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On Gamers Whining About Cheese 200

Posted by simoniker from the sumptuous-complaint-snack dept.
Thanks to GameSpot for its editorial discussing the fine art of 'cheesing', and the annoyance of those who complain about it. The write explains of 'cheesers': "These gamers (either intentionally or unintentionally) use the same moves or tactics over and over again [in games such as Soul Calibur II or Top Spin] to defeat opponents and, as a result, are often treated as the redheaded stepchildren in gaming circles." However, he argues: "Repetitive moves and tactics can become annoying, but what irritates me more are the people that whine about them", and concludes by suggesting: "The challenge then, for those who prefer to take the high road, is to find ways to beat them... Don't get mad. Get better." But is whining actually a good, natural part of videogaming?
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On Gamers Whining About Cheese More

On Gamers Whining About Cheese

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  • hmmmm (Score:4, Funny)

    by SkunkPussy ( 85271 ) on Tuesday April 27, 2004 @07:05AM (#8981944) Journal
    > But is whining actually a good, natural part of videogaming?

    Is anything good and natural about gaming?

  • Obvious (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Mr.Dippy ( 613292 ) on Tuesday April 27, 2004 @07:11AM (#8981975)
    "Losers always whine about their best. Winners go home and f*ck the prom queen" Gamers should grow some balls and not whine. This just helps feed the stereotype that the majority of gamers are 13 year old bitches who spend too much time playing games online and can't handle being schooled by another player and are reduced to speaking l33t in order to seem cool and elite.
  • Yeah, I just played king of fighters against a friend on the PSX, and in one of the fights he used a character he knows well, and I heard the exact same 'yihaaa' and me getting hurt around 8 times in a row, same happens when I play against some other, not-so-smart people at games like Mortal Kombat 2/3, anyone else remembers sitting there holding the controller while the enemy freezes, jumps to you, upper cuts and jumps back?

    Anyway, these kind of tactics are usually annoying, but that same friend I just

  • Cheesing, gaming and whining (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Anonytroll ( 751214 ) on Tuesday April 27, 2004 @07:22AM (#8982024) Journal
    But is whining actually a good, natural part of videogaming?
    No, whining is a good, natural part of being a human being. No matter the circumstances, we need to have something we can whine about or we are unhappy (and end up creating artificial problems so we can whine about them).

    That said, I can understand people whining about cheese. If someone just acts following a tight formula (that in most cases wasn't even made by them, they found it on a FAQ site) he's somewhere around the capacities of a script kiddie.
    However, if they are capable of doing more than just cheesing (and just prefer not to because it just works, not because they are too dumb to do something more challenging), then more power for them and learn how to play (and stop whining because you are not able to counter a tactic that has been used against you several times in a row)!

  • Spawn sniping (Score:5, Insightful)

    by etymxris ( 121288 ) on Tuesday April 27, 2004 @07:24AM (#8982032)
    Note that the writer didn't offer an effective counter-strategy to spawn sniping/camping. I can't speak to the other "cheese" moves he's talking about, but I can certainly understand why people complain about spawn camping. The reason why it is universally reviled is because it degrades the quality and enjoyment of the game. When the game comes down to who can spawn camp the best, then it's really no fun at all. The solution to spawn camping is temporary invincibility. That is, a newly spawned player cannot be injured for 5-10 seconds after spawning unless he or she engages in an offensive attack. (This last part is to stop those that are newly spawned from tipping the balance of power in reverse.)

    Absent such technical solutions, admins are free to kick or ban players they see as using cheap moves, and players are free to discontinue playing with those they feel can't play fair. There is no a priori reason that video games have to be anarchistic. What does this mean? Well, it seems the writer of the article assumes that just because something can be done in a video game, that it is perfectly acceptable to do so. But I disagree. Suppose I was playing a real-life tennis match with Sampras, pulled out a gun, and shot him in the knee. Would my subsequent win (assuming I wasn't arrested or handcuffed) be honest or fair? Certainly not.

    Similarly, just because we are used to being able to get away with anything in video games doesn't make those things we get away with right. There are already rules against automated helpers in most games. There is thus no reason to assume that just because an action is possible in a game that it should be allowable or rewarded.

    • Re:Spawn sniping (Score:3, Insightful)

      by GypC ( 7592 )
      There is a simple solution to spawn camping. Spawn at a random point on (your team's half of) the map. Developers really have no valid reason to code in "spawn points", except for tradition, do they?

      • Re:Spawn sniping (Score:2, Insightful)

        by nifboy ( 659817 )
        But that's a developer's solution to the problem, not a player's. It's not like you can just force the game to spawn you at something other than a spawn point.

        So the question is, what can you do while waiting for someone to make a game with fully random spawn points?

        (oh, wait, they did [bzflag.org].)

        • Re:Spawn sniping (Score:4, Insightful)

          by AndrewHowe ( 60826 ) on Tuesday April 27, 2004 @08:39AM (#8982573)
          Well, what you can do is, while you're waiting to respawn you start whining about their spawn camping. If you whine enough they sometimes stop to whine back. If you time it right you can be half way to somewhere else before they realise what's going on.
          Also realise that a spawn camper isn't taking or defending flags.
          I don't think spawn camping is necessarily bad. Most people will whine about it, then turn around and do it to the other team as "punishment" anyway.
          Another thing, most games allow you to choose your spawn point. If you have only one spawn point left, and it is getting 0wned, then you're probably about to lose anyway... Get over it.

      • Re:Spawn sniping (Score:4, Insightful)

        by apoc.famine ( 621563 ) <apoc.famine@nOSPam.gmail.com> on Tuesday April 27, 2004 @09:25AM (#8982981) Journal
        There is indeed a vaild reason to code in spawn points - so that nobody spawns closer to major powerups or the best weapons. The problem with random spawns is the randomness of it all - most map makers try to make maps fairly - no spawn point has a major advantage, no team has a major advantage by spawning closer to team-based goals. Randomness throws this out, as well as occasionally spawning people in rather dangerous spots.

        There are a few easy ways around spawn camping. First and foremost are server admins who pay attention, and ban lame-ass campers. Secondly, if you have about 2x the spawn points as the # of players, it becomes almost pointless to try to camp one point. Lastly, a couple seconds of invincibility for newly spawned peeps should kill any remaining problems.

        Personally, we run two things to prevent spawn-camping - a 2 second invincibility period, and the Matrix Moves. Our mobility is good enough that even if we spawn in where someone is camping, we can usually get away or at least get to a decent weapon.

        Frankly, only n00bs camp, and if a n00b camps on our server, they will get their ASS handed to them. About half our regulars would probable smite them with the default weapon, and everyone else would take the time to hunt them down and smite them until they quit playing. We generally don't have to ban people - if a handful of clanners get pissed off at someone, they gang up and obliterate them. There's nothing like spawn-camping with a major weapon, only to have someone sneak up behind you and beat you to death with a melee weapon...
    • Spawn camping can not be exercised of the team you are trying to camp are aggressive. I frequently play a video game called Team Fortress Classic(a conversion of Team Fortress for Quake for Half-Life :)) where everyone spawn in one or two places most of the time. In the game you have distinct offense/defense roles.

      Sometimes a team will put more(all) people on defense than offense, that way the other teams defenders will get bored and go off to the enemy team - not for capping flags though, that's up to the

    • Re:Spawn sniping (Score:3, Interesting)

      by RzUpAnmsCwrds ( 262647 )
      "That is, a newly spawned player cannot be injured for 5-10 seconds after spawning unless he or she engages in an offensive attack. (This last part is to stop those that are newly spawned from tipping the balance of power in reverse.)"

      This is eactly what UT2004 does. Unfortunately, many server admins deliberately turn it off.

      The new fad in UT2004 is "lev lifting". Due to a physics bug, you can lift the huge tank-like vehicle with the Raptor (a flying vehicle). This should be fixed in a patch.

    • you just suck (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Ender Ryan ( 79406 )
      What do you mean there's nothing you can do about spawn camping? Defeating spawn campers is easy. They can't camp near EVERY spawn point! If spawn camping is winning someone matches, those matches are pretty pathetic. Get better, and then when you stomp on the pathetic campers, find some real gamers to play with.

      And your analogies to real life are ridiculous. In real life tennis or whatnot, there are rules. Shooting someone in the knee is against the rules. If you did that in a real match, you'd be

      • What do you mean there's nothing you can do about spawn camping? Defeating spawn campers is easy. They can't camp near EVERY spawn point!

        Actually that depends on the game and the map. In RtCW and Enemy Territory, the spawn points would usually be placed outdoors. The end result being... well either being gunned down by MG42s, torched by flamethrowers, blown to bits by artillery/airstrikes, or being hit by mortars. On some maps (Enemy Territory's Goldrush map most notably) players know exactly, what spot,

    • Re:Spawn sniping (Score:2, Insightful)

      by way2slo ( 151122 )
      "I can't speak to the other "cheese" moves he's talking about..."

      I can. The one example was Top Spin, a tennis game. In video game emulation of tennis, you are thrown right into the mental aspects. His "cheese" was to hit an acute angle shot, a drop shot, that the other team could not return. Quite frankly, that is exactly what you are supposed to do. You play enough, you learn how hard and where to hit the ball to increase your chances.

      If your opponents are living at the baseline, come to the ne

    • Suppose I was playing a real-life tennis match with Sampras, pulled out a gun, and shot him in the knee. Would my subsequent win (assuming I wasn't arrested or handcuffed) be honest or fair? Certainly not.

      Using a gun isn't within the rules of tennis. Cheesing is (in fact, cheesing is expected). Your analogy is invalid.

      Rob
    • The problem isn't spawn camping, the problem is with the games themselves not being designed well enough to have more intelligent and varied spawning rules and play options. Soldiers landing on the beaches of Normandy sure as shit had to deal with spawn camping. Every Nazi machine gun and mortar was aimed at the landing points, hoping to kill soldiers when the gates of their landing craft dropped. In real war, the defending troops generally have a 3:1 advantage precisely because they *can* camp the likel

  • *WHINE* (Score:5, Funny)

    by pugdk ( 697845 ) on Tuesday April 27, 2004 @07:28AM (#8982064) Homepage
    OMG! YOU SUCK! What kind of a post is that? GO AWAY YOU n00b!

    *WHINE*

  • Hahahah (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Apreche ( 239272 ) on Tuesday April 27, 2004 @07:32AM (#8982085) Homepage Journal
    I'll admit it, I'm a whiner when it comes to cheese. The way I see it is this. If there is a game where cheese is possible. For example, a fighting game. Then the design of the game is flawed. Now if its like a tournament or something with a prize, all is fair cheese away. But when you're playing with friends the idea is to have fun. If everybody just does the cheese move what's the point? There's no fun there, it's just plain stupid. Everyone lines up to push the same exact buttons as the previous guy, and if they don't push those same exact buttons they lose because the cheese is unstoppable. (I know its not always unstoppable, but often it might as well be ).

    So, if you have a poorly designed game in which cheese exists and you want to play it with friends and have fun. Don't do the cheese or you're going to ruin everyone's fun. If there is a cheese whore in the current group of gamers you must play a game that has no cheese. So as a whiner even though I'm saying with my mouth "Stop that you cheesy whore!" what I really mean is "ok, this game sucks and has bad design, but we can have fun with it anyway if we don't do the cheesy crap. Losing isn't a big deal fanboy, pick a different character for once".

    • I agree with you. When people play together, it should be in the name of fun. When one player decides that his winning is more fun than everyone else's then he is an asshole. Worse, when cheesing, it often isn't even about fun for them, it's about kill counts or ego. I don't see spawn campers laughing a lot, bragging yes, but no real joy.

      And this guy is a hypocritical prick too. He tells people to get better at the games and then says,
      "In Soul Calibur II, I use only two moves with Raphael--not because I ha

  • It's always the losers who whine (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Saiai Hakutyoutani ( 599875 ) on Tuesday April 27, 2004 @07:39AM (#8982126)
    Gamers seem to think up an endless number of terms for ridiculing those who beat them, "cheeser" and "camper" being just two.

    If anything, I think these people are letting themselevs be fooled by the game. The whole point of introducing the possibility of loss in a game is to leave the player with a feeling of being treated unfairly. But it is not so.

    I think the point when these gamers can admit to defeat and say "I got owned" is the point when they'll start enjoying the game.

    • I have been a casual gamer for about 9 years. I have *always* been by far the worst among the people I play with, at least until a couple of years ago. I never objected to losing, since I knew I was bad at it, and was likely to lose a lot--UNLESS the person who fragged me was camping.

      Even when playing against someone of totally unknown relative ability, I don't mind losing so long as they adhere to the same standards as me, which are unwritten rules of polite gaming: don't cheat, don't camp, don't cheese

      • Instead of presenting a counter-argument, you're already attacking my credibility. What's up with that?

        If you can't beat a person who relies only on camping or on cheesy techniques, why should you expect to do so? Camping and cheesing are legitimate and good techniques that present a real challenge to some players. Like yourself. Demanding that players stop using these techniques is like demanding a handicap.

        • Actually, I attacked your credibility after I presented a counter-argument.

          And, like I said, you have totally missed the point. There are plenty of people who feel that camping and cheesing are not "legitimate and good techniques." I refuse to use techniques like that, and so do most of the people I play with, at least when they play with me (obviously, I don't know how they play otherwise). They are techniques that game the system, rather than actually trying to build up a real strategy. Sure, you can

      • Re:Either you miss the point, or you're one of the (Score:5, Interesting)

        by Blakey Rat ( 99501 ) on Tuesday April 27, 2004 @12:52PM (#8985656)
        As long as you're only whining about camping in deathmatch games, I'm fine with it. What really pisses me off is whining about camping in team-based games! Uh, hello people, that's not "camping" that's "defending." I'm not "camping the flag" I'm defending it to keep it from getting taken! That's part of the design of the game!

        I've gotten accused of camping for defending a power node in Unreal 2004 Onslaught mode, and it boggles my mind. Why *wouldn't* our team want to defend power nodes? Especially the important one at the middle?

        Anyway, rant over.
        • I totally agree. I don't particularly relish spawncamping with a tank or similar overpowered weapon, but it's part of the games. BF1942 has a particular weakness to this tactic, but basically since the enemy controls the spawnpoint, you have to spawn somewhere else and regain control from there. It's tactic, not cheating. And sniping or camping is a legitimate military tactic which makes each soldier effective. Charging across Omaha Beach in the open with a Thompson submachine gun is simply a great way to d
        • Yeah, i've copped that shit plying BF:V and DC online. It is not camping, it's trying to hold a spawn point/flag, ffs. Although, I have noticed how frustrating it can be in both BF:V and BF1942/DC to be down to your last spawn and have the opposing team covering it with snipers, napalm drops and artillery. It's frustrating, and makes some people VERY upset, but the reality is you wouldn't be in that position if you could hold on to your spawn points anyway. If you've been driven back to your final spawn
      • Your problem has nothing to do with "cheese" (I can understand cheating complaints, where there is clearly a bug in the implementation, but that's different). I can think of very few games that actually do not provide you with any way to counter "cheesy" tactics. Many are difficult to counter, and may force you to lose once you make one initial mistake (failing to counter something), but it sounds more like you are simply out of your depth.

        Your problem is that you are playing with people who play more th

        • You make a lot of good points; I would like to reply first in general, then to a couple of specific parts of your post.

          First, I guess the heart of the issue is this: it's about courtesy--the courtesy to say, "Well, I'm here to have fun, so you probably are too. Thus, so that we can both have fun, I won't use repetitive, annoying techniques that will simply prevent you from acting." (that being, essentially, my definition of cheese) Whenever I play against someone whose skill level is significantly lower

    • I think the point when these gamers can admit to defeat and say "I got owned" is the point when they'll start enjoying the game.

      I am disappointed that I already have a signature; I find your statement to be both pithy and insightful.

  • The thing is... (Score:4, Insightful)

    by nifboy ( 659817 ) on Tuesday April 27, 2004 @07:52AM (#8982210)
    The skill required to counter "cheesy" moves often requires more skill than either player actually has. If the "cheeser" had more skill he wouldn't spam one move. If the "cheesee" had more skill he wouldn't be suckered into being killed by it.

    (Cue "WELL DUH!" from the article)

    The thing is, skill isn't acquired immediately. It's not like you can just "get better" as the article suggests and start kicking ass. If that was the case everyone would be tournament-level material. It takes time, and in the meanwhile, you're faced with a "cheesy" move you can't find a way around.

    Plus, fighting a "cheeser" isn't going to increase your skill in the least: The only thing you're going to learn is how to win by spamming one move.

  • Fix the Cheese (Score:5, Insightful)

    by TwistedGreen ( 80055 ) on Tuesday April 27, 2004 @07:56AM (#8982230)
    The first time I played Soul Calibur II was the first time I had played any kind of fighting game since Mortal Kombat. And I kicked ass.

    Let's face it, these games require very little skill, and this is no accident. There are purposefully two ways to play: one for beginners who aren't even sure which button is kick and which is punch, and one for the people who spend all their time memorizing combo moves. But the thing is, the beginner's technique is often more powerful than any advanced player's most complex combo attack!

    Is this a flaw? No, it's definitely a feature, but perhaps it's a feature that a player should be able to turn off. How about customizable rulesets like in Worms? This is an obstacle that can easily be circumvented if the players really want it. But for now, it is part of the game, like it or not.
    • Yes, but there's a difference between button mashing, and cheesing. If you constantly mash buttons and end up winning more power to you, most decent players can beat a button masher. But if you figure out one good move, and constantly do that, only do that, then there's a big difference. You know exactly what you're doing. If an advanced player did that, the beginners would never play, why should the beginners and/or those of little skill be allowed to use it against the advanced players? (not to mentio
      • I doubt an advanced player would have much trouble against someone who just repeatedly did the same moves/combos. My experience with SCII is that *everything* has a counter. If an experienced player keeps doing the same moves against a new player, the new player will learn to counter those terribly fast (assuming that they're actually trying). End of story.

    • Re:Fix the Cheese (Score:5, Insightful)

      by SamSim ( 630795 ) on Tuesday April 27, 2004 @11:18AM (#8984365) Homepage Journal

      Perhaps you could implement a Tony Hawk's Skateboarding-style system, whereby the more you repeat a given move, the less damage it does.

  • Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Tuesday April 27, 2004 @08:18AM (#8982378)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion
  • It's part of the game, I say. Only the evil, spawn of satan spawn campers have anything aginst them. Geeting sniped every time you go to the enemy base? Try another route, or run in groups so some of you make it to kill the sniper. There isn't really a anti-spawner technique yet, but a throwing kinfe usually works...
  • Savage [s2games.com] is a great game. It's a tactical, strategic, first person shooter; you have 1 commander who oversees the landscape, commands, and deals with resources. The rest of your team does the actual combat and other tasks to ensure victory (or totally 'ef it up).

    Most of the early Savage [s2games.com] games were predictable; rush forward, get mines, build, and put up some towers to protect what you've built. Specific maps had "the way" to win. Anything else was ignored. After about a month, the commanders figured ou

    • Kind of offtopic, but I'd like to know if there's a place to buy it off of their site, or if you go and get it in stores.
      • They sell it as a download or you can get it retail. For some reason -- so as to not *iss-off retailers probably -- they don't sell it on-site as a boxed game.

        I picked a copy up at a retail store (EB Games in the US) a few months back. They have a samuri mod that I haven't tried yet. It was initially only for European players but they said that it would eventually be a download for everyone else. (checks) Yep, it's a 11mb download (2 parts).

  • In my view, if you're continually beaten by someone doing the exact same thing, maybe you need to learn a new tactic to deal with it. Remember what doing the same thing and expecting different results is a sign of? Stupidity.

    • Re:Wacky whiners (Score:2, Interesting)

      by Jtheletter ( 686279 )
      if you're continually beaten by someone doing the exact same thing, maybe you need to learn a new tactic to deal with it

      The problem is this is not always even possible, hence the whole idea of the "cheese" move in the first place. The best example I can give is in DOA2 for the XBox, some of the characters are faster than the others, but to balance gameplay the slower ones deal more damage on average. You can get into situations though where if a faster character (like Kasumi or Ayani) knocks you down and

  • Cheese = Skills. (Score:4, Interesting)

    by JavaLord ( 680960 ) on Tuesday April 27, 2004 @09:32AM (#8983079) Journal
    Having played at probably over 100 fighting game tournaments at 8 on the break [thebreak.net] and other arcades on the east coast during the peak of fighting game popularity (ie 1994 - 1997) I can tell you that all fighting game tournaments come down to a combination of skill, and exploiting an overpowering move or character. Players that refused to embrace a top-tier character never won tournaments and usually were the ones who bitched about cheese. Players that won tournaments could usually play with any character, but embraced the cheesy/exploitable strategies that went with the game. For example:

    Mortal Kombat 2 - Most players used Jax (Ground pound was over powered) or Millena (Jump away and air throw sai all day).

    Street Fighter Alpha 2 - Most players used Chun Li (insane damage on custom combos) or Ken (alpha counter with glitched range which made it too long)

    X-Men vs Street Fighter - People would constantly fly off screen with storm and use her "float" move to stay off screen to charge their super meter then come down, use a super, and fly back off screen.

    Killer Instinct - there were a number of infinate combos in KI, which I saw used in tournaments plenty of times.

    All in all I see the same crap playing games online today. Go play any FPS and 80% of the players are running around with whichever weapon is overpowered, not to mention the ones that run maphacks, aimbots, etc. Log onto a MMORPG and who usually has the most money? The people who are duping, macroing, or just exploiting stuff in game. A good example is in Star Wars Galaxies, a Jedi who uses their powers in front of any other player is subjected to instant PvP. This means Macroing any of these powers to gain experence while you are AFK is suicide. So, what the Jedi's do is they go inside a large house with a balcony, climb to the top where no one can get them and AFK macro there. While using their powers inside the house would push them outside with a temporary enemy flag to everyone, for some reason on the balcony they are immune. So that is where they camp and level.

    The point is, any game with 2 players that isn't co-op is going to have exploits/cheese and the players who exploit the cheese along with having skills in the first place are always on top of the heap.
    • The point is, any game with 2 players that isn't co-op is going to have exploits/cheese and the players who exploit the cheese along with having skills in the first place are always on top of the heap.

      This reminds me of a saying I've heard in several forms from competetive Magic: The Gathering players: "If you're not trying to break a card, why are you bothering to use it?" The people that win are the people that use the most broken unfair cards and combos.

    • Re:Cheese = Skills. (Score:4, Interesting)

      by k_187 ( 61692 ) on Tuesday April 27, 2004 @10:15AM (#8983584) Journal
      Yeah, you know what was a great game? Primal Rage, the old 2-d fighter with dinosaurs. Pretty unremarkable, but if you did the same special move most than twice in a couple seconds, it would popup and say No Cheese, and then you couldn't use that move for a while. About the only remarkable thing about that game really, didn't have too much death, mediocre graphics...

      Anyway, yeah people are crap, but that doesn't mean the designers can't make the game so that people have to play fair.
  • Cheesing is simply another strategy for kicking opponent's asses. It might not be the most desirable method, or the one that requires the most skill, but it's still a strategy nontheless.

  • Play To Win (Score:4, Interesting)

    by *BBC*PipTigger ( 160189 ) on Tuesday April 27, 2004 @10:30AM (#8983764) Journal
    There are a lot of uninformed highly-rated posts already so hopefully I can shed some light.

    Regarding shooting Pete Sampras to win in tennis: You wouldn't win the match! That's not legal within the limits of the game. Spawn camping is legal in several FPS games. Maybe the games were designed so poorly that this is the best tactic. If that's the case, you should do it better than your opponent if you want to win. If that means the game is not "fun" anymore, then play a better game. Possible within the rules of a game by definition DOES mean allowable (including exploiting bugs). Competitive games are about winning within the rules of the game... if you make up your own rules about honor, you are playing a different game that you've made up && you have no basis in reality or even agreeable reason. Scrubs cry "unfair!" but they just need an excuse to soften the blow that they can't defeat a simple tactic or that their game does not stand up well to serious competition. Do you want to win or whine?

    Regarding Soul Calibur II requiring very little skill: Think again. Soul Calibur II was designed to have a more gradual learning curve than most other fighters on purpose to be easy to pick up but don't kid yourself in thinking your "beginner attacks" could in any dreamworld be "more powerful than any advanced player's most complex combo attack". You are way off base. If this is your opinion, I know I could defeat you 63/0 with one hand. Enter a competition to test your theory rather than replying with some anecdotal evidence about your living room experiences.

    Regarding "cheese" practitioners having the capacities of "script kiddies": What do you say to someone who wins tournaments against the best players in the world with your so-called "cheese"? That they have no skill? They may have the best execution skill of anyone on the planet && also the best understanding of the game to know the greatest tactic (which could be a simple one). You're right that a simple tactic is often easily defeated so anyone wishing to win should figure it out but just because a tactic seems simple doesn't mean it's not the best thing (which you should do too && do better if you want to win).

    Regarding fighting a "cheeser" isn't going to increase your skill in the least: Of course it will increase your skill if you constantly experiment with all the tools (moves) at your disposal in order to find the best counter. In Soul Calibur II particularly, almost every move in the game (including throw attempts) can be parried (called Guard Impact [guardimpact.com] in SC2 terminology) which was designed in as a balancing feature. If you know when someone will attack next, you have the advantage. Studying even a simple tactic in order to either emulate or defeat it does make you a better player. You explore areas of the game you might not have needed to otherwise. Isn't this obvious?

    Regarding "riding a move or two all the way to victory" as the same thing as "exploiting flaws in games": If a game has a design flaw, then it is not a good game. Get over it. If there are moves in a game that are arguably the best tactics, you will learn, practice, && execute them consistently if you want to win. Your fake morality about some arbitrary realism element in FPS (players not getting tired from jumping) is foolish. Jumping is a fair part of those games. If you think games should penalize jumpers with noticable fatigue, write such a game && play it. Otherwise, you're just making up your own weird rules that most reasonable people wouldn't even agree are right. Are you playing a game? What are the rules of THAT game? I'm not asking what you think the rules SHOULD be or what you wish they were. Nobody knows your made up rules except you && I bet your rules change even on you once you start getting beat by some other tactic. Learn to play the real game.

    My close friend, David Sirlin, has written four popular articles on this
    • Competitive games are about winning within the rules of the game... if you make up your own rules about honor, you are playing a different game that you've made up && you have no basis in reality or even agreeable reason. Scrubs cry "unfair!" but they just need an excuse to soften the blow that they can't defeat a simple tactic or that their game does not stand up well to serious competition. Do you want to win or whine?

      To be entirely fair -- up until recently, many games had low production budget

    • Re:Play To Win (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Daetrin ( 576516 ) on Wednesday April 28, 2004 @03:44AM (#8994128)
      Regarding shooting Pete Sampras to win in tennis: You wouldn't win the match! That's not legal within the limits of the game.

      Is there actually a clause in whatever rulebook tennis has that says you are not allowed to shoot the other player? Even if that one is covered, is there a rule that you can't take a baseball bat to their knees ten minutes before the game starts? I seriously doubt it.

      If you tried to assult the other player before the game you'd get arrested if you were caught, however it probably wouldn't be breaking the written rules of the game itself. Steroids were presumably only made illegal because lots of people thought they were unfair and whined about them, i'm sure the original rules for most games didn't cover drug use.

      Rules change over time based on what people consider fair, and some "rules" are enforced by an authority other than the literal rules of the game. You break your opponents kneecaps and you'll get arrested by the police, spawn-camp or bunnyhop too much and you'll be ostracized or banned by the other players.

  • speaking as a sniping bastard (Score:3, Interesting)

    by beegle ( 9689 ) on Tuesday April 27, 2004 @10:33AM (#8983809) Homepage
    My "twitch" reflexes aren't very good. This means that I -really- suck at close-quarters combat in most first-person shooters. So, I grab the sniper rifle and head for the hills. It's amazing how many bunny-hoppers will sit still for a head shot as soon as they think nobody's watching.

    The thing is, I make no secret of this. In fact, I don't like "perfect" sniping spots. If you can't hit me, the game's no fun. I think the UT "lightning gun" was a beautiful compromise for snipers. My goal is to make people cringe and cower every time they enter an area with an overhead vantage point. Their extra paranoia (often justified) slows 'em down enough that I actually have a chance when I do come down to ground level.

    My preferred vantage point is on the top floor of a level within sight of the elevator or top of the stairs. That means that I have to watch my back and be ready whenever I hear the elevator. It also means that when I reveal that strategy after the game, the guy who was hit with half a dozen head shots -really- kicks himself. >:-)
    • Speaking as someone who occasionally plays the same moves repetitively in Soul Caliber/II, it would amaze me how guys would be full of their ego and choose to not block. My repeat attack was the simplest in the world: medium height strike, delay, low height strike, delay: plenty of time for a block and then counterstrike. One could say I pounded it into them to block in the first place. But still, they didn't seem to get the medium height and then the low height block in succession...

      My brother comes al
  • The one thing I hate most about gaming is people whining! I want to kick whiners in the face!

    If there's an easy-but-powerful move in a game, the best thing you can do is learn how best to counter it.

    I've put a great many hours into Mortal Kombat, Street Fighter, Soul Calibur, Q3A, etc., and in all those games, there are "cheesy" moves, but they're not unbalancing for a hardened fighter.

    OTOH, there are times when there's a bug in a game that gives one side an advantage. Eg. In EA's NHL 93 or 94, if y


  • What is the natural history of the infamous red-headed stepchild? Where did this line of homo sapien subspecies arise? Ireland? Madagascar?

  • Cheese, the noob myth (Score:5, Insightful)

    by mateomiguel ( 614660 ) <matt_the_grad&yahoo,com> on Tuesday April 27, 2004 @11:19AM (#8984384)
    Well, I play alot of games online, and I get to experience alot of gamers. I even run a small gaming guild online. I have always liked to play games against other people, and I usually try to be competitive. I've found that you can always identify newer players because they, uniformly, belive the following things:
    1. You have the rules of the game, that everyone knows, and in a computer game they cannot (usually) be broken.

    2. In addition to the rules of the game that are clearly laid out, there is another subset of 'unwritten rules' that act much like a code of honor.

    3. Each new player has his own little version of these unwritten rules, and cries foul each time that their own version of the rules is broken.

    4. These new players that play by two sets of rules consistently, and without fail, LOSE. ALL THE TIME.

    Such players will continue to lose until they see the light, and move on to the next level of gaming: playing only by the game's rules rather than their own.

    I.E. THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS CHEESE

    Now, I don't know about you, but I dislike losing. If your goal when you play a game online is to make up some sort of imaginary rule-set for yourself and the other people you are playing with, and then proceed to bitch and moan when these rules are violated, then go right ahead and do so. I won't stop you. In fact, I will aid you by becoming the person you can bitch and moan about.

    However, if your goal in playing online games is to experience the evolution of learning that good games put the player through; to practice the process of ability refinement, knowledge, and experience in a game; to just become better, then you might want to put that childish subset of rules behind you and step into a truer gaming experience.

    I firmly believe that games are thorougly healthy pursuits, and that in them you can practice many of the skills that make you successful in real life in a short amount of time. That is why I still play them, and that is why I try to play every game I play well.
  • SC and SC2 are interesting examples, because they contain an anti-cheese technique, the Guard Impact, or GI.

    The idea is, if a player uses the same move over and over and over again, their timing will become regularized. If his opponent takes notice of this, he can attempt to press towards and Guard at the same time to perform a GI, parrying the attack. This leaves the attacker wide open for a heart-stopping half-second, and the defender can then launch a counter-attack the only defense to which is perfor
  • You know, this reminds me of an audio replay commentary I heard once on WCReplays [wcreplays.com] once about how the Korean WC3 players deal with a well known cheese strat, the Orc tower rush.

    One comment the commentator made was on the difference between how Korean and American players deal with cheese tactics. He said that the American would probably say "OMG!! This cheese is so imba! Nerf it! NERF IT!!!!!" while the Korean would probably say "Ok folks, there's this new cheesy strat going around. What's the best way to
  • No one likes losing but there are different ways to lose. You can lose to a legitimately better player who is faster and more knowledgable about the game as a whole. That is a fair loss. Or you can lose cheaply. To someone that just sits there and has fast reflexes but thats it. They know one move and can do it faster than you can react. That is a cheap kill. The best way to deal with these people is to refuse to play against them. Tell them they are cheap players and find another opponent.

    I'm all
    • If you're losing to someone in a game and find them to be a one trick pony, doesn't that say more about your ability as a player than theirs? That is, if they can beat you with the same trick again and again, why should they tip their hand and show you any of their other tricks?

      Generally, I find "cheap" to be gamerese for "I lost, but I don't want to admit that someone better beat me." Obviously, genuine game bugs are a (rare) exception.

    • If they really only have one thing that they can do better than you, wouldn't it be reasonable to expect you to figure out how to leverage your superior skill in other areas to win?
  • I don't get very many opportunities to play against human opponents, but I can get VERY good at playing against the computer. The problem that the computer has is that it's often very susceptible to very simple and easy to do moves. Dead or Alive is a prime example of this. I was able to easily beat the computer over and over with just a jump kick. My cousin wasn't able to easily beat the computer. However, when a human opponent came up, for the lack of a better term: I got my ass kicked. Almost every time.
    • I'd personally like it if the computer characters had AI that changes personality. Take the beta testers, and use thier styles to shape various AI setups. It'll make the player be more well rounded and fill holes in thier style.

      Frequently, game manufacturers have trouble with piracy. The easiest way they have to work around piracy is to convert the game into a "service", so that you miss out on significant functionality if you pirate the game. Half-Life, for instance -- sure, players can pirate the game
  • I suppose camping is a derivative of Cheesing here.

    Personally, I'm a camper. I like dark maps, dark corners, boxes to hide behind, etc. And I just love catching the same person 3 times in a row in the exact same spot. They spawn, run into room, I get them from behind box. They respawn, run into room, I get them from behind same box. They respawn, run into room, I get them from behind same box. Then they tell me I've got no skill :^)

    • A matter of tactics (Score:3, Insightful)

      by 0x0d0a ( 568518 )
      When you beat someone with tactics that they are unprepared for and not experienced in countering, they get frusterated and angry.

      It happened to the British in the American Revolutionary War -- "hiding behind trees and rocks is unfair and cowardly!".

      It happened to the US in Vietnam -- "using ununiformed troops and ability to blend into civilian environments is unfair and cowardly!"

      Now it's happening to the US again in the form of bin Laden's tactics -- hit and run, avoiding allowing the enemy to get a go
  • In Tony Hawk's games your scoring exponentially decreases for repeats of the same move, this could easily be applied to beat 'em ups to reduce the amount of damage taken by repeats of the same attack.

    Any cheating like this could easily be captured and worked around in playtesting, it's not like it's difficult to fix. It just smacks of lazy programming.

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