-
Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.
So, what's the best single player mode fighting game?
- Thread starter nickgia
- Start date
InfiniteCombo
Banned
No lies detected.
Not as great as those examples, but Guilty Gear XX has a lot of single player modes, including the story mode, from which you learn the seriously deep lore of the series.
Also, Tekken 3 and Tag had some pretty fun single player modes. I spent hours playing the beach Volleyball game in 3 (with Gon, fuck yea) as well as the Tekken Force mode... and the bowling game in Tag.
Mr. Nice_Guy
Member
Soul Calibur 2 and Melee for me. Brawl's was as well, but I was disappointed in WiiU's SP stuff.
InfiniteCombo
Banned
My previous post almost got me sad, as it reminded me how awesome Namco was around the time of Tekken 3/Tag and SoulCalibur 1/2. That right there is a foursome of truly amazing fighting games.
Virtua Fighter 4: Evolution's quest mode is still the number one for me. I wish the time put into story modes in other games was instead put into the kind of varied range of AI opponents that Evo has.
For 2D fighters I still like Alpha 3 world tour the most.
Anyone who says fighters never have good single player modes either hasn't played enough of them or is stuck in a competitive only mindset and can't see outside of it.
For 2D fighters I still like Alpha 3 world tour the most.
Anyone who says fighters never have good single player modes either hasn't played enough of them or is stuck in a competitive only mindset and can't see outside of it.
InfiniteCombo
Banned
This is a shitty post. It cannot be further from the truth.
It's kind of crazy that no fighting game has done an interesting SP so far.
Old Gaf might remember Chambers of Shaolin on Amiga. A game where you go through training chamber mini-games which will determine your stats for upcoming fights.
There was another game on Amiga -don't remeber the name- with a similar idea where you train and enter a tournament. This is basically all 80s martial arts cinema stuff. Kind of sad that no dev was inspired by those simple ideas.
Old Gaf might remember Chambers of Shaolin on Amiga. A game where you go through training chamber mini-games which will determine your stats for upcoming fights.
There was another game on Amiga -don't remeber the name- with a similar idea where you train and enter a tournament. This is basically all 80s martial arts cinema stuff. Kind of sad that no dev was inspired by those simple ideas.
False Witness
Member
Seriously, a refined MK: Deception would be absolutely amazing as far as a fighting game campaign could go. It's like an RPG where you fight for two rounds versus having a turn based battle.
Junahu
Member
Final Fantasy Dissidia Duodecim complements a lengthy story mode with a fully featured suite of RPG progression systems, shops, unlocks, challenges and extra modes. It's the kind of experience where you could actually sell the game JUST on the merits of its solo content.
In fact, I bought both Dissidia games without any intention of ever playing multiplayer.
In fact, I bought both Dissidia games without any intention of ever playing multiplayer.
Well, I'd say Soul Calibur 1 and 2. Very cool single player modes (especially the "quest mode", if I remember its name); Soul Edge/Blade on PS1 had something similar too.
Recently, I enjoyed Tekken 7 offline modes. There are a lot of story quests and, more importantly, the Treasure Battle is very cool.
It's just a survival mode "reimagination", literally; each defeated enemy grant one or more treasures; it's a nice diversion from the endless fighting usually made for Survival modes.
Recently, I enjoyed Tekken 7 offline modes. There are a lot of story quests and, more importantly, the Treasure Battle is very cool.
It's just a survival mode "reimagination", literally; each defeated enemy grant one or more treasures; it's a nice diversion from the endless fighting usually made for Survival modes.
Bloodporne
Member
I play single-player only and have always enjoyed them. Sorry...?
Really curious about Def Jam. What was great about it? All I know is that you can play as Method Man.
Winner winnner.
It's this. Edge Master mode and World tour mode.
It's a god damn shame other fighters haven't copied them directly.
Def Jam and Def Jam FFNY were excellent. They were the best wrestling games that we could have asked for. The actual narrative of the story mode wasn't amazing but it was a cool enough mode to go through.
dickroach
Member
it's been over a decade since I played it, but it was just a fun story mode. Henry Rollins is your trainer
TannerDemoz
Member
Agreed. But I absolutely loved nearing the edge of every stage to use his 180 grab for ring outs!
Soul Calibur 3's RTS mode was sick too. I also loved Tekken 3's side-scrolling mode.
SystemUser
Member
Urban Champion
zephervack
Member
I remember beating Tekken 2 with every single character as you were guaranteed a new character and stage unlock with everyone of them.
So is Street Fighter Alpha 3.
Holy... I had no idea fighting games were doing stuff like this that long ago...
Lux R7
Member
I have to agree with this
Spring-Loaded
Member
The way the matches/fights were contextualized (some take place in fighting cages, some in spontaneous spots like a bar, subway platform, burning building), being a recruit of the previous game's antagonist, the fun personas of dozens of popular hip-hop stars at the time (with almost all voicing their characters), customization was fleshed out (real branded clothing, choice of fighting style, choice of voice), 4-player multi iirc, lots of characters/rappers old and current (you can fight as Flava Flav ffs), random personalities like Danny Trejo, Sonny Rollins as your trainer, Carmen Electra as a potential girlfriend, etc.
Not to mention the gameplay was good, nice environmental interaction for the time (e.g. throw someone in front of the subway train or slam them into an SUV) and the super moves were each distinct and brutal as hell with great animations. I'd love for another game to be as fun a brawler with as solid a story mode.
Romars202129
Member
Brawl for sure.
One Must Fall 2097's four years older, probably the oldest post-SF2 fighting game with a robust single player. Although someone mentioned Sango Fighter, that's a little older, I don't think it was really special outside the presence of generic enemies before the real fights.
One Must Fall's arcade mode had two secret opponent. The tournament mode let you upgrade your character's stats (the game speed is totally different at the end for this reason), upgrade certain special moves, and had a ton of secret opponents, some of which were exclusive to particular difficulties. Points translated to money which you spent, so it also added a purpose for fatalities outside of bragging rights - they were also necessary to trigger some of the secret fights.
The game also let you record matches and play online - again, in 1994. But obviously they're not as convenient as the implementation we have of those features now.
There was also a secret option that enabled juggle combos, which is pretty cool.
Plumpbiscuit
Member
Tons AND TONS of content, unlockables and rewards. Character creator, game modes, lots of characters, art style + character design at its "peak". Tight, precise 8-way movement, good sound design, hundreds of hours worth of replay value.
Psychic Force 2 on PS1 had a similar mode too.
Very nice
Glorious times, my friend.
Glorious times.
This. Structurally speaking, Dissidia was great - the full story was completed by playing through each character's path, which reflected at least part of the story arcs of their respective games, and all of them had a difficlty setting assigned to them, and since the devs expected people to start with popular characters/games, Cloud and Cecil had the easier chapters to people could jump ahead and start with them.
Since you unlocked weapons during story modes too, stuff you unlocked for a character could then be applied to another character when you played through their story mode, which made to a nice progression curve.
The other neat thing is practically all of those character stories happen in parallel, yet with some degree of sequence, and the game's Theater mode then lets you watch all even in their canonical chronological order after you play through them. Another nice touch is that Warrior of Light, as the OG protagonist, not only had the highest difficulty assigned to him, his story start before and ended after everyone else's.
And or course, after you were done with all of that, there was still way more to do, also with some story assigned to it.
The other game with a very good single-player mode is Dead or Alive 5 - its story mode doubles as a tutorial, has you play through several characters, but unlike MK9 and its ilk, the moments in time where their fights take place, while sequential, are momentarily depicted only for the moments that matter those characters, with the implication made clearer as you advance through more character chapters, that more stuff happens in-between - progressing in the story mode makes a chronological map of events clear, but the general progress still escalates from the more grounded characters dealing with more grounded issues from before the titular tournament, to the more plot-heavy characters going through more significant events, so that things later progress to the tournament and you can get a clear sense of whom officially beat whom (you generally play as the winners through their victorious fights), after which the characters and events you play through focus more squarely on the ninja characters and their conflict with their high-tech antagonist that breaks out after the actual tournament is done.
Also, props for Tekken 7 for sneaking in flashback of significant series events during its story mode scene when someone gets knocked down, it illustrates the history and stakes of it all during the actual gameplay,which was a neat touch.
Kremzeek
Member
This thread is about single player modes and Smash's single player is no fun at all. It's a party game through and through.
Crazy Diamond
Member
The Budokai series offered a nice variety. First game was just standard story through the Cell saga with some what-if scenarios. Second was a board game structure. Third game was an overworld map in which you could fly around with various characters and find hidden items, skills, and even hidden fights. Characters were unlocked through this mode (either through secret encounter or meeting other completion conditions) and there was a great deal of progression to be had. Budokai 3 is my recommendation for sure.
So is Street Fighter Alpha 3.
Came to post this.
TheBryanJZX90
Member
Soul Edge edge master mode on the PSX. Separate endings for all of the characters from the main game, alternate weapons that actually looked and performed different (Hwang had that awesome invisible super long sword as his ultimate!), that really set the bar for me.
I didn't care much for Shadow Lord's campaign from KI. Maybe I'm just not skilled enough but it was straight up brutal. I felt like I was never making any progress.
I like Injustice 2's online single player mode better, which in itself is just a better version of MK's living towers.
I like Injustice 2's online single player mode better, which in itself is just a better version of MK's living towers.
Mass Effect
Member
Yes it is. Now deal with it and stop being a thread-shitting asshole.
SSE was kind of not though. TBH I much preferred Adventure mode from Melee even if it's super short. At least it doesn't drag on forever like Subspace Emissary.
The Budokai games are interesting. They're all so different, yet I liked all of their takes on the story mode. Budokai 2's is definitely the strangest though. I mean who would have thought of a board game story mode for a fighter?
And all these mentions of Soul Calibur 2 and 3... I played quite a bit of both of these games, but I don't remember anything from the story modes. I guess I need to replay them.
MK9's story mode is probably one of my favorites too, particularly because of the production put into the cutscenes. It was nice.
Shift Breaker
Member
I won't say that it's the best, but I was a fan of Tekken 4's arcade mode actually being more story rich than others in the series. Every character got narrated text and illustrations which was nicely detailed without being an essay, peppered nicely among the 10+ matches, the usual end-game cutscenes and it was a damn sight better than what the previous games had, plus what followed in T5.
Street Fighter Alpha 3 world tour mode
Pick your character then battle through various locations with some having specific challenges like the opponent can only be damaged by super combos, or custom combos, fighting multiple enemies, having to defeat 3 people in a row. And you get passive bonuses along the way like auto block or take no chip damage, as well as being able to tweak your offensive and defensive power.
I was so disappointed that ps2 alpha anthology didn't have this mode
I love these kinds of single player modes in fighting games.
Mortal Kombat is pretty good about adding fun single player modes too. The campaign is pretty fun in the newer games, and the older games had some fun minigames and conquest mode. Armageddon conquest mode was pretty sweet.
Pick your character then battle through various locations with some having specific challenges like the opponent can only be damaged by super combos, or custom combos, fighting multiple enemies, having to defeat 3 people in a row. And you get passive bonuses along the way like auto block or take no chip damage, as well as being able to tweak your offensive and defensive power.
I was so disappointed that ps2 alpha anthology didn't have this mode
I love these kinds of single player modes in fighting games.
Mortal Kombat is pretty good about adding fun single player modes too. The campaign is pretty fun in the newer games, and the older games had some fun minigames and conquest mode. Armageddon conquest mode was pretty sweet.
It's not. And it hadn't big single player component too, given its multiplayer focus.
"Deal with it" and stop derail the thread anymore, thanks.
On topic: I also remembered that Soul Calibur 3 had a huge single player mode (both in terms of contents and modes).
It was very cool, for what I remember.
Even with that flimsy criteria, it'd get its ass beat by Streets of Rage 2 and Guardian Heroes.
Both the arcade and mission modes from Gundam Versus Gundam Next Plus are really good.
In arcade mode you had various themes to choose from, each with their own difficulty, opponents and stages with different endings and unlockables. But even during said theme you had various routes to choose from, making it a new experience everytime. Also, they had giant bosses in the middle and end so that was neato.
Then you had Mission mode, the cool thing about this was that it wasn't just fights, some were the BS "protect X until time runs out" but others had you eliminate characters in a certain order to proceed, destroy some NPCs, reach certain objects before the opponent . It also had a somewhat lite RPG mechanic where you level up your mechs and give them upgrades. Said mission mode also served as a Story Mode because some of the themes were iconic fights from the various shows.
In arcade mode you had various themes to choose from, each with their own difficulty, opponents and stages with different endings and unlockables. But even during said theme you had various routes to choose from, making it a new experience everytime. Also, they had giant bosses in the middle and end so that was neato.
Then you had Mission mode, the cool thing about this was that it wasn't just fights, some were the BS "protect X until time runs out" but others had you eliminate characters in a certain order to proceed, destroy some NPCs, reach certain objects before the opponent . It also had a somewhat lite RPG mechanic where you level up your mechs and give them upgrades. Said mission mode also served as a Story Mode because some of the themes were iconic fights from the various shows.