The Hunt For The Craziest Status Effects In Fighting Games 

Bro always has unique topics

alright, i'm sold. all new fighting games need weather cycles. let's get Toxic Sandstorm Spikes going in fatal fury

I love how there are a bunch of generic topics and then the last one is just "touhou hisotensoku" This game is so random, i love it

Soku definitely deserves it's own video. The game's so unique, full of interesting mechanics, and most of those mechanics aren't Typhoon or River Mist.

Cheers, I'm the Iku at 13:10, always love seeing our silly game get some attention.

Talk about Soku! is a really fun/wild game with a very active community. The fact that everyone was surprised with Asuka's gameplay in Strive when customization of moveset on cards and resource management is part of every character in Soku hahaha

Fun fact: The weathers were rebalanced in Soku compared to base game, SWR. Most notably, Spring Haze in SWR just disables melee outright.

A dedicated Soku video sounds like a real fun prospect. I support it. Nice video overall, as well. Always liked the extra layers that status effects can create in other games, so seeing them done well in fighting games is always a joy.

hisoutensoku mentioned! thanks for bringing soku up. a full video would be cool, but as with most fighting games, explaining where the depth comes from can't fully express the depth itself. unlike other fighters, though, knowing about other fighting games won't help you understand soku much. normal concepts like whiffpunishes and mixups exist and are easy to spot in soku, but the decision-making around them is usually completely different. all this is to say, it's a unique enough game that the only way to know the experience is to play it.

I'm a dimple man. I see people acknowledge Hisoutensoku in a duscussion of fighting games, I click.

It's funny seeing Soku's weather being praised as when it came out in Hisouten it was super hated by most, the weather was reworked in Soku, but it didn't feel ths much different at first, they did more balance changes later on. I think the video is missing some other things that make the weather interesting, as going unga bunga in typhoon is fun, but most weather effects have interesting properties.

Hisoutensoku mentioned, thats cool! Funny enough, aside from the Weather System having various global effects, there are some Supers (Spellcards) that would also count towards being buffs/debuffs or ailments, so Soku really got it all in the Status Effect department. Aside from that, I think a deep dive into the game would be quite interesting as the game isn't discussed enough in the common FG circles and there is a lack of videos or material that actually discusses the Gameplay elements proper, especially considering how complex or messy the Offense and Defense can be with the lack of throws/proper high-low mixups and defense being astoundingly powerful. It's been 15 or so years and the game sometime still feels in its infancy when it comes to a complete understanding on how to play it optimally.

Very small almost meaningless correction: Calm gives you the spotlight on HIT, not on knockdown. It also trades back and forth if a player is hit again during that Calm. In the case of a trade that knocks down, the player who wakes up first gets the spotlight (as is in the video). Thanks for making this, it's well researched and a good acknowledgement of a big part of what makes soku a fun system to play around with.

A dedicated Soku video would go unbelievably hard. Iv only watched like 2 videos so far but banger content dude ❤

Oh my god I would LOVE a dedicated Soku video. Soku in my opinion is the most under-appreciated fighting game that definitely deserves to at least known because I mean- it’s very unique in many ways and its just overall very special to me.

only played it casually and mostly a decade+ ago, but it feels like i see people asking for a game like soku all the time - short combos to spend more time interacting, customization in the form of decks, unique interactions and strategies all over. the cards that completely change a special move for the rest of the round (or just level it up) are such a cool concept, like the opposite of that deranged lab coat debuff. it also has a great community rollback patch w/quickplay (it's a discord game for the most part, but its not impossible to find ppl ingame at peak hrs - hopefully even easier after getting the exposure!) also, and i cannot stress this enough: patchy best 2hu

Dawg This might actually be the best FGC channel on YT

I really, really, really like how p4a did the status effects. They translated so many things from the rpgs its actually nuts

This came up on my radar specifically due to Soku. I adore this game with all my heart and I'm glad you mentioned it! It's fun, too, how the timer being completely replaced by the weather system means that there's no way to stall out a win by health lead. Everyone needs to interact in order to secure the victory. As an aside, Calm gives you the healing effect on hit, it doesn't require a knockdown (which the footage itself ended up showing anyway). And as an aside aside, I would love to see a dedicated Soku video!

SOKU MENTIONED RAHHHHH genuinely recommend people give it a shot if they’ve never tried it, there’s no other fighting game like soku and for good reason oh and fun fact, the game has received community rollback not once, but twice

Soku is one of those games that is so unique in how it pushes the boundaries of fighting game mechanics. It's in a league of its own, honestly.

The wildest status effect I can think of on a fighting game character is probably on the modded yomi character sunshower. Sunshower uses a status effect called sinking which he can apply to himself or the opponent in a bunch of different ways, and the short explanation of how it works is it's a stackable status that accelerates the character's negative penalty gain, forcing both players to become more aggressive as their sinking builds over the course of the game. Sunshower himself also gains a crap ton of different advantages from applying sinking to himself and to the opponent, pretty much all his moves (normals, specials, supers, even movement options) gain unique buffs at certain sinking levels or on hitting an opponent with enough sinking, sinking gives him a damage multiplier which helps with his pretty low base damage, he can spend meter to convert sinking into another status called protection which gives him a defense buff, spend sinking on umbrellas which can be used as projectiles that apply sinking to either player on contact or to launch yourself off them, transfer sinking to the opponent with certain moves, and at enough sinking his guard break inflicts sinking deluge, which burns all of the opponent's sinking to completely erase their health bar. Sunshower is literally an rpg character directly ported into a fighting game and I'm all for it Edit: yes I know sunshower comes from limbus company, I just didn't mention it because my comment was getting super long and my project moon knowledge is pretty much nonexistent so I can't really compare it to the source material, he looks like an incredibly good adaptation of the character though

Hisoutensoku sounds like such an interesting game! Even the card mechanic is so fun to mess around with

Always loved status effects and buff/debuff stuff in fighting games they are usually very dynamic and unique

Yooooo using "today is special yesterday was not" for this video, based man

A dedicated Soku video would be really cool!

Thank you for covering Soku, it's a criminally underrated gem and outside of weather the game has a ocean of extremely unique mechanics. The English speaking community recently had it's 300th weekly tournament which was a absolute treat to watch (On Tessiro, the TO's RU-vid channel) if anyone is interested in seeing some of the highest level gameplay.

yoooo finally soku's appeared on the list. the only one i've seen FGC content creator discuss this underated game. the mechanic is fun and has a lot of depth. hoping for you one day talks about the jishin reset on Soku.

Soku mentioned, let's go! 13:55 Holy shit it's Tessiro! Crazy to see names you recognize in videos like this.

YES I DO! Talk about Soku, please!

Please make the Soku video. I played Touhou Luna Nights a few years back and ever since I've been dreaming with having Sakuya on a fighting game 'cause I loved her mechanics. I've even looked up the Touhou fg's but didn't understand enough to realize what was going on, but with your brief explanation, I just felt really curious to try Soku myself. Graze is another bullet hell mechanic they used masterfully in Luna Nights, so to have it in a FG seems amazing.

A Soku video would be great, I first discovered it through someone hosting it on Parsec Arcade (back when that was a thing...) and it's definitely a complicated game to get into

I am a simple man. I see what looks like soku, I click.

I have a feeling this will be a huge part of 2XKO. Several champions have unique mechanics that will probably find their way into the game in some form. Ori ball, Illaoi tentacles, Ekko rewind, etc.

Holy shit there's an input lag status effect in Skullgirls? That's hilarious.

Oh man i was waiting for the soku mention. That game is insane. I wish i was good at it

Shoutout to Taz in Multiversus for his seasoning system: He can shake salt and pepper shakers onto an opponent and hit them with other food items to apply levels of “Tasty” status to them. When their Tasty level is full, this immediately activates the “Cooked” status: they are temporarily transformed into a whole roast chicken that can’t attack, only run away.

I don't know if you're considering platform fighters as eligible for discussion (not that the genre matters that much for the game I'm bring up) but Rivals of Aether is a great example of statuses and meters being a core component of the game. While not containing universal statuses like Soku, a good portion of the Rivals cast operate around some kind of buff/debuff application. Thought it'd be interesting to bring up because it's rare to see a game give so many characters their own individual micro-goals

soku will always have a special place in my heart, even if I don't really play it any more, because its the only fighting game that has sanae (but then when I lose with her I feel extra bad...)

Oh my god that weather system is like GRD on crack & I love it.

Touhou fighting games have some of the most unhinged and ridiculous mechanics, it's just fantastic all through out to mess with Hisoutensoku also needing you to craft your own decks is a great way of making the experience even more unique The amount of customization you can do to each character from their deck is insane with that all the 4-5 command inputs can be switched out or in with the corresponding cards. Allowing you to completely mix up your kit, gameplan, supers, just everything. Heck, have you seen a super that can do damage in the next round? I certainly haven't before this game, Sanae and Patchouli has that as a 5cost super, you can literally activate it at the end of a round and the effect lasts long enough to be still there to provide advantage in the next round. Is it good is another question, but the fact that it's possible is hilarious. Each game with each character is very unique due to what you can do with each character, you can make each character play in very different ways, in a sense, just from a kit stand point, it's like Smash 4 but way more interesting in every way. The weather also makes sure that no two fights are exactly the same, you have to always adapt to the new weather. Snow literally lets you decrease your opponents super gauge, River mist absolutely fricks with all your spacing, Heavy Mist gives everyone life steal, there's just more and more, from funny effects such as whoops no one gets to see what their selected super is to simple effects such as melee is more effective, or to more shenaniganry effects that can outright turn the tide with supers costing one less to use. It's just so incredible. The later fighting games are also all very unique For example there's also a character that literally acts on her own at times and so playing her is almost like needing to do teamwork with someone else. Both HM and ULiL also has some really unique game mechanics, though sadly I wish AoCF was better at this, it's mechanic is far less unique compared to the previous ones

Oh a dedicated Soku video would be an absolute treat

soku isn’t even the only 2hu fighter. There’s several of them, all with their own gimmick! soku might have the most active community, but I def recommend giving them all a shot

Fun fact! There are 6 different touhou fighting games, soku is the 3rd in the series

A Soku video would be really cool to be honest

Everything comes back to Touhou. It's inescapable.

Soku video would be very much appreciated! I absolutely love this game.

Soku mention! Hoo boy, this man's about to talk about the weather

SOKU, HELL YES!

As a long-time Touhou fan and general FGC outsider, I really WOULD like to see that full-coverage Hisotensoku video. :V

another qmanchu video... (lee voice) excellent... lol heres some ideas off the cuff what about a video on how weapons (sword, guns, a knife on the floor) are like designed. or whos got the best weapon in all of fighting game (best as in broken) also a video about "freaks/monsters" in FGs could be cool but i would wait for halloween lol

oh i would love to see a video dedicate to soku that game is crazy, especially cirno

Go for Soku! that game is so deep and layered it's Crazy. There is a deck building element that allows your character to evolve over the match based on what kind of deck you built and whether you spend your cards on supers, changing your specials, or upgrading your specials.

As an avid soku player and enjoyer, I love getting any content on it. I always feel like the Touhou fighting games get overlooked a lot, and if anyone talks about one it's normal aocf.

soku weather my beloved

Haven't played Hisotensoku for years. But, it's crazy fun and dynamic. You should definitely do a video on it, as there's so much to it. Like the spell card system and how it can upgrade or change moves, the unique abilities of the characters, even the movement of some characters. I think there's a weather effect that gives hyper armor. The mixups between bullets and melee can be crazy.

Lovely video as always!! I'd love to see your take on the various training modes in fighters from old to new.

I would love a soku video!

Hisoutensoku sleeper agents wake up, tell about how much typhoon has ruined our matches

Always love to see your videos show up on my feed, even with the homepage being like shit and the bell not doing a thing apparently. Looking forward to ur next one! Did not even realize that Touhou game was this wild

SOKU VIDEO, CLICKED AS SOON AS I SAW THE THUMBNAIL/

dude, this is genuinely such a unique and interesting topic i love the way you edit as well, you’ve definitely earned a sub

Figured this was going to be about characters that can affect stats given LC21 in the community post tease. Great job as always!

This was really interesting! I remember first seeing Persona 4 Arena back in the day and being blown away they had "RPG mechanics" in a fighting game, and now it's interesting to see how this has evolved over time. While I have issue with how the games beta was handled and it's business model, Multiversus is also pretty interesting in this regard. They take a lot of inspiration from MOBAs when designing characters, so a good chunk of the cast have buffs and debuffs. You have self-explanatory ones like Slow or Weaken but then there's things like Steven Universe's Bubbled status or Taz's Tasty status. Both require hitting the opponent with specific moves to inflict and then building up stacks of the debuff before it finally procs and the effect kicks in. Steven puts his enemies in a bubble, where they cannot move or attack (or BE attacked) for several seconds, basically turning things into a 2v1 in team matches, while Taz's Tasty debuff turns enemies into roasted chickens which can't attack but only flee from the hungry Tasmanian Devil who can either KO them or use his other special move to eat them and restore even more of his health than normal. If that game manages to stick it's relaunch (which I'm....kinda doubtful it will), they're bound to have more interesting characters and statuses too.

Nice video dude :). Would love to see a vid about soku

Thank you!!! I've recently been looking for the exact thing you described, a fighting game with debuffs as a central mechanic, because of Marvel Contest of Champions. Even though it's a mobile fighting game with no real pvp, i thought the way buffs and debuffs are used was super interesting and hoped a proper fighting game existed that used a similar idea. I researched a bit but this is the first I've heard of soku. Even though it's not exactly what I was looking for, the whole weather mechanic reminds me a bit of rpgs like pokemon which could be super fun and I think that more fighting games should use rpg elements. Keep up the good content!

A full Hisotensoku video would be great 🎉

Best Status effect in a fighting game. Level 3 X Factor + Dark Phoenix MVC3...

I’d love a video on Hisotensoku, that’d be really cool to watch. Nice vid.

Yes, please. One soku video please.

For the ailments part, great example of it being implimented well is the fox clone in rivals of aether, the fire tick damage is really weak and doesn't last very long, but if he hits a burning enemy with a smash attack it will do much more damage, rewarding good setplay/reads and offense which the character is designed around

Alright a Soku video would be awesome, I'm on board with that

Every other comment is about Soku! We love, LOVE this game!!! Now, more importantly Tasogare Frontier; Twilight Frontier; TasoFro; ZUN, or WHOEVER! Needs to see this because we NEED another installment… MORE!

Commend you for putting so much effort into the intro’s editing

I just found this channel and I must say I’m hooked on all the ideas and content here, I see a bright future for this channel if interesting videos like this keep coming

More soku content? Absolutely!

Holy shit I didn't think people knew about Hisotensoku

hisoutensoku? subscribed!

soku is a wild game thats for sure. its also the only fighting game where you can kind-off change your move set on the fly through the card system (until you are stuck with the last one you used. i could be wrong though)

This game really needs more attention, it does so many things that are unique to itself and more often than not are copied, like one of the design notes for Marie in skullgirls on the old kickstarter campaign for dlc characters had this sakuya as a design reference

I don't really know much about fighting games (or pvp-focused games in general) but I'm a huge touhou fan. I didn't realize hisotensoku was so unusual, so this was interesting to watch. Soku isn't the only touhou fighter, by the way, though the others (aside from Scarlet Weather Rhapsody) don't use the weather system. instead, Immaterial and Missing Power is (as i understand it) a fairly standard fighter, and the other three (Hopeless Masquerade, Urban Legend in Limbo, and Antimony of Common Flowers) have the characters be constantly airborne. (HM also has an odd mechanic based around winning support from in-game spectators)

I'd love a dedicated Soku video. It's one of the hardest fighting games out there because of its neutral and other systems you have to manage, but it's also on the easier end for execution so it's pretty easy to pick up. I really recommend finding games and asking question in the global Soku discord

TOUHOU SOKU MENTIONED, absolute dub

Valentine from Skullgirls' reverse controls vial, increased hit-stun vial and poison vials are all crazy to me

Great video! 👍

My favorite buff in fighting games has to be in guilty gear with bedman. His error6E is so fun for pressure and a really unique way to buff himself

>Not including Ultra Fight Da Kyanta's Dr. K 5B >Just landing 5B forces your opponent to auto-jump

HISOUTENSOKU MENTIONED

I'd absolutely love to hear more about Soku, my god that weather stuff is so cool

Touhou looks sick, I’d be very interested in a dedicated video

My biggest takeaway from Part 1 and 2 out of the Fighting Games I've played is that I am...very grateful we will never see another character like Parace L'Sia ever again Labcoat 21 was already overtuned as a debuffer, but the elven devil of Arcana Heart truly is the ultimate antithesis of this as she had everything everywhere all at once with the overtuning and no downsides. Something I don't know if they ever toned down for her playable debut in Six Stars given she was purely a boss for so long that it felt like Arc and Team Heart were genuinely terrified of making her playable.

JoJo ASB has some wild status effects like, Rohan's Heaven's Door seal, Pucci's disc stealing or Fugo's virus that affects both him and the opponent.

I wouldn’t say that lab coat’s debuff is the main thing that makes her good in a game where a combo not killing is genuinely surprising everyone can tod it’s just a matter of how much resources it takes. And honestly zamastu takes much less resources to get those tods and can do it off a kii blast potentially so honestly imo he was honestly still the best character assuming perfect play he’s just also one of the if not the hardest character. Lab coat was just significantly easier to play which take a lot of the mental overhead off the table so you can put your brainwork into more then ok don’t drop the combo gotta be prepared to tod from full screen off any random kii blast I do,

In this Aurora Typhoon...

Akatsuki Blitzkampf: Sai, that's all that is needed to be said

I'd like to put forth that poison in Smash doesn't end when the afflicted lands a hit, but then again the standard for Smash is getting knocked out of the map, not running out of health.

At the moment i saw sanae on the thumbnail and saw it was YOU who made this video i was sold and needed to watch it.

Soku was the first fighting game I ever played. It was an... interesting introduction to the genre, and I was too young to really understand how absurd it was.

We love to see Soku love That aside, I'd be besides myself if I didn't bring up Pokken. Like in core pokemon, stat buffs and debuffs are a core mechanic and there are a good number of moves that get buffed operate differently depending on how buffed or debuffed you or the other mon are.

Argagarg in fantasy strike does poison pretty well because it's not a slow health drain but rather in this game you have between 5 and 8 hp depending on the character and what argagarg does is throw a poison fish that poisons 2 of your hp and a timer that starts running down when it gets to 0 it removes 1health and if there is still poisoned health it starts over. (you can stack it but it just increases the number of poisonned hp it doesn't kill any faster). And of course if you get hit the poison disappears from all poisoned HP. What makes it really interesting is that it's less gradual, if arg keeps you out until the end of the timer you lose 1hp, if he doesn't he achieves nothing (and worse cause throwing poison has an opportunity cost that means you're not throwing something else). Another cool status effect in this game is armor break. In this game chip damage when blocking is also not a small amount of damage, it applies a status effect that make one of your hit points flash. If you block another special it flashes faster and if you block a third you take 1 damage. But if you manage to not get hit for a bit it reset and you take no damage. This tend to change the risk/reward for actions because a safe action that you are comfortable blocking the first two time suddenly becomes dangerous if you block it a third. And in this game onimaru has a special effect where if he chips you he armor breaks you, instead of the normal chip he just straight up hit through your guard (the difference being that you take the full damage and hitstun, which really matters when his normals also chip and can deal two damage).