Story Telling in Fighting Games

Travis Lionel
Aug 28, 2017 · 4 min read

This article will be more of a rant than a traditional thought piece.

Blazblue is one of my favorite fighting franchises ever. I’m terrible at it, but I love the mechanics, animations, designs, and watching people who are much better than me play it. More than anything though, I love the complex, overly cliched anime story. However, I can’t recommend anyone actually play the story mode. It’s boring. And, this isn’t unique to Blazblue.

Fighting games are an incredibly popular genre of gaming. There are million dollar events every year for gamers both professional and casual to participate in tournaments for prize money. EVO is probably the most popular. Most fighting games are designed with this in mind. It’s a genre that is entirely gameplay first, flavor second. Whether a developer is going for a casual edge or competitive edge, the mechanics stands out as the most relevant point. Many other genres of games make multiple philosophies run parallel such as story and gameplay for RPG’s or story and visuals for a Telltale game. However, in a fighting game, everything is made to enhance the mechanics of the game. Sound and visuals all exist only to enhance the experience of the fighting game and provide and edge for the player and their opponent. But, if someone is coming from another genre of gaming or has just never played a game, they will probably ask, “Why?”
Many of these games utilize and excuse plot to justify why these people are beating the literal snot out of each other. For example, in Skullgirls, everyone is looking for the Skull Heart, so they’re willing to fight and sometimes kill each other over it to find it. And this works for most games and most players.

However, there are some gamers and designers who want to implement a little more into their games. The decide to concoct a full blown story into their game. Games like Injusticr: Gods Among Us, Mortal Kombat, and Guilty Gear have strong narratives and reasons for their characters to participate in these one on one brawls. Sometimes, these stories are amazing and praised by fans and critics alike. But, a major issue is that it doesn’t function as a game.

The issue with storytelling in games is that it has to take control away from the player. The average timed match in a fighting game is about ninety nine seconds. Most matches are best two out of three. Assuming three matches are played for the maximum amount of time, that makes 297 seconds of gameplay, or four minutes and fifty seven seconds. The first cutscene in Injustice 2 is seven minutes and forty seconds. If someone is really good at the combat, a match can be much shorter, but the cutscene doesn’t get any shorter.
In most games, it’s understood that things like this should be avoided. A player wants to, well, play, and shouldn’t be watching cutscenes for longer than they’re actually playing the game. There should never be more viewing than there is interaction. The only exceptions to this rules are interactive stories and visual novels. Xenosaga did this and was a common complaint of an otherwise great game. With fighting games, a medium where matches are much shorter, this issue is far more noticeable.

This creates a conundrum for the developers — should they cater to the fighting game crowd or the crowd who came for the plot? The obvious answer is the fighting game crowd. However, if a creator spent time developing a plot for the entire game, they want their story to be heard. One choice is to have characters interact more in combat. But, the audio in fighting games is tied into the mechanics. Audio cues can help notify an opponent when to block or if the player executed a combo correctly. If there is too much excess noise, it makes focusing that much harder. A second option is to put the story into a different medium à la Overwatch or Destiny. Though, this option is highly criticized . If someone purchased a game for the story, they aren’t interested in taking extra steps to hear it.
Some fighting games have taken to just letting the player skip the cutscene so those interested can watch and those who just want to unlock the other characters can focus on doing just that.

Intros can help develop characters

I’m not actually sure how to mix gameplay with story in fighting games. Most methods are either intrusive to the fighting experience or require the player to stop playing. Fighting games just don’t seem like the go to genre for deep story telling. I love the story of Blazblue and Injustice, but it’s much simpler to consume these stories outside of the game. But, if you like the stories of these games, buy them. This will make sure the story continues for another installment. And, fighting games are fun, even if you’re like me and suck at them. Sleep tight.

The Blanket Fort

A place where everyone can pretend to stop being an adult, but with the freedom being an adult gives you. The Blanket Fort seeks to talk about animation, gaming, and general geek culture while at times tying together with politics and western society as a whole.

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Travis Lionel

Written by

A writer and journalist with a passion for nerd/geek culture and photography. Politically driven, he seeks to walk the line between politics and pop culture.

The Blanket Fort

A place where everyone can pretend to stop being an adult, but with the freedom being an adult gives you. The Blanket Fort seeks to talk about animation, gaming, and general geek culture while at times tying together with politics and western society as a whole.

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