I’ll let my salt flow, maybe it’ll be therapeutic…
Having spent the majority of my KI time in the last couple weeks or so reworking and/or tweaking my game has been maddening. For me, i’ll shoot 99% of a loss or frustration on something i f***ed up on. So when you sit and replay match after match of…dropped openers…missed punishes…late pickup on tendencies…a missed block…Yeah.
Then there’s playing the game live. You see a jump, you know your go-to punish in your mind, and you ■■■■■ your inputs. Or you’ll see that little walk forward and know a throw is coming and miss the timing. Or one of the worst, when you play a tight game, get that life into danger and miss your ultra into something that gets broken/dropped and lose. At my level, there’s also the chance you run into players that are major tournament contenders and get hit on a perfect. On a side note, KI has some of the most…i dunno, appropriate end match music for the losing end. Those long guitar notes and somber feel?
Or even just the studying of the game, sometimes. Looking at your character’s frame data to understand what should would and what doesn’t. Looking at resources specifically for this game. Even looking at just how other players in other games attack how to learn and build up a character.
It’s a combination of all those things. Plus, i know it’s all me, and stuff that can be fixed. So you grind it out in practice mode awhile. Spend some time in the Shadow Lab playing your own shadow. Seeing the stuff that you do wrong, objectively. Eventually get around to some extended exhibition sets where not only is the improvement not there, the result isn’t any better. Basically, it feels like your improvement is slower versus others who are doing the same.
Sure, a calm mind will tell me to grind some more. There’s no magic button, no secret trick, no quick fix to being good. Can almost put that on the simple fact alone that a lot of the other people you play against are doing it too. But i’ll be damned if that doesn’t get old to convince yourself of when you’re still losing and the improvement isn’t showing.