Fighting Games Friday: Japanese Developers Should Take Online Play Seriously

It’s been a little over a decade since the fighting game genre returned to prominence and attracted those beyond a niche audience again, mainly thanks to the efforts of Street Fighter IV. Since then, home releases of fighting games have been more feature rich, after publishers listened to what players wanted and responded accordingly. For instance, more fighting games come with detailed story modes, and tutorials have been made more intricate since leaning different fighting games isn’t easy, even for seasoned veterans and semi-experienced players (like me, for the latter).

One key feature hasn’t improved, despite its importance: Online play.

When fighting games returned from the wilderness during the last console generation, online netcodes were delay-based. The stronger the connection or the closer the opponent was to the player, the faster each specific move would occur when a button was pressed. If the connections were weak, players would feel like they’re fighting underwater. This was slightly different for titles that contained fighting systems designed to be played with online-based delay, like the Blazblue titles and the Persona 4 Arena games, though the delay could still be felt in them. Some titles contained netcodes so bad that the strength of the connection didn’t matter, evidence that they only tested it in areas where players were in close proximity with each other like Japan. Of those, SNK’s titles were by far the most grievous offenders.

Meanwhile, the games that handled best online were 2D titles, ports and new games. Street Fighter III: 3rd Strike Online Edition and Skullgirls used GGPO, a rollback-based netcode instead of an input-based one. This kind of netcode usually correctly predicts the player and the opponent’s techniques. When they’re incorrectly guessed, which depends on how strong the connections are, moves will occasionally be rolled back to correct the flow of the match. Most fighting game players prefer this to having their moves delayed a bit even in the best connections, since rollback-based netcodes based on GGPO usually tend to be stronger when they’re implemented for game online infrastructures well.

In the last decade, developers have had more experience with implementing netcodes, and more powerful consoles have been able to handle more sophisticated systems. Despite that, the overall quality of online netcodes continues to be behind the times, thanks to companies that have made little-to-no improvements. This especially, though unsurprisingly, goes for Japanese developers.

For example, Arc System Works’ current-generation titles barely handle any better online compared to their last-generation titles, with delay-based netcodes whose delay ranges from acceptable to abhorrent depending on the connection. Given recent comments from Guilty Gear creator and director (and composer and character designer) Daisuke Ishiwatari, it doesn’t sound like they have any serious plans to improve it, despite fans begging for them to do so. Ishiwatari has been asked about whether the netcode for the upcoming Guilty Gear -Strive- will be improved over previous efforts, but his answers have boiled down to how they’re only looking into other solutions for netcode. It’s easy for most to see right through this for the bullshit it is; there’s minimal reassurance that they’ll actually improve their online infrastructure anytime soon.

Arc is at least better than SNK, which has released games with netcodes where even the best connections have significant — and, worse, inconsistent — delay. Their newest game, Samurai Shodown, continued the trend of having bottom-tier online. The only exception was Samurai Shodown V Special, which contained rollback netcode and good connections, thanks to — surprise, surprise being outsourced to Code Mystics.

Western gaming companies have been better in this console generation. After spending years in the netcode ghetto, NetherRealm Studios improved their online infrastructure with rollback code as of Mortal Kombat XL, the updated version of Mortal Kombat X. Online play in their games, specifically Injustice 2 and Mortal Kombat 11, has been solid since then. The new Killer Instinct was one of the earliest big fighters to incorporate rollback. As Adam “Keits” Heart mentioned in this video about online infrastructures, it’s the reason why its online community is still crowded more than six years after its release, despite the game not receiving any new content in years.

The only exception here among Japanese developers (with ports that aren’t outsourced to other companies) is Capcom. They started using rollback with Street Fighter x Tekken, which handled well after a patch fixed early issues, though it never had a large player base for multiple other reasons. This continued with Street Fighter V, which was unfortunately riddled with all sorts of crazy rollback problems due to poor implementation. It hurts that SFV is some players’ only experience with rollback, and it’s colored their entire perception of it. Capcom appeared to get this right with Marvel vs. Capcom Infinite, but it’s a shame that it was Marvel vs. Capcom Infinite. I said “appeared to” because it’s possible the online handled well thanks to the low player base, given MVCI’s reception. Capcom hasn’t always gotten it right here, but at least they’ve tried to. That’s more than any other Japanese fighting game developer has done.

Documentation for GGPO is now available in Japanese, so there isn’t a better time for developers to either see if they can use it for their games, or consult it as a guide to make their own rollback codes. Excuses like those from Ishiwatari above should no longer be tolerated when players and apparently the companies involved want their communities to thrive for years to come. There’s a reason why KI is still played while, say, Guilty Gear Xrd Rev 2 is a wasteland online, and that’s due to more than the popularity gap between the two franchises. There’s still a good chance that Japanese companies still won’t listen to the player bases outside their home country, but the only way they’ll learn is through continued criticism and their online communities continuing to flatline. Maybe get it one of these days.