PUNK VALENTINE

deadmanwalking

[Around The Counter @aroundacounter2]

I miss you, just volleyball… 🥺
#justvolleyball

[PUNK VALENTINE @XOPUNKVALENTINE]

@yuviemi thank you for keeping the city safe

[6 weetbix @6weetbix]

If we've analyzed Tekken 8 in depth and have specific critiques, it'd be better to outline them precisely. Things like:

- Hitboxes are computed vectors, not hand-placed 3D colliders, which makes tuning them precisely impossible, c.f. https://t.co/cE9woOUc9v
- Tracking is janky. You'd expect something like "move realigns at X speed on frames Y-Z" but actually there are about 9 different flags and they're things like "homing if on-axis on frame 8", "tracks for first 8 frames", "tracks for 8 frames before first active frame", "tracks during recovery", "inherits tracking from previous cancel", and "completely homing". And these flags can be both on the move itself and on its cancels. Again, this makes precise tuning impossible.
- Pushboxes struggle to keep players separated without also pushing them too far apart during animations and making attacks whiff. Velocities are coupled with animation data, which again makes precise tuning impossible.
- Wall interactions are an overgrown web of hacks and exceptions. Every patch they change how some move behaves at the wall because the underlying system does not generalize well. Related to above issue with pushboxes.
- There is no pure physics free simulation, which makes rollback, spectating, and replays computationally expensive and the UX cumbersome.

Those are major technical flaws that almost everyone would agree on. Then there are things like:

- The large roster with big movelists creates an onerous knowledge burden. On its own, this is fine, and even good, since it gives the game depth. But then Tekken more than any other FG has a duty to proactively teach the player, and yet:
-- The story mode doesn't teach the player how to play, c.f. https://t.co/NoqI117NZ3.
-- There are no cues that e.g. distinguish highs from mids from lows, safe moves from unsafe ones, strings with jailing or force block highs from duckable ones.
-- There's nothing teaching players how tracking or hitboxes work, because as previously mentioned... they kinda don't.
-- The built-in training routines are limited and (aside from the throw break practice) aren't serious exercise tools. This isn't something you can assign one developer to for a month and call it a day. Takes a lot of craft to make it even mildly useful, c.f. https://t.co/X0cAUfTnkh for a bare minimum prototype for one singular lesson.
- The FT2 ranked system discourages playing interactively and encourages running gimmicks.
- The Tekken Lounge is public and unmoderated. You can't make a private instance to e.g. organize a clan, social group, or tournaments without getting gatecrashed.
- The "time to fireball" – how long it takes to open the program and throw an attack – is one of the worst in the genre. Makes it annoying to lab.

Those are some big product issues. Then, matters of taste regarding the actual battle system:

- Too much time where players have no agency. Freeze frames, cutscenes, overly long combos, and jailing strings with no counterplay (many heat moves) all contribute.
- Relatedly, too many situations lack real-time pressure, making the game feel turn based.
- Too much easily looped offense, e.g. Steve LNH, Raven BT.d+2, Kuni FC.1+2, Law and Shaheen slides. More generally, too many ultra plus lows.
- Many stance transitions don't have layered counterplay. Sequences are too repetitive.
- Not enough neutral resets. Once pressure has started, it rarely ends. It just switches polarity.
- Neutral is warped around demon paws, running moves, and safe launchers. Other move categories get powerkept to keep up. Now everyone's neutral is rotating god buttons without regard for the opponent's patterns.
- Heat Burst is strange. It presents as "sacrifice meter to enter heat under pressure", but in practice it's mostly a combo tool. Outside of combos, it's riskier than a regular powercrush, because the freeze frame makes optimal punishment easy.
- Heat Dash on block can't be tuned. The "always +5" rule means almost every character relies on a single heat dash button: whatever one is most unsafe normally.
- Execution barriers are poorly tuned. Most are either too easily mastered or not satisfying. Nobody cares about all these "blue spark" moves for 1-2 extra damage.
- Many i10 punishers are too rewarding. Not enough reward for punishing precisely, and not enough of a risk gap between -10 and -14.
- Risk gap between -9 vs -10 and not-launch vs launch is enormous, making risk tuning imprecise.
- Main way to use recoverable health for a comeback is just "hit a launcher". Other ways to recover health are insubstantial or unreliable.
- Recoverable health makes it rare for both players to be low health: the conditions for slow-mo, GREAT, and highest tension situation in any FG.

I could bandy this list and go around proclaiming "Aha, look, Tekken 8 is bad game!" But if I knew any other game as well as I know Tekken, I'm sure I could make a list just as critical for that too. And if I had the time, I could make a list of all the things that Tekken 8 does well that's 100x longer.

We shouldn't reduce our analysis to "Tekken 8 is low quality" because that doesn't let others weigh up or dispute each of these points. One could very well look at this list, agree with every point, and still think the game is good despite them, because the good outweighs the bad.

Many things in life are like this. What you choose to focus on often holds more power than any underlying truth about the thing being examined. Focus only on the negatives, and you will see a bad game.

[PUNK VALENTINE @XOPUNKVALENTINE]

@chipzeeh @WATANABEtekken i bet watanabe was excited to take a pic with the worlds greatest azucena player

[PUNK VALENTINE @XOPUNKVALENTINE]

@crellythecow gang what dont you eat

[PUNK VALENTINE @XOPUNKVALENTINE]

@waifuScarlet @thievesguildist rogue is 5'8 and we LOVE tall women

[FATE | Tone @hidetone]

Guys we have to stop using AI thumbnails😭 it’s so ugly

[AyoRichie @AyoRichie_98]

People gotta start reading these posts before quote retweeting, wasn’t for you gang 🤞🏽

[Ryomen Sukuna |👑King Of Curses👑| @RyomenSuku1170]

He had a family.
He had children.
He had a wife.
He had friends.
He had followers.
He had supporters.
R.I.P. Ryomen Sukuna

[slayr @countdragons]

shoutout deltarune

[PUNK VALENTINE @XOPUNKVALENTINE]

@chaigrima #PassTheHyoketsu

[PUNK VALENTINE @XOPUNKVALENTINE]

@yuviemi ur the best yuverson city 🖤 thanks for being a part of the community c: u bring this WAVE of good feelings with u, ur appreciated and loved too

[PUNK VALENTINE @XOPUNKVALENTINE]

@NECROMANDRE @nom2609 need one of the homies who can actually say the quote man fuck

[PUNK VALENTINE @XOPUNKVALENTINE]

i uninstalled 2xko like a year ago cause they kept adding gun/projectile chars rather than melee or martial arts chars and i didnt care for it. i been waiting for Sett since the betas and i saw other ppl asking for him too. 100+ chars to make a roster with and they made sum ASS😭

[Riot Games @riotgames]

With a heavy heart, the @Play2XKO team shares an update about the future.
- Active development will end in December.
- The final content patch goes live in October.
- Servers stay online.
- In-game purchases made before August 20 will be refunded.

https://t.co/3UQF7kh5S4

[PUNK VALENTINE @XOPUNKVALENTINE]

@ArahSensei and that one guy who spectates with a bottle of henny