Coliseum

Abare. Okizeme. The Shimmy. Beyond execution, matchups, and a number of other important bits of information, newcomers to the fighting genre are tasked with picking up these terms in order to effectively communicate within the community while assisting their own growth in their game of choice. One such entry from the admittedly large fighting game lexicon is “option select.” To give newcomers a (very close) look at what an option select is, as well as to dismantle some common misconceptions tied to the techniques, BROKENTIER’s Jay “Viscant” Snyder has dedicated this week’s entry in his “Hit the Ground Running” series to them.

Aside from offering insights into specific option selects, ranging from simple cancel window abuse to advanced mechanics like the fuzzy jump, Viscant makes two main points in this post. First–and this is aimed more at those less familiar with the mechanic–the game doesn’t always pick the best option for every situation. The most well-crafted option selects will be able to find ways around more situations than the poorly-crafted ones, but even the best ones have counter play.

Second, option selects as a whole probably won’t be going anywhere. Yes, Capcom could make more restrictive inputs, or implement other systems along the lines of what they’re doing with regard to the crouch-tech-like option select we’ve been seeing in some form or another since very early builds, but, as Viscant notes, “[t]his may seem fine, even preferable to the advanced player but for beginning level players this would make the game a lot more frustrating.”

As such, handling option selects becomes a weird battle for the folks at Capcom, perhaps one of picking a crowd to cater to. When looking to expand the influence of your everyday street fight, or to make street fights an everyday part of more lives in the first place, smart money is on keeping inputs that are a little more user-friendly, even if it does mean a proliferation of such unsavory tactics. And even if Capcom truly brandished their torches and pitchforks en masse and drove our current compendium of option selects to the hills, let’s face it: the fighting game community is full of lab monsters. Option selects would still find a way.

Viscant leaves us with a note that he plans his next post to be about the ever popular wakeup jab, so you can look forward to that next week. If you’d like to see this week’s post in full, you can do so at the link below.

Source: BROKENTIER