LoL … That just says it all, doesn’t it…
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If top players hate Gargos so much then why most of them main or used to main him?
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…Because he’s good?
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Top players who use Gargos fall in one of these categories:
-Actually liked Gargos and use him because his style suited for them. Players who got good results with him were actually good players with other chars
-Were trying to prove he was broken/badly balanced/some ■■■■■■■■■ so they used him, naively thinking that he will carry them to the top places in tournaments. Surprise, it didn’t work.
Gargos never was(nor is) one of the most powerful characters of the game (not counting during his launch, were he had the portal punch bug), but he actually requires MU knowledge to work around his tools, something that some players weren’t disposed to learn. And since IG did an awesome job balancing the game, and even took balance decisions which were similar/the same some people were asking, some pro players got this idea:
“IG listens, and it seems that with enough noise I could convince them to change X, which I dislike, so I’m going to cry about it and convince other people about it(without constructive reasoning,just because) until they do it”
There are a bunch of super toxic players who really damaged this game. And they are blind enough to believe that they were right.
Thankfully most of the current forum members doesn’t fall in this category
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Early on He did have a few things that made him stronger than he was supposed to be and alot of top players did use him. I dropped him due to getting bored with him after about a month in. Though only Rico and Dayton did serious work with him competitively and jackal to a lesser extent.
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I think that each season brought with it some changes that were welcome by some, but reviled by others. I also think that season 3 had a lot of changes, many of which didn’t go over as well as season 2’s moves from the new developer. Here are some of the more divisive moves:
-Fewer stages: This angered a LOT of people back when this was first alluded to / acknowledged. People were used to one stage per character and all of a sudden that wasn’t going to happen anymore. Some practically demanded to know where their money was going to go.
-Guest Characters: Again, a departure from the past two seasons, and not just one, but three. Some simply wanted new IG characters designs, some hated how goofy Rash seemed, and some simply hate guests on principle.
-Shadowlords: Now, I love this mode. I played the crap out of it and had a blast doing it. However, some were salty that such a substantial portion of the 3rd season’s budget was going to this large single player mode that they didn’t care about, as opposed to more stages, more outfits, etc that they wanted.
-Level 4 Ender Animation: I don’t know if I’ve ever seen more of a kneejerk reaction from a twitch chat. Wow did people hate this when it was first revealed. Personally, I liked it and I still use it, but either way, people hated it so much that the devs actually put a toggle in the game.
-Purple shadows: People appreciated the toggle for Lvl 4 enders, and then wanted one for this as well, only to find that they would not be placated. I like the old shadow look, but whatever. This wasn’t a horrible thing to me. But people still complained. A lot.
-Complicated characters / Roster issues: I think some people were kind of tired of characters like Gargos and Eyedol having so much craziness going on, especially if one was more in to the less complicated character designs of season one. You combine those two with three guests, a glass cannon character, and only two regular returnees and some simply didn’t love the roster of season 3 compared to the previous two.
-Kim Wu’s face: Good lord. Has anything been complained about this much? I know some like LCD led the charge on this, but the snark about her face was really over the top.
-Character rebalance: As with the first rebalance prior to season 2, I think some people were annoyed at the idea of having to relearn their character or even relearn them once again. Especially if, as others have said, their character got nerfed hard. I didn’t mind this, but I think the more hardcore base was a bit miffed. Or at least some of them.
-Flipout and Stagger: As has been said, some simply didn’t like the addition of one or both of these. I don’t even know how logical their distaste was. If anything, I think it was more people not wanting yet another thing to have to contend with or figure out or whatever. The “let the game breathe” crowd seemed to bemoan every change like this.
That’s just what I remember from season 3. The fewer stages thing kinda set the tone for the season, unfortunately. Basically every change from what people were used to, especially if it “took away” from what people thought would be in the game, was met with harsh criticism.
Also, as others have said, I think the more MS / IG listened to us, the more some felt that they could bellyache to the high heavens in order to get what they wanted, not realizing or not caring that this was an awful, embarrassing, immature way to treat people making something they claim like.
Then, of course, when MS / IG didn’t immediately make changes people wanted or expected, they became even more toxic. So it became a damned if you do, damned if you don’t scenario for the devs.
Personally, I love that the devs interacted with us so much during each of the seasons and I hope they continue to do this in the future. I really don’t want the bad apples to spoil the whole bunch for them, as there are some really good, intelligent, mature players with solid insights, plus PLENTY of people that simply give good, valuable, constructive feedback regardless of their play level.
I hope they’ll continue to listen to us, interact with us, and make some needed changes based on our feedback, but also keep making the game that they want to make, the one they feel will please the most people, because they have far more voices and opinions to listen to than just us, and I sincerely hope that those needing to learn this lesson can learn to respect that more and somehow feel heard, even if their suggestions aren’t acted upon.
I can see how season 3 ended up being more divisive than past seasons, and I don’t know if nostalgia will pave over that as well as it paved over season’s one and two, but I still firmly believe that the future for this game and / or series is exceedingly bright. This game was SO much better than it had any right to be, and as a foundation for future content / entries, I think KI has the potential to be a tent pole franchise for MS in a genre that’s notoriously difficult to get in to, especially for American devs.
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If you go back and listen to any commentary that Sajam did while Kim was on the screen it was nothing but him crapping all over how bad Kim’s face was. Not to say I didn’t either but this stuff is pretty normal especially when you look at how the Marvel community reacted to Chuns face in MvCi the only difference being Chuns face actually get fixed 
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On a more serious note about community negativity, I think most would agree I was a rather major part of that not all of it but a good source nonetheless. I can’t change what I’ve said in the past or complained about but I’d like to think I’ve grown heavily as a person and matured quite a bit since I first joined the FGC and still continue to learn and grow.
Being a lot of players first competitive fighting game it’s understandable that we or ‘I’ would complain about things we didn’t fully understand and as time as passed I’ve realized this. I’ve done nothing in the last two years except try to change my ways and repent for the things I’ve done to this community and game. Even in this thread or with King Hippo’s recent article we keep perpetuating things we were trying to eliminate. We don’t need to continue to talk about why the negativity came to be or why this happened or why that happened because it’s done and over with, we have to move forward.
No disrespect to anyone here but I feel a lot of the KI community including myself speak about this game inside a bubble like it’s the only game that had problems when in reality every community is the same. Every game has these problems with their community and there will always be complaints about whatever, I think those can be minimized for sure but at the end of the day we’re all human and to expect everyone to be perfect all of the time especially with social media around is a non-winnable goal. Even just yesterday Jebailey made a distasteful joke about suicide on Twitter about the MvCi community not getting their game at EVO…it happens to the best of us we all make mistakes.
Ideally if a new KI were to ever come around I think we can all agree we made a lot of mistakes and the lessons learned will help guide us forward to a bright and successful future.
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P.S - For the record, Season1 was garbage in comparison to S2 and S3. But to be fair IG and 3+ years to polish and iterate on the game. DH were only given a year to build the game from scratch and never had the chance to fix or change anything.
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That’s why I said “some like LCD” and not just you. I know it wasn’t just you and I apologize for singling you out, but you were really on that for a while. Yes, others have taken issue with other characters both in this game and in other games, but the idea that everyone’s doing it doesn’t mean everyone’s absolved of doing it. I’m sure you’d agree with that.
I don’t think you should be that hard on yourself. Yeah, you had some issues with the game and you voiced those issues a fair amount, but when I think of truly negative or toxic people, your name wouldn’t come to mind, but that’s just me.
I think that’s all anyone can hope for with people, so good on you. The thing that sucks though, and this is by no means your issue, is that when the next game comes around, be it KI4 or MK XI or whatever, there will be new fans, young fans, immature fans, people that have no problem dropping endless amounts of shade on the game because they think it’s their right as a customer, or it’s their right to have an opinion, or they know more than the devs or they just want attention because hot takes makes makes their followers laugh or tune in next time or whatever.
I agree that talking about negativity isn’t the best topic for a game forum. Ultimately, nothing will ever change the past or prevent these attitudes from happening again in the future. People react to things, and sometimes those reactions are strong and repeated thoroughly. But part of me has to hope that we can learn from our experiences, even if the internet seems to be getting worse by the day.
Part of that learning should maybe involve having these types of conversations in forums, on twitter, in streams, etc and getting these ideas in front of people’s faces. Sure, maybe most of them won’t care, but if some do, if some realize that their behavior is in fact toxic and bad for the game, the fans, the FGC, etc, that maybe they’ll take a little more care to try and grow the community and speak constructively when they criticize, rather than trying to make the funniest, snarkiest hot take they can. Again, I’m NOT saying you did that. I don’t believe you did. I’m just talking about the overall attitudes in the FGC in general.
Yeah, every community has these issues, I agree 100% But I also think that every community should be striving to deal with it on some level. Toxicity drives people away and creates an unwelcoming environment for newcomers. Sure, you’ll absolutely never get rid of it completely by any means. I’m not that naïve. But as long as these attitudes are so prevalent in both the KI bubble and in the FGC as a whole, I think it’s something people should address from time to time. Educate the newer people, send a message to the old timers, whatever.
That’s definitely the ideal scenario, I agree. I just wish it had a chance of playing out that way. I wish everyone that discovered they hated something could just ignore it or move on if it bothers them so much instead of trying to bend the developers will to suit their whims.
But more realistically, if only slightly, I’d love it if some people could stand up to those that are acting this way and either tell them to relax or just stop following them on twitter or their streams or whatever so that maybe they’d get the message that showing a fun game and having fun with it, or expressing criticism in a constructive, informative way is maybe a little better for the game they claim to like than finding the best, most entertaining ways to crap on it.
Again, I don’t consider you to be one of those people, but if you feel like you’ve learned some lessons with your time in this bubble or in the FGC in general, then more power to ya, man. No doubt!
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Saw your KI podcast. Very interesting and I hope you keep on doing them. If you bring guest to talk about the game (as you mentioned) it would be also nice.
You also mentioned that one time a guy asked you what game was the medal you won and he didn’t know the game. I have experienced something similar but in my local scene and I get the feeling. But with the twist there were players who just hate on the game for being an Xbox One exlcusive and would never touch it (however I don’t believe the game would have been more popular in PS4 because nor KoF or other game has the popularity SFV has in PS4). But that’s talking about my regional/local scene.
It doesn’t surprise me seeying threads like this. Looks like as community some of us are experiencing some kind of “mourning stage” because of how silent everything has become. There are those who just keept on going but still remember the good days with the game on its early stages. There are those who play from time to time, and there are passionate star collectors out there in ranked.
However, The game is done. No more tourneys as we used to have,they might be new ppl trying the game but not going much farther. This gives a sad feeling for such a game that has grown and last more than 3 years, in a less popular genre where its last game was releasded in 1996. And I think it did well, considering the odds.
As community we need to encourage the saga we love the best we can or with constructive criticism.
I’m not saying we can’t rant a little too, we all get salty and get mad. But just not throw everything away because of that.
I wonder what would have happened if the game was launched as finished as it is now…
Lets hope for some news in the future and that MS still cares about KI.
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I mean this has been going for a while now, but I guess it’s written in stone now that the lead combat designer for the game has spoken. Not sure why someone in his kind of position would tweet something like this in the first place when trying to grow the community but okay. If this was the old me and I tweeted this I would of been labeled as ‘toxic’ and trying to kill the game. Probably another sign that IG isn’t working on the game anymore.
https://twitter.com/TheKeits/status/961075251340857344
To give context to the tweet, he was referring to it not making EVO 2018’s lineup in anyway and that the MvCi community is feeling what it’s like to not have their game at EVO for the first time in years despite this is how other smaller communities have struggled with for a long time like KI’s. I for one am grateful that KI managed to get 3 EVOs in a row when a brand new game that just came out less than 6 months ago MVCI couldn’t and that speak volumes.
Thank you, I’ll continue to host them and more than likely get guests.
Exactly. Being able to just speak your mind and say anything and everything at the touch of a button is a powerful tool and sometimes it gets to all of us especially depending on our mood. Learning what to say and what not to say is something we all have to learn at some point unfortunately a lot of us learned during KI 2013’s life cycle.
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ffs you install game to play it or to observe update bar progressing?
I dont understand this retarded logic.
And from Keits’ response to some tweet, you can tell he is really bitter about KI community’s ■■■■■■■■■ I know that feel when you go out with goodwill and get shat on your head.
I don’t know if it’s mourning or sort of a “season 3 post-mortem.” Like an analysis after the fact; a look back at what happened and why, as the OP suggests, the third season didn’t receive the reception that season’s one and two did. I don’t think that has much to do with mourning the end of this game, though it certainly could. It’s possible.
As far as the game goes, I’m not currently playing because our first floor flooded and we had to move all the game systems up to the second floor while we fix everything. But I still play every now and then for fun when the system’s plugged in to a TV. I need to get online more, that’s for sure. I think that’s where the longevity of the game will be for me, and for others as well, I’d assume.
It honestly exceeded my expectations by a mile and then some. I was just happy to have KI back, but when I saw that Double Helix, a studio I’d never heard of was developing it, I just figured I’d pick it up because it’s KI. I didn’t think it’d be particularly good. When I saw the release model, I was disappointed and worried about it. So to go from that, to having such a great game with such a wide variety of fun characters and all this other stuff, like great modes, stages, colors, etc over four years later? I’ve NEVER played a game that much for that long a period of time. I didn’t think that was in my DNA to do that lol.
So yeah, I’m encouraged by what MS, DH and IG were able to do with this game. There were some bumps along the way, things that I’m sure were learning experiences for fans, the developers and publisher alike. There were decisions made that obviously couldn’t please everyone, but as many fans as they lost along the way from season to season, I’d have to think that they gained far more along the way.
But personally, beyond creating a fun and innovative game, I think they laid a phenomenal foundation here for future installments. Given how badly MS needs exclusive IPs right now (to the point where purchasing EA became a rumor, albeit a laughable one), I’d have to think they won’t just put KI out to pasture and let is sit for another 25 years. All that together gives me hope for the future of the franchise, even if the present seems a bit quiet. 
Agree 110%. I can only hope that more people will take this approach the next time KI comes around, whatever form it takes, whenever it arrives.
To be fair, it’s tough to infer sincerity from that tweet. KI wasn’t announced for last year’s EVO earlier in the year (if I’m not mistaken) and it was still putting out content well in to 2017. I think it sucks for a game to not make EVO, especially when it’s a smaller game, but I don’t think he even believes a game is dead if it doesn’t make it in to that particular tournament. Who knows though, I could be completely off on that.
As for his professionalism, I dunno man. It’s his private twitter account and he uses it the way he sees fit. I say more power to him. These people that make these games that we enjoy, they’re not elected officials. Actually, I think they’re more professional than most of our elected officials on Twitter, but I won’t dive down that rabbit hole lol.
What saddens me is his response to the question someone asked in that thread “if he could go back and tell yourself not to do something you did” and his response was “don’t communicate so closely with the community.” To me, that just further drives home the toxicity level at times. If you can make someone that’s been as involved as he’s been with the FGC to believe something like that, then I think a lot of people failed as fans and likely did so several times over.
I hope he still enjoys making this game and that he’ll keep working on it in the future and maybe even engaging with us a bit more again. I don’t think he needs us to constantly pat him on the back and tell him how great he is, but I also don’t think he or anyone else at MS / IG deserved a fraction of the ■■■■ they got during ever stream, announcement, etc. I’m still a lot more worried about how fans treat each other, the game, and definitely the devs than I am about how Keits treats KI on twitter.
Many communities get angry at their game and perpetuate negativity, but there are some important differences with KI.
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It was an especially small community, so negativity spreads a lot faster. There were times when it was impossible to escape, whereas if you want to escape negativity in, say… SFV, you can just watch a Japanese stream or tournament and enjoy the game.
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Our game was already a huge underdog because of the Xbox thing, so we didn’t have the luxury of turning people off the game if we wanted growth.
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Perhaps most importantly, we interacted with the English-speaking devs incredibly directly, for the first time in FG history (and perhaps the last?). We had a huge opportunity as a community to show maturity and responsibility and we let it go. And yes, Keits at the start was a little prickly as well and instigated some stuff, but I felt he softened over time as he learned lessons, while the community got more strongheaded.
So yes, KI is not the only community with negativity, but we had a lot of unique circumstances that made the negativity extra hard to deal with.
I’ve also heard the argument from others (not necessarily you) that because other communities are negative, we shouldn’t expect KI to be any different. That is, it’s almost like an invitation to be negative, because it’s human nature to be that way and there’s no point in trying to change it. I would be critical of negativity anywhere, even for games I don’t like, and it’s rather surprising to me to see that some people expect it/seem to thrive on it. That sucks.
Anyway, it’s cool to see that you want to move past the negativity. I’m just as happy as anyone to put in the past and talk positively moving forward, although I continue to run into roadblocks about that with certain people, so it’s more difficult than you think. I don’t talk about it because I like dwelling on the past, I talk about it because it is unfortunately still an element of our present.
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-shrug- I read Keits’ tweet as tongue-in-cheek - KI didnt make Evo last year, so I can’t imagine why on earth anyone was seriously thinking it would make it this year (with several new games out and on the horizon to boot). I read it and laughed, and then made a snarky comment about how my KI online experience is still trumping my DBFZ online experience. You want to see active tearing down of the game, watch a bunch of former players ■■■■-talking the 16-20 people who still care enough to travel and make it out to play. I’ll take a dozen maybe-sarcastic-maybe-not Keits tweets over seeing that garbage.
I think the fact that the opportunity to interface with the devs and help shape the game was squandered is extremely unfortunate. But I can’t think of any compelling reason why a dev would put themselves out there like IG did for KI given the vitriol it entailed. It engendered a lot of bad feelings on all sides, and even to the extent that some of the back-and-forth made for a better game the process still did long-term damage to the game’s community. I’d take Harada’s “don’t ask me for ■■■■” mentality any day as a dev, because at least then the players have no way to delude themselves into thinking you’re somehow beholden to their particular whims or preferences.
Just look at the toxicity and hate surrounding Marvel, a game with a much more stable and entrenched fan base than anything KI had. Even that behemoth of a FG community is slowly being ground down by the perpetual rage machine, and that anger is largely diffuse and impersonal. If even Marvel is gasping under the weight, how much more do you think it affected Killer Instinct, a game that hadn’t been heard from in almost two decades? People’s negativity matters, and I’m just really sad to see people who genuinely love their game have to put up with that. Marvel Infinite is certainly a game with flaws, but the amount of shade is gets just isn’t warranted at all.
But what’s done is done at this point, and there’s nothing for it but to keep playing what you love, whatever that may be. I’m glad that some people apparently learned from the KI experience, but it’s a shame that’s how the lesson had to sink in.
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I did the same, I laughed because I knew he wasn’t serious.
I’m still immensely grateful KI managed 3 Evos in a row.
Also I hope everything is going well for you at your new residence Storm. Haven’t seen you since KICUp2016
It’s unfortunate but sometimes people have to learn lessons the hard way. It is what it is.
Can only hope for a better future.
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Things are great with me - actually just got back from a long vacation in Japan, and am pretty happy to be back in balmy Singapore 
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Same here. I honestly think that’s part of why being a developer and interfacing with the community is so difficult though. You and I read it as him making a joke, but others might not take it that way. I can’t imagine how tough, if not outright maddening it must be to have everything you say scrutinized, parsed and interpreted fifty different ways, especially when you might be restricted in how direct you can be for reasons beyond your control.
I’d also imagine it’s exceedingly obnoxious to have your job bleeding over in to your personal life. You want to comment on a funny video or tweet something political and all of a sudden there’s some stranger telling you that you shouldn’t do that because it reflects poorly on your company or why won’t you answer their question about this character or that or eight hundred other things. Like being a game developer is just so awesome that everyone should have to pay the price of not being able to separate themselves from it and they’re just this on-call customer service agent 24/7/365. I dunno, that seems pretty rough to me.
I really hope that IG and MS for that matter don’t view this level of contact with the fanbase as some sort of failed experiment. There ARE good fans out there; useful fans. It’s not all just people that become obsessed to the point where they feel like they own the game.
There are plenty of peoplee that can control their tempers, people that don’t feel slighted or ignored simply because they’re not waited on hand and foot by people already working long hours on tight deadlines. There are people that provide criticism and feedback without being rude, insulting or worse.
Yes, you’re going to have people that lack nuance and people that love joking around to the point where they should probably reign it in and stop making it about them. You’ll also have people that passionately disagree with a design decision who have the same issues with nuance or maturity.
That’s the nature of the internet, and that’s partially the result of having a lot of people that might not feel as compelled to act as mature because they’re in an environment with similarly aged people (ie teens, twenties and thirties) who share a similar common interest.
But I don’t think that acknowledging that has to equate to accepting it. I think that there have been plenty of people, myself included, that engage people that are screaming their heads off, not as white knights for the devs, as they can take care of themselves, obviously, but as people that either have more information and want to help correct fallacies, people that don’t love a ton of discord in a place that’s supposed to be a fun gathering area for fans, or people that simply don’t want to put the devs off and make it seem like this isn’t a place they’re welcome.
I think that’s a fallacy some have had with KI, no question. The idea of “we want your feedback” somehow means “if you shout loudly an angrily enough, we’ll do what you want.” Who knows, maybe giving us the toggles many of us asked for emboldened people. Maybe they didn’t want to say no definitively enough times to certain things because you never really know, as was the case with Ultimates, or their masterful trolling with Eyedol.
But either way, I think some need to take away from this whole experience with KI that these people are creating a product for lot’s of people with differing tastes, playing preferences, and skill levels. So maybe try and cope with the fact that not every part of the game is made for you. Not every character. Not every mode.
Also, if you don’t like something, try and find a diplomatic way to say it, and if you don’t feel like you’re being heard, then start a conversation and see what other people think. Devs are still around here. I still see Adam responding to people in various conversations. But do everyone a favor and drop the “I’m the customer, I’m always right” attitude and just talk to people the way you’d want to be talked to. I don’t think that’s too much to ask.
Agree 100%, and this can’t be stated enough. People’s negativity matters. No question. Less people will want to play a game if they think it’s dead or if everyone in its own community seems to hate it and have nothing nice to say about it. It also makes some that really enjoy the not want to interact with its community as much because who wants to just scroll through rant thread after rant thread?
I’ll be curious to see where the franchise goes from here. Will we get a 4th season and would that make people stay with it, come back, or try it for the first time? Will there be a sequel, and how will that be received by fans? Will older fans have learned from past mistakes and maybe, hopefully impart that wisdom to newer fans that jump in for the first time and start bellyaching about Orchid’s boob size, Thunder’s Mohawk, Wulf’s retro or the fact that the new season / game doesn’t play exactly like the good old days of KI?
There will always be bad eggs no matter what. People that want something to fail because they hate it that much. I just hope that whatever comes next for KI, as many people as possible can find it in them to be more considerate, more understanding, more forgiving, and more open-minded. Hopefully we’ll find that out sooner than later!
I think Keits has some real, legitimate reasons to be bitter toward certain portions and certain people in the community. Hopefully that’ll subside a bit in time and he’ll feel like he can interact with more of the KI faithful again without feeling like people are jumping all over him for every design decision he makes that they don’t agree with. If not, then that’s certainly his right and I respect it.
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Im Manuel Grullon296 , xbox and ki steam Tag Edrick296 .I completly understand his answer . IMO there were some bad suggestions / ideas that were taken and executed , and other really good ones that never were even considered. The game IMO is reaaly good , as good as any other good FG game out there, some things could be a little bit better/tuned . But a great Game. The problem is that too many people in the KI FGC act like if they are the sun and KI is a planet. Maybe They think they are importat to the game, but the game and KI FGC is not so importat to Them.
IMO pro players are grumpy about a game because polarized tiers are convenient, they’ll pick top tier, they have easier time winning tournament.
They won’t openly admit that, so instead they complain about recapture, staggers, etc. They want to force a change and not get their hands dirty.