymore for awhile untilone day he actually wanted to play around with some other guy she was playing with. They needed somebody to complete the team. I told him fine, but I'm not trying to go hard I just want to enjoy myself. Then tells me he wants somebody to help him with some competitive challenges in competitive play. Needless to say we damn near ended our friendship that day. They said they swear they were going to just chill and enjoy the game meanwhile they continue to b****, Mon, and complain like we were in a epsorts tournament. It got so bad and so toxic that I damn near was fed up with this b******* and just turned the council off. I didn't back out of the match or nothing. Literally just pushed the big on-and-off button and walked the f*** away. Danny wants a blow up my phone acting all pissed that I threw the match and the team's going to get a penalty because I left during a competitive played in told him I don't give two fux by guy cuz I told you I did not want to f****** play that match. You bought me these games just so we could play and we never played. Until you all of a sudden want to completing achievements or max out your rank than b**** at me that I don't play like I'm part of f****** FaZe clan. After that I just blocked him for a whole month on Xbox and my phone. And lately I've pretty much given up on multiplayer games in general because I'm tired of the get good toxicity, people playing like it's a million-dollar tournament every single match, Shady reward system with shity matchmaking, and constantly getting into lobby's at level 20 or lower with level 300 and above. Oh, speaking of which I forgot to mention Doom eternal battlemode. It needs to have the biggest skill Gap to the point where the pros were literally begging for SBMm. Because they couldn't get into a match for ship because everybody they would get teamed up with was always level 30 or lower. Anybody who got into a match with a higher-level knew they were just going to get brutalized so they went back out before the match even started. So by the time you were level 300 or 400 you would just sit in the lobby for hours hoping somebody will just play with you. Now I used to be the lower-level players so I didn't experience the constant waiting for somebody to play with me like the higher levels did in battle mode. But I did have this issue in Star wars battlefront 2. I was still a lower-level but at least a decent level compared to all the maxed-out players. The game had a massive population to climb to the point where you would end up in a match with the same people over and over and over and over again.and if that guy just happened to be that one guy who was already maxed out and somehow keeps happening to spawn kept you from across the map, at that point I just block the dude. Not because I think he's cheating or anything. But I literally and just not having any fun anymore and I want to just play the damn game. If I'm just went to spawn die spawn die spawn die spawn die then I might as well just put the controller down and walk away. Although I will say I overdid it with the blocking technique because now I can't get into a lobby at all. Like I will never ever get into a match in that game ever again unless I unblocked those accounts. So I just said goodbye to the game and accepted it's dead and enjoyed the memories of gave me and all the fun and gave me because I'm not a unblocking them. I would rather never play the game ever again then ever play with those players. And I'm starting to hear people have the same issues of people just leaving matches and getting stuck in loading on other games. From battlefield to Halo to call of duty. I watch this one video where this guy was going against this team and one by one the whole team left before the match was even halfway finished. And that it kept happening to him a few matches in a row. And this will search and destroy by the way. But people are doing it on team deathmatch too. And I don't want to hear none of that good good mentality because I'm going to make this very clear and very simple. If the game is not fun, if you are not having fun then you simply do not push yourself because the whole point of gaming is for escapism and to relieve stress. Not add more on. So you see what people do when a game is stressing them out and they're not having fun with it anymore they go play something else or they turn it off and walk away. And they take a break. so if you're getting into matches where the enemy team keeps leaving five times in a row every single match then cry about it. Nobody wants to play with you because they want to have fun. They're not there for you. They are there for themselves. And this is just how people are feeling especially casual players I'm games outside of the fighting genre. It half of those people me included are not going to deal with that s*** in those other games, we're sure as hell not going to deal with them in fighting games. The last fighter game I ever played was mortal Kombat 10. The last one I ever *OWNED* was 9. I have tried other fighting games, but the only one that ever getting my interest was mortal Kombat due to its Gore physics. But even then I can still enjoy that stuff on KZfaq and don't need to get the game at all to do so. That's not to say I don't find the game fun to play. But once I'm done playing with the but in the two other modes, what am I going to do next? Play multiplayer? 🤣🤣 Not a damn chance. The last time I played a mortal Kombat multiplayer the match was ended before I press the single goddamn button. I literally try three more times and each time I had the same reaction. I just put the controller down and I just died. There's nothing I could do and nothing I'm going to accomplish. Even attempting will risk me breaking my controller. Not even out of rage but just by accident just mashing buttons. Any game that puts me in a situation where I just put the controller down and take it and walk away and don't even exit the game, I'm done. I'm just done. I might be done for a while, and I could be done permanently. I don't got time for this b******* because there are a ton of other games that deserve my attention as well as other media that I consumed and responsibilities that I got to take care of. I cannot sit there in a chair 24/7 getting better at a game when I got s*** to do. And it's not that I wouldn't want to try the other games or get into mortal Kombat again. But I literally just don't have a reason to. Anytime I try to find a reason to just buy it a fighting game, I find a hundred other reasons and not even bother and just look it up on KZfaq. It's not where's my money, it's not worth my time, and it's not worth the effort. And usually it's not always the fault of the game itself. I can't catch up anymore. I can't keep up and I don't care to. I'm a casual gamer. I play once in awhile and enjoy myself and I switch to another game or do something else. I will never play like a pro or an esports champion nor do I ever want to. I just want to play and enjoying my games. And I can't even do that anymore. Some days I feel like I'm getting too old for games. I'm only f****** 24 years old. But between my back problems, and not being able to keep up, I already feel like I'm 40. Why do I already feel old? Why is gaming making me feel old? Now I know how my grandparents you every time they open a device. Now I know what my mother feels and why she never got out of burnout Paradise. The last game she ever played. Never got anything else because it was too much to keep up with. A Batman games wanted s***. Nowadays, nowadays you really can't keep up. I'm done with multiplayer games in general. I don't want to get better. I just want to f****** enjoy myself. But I guess I'm too old to do that. When I was a little kid I used to want to play every game of every genre ever in collecting like they were Pokemon. Now I'm lucky if I even have the energy to play one. I'm too f****** tired. I just want to take a break, relax, and relieve stress. Not add on more.

I’d say, in fgs, progress is all mental, story doesn’t matter, and unlockables became dlc.

2:40 absolute take

The argument about player count is bad because only a pc has public player count data. And pc is really small part of fighting game ecosystem due to it being fairly new gaming platform by itslef (since like 2010th) and for fighting games in particular. Like SoulCalibur 6 and tekken 7 being the first iteration that got pc release. Also the existence of cheaters and growing disparity in controller types hurts playerbase a lot. It's far more likely on pc to encounter either a cheater or a guy who plays on an arcade stick or a keyboard. The difference between stock console gamepad player and keyboard \ fighting stick players is becomes really fast. They are basically start several ranks above in most fighting games and especially in games with dashes or 421 \ 523 and\or charge based game\character. Yes at high end where most of the input becomes muscle memory the input device become far less relevant but at the low - mid levels it's huge. I personally have like a hundred+ hours in guilty gears on gamepad, but moving on keyboard or fighting stick consistency gives better in just a couple of hours.

Completely based take, you have a new fan cheers mate

That first sentence is so completely wrong that I dipped on the rest of the video lol

BARS. I DEMAND actualy stuff to do offline. give me content

Yeah, a lot of fighting games are already expensive. On top of that, they even put in microtransactions as well. It would make sense if the game was $39.99, but not a $70 game...

Honestly, the biggest thing repelling me from fighting games isn't the learning curve (Counter-Strike is arguably just as complex and hard to get into as most fighters, yet it's one of the most popular games in the world). It's the community and how hostile they are to new players. I can't tell you how many times I've seen the question "What game are you trying to learn?", the person replies with **Insert name of game here** and the response is "HAHA, that button-mashy trash! Go play a _real_ fighter!". I thought tribalism was bad among FPS players, but it seems to be 100x worse in the FGC. Which is a shame because I've been on the fence about jumping into Mortal Kombat for the longest time, and it's the extreme hostility towards new players that's keeping me from taking the plunge (that, and there's a weird stigma around Nether Realm fighters in the FGC).

It's not hard to learn a fighting game it is hard to master too many games hold hands I'm totally fine with the genre just ignoring those players

I don't have friends

The problem with gauging fighting games popularity is that online numbers don't say the whole story. Fighting game matches can be over in a single move. Under mere seconds. But literally every other game is all about "How long can this last". Sometimes even playing out the entire match time which can be from 15-40 minutes depending on the game for one match. If you and your opponents do well in a team game things will start to get really slow. But in Fighting Games it's still going to be roughly under a minute of actual gameplay either way. So naturally of course less online players because they get their fill much faster. Something woefully misunderstood. Compared to the other genres the online numbers is 100% to the games player count. Fighting games don't need online. Matter of fact it's always optimal to play offline anyways. So how can we really say any online player count actually shows the total player base? 20 years from now we can have a SF4 Tournament but can we say that for any of these other online only games? They should definitely go free to play

Please touch on the “getting friends” topic a bit more next time

Fighting game companies do need to make the games fully-packed products indeed, however there is another reason why fighting games don't grow like they should: the FGC themselves. They are, and let's be brutally honest, an extremely toxic and unwelcoming community, and this is the most true with the NRS/WB community, as Mortal Kombat and Injustice games are fully complete products from every possible angle while also bring games that are easy to understand and play but with tons of depth underneath, and yet these games don't get to grow in the E-Sports field as they should because the community is so toxic, bitchy and unwelcoming. Even MultiVersus, that is F2P, gets trashed by the members of the FGC for ridicilous reasons.

Giving an example that contradicts your main point and retoring it "that's besides the point" is very dumb. Literally unforced error. Either don't bring that up to support your claim, or try finding the reason why it doesnt contradict your point. Otherwise you've literally disoroven your point by yourself.

Incorrect as a 7 year fighting game veteran the reason people quit or avoid fighting games is ego and pride. It's a cut throat competitive game. When you win you feel on top of the world when you lose their is no one to blame but yourself. There is no real victory only a eternal loop of improvement as their will always be players stronger than you. Most games appeal to everyone fighting games only appeal to people who enjoy getting their ass handed to them and come back for more. Only those with the strength to keep coming back will remain and at the end of the day only you can make that decision to keep fighting. And while this may be true about other games, fighting games takes these concepts to the extreme. It gives the feeling of life and death like you have everything on the line and that's because you do. Your ego pride self worth and identity hangs in the balance and due to the nature of the game, this will get challenged and crushed. Good players detach and transcend this going beyond winning and losing. These players remain. The rest make excuses, delude themselves of being good when they are not and run when the reality hits them or quit all together.

Fun was never the problem even if fighting games are baby down and become "fun" there will always be another weak excuse

Me with 1000+ hours in smash ultimate: 💀💀

You can learn a fighting games via playing NOT going off to go to training mode.

5:54 BULLSHIT THEY'RE NOT HARD TO LEARN! At least with League I was able to learn via PLAYING, not watching/ doing tuts online from YT VIDEOS!

I mean multiverses is ok, but no Regular Show characters, no interest on my part. Give me King Kong v Skips already!

Most fighting games aren't good at providing appropriate value (they aren't worth full price). They have overpriced DLC and the general gameplay is limited. Beat em ups are a similar genre, but they offer more in their gameplay and usually at less than half the price of famous fighting game series: level design matters, power ups, understandable and easily usable special moves, more freedom and bigger areas to move around, and more recently they have their own survival modes.

FGC will always remain a small community bcz of execution barriers

So if cost is a factor, tell me, what's the cost of a PC you have to maintain, versus buying a fighting game and DLC? I could argue every one of your points to show how shallow your knowledge is, but I won't waste my time. It seems your points are all very superficial and come from a place where you don't like fighting games because they are inevitably not fun for you to play. The simple thing would be to not play them, and play what you like, but instead, you want to act like you waxed philosophical about the matter, did your best Core A Gaming impression, and spouted half-truths about a genre and community that you have very little knowledge about. I get it though, having a channel means your opinions are always valid.

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the real reason is that fighting games are bad and if you like them you should feel bad

Please stop pronouncing genre with a hard j. It's very offensive.

FGC community is one of the most toxic I ever saw, it's clear they never played other games while being too small to counter the hivemind mentality

Hello I obviously don't play fighting games but I feel like I'm qualified to make a video about fighting games.