I’m listening. It’s not falling on deaf ears.
The thing is the most OP option selects generally DO get removed. There were several in season 1 that made some characters a nightmare to face.
But even though they still exist, they aren’t the overblown end all thing you seem to believe, and even so, almost every character has some form of dealing with pressure.
This is a video highlight of Justin Wong on stream doing some season 1 OS tech hunting for sabrewulf. Now as you watch the video, you’ll notice how his meaty OS nails Orchid on wakeup if she tries to backdash, or forces her to block if she doesn’t. While these two outcomes are both advantageous, JW doesn’t account for the fact that she has an invincible wakeup, which if the opponent uses any strength uppercat, Sabrewulf will lose. He most likely is planning on using this as an OS to after he’s conditioned an opponent to not use invincible wakeup, which in itself is still very much a gamble. Also notice his OS fails to work against Jago, as Jago’s backdash recovers too quickly to actually leave him vulnerable, and Sabrewulf is now at a disadvantage for either being shadow countered or at least being negative on block.
OS tech is actually very situational. In SF4, given how the game’s system mechanics were designed, OS tech was highly overpowered, as they could lead to some of the most advantageous of setups. In KI, they most likely can buy you an opening, but after that, you still run the same risk of being combo broken. Also given that unlike season 1, unbreakable situations are almost non-existent thanks to many of the game’s newer breaking rules, and OS tech leading to any unusual opener situations are now breakable.
Combined with the fact that @Infilament is absolutely correct in saying that you use them without even knowing you do, really there’s no real reason to call for removing them at all.
The can really help if you let them, and at the very least can catch opponents who rely on backdash as an escape route. There will still be much room for mixup games and things, and KI heavily involves that. These aren’t the catch/defend all things like SF4’s crouch tech OS.
Wasn’t there also something that made Bison a touch of death character in ST? Cause I can remember a lot of people saying he was ridiculous in that version.[quote=“LeoFerreis, post:37, topic:8777, full:true”]
Aganos also has also the oh so popular Ruin into Instinct OS.
[/quote]
Pics or it didn’t happen. Actually I believe you, but I still wanna see it in action.
It’s how I’ve been playing for the last…5? years now. Or was it 6? I can’t remember. Live and let learn I guess.
The technical aspect of it, as others have said, is very hard to avoid. Theoretically you could create a FG that doesn’t have OSes but it would be very hard to either do in the first place and test to see if you succeeded.
As for the cheapness this is kind of a controversial topic. CAPCOM seems to agree with you as they are trying to make sure SFV has as few OSes as possible. They for example got rid of the tech throw OS by making a lp+lk in SFV also throw, so you can’t mash lp+lk on wakeup or else you’ll get a wiffed throw.
I don’t know if I agree. The problem I see isn’t necessarily the cheapness of having the game autocorrect commands for me. To me the bigger problem is that this is the kind of thing that separate players by their execution level instead of their mind games. An OS is a moment where the player is fighting the gamepad and not the opponent, like a 1-frame link in SF4 for example.
On the other hand OSes are kind of rewards for successfully putting pressure on your opponent. Some OSes are used for defense but most OSes I see are done for offense and require a certain setup - a setup that require some level of mind games. Because of that OSes don’t seem to me as bad as long combos that require several 1-frame links, I think the ratio of mind game to high level execution is balanced enough so it’s not a huge problem.
About your fear of not reaching higher levels because you didn’t know about how OSes work, I don’t know if I would go so far. Most OSes aren’t inescapable, the Hisako OS posted in the PaulB video for example is avoidable by just back dashing. So in the end it comes down to another mind game because one OS can’t cover all cases and usually a high level player will need to mix multiple OSes to keep pressure going.
Every player has strong and weak spots. You could compensate your lack of OSes by having on point manuals for example, making your combos virtually unbreakable. You could even simply get some OSes from other players and train them to create muscle memory, they usually aren’t that hard to execute, just hard to discover.
You might be thinking of CE (Champion Edition). CE Bison is nuts but it’s not because of touch of death OSes.
Aganos can’t instinct cancel Ruin on hit. So basically, every time you do ruin, you should also press instinct. If it’s blocked, you cancel into instinct and remain safe. If you hit with it, instinct doesn’t come out.
It’s apparently necessary because bad things happen if you allow Aganos to instinct cancel ruin on hit and the opponent is interacting with a wall, so they decided this was the best way to go about it. Considering ruin itself is a pretty bad move (and shadow ruin, the good one, costs meter) I don’t think it’s a big deal.
The fact that you’ve been playing against Aganos players who have been using it this whole time and didn’t know about it means that it doesn’t have that high of an impact. 
Random question but does Divekick have option selects? If not, kudos to IG for making the only fighting game without them!
Not really worried about it having an impact on me, I just really wanted to see it or understand what it entailed, but that explanation will suffice, I understand where you’re coming from now. I’m no Aganos main so that one escaped me. Thanks for the response though.
It was something about his Psycho Crusher, I don’t remember what, but I’m an 09er so my knowledge before then is limited. Before SF4, my first real fighting game was Guilty Gear on PS2. Then it was CvS2, but neither of them did I play competitively. Man I played my copy of CvS2 to death though. It still sorta works but my PS2 barely reads ANYTHING now, even pristine discs.
I wouldn’t judge anyone for using Option Selects, it’s a tool to give you a benefit in a game. It’s also completely legal. I wouldn’t choose to play like that even after the explanations in the chat. If i find a need for them i’ll explore it but for now I think i’d like other ways to enhance my game.
It’s an interesting question, but I think I personally tend to fall on Capcom’s side in this debate. The word I used above is “degenerate”, because I do think that particularly strong OS’s have a tendency to degrade the importance of actual decision-making in a game. It’s obviously not possible (nor desirable) to try and remove all OS’s, but egregiously strong ones really can minimize the importance of actual decision making. If I have a defensive OS that let’s me block meaties, tech throws, and jump back (which there aren’t great punishes for), then yeah, that kind of makes the game less interesting for me personally. (This is/was an actual SFV OS - the proper punish is a delayed “meaty”, and I think Capcom upped pre-jump frames to minimize its strength).
This. Many times this. OS’s are useful, but very rarely (in KI anyway) overwhelming. If you haven’t reached the level you want to be at @GalacticGeek, I can say with 99.836% certainty that “lack of Option Selects” is pretty far down on the list of why you’re not there yet. Good neutral decisions, solid knockdown/oki pressure, defense, maximization of punish opportunities…all of these things are far more important to your success long-term than any secret-sauce OS you haven’t been using. Those are the things that truly make you a better player - a nice OS is just icing on top.
2 Likes
You mean that OS that got beat by lows?
@Infilament @GalacticGeek @STORM179 @SithLordEDP
I am brand new to Option Selects, and i just finished watching those videos.
I think Option selects are an exploit and should be removed. It is taking away from the single greatest aspect of a fighting game, mind-games.
There is a very simple fix for this.
-If two buttons are pressed at the same time that DO NOT activate a SPECIFIC move, then NO MOVE should come out. (for example, LP + HK should do NOTHING). This removes the exploit, puts the mind games back, and punishes button mashing.
-If an “Invalid input” gets pressed, it should be be “buffered” instead of being discarded.
So for this example:
What SHOULD happen is, If they do this, and the move lands, then the auto-double comes out as usual. But if they do this and the pulverize move DOESN’T connect, then the HP should still come out, but as a normal HP, not an auto double. Basically, they will get LOCKED into performing the HP as their next move, as punishment for mashing the button without actually knowing if the move hit or not.
This would also fix the priority system, put the execution skill back in the game, and punish button mashing.
All un-necessary buttons should result in a punishment.
-In low-tier fights, as long as moves come out, the (casual) players will still have fun while button mashing.
-In mid-tier fights, players will begin to understand that button-mashing is a REALLY bad idea.
-In top-tier fights, the exploit will no longer allow free pressure, and the mind games will be put back into the fights.
@TheKeits . I may be over-reacting about this, since it is the first time i have learned about Option selects, but i feel like you would be able to add more to this conversation than any of us, in relation to KI.
Is this really acceptable in fighting games?
Is there ANY way to fix it?
Is it really somehow NOT cheating?
Are Option selects considered during character development?
It’s not possible to completely remove OSes by only using an universal system mechanic, OSes have to be removed individually.
For example:
Some OSes use completely valid inputs in both cases of the OS. Your idea would work in some cases but wouldn’t remove those OSes. On the other hand your fighting game would be TERRIBLE to control, a single mistake hitting lightly a kick while trying to punch would get me punished for doing nothing instead of resulting in a possible trade by either a punch or a kick coming out depending of the priority system.
Another example that wouldn’t remove all OSes and insert an incredible annoyance in the game that would make it terrible to control. Also it would directly interfere with your first tip of having invalid inputs result in nothing. Inputs are situational - LP + LK is invalid if you’re knocked down for example - so if I do a command that at that moment is invalid what should come out? Nothing or it should buffer until it becomes valid? If your answer is “only the commands that have no possibility of ever being valid should result in nothing” then it will fail to remove most OSes.
I believe you’re overreacting by thinking OSes are bad in general. @STORM179 said it better, OSes should be looked into in a case by case basis. Some OSes really do remove the mind games and should be fixed but others aren’t worth the hassle because the “fix” would create more problems in other areas of the game.
2 Likes
If you make an input that is NEVER valid, then NOTHING should happen.
If you make an input that is not valid at that time, then the move should activate at the next valid time.
(Except after enders in KI. you should not be able to press a follow-up button during an ender, and have it come out perfectly after the ender. Enders in KI should have NO buffer window. Follow-ups should be manual timing. As they are now.)
I’m sure there is a way to get rid of them. But that way won’t be anytime soon I’d imagine. If it was they’d be gone by now.
Its been said they are very situational, that balances the strength of an OS. @STORM179 made mention of the tech Xian (i think) found, then there’s our own CAM assisted TJ OS, both of which were OP and have been since removed.
They’re pretty useful pieces of tech but you have to learn how and when to use them so that makes it fair for me. And they’re not OP, they may cover most options but there’s always a way out.
Like @Dancovich said, it’s a case by case basis, and usually the more powerful ones are removed if they prove to be too degenerative to gameplay, but most OS you see are hardly that level of powerful.
However, they are a consequence of a super lenient input buffer system. There’s nothing in KI that’s SF4 OP, but there is no easy fix to them without breaking the game’s fundamental control scheme and making the game unplayable. If you tighten the buffer window too much, you basically made the game much harder, and all moves (specials, linkers, enders, autos) have the timing of manuals, resulting in lots of dropped combos.
That’s why I said not now. I imagine in the future things will be different. If someone found a way to be rid of them they would have done so by now.
I am usually the guy who argues: “Nothing is OP, there is ALWAYS a way to win, even if it means using mind-games.”
But a system exploit that removes mind-games? No way. That is cheating.
Characters having bad options is not NEARLY as bad as a character having LESS options.
Option selects can COMPLETELY remove the “wakeup game” in some match ups, and that is unacceptable.
1 Like
Option selects have for many games, been exploited to benefit the advantaged player in many situations. It would be difficult to pin point this based on button commands without proper balance to Killer Instincts mechanics. If you were to program the game so that certain moves can’t be buffered on block or hit then you are messing with the ability to properly cancel moves. It’s more of a BUG scenario that has to be picked out individually before you can address it. Like I said before, people will always find ways to exploit the system.