10 Worst Fighting Game Habits | Screen Rant
Fighting video games have been popular since the early arcade days. While they have evolved over time, the fundamentals of the games have remained fairly constant: use a series of attacks to knock out your opponent, and use guards and dodges to avoid getting knocked out yourself.
Every platform of gaming has its own version of a fighter game, and today players can strive to play professionally in tournaments. Therefore, having some serious skill at fighters will always earn a gamer respect. Achieving such skill is no simple task. It takes constant work to be one of the best and the first step in this is to avoid developing bad habits. Whether you are playing Tekken, Street Fighter, Mortal Kombat, Super Smash Bros, or others, avoiding these bad habits will help you crush your opponent (eventually).
This is not just referring to button mashing. When you know what you want to do, and you know which button you need to press, hitting it repeatedly will not make it happen any faster.
More often than not, this is a panic response for new players, but it can very easily evolve to the point where you can't even do certain skills without unnecessary button-pushing. This will ultimately just slow you down when you could have achieved so much more in that same amount of time.
Everyone has a favorite character to play but when a player sticks exclusively to only one or two characters, they are really cutting themselves short, and will never discover what fighters are best.
Trying out all the characters, and putting a good amount of energy into a majority of them can help you find what player type works best for you. In addition to this, if you have a good working knowledge of everyone, you will know what to look out for no matter which character your opponent is playing as.
Dashing and dodging is a go-to move for newbies. It can be great, as it allows you to get out of the way of oncoming attacks, or rush up on an opponent in order to to take them by surprise. Unfortunately, it also has its downsides.
Longtime, die-hard fans of games like Super Smash Bros know that dodging and dashing have their downfalls. These actions often have a brief period of time before you can do anything else. It's very short, but is just enough to make you vulnerable as your character is getting off the ground. Between this and the fact that these actions are very predictable, it may be better to avoid them as much as possible.
If you have gotten used to using jump-in attacks on CPUs or less skilled opponents, you may have started to rely on them. However, the second you play against a skilled opponent, you may notice that not many of your jump-in attacks land a hit.
Jump-in attacks are predictable. If a skilled opponent sees that you are using a lot of them, they will know pretty quickly that they will be able to beat you with no problem. Switch things up and only use the jump-ins when you know your opponent won't be able to react fast enough.
Similar to jump-in attacks, powerful attacks in fighter games have their time and place. They feel good to land and will do a lot of damage, but they are easier to avoid and leave your character vulnerable to incoming attacks in the moments after you miss.
Instead, don't underappreciate the value of standard attacks. Tapping away at an opponent's health can get you where you need to go, and will allow you to put your opponents in a position where the more aggressive attacks will be more likely to land.
Now is a perfect time to get into fighting games, but new players have to be willing to challenge themselves. It feels pretty good to win, but if it's all you ever do, you will never get any better. Playing with CPUs or less skilled players will not provide you with the challenge you need to become the player you want to be.
Playing with experienced gamers allows you to see which of the combos you've been practicing are actually effective, and give you a chance to pick their brain about ways that they think you could improve.
The objective of the game is winning, but while playing, maybe it would be better to pretend that it isn't. When players are focused on winning, they tend to dive in without thinking and put themselves in risky situations. These players are easy to manipulate and put into a corner.
Instead, focus on simply not dying. This allows you to be much more aware of your surroundings, stay out of corners, and be aware of dangerous stage features. You may not win at first, but you will develop some better habits.
Sometimes it's okay to hold still. New players often feel like they should be moving at all times, but this can be distracting for the player themselves and make it difficult to be aware of all that is happening.
Allow your opponent to fill the gap between you as opposed to constantly moving away, but practice moves that you can use to be ready for them once they make contact. This will make you a more efficient player, only moving and acting when you actually need to instead of hopping all around the stage.
If you have experience with video games, you may automatically assume that the training mode isn't meant for you. However, in fighting games, the training mode is an integral part of a player's improvement.
Take advantage of the training mode of your game and experiment around with characters, controls, combos, and more. Repeat skills over and over until it becomes muscle memory. Then applying them to a real opponent will come as naturally as riding a bike.
So many gamers say that they are no good at this genre. Like the classic arcade games that inspired them, they are hard and take a lot of practice to master. But when a gamer just decides that fighting games will always be out of their reach, they are really cutting themselves short.
Anyone can get great at fighters. By continuing to practice on the training mode, with CPUs, and with other players, fighting games can quickly become any player's favorite kind of game.