VanillaCakeIsBurning
Member
I think it'll work better in the US, since you're not paying for every loss. People don't like taking Ls regardless, but at least it's not hitting their wallet. That and the US GG community isn't nearly as big as it was in Japan, so more of the playerbase is going to be learning the game new. That and I think online matchmaking can work better for keeping skilled players from rolling on noobs 24/7, but that requires enough players to begin with.
I noticed that GGXrd uses some kind of award system at the end of matches. I wonder if something like that could be used to help determine ranking for online matchmaking.
Like if you frequently get awards for performing high damage/advanced combos that newbies would never know then that could be used to match you up more with people who can do the same.
Like with UNIEL, day one there were some monsters going through online already. But I guess that's heavily affected by the player population. The people most likely to import UNIEL are going to be the enthusiasts who likely have experience with other fighting games that will give them an edge when it comes to fundamentals and learning combos.
Newbies to fighting games are not likely to import so it would be expected to see a bunch next year when it releases in NA. However since the hardcore crowd imported the game already months before they may all be high ranked enough to not get matched with newbies. So I guess the online situations are a little different due to when everyone's going to buy the game (UNIEL = some this year, some the next ||| GGXrd = same time).
I'll say that part of what kept me on Calamity Trigger when I first played was because I wasn't getting dumpstered every match. It was a new game in NA that did fairly well so there was a lot of people playing who had no idea what they were doing (me). It's fun to play against someone at a similar skill level.
Not so much when they are so skilled that you might as well watch them combo you to death because you have no recourse due to your lack of knowledge, familiarity and experience with fighting games.
I can only hope that Arcsys/Aksys have some improvements in store for the matchmaking so new players don't end up playing a one player game frequently.