I first met Tokido in 2007 at EVO playing in a Samurai Showdown 6 tournament, and then a NeoGeo Battle Coliseum tournament.
We spoke the following year a bit while we both waited for our matches in a KoF98 side tournament.
He plays a lot of games very, very well. Super nice, too!
One impression I got was that even for veteran FG players first impressions do matter a lot.
I would imagine a high level player of one game would know that his first impression regarding mechanics of another might be a little off since he has no knowledge of those mechanics but it seems that even those players will give a lot of value to first impressions.
In particular I thought Magoâs comment on the work to open up your opponent being âwastedâ by being broken very interesting. Iâm curious to know how much effort he made into evaluating why the game is balanced this way. Since in KI it is so much easier to open up your opponent my impression is that he made that comment thinking about SFIV, where if you could break a combo it would be a very frustrating game since defense is already so strong.
On topic, Iâm really glad Tokido seems enthusiastic about the game. As I mentioned above, his opinion matters a lot for getting Japanese gamers interested. When S3 comes out, if Tokido is enjoying the game and telling people about it on TopangaTV, you can bet the PC version will help sell it over there. Obviously nobody is going to buy an Xbox One in Japan for this game, so the PC version is super important (even though PC gaming is less popular there than other parts of the world, itâs still way more popular than the Xbox One).
In particular, Tokido seemed to enjoy explaining how to do the shadow linker breaks. Like he was having fun rhythmically tapping to show the timing and stuff. That was one of the big selling points of the game to me (I love rhythm games and parrying stuff) so I liked hearing him talk about that part with enthusiasm. The game also does a really good job at the presentation of breaking shadow moves (with the 1, 2, 3 thing). Gets you feeling excited.
Magoâs initial hesitation about the game makes a lot of sense to me. I think those fears are generally alleviated just by playing the game for a while, though. This isnât SF4 offense where your openings are rare and extremely precious⊠heâs probably trying to imagine doing a Yang combo and just getting randomly broken because he chained shorts into rekka, which I agree sounds terrible and not fun. But once you sort of get into the KI systems, you understand why combo breakers work with the rest of the gameâs pace and flow.
They also talked a bit about how western audiences like âmachoâ characters, whereas Japanese audiences just like cool/mystical characters (they mentioned Dr. Strange from UMvC3 as a favorite in Japan). I think thatâs probably why a lot of Japanese players have gravitated to Omen, Riptor, Spinal and Shadow Jago, but strayed away from otherwise very strong characters like Sadira (who is basically just a mean-looking woman). Definitely fits the description to me. Hopefully S3 has a good balance of macho and magical characters in it.
LolâŠJapanese games have PLENTY of ridiculously non-âmysticalâ macho main characters. Câmon bro.
Go tell Tokido/Mago that, Iâm just telling you what they said in the interview.
If Streetfigher V was developed in the West (hypothetically, in itâs exact form), they would find something else to play.
Cool, Iâll pass the word along.
One thing that doesnât come out well in my summary is that Tokido continuously was stressing the point to his audience of an entry barrier to KI.
He was alluding to a combination of things: the transitions from SF combo mechanics to KI breaker system (1), new terminology (2), character specific traits (3) and sheer number of special moves available and relevant to the the breaker system (4).
Especially the new terminology seemed quite a hurdle to Mago.
Definitely, a positive attitude on Tokidoâs side as he enjoys KI but Tokido seemed very honest to Mago and Momochi that you have to embrace a different philosophy to play KI. Almost every comment he made was accompanied by him saying something on the learning curve.
I just wanted to add this for what itâs worth.
To be honest, This is one of the things that sold me in KI as well. It reminds me of a parry, and the 1-2-3! of the announcer. Itâs SO hype when you can pull it off, especially the multi-hitting ones, like Thunderâs Shadow Ankle Slicer. When near Danger too, and only 5 seconds left, with an opponent with half a health bar left, and you have no Instinct & One Shadow bar!?
LOL I have to stop before I get too HYPE, and ramble on.
Man I love KI. Hopefully they can see the AMAZING fun we have with this game.
wooow quite intersting taht tokido like the game and is looking to bring more pro japanese player to the game ⊠love that . maybe we will have a surprise for evo 2016 on the batch on the tournament
The most important question here is, what is his GAMERTAG? Letâs hunt him down! 
He is looking for opponents so thatâs no problemâŠ
Yes, and even more, MS should use the opportunity to have him promote KI.
It is indeed a strange comment giving the fact he plays SFIV. He plays Yang which I donât know how to position in the âmachoâ metter but Yang is just a character, if you look into the entire roster there are plenty of macho characters or otherwise just mean characters. All SF bosses except Bison/Vega are macho characters (SF1 had Sagat) and even Bison is a mix of the two.
If we compare it to KI I donât believe we have a single macho character. The biggest character is a Babylonian Golem, the second and third are an alien and a native american with the power to call thunders and teleport through ravens and the âRyuâ of this game is basically Chinese, not to mention the Japanese character is a ghost. Maybe Sadira which is just an assassin but we can trace a correlation with SF Gen.
I feel Magoâs comments had nothing to do with the actual origin of each character and itâs role in the game but rather the art style in general. It doesnât matter that Jago is from Tibet and uses the power of the Tiger, the way heâs drawn is just âwesternâ.
I think art style does come into play, yes. But itâs also how the personality is conveyed. A character like Zangief or Hugo, who are basically just giant muscular dudes, tend to convey a lot of personality because they are a super crazy stereotype or intentionally goofball-y. Zangief wrestles bears and does the cossack dance, and Hugo is everybodyâs favorite lovable potato. I can see them liking a character like Aganos because he has some lovable personality behind him. I donât think thatâs true of every KI character though (from a Japanese perspective).
In general, KI does feel (visually) like a very western game, based on 90s western stereotypes, so I can see why a Japanese person might not like it if that aesthetic doesnât appeal to them. Lots of Americans donât play anime games for a similar reason, too. (shrug) It is what it is. I think there are characters in there that are less westerny than others, hopefully thatâs enough to appeal to them. If you donât like the characters, then you wonât like the fighting game, even if itâs really good.
âCheerfulâ. That is the word Mago used.
(Just added to the summary too) The three were discussing that KI, Marvel and MK characters have a realism that is too dark. According to them, you sort of have to be attracted to one specific character implying that anime fighters generally have more softer or cheerful characters to choose from. With MK or Marvel you have to be lucky to have one such character in the roster. Mago used the word âcheerfulâ in this context for KI which I think summarizes it well.
And it links to a non-KI discussion they have later in their talk about the personality of a FG character as welk as the age kids are very receptive to try a fighting game. This context becomes clear once they go into this general subject about talent and personality of playersâŠ
Mago also said the same about the music, not just visuals, in relation to âoverseas fighting gamesâ.
Hope this background helpsâŠ
They might like Kim Wu perhaps. Serious, with a side of Cheerfulness. No?
Actually, itâs modern Darkstalkers IMO. (Which is a good thing)
BTW, thanks for the translation @BoJima404 .
I spent time wondering what they were saying, lol.
lol, not a bad idea.
You should probably hit up @TempusChaoti @TheKeits @GoogleMyName @rukizzel
Donât ArcSys games and other anime fighters (as well as Tekken) completely trounce Street Fighter in arcades in Japan?
KOF also follows a similar route, and happens to be extremely popular in Latin America and China, even more so than Street Fighter as well (though they roided up a bunch of people in XII and XIII for some reason).
It makes sense. So Iâm just taking a guess, but the popular characters over there based on the information given, as well as spectulation, are:
Shadow Jago
Omen
Riptor
Hisako? Definite MaybeâŠ
tokido plays all sorts of dirty stuff, so I dont see this as a special event. He played marvel too, but that has not helped the game very much in japan.