Zelda Reference

I think playing the blazblue challenges has helped my execution a little bit. The best part of them is that the combos start off pretty long and aren't particularly simple. That way there is no point where you can do all these easy things and then be stuck on the harder things. Your only choice is the harder stuff.

Another good part is that you can view the combo being performed. I've found this to be most helpful. I was working on a combo for Ragna and I could do a QCB+B with the QCB+D follow-up just fine, but could never get the next input, B, to hit the dummy. After watching the combo done by the computer a few times, I realized that their dummy was being launched higher by the QCB+D than mine was. This would then allow enough frames for recovery to then be able to do the standing B. Once I realized this, I watched it a few more times to see what I was doing differently than was needed and saw that I needed to not do the QCB+B, QCB+D right away, but to wait just a fraction of a second longer before doing the QCB+D. This wait is hard for me to learn and it took a few tries, but then I started getting it more regularly. Soon after, I did the combo.

Doing that combo helped me in doing a combo with Cammy in SF4 as well. I've known that her BnB combo is cr.LK, cr.LP, cr.LK > QCF+HK. I knew that it was not a cancel between the lp and the lk, but a 2 frame link. Having to learn to wait a little with Ragna helped me figure out the link with Cammy a bit better. Links are tough. The margin for error on them is very small.

Unrelated: I want to code at home. I like doing nothing more though. Oh well.

The End of Civilization

I'm not sure if I like Civ4 as much as I thought I did. I find it hard to get enjoyment from a game where for no reason what so ever, I suddenly have six other nations declaring war on me. That's great. And of course they all have the perfect set of treaties and roads that they can move their armies to me in no time at all.

It's a lose-lose. I need to expand for resources and such, but I'm always started in a place where I'm surrounded by other civilizations... so if I try to get rid of them, I can take down one easily enough, but then the other magically can create enough defenses to hold me off forever. It doesn't matter if my units are twice as strong and I have twice as many. Their city defenses seem to count more than mine do. Of course, by starting this war, I've offended every other nation on the planet, who now want to kill me.

It's not like I can try for the non-aggressive route either. I'll get boxed in and then some stupid aggressive leader will declare war on me for no reason. Hooray! That's fun!

BBCS

I'm not sure why this has taken me so long to make this post, but here it is.

The new version of Blazblue is pretty good. The tutorials they have put in are pretty good. They explain the characters strengths pretty well and go over some fighting game terms and BB specific mechanics that a new player may not know.

The challenges are also great. I'm always a big fan of a good training mode. I like being able to see what a combo looks like and being told if I'm doing something correctly or not. Sometimes when I'm looking up combos online and I give them a shot, I'm not sure if I'm doing them in the correct way.

Even with the challenges, I'm still very bad at BB. We all know about my issues with execution and Blazblue requires tighter execution than Street Fighter. I think. I can't back that up.

Purchases

I bought Starcraft 2 and the fixed version of Blazblue. Starcraft is great. I'm liking it how I liked the first one when it came out so many years ago. I'm certainly as bad as ever, but if you combine enough troops of different types, you can overcome. Like all games I play, I won't be playing multiplayer, but that's for pretty much the same reason why I don't play street fighter online... I am not good enough and confident enough in my abilities to be okay with my performance, regardless if I win or lose.

I know that if I practiced my execution enough with Cammy that I would not have any excuse for sucking. After that point, every loss is another lesson to examine for new tactics and weaknesses. Currently, if I'm getting angry because I can't pull of a simple combo, I'm not going to be open to the other weaknesses in my game. I won't be thinking if it is a good or bad time for that combo if I'm struggling to get it out.

I think I will post about the new blazblue next week because I haven't put much time into it and I'll need a topic.

Last post I mentioned Capcom x Namco. That is incorrect. It is Street Fighter x Tekken. Only characters from those series will show up. Which is good, because nobody cares about Soul Calibur.