In Reply To #633
I agree. Soul Calibur II had too many moves, and NO ONE could memorize them all!
You're not really supposed to use every move. You create a custom moveset from the master list -- whatever works for you. In this way you can create a sub-fighting style within the main one, all your own. In this way too, you won't hesitate as much during the match.
For instance, I can usually get away with just a few of Lei Fang's leg sweeps in the DOA series; with maybe a couple of her holds on the side and one smash attack. But it's awesome that I could still mix it up further if I saw the need to by incorporating a few more from the master list. The freedom of these newer fighters is what makes the fights feel more realistic with each new one.
And yeah, Street Fighter 2 is still one of my all time faves because it doens't bog us down with movesets. But it also has some of the most balanced, entertaining gameplay in the history of the genre, and few have touched it. Because of its excellent paper-rock-scissors design and character variation, it can get away with smaller movesets and still offer freedom. I mean, and even E. Honda's slap attack feels different from Chun-Li's bullet kicks. It's just really, really good fighting design.
But there's a huge difference when you take the genre to 3D. You have to compensate for characters moving through depth. So the movesets have to include things that can both take advantage of and halt 3-dimensional dodges and sweeps; otherwise the fighting won't come off as palpable at all. Virtua Fighter is the absolute worst offender with length of movesets, but if two players really know what they're doing, witnessing the resulting match is just short of witnessing a real fight; more than any other game (Soul Calibur would come in second due to its more fantasy approach). It's been said that martial arts are like a dance, well such movesets allow for such flair during a match and when a fight teeters on the edge between belivability and merely playing a game, it's the greatest thrill you can feel with these games. Whether you win or not, a good match is a good match. You're recreating the amazing feats you see in kung-fu flicks, (the stuff you've probably dreamed of while watching them), and it's awesome.
Even IGA has claimed that Judgment is going to be a more simple fighter than the current competition. Judgment's moves look BORING; especially considering it's the Castlevania characters here. All I see the characters do is run around eachother in circles and slash at eachother with a couple of variations. They toss their subs from afar and maybe teleport to dodge any thrown at them, and they build up their meter for the finisher. I see very little variation, and only Maria seems to have any sort of defining fighting style (other than that Drac can't move really and Al has spirit summon). I am interested to see how Shanoa, Cornell or Sypha plays though.
You can akin these sort of movelists to Smash Bros., but the difference there is there is WAY more things to interact with in a match, and so the moves themselves are just one way to take down your opponent. Sure, you can throw barrels or knock your opponent into a zombie in Judgment -- it's something. But when the fighting itself doesn't look all that fun.... it probably won't be all that fun. The engine looks very limited when compared to the more popular franchises and it lacks the rush and speed of Power Stone.