PS2 Arcade vs Arrange mode difference.

[Shirakani]

Ok, some good things are that certain chars with previously almost worthless LDM's, like Iori, have gotten changes. Iori's is back to his KOF2k3 speed for instance.

But, here is the single WORST change that EVERYBODY will hate, and make sure that no one uses Arrange, ever.

It COMPLETELY, totally, utterly BREAKS the crouch poke timing in general. The normal Arcade poke timing is similar to NGBC, ie, spammy, go for your life. Arrange changes it somewhat to almost KOF98 type, and increases lag UNIVERSALLY between almost all pokes.

The worst affected character by this is Gato. It renders his usual combos IMPOSSIBLE to do. He can't even do close D 2hit, cB anymore, and he could in Garou, geez. This effectively makes him well...from S tier to prolly C or B tier. His crouch B becomes like his KOF2k3 version....almost worthless.

Kula is also harshly affected, her pokes are far more difficult to chain and combo off, as well as seeming to have slightly more pushback.

Oswald isn't hit too hard by this as he can still reliably do cB cA. But still....

Still, this is a MASSIVE, gamebreaking change that many, including myself, will despise. If the game was designed like this from day 1, then yes, ok, fine. But it's not, and this will break MANY characters in the name of balance. The S tier are arguably nerfed down to A or B tier coz of this, Gato definetly is kicked down to probably C tier.

So...take your pick. Anyone who's played the arcade game will DESPISE this change and will never touch Arrange mode. However if you're totally new to XI, you may want to give this a shot.

Either way....this is THE single most noticable change, and it's a horrible one...[/b]

[Bugle/Hawk'M]

Now, granted, I have yet to play XI because of various circumstances, but I've heard my fair share of bitching about how overpowered the Kula Gato Oswald team is. So why are you complaining that they changed the game in a way to balance the tiers? Wasn't that the whole point of making an Arrange mode in the first place? I mean, of course you can't use arrange mode to practice for your arcade play, that's why the arcade mode is still there. The point of the arrange mode was to make a more balanced game so that when people are playing against each other on it, they can play on a more balanced ground and not have to worry as much about top tier character abuse.

[-Defuser-]

He was expected KGO to be nerfed to A tier at least somehow got nerfed 2 or 3 tiers down which make me believe me that other Chars may get nerf down alot also due to it. But that's my guess....

[Iie-Kyo]

Here's a brief wrapup of what they did to the system:

- Rolls are slower with more vulnerability frames at the end. Kinda similar to 2k2, not as bad as 2k3's rolls.

- Jumps/hops seem slightly slower, but I'm probably seeing things.

- As Shirakani said, A and B button pokes are less spammable. This is ENTIRELY a your mileage may vary view, but it DOES screw up people's timings for a lot of moves, and makes some combos impossible, and yes it does fuck with the Unholy Three, but since I was the main source of the bitching, I'm pretty damned happy. I don't mind the '98 timing change, but as Bugle pointed out, we're not playing Arranged mode to "prepare" for the arcade, we will be playing it for the balance.

- Hitstun from jump in attacks greatly reduced, especially light attacks. None of this early hop B/A business into pokey pokey pokey combo of your choice. You must be accurate with your hop in - this of course makes Kyo's hop B whoring weakened, but again, if it takes several top tiers down with him, I don't mind. This especially nerfs Clark's hop A - way too easy to hop EARLY with it and still land a combo from it, wtf.

- Characters land funny... it's ALMOST like 2k3 landing, but not quite.

There's probably more, I need to do some more messing around to see what they did to everyone, but it's like exploring a new game, that's not quite new. From what I can tell, SNKP basically said "slow the hop whoring rushdown shit down folks, it's being overdone" with Arranged mode. Stuff in general "feels" slower - not the specials - SNKP's not stupid enough to nerf 90% of the cast to uselessness like they did with 2k3 - but rather the overall engine speed seems to have changed. For the better? I dunno, but now that hop whoring has been weakened this may give the lower tiers a chance to shine.

Kinda fun trying to see what they nerfed and de-nerfed. Maybe Momoko has some decent defensive moves now! :LOL:

[Shirakani]

Some characters actually got noticable buffs, while others were totally ANALLY raped with a spiked baton. Duck for example, got totally anally raped, he can link NOTHING with his pokes now, NOTHING.

Whereas say, Iori got his LDM improved. It's now back to it's 2k3 startup and comboability, but it loses it's full body invunerability on flash as a tradeoff. Tho that is also good.

There's definetly other changes but we'll have to play more to find out. Kula can't go cB cB sB sB +C anymore as easily, but she can still link 3 standing B's into +C, and 3 crouch B's into +C...Her +C however feels funny...i need a 2nd opinion on this...

[alexis]

As soon as I get the game I'll tell my share of bitching/praise for Arrange mode.

But for now, people, calm down. KGO was the 03/Duo Lon of this game. They had to be nerfed. Also, a LOT of people were complaining that this game was too poke-friendly, and now suddenly reducing pokes is a bad thing? If you like the pokey-pokey-pokey play Arcade mode. It is a direct conversion of the arcade game, complete with (I suppose) pokey-pokey, unblockable moves and an unstoppable Ace.

Actually, speaking of the Ace, can someone post the arrangements done to it for Arrange mode? I hope it got nerfed like it damn well should.

[Iie-Kyo]

More information regarding pokes.

The statement that pokes has been nerfed is true, BUT, and I'd definitely like to add a huge but statement here, it is ENTIRELY character dependent. They're spammable, but in a slower manner - some characters can spam them, some characters can't.

i.e. with Kyo, Terry, and Ryo's crouch attacks

Kyo - B slightly slower, not as spammable. crouch A seems about the same.

Terry - B slightly slower. crouch A slightly slower.

Ryo - B no longer spammable - this was the way his old B was in the older KoFs, there's a slight lag in between each one. His crouch A is still spammable - far A not as spammable.

Gamebreaking for these three characters? Hardly not in my opinion. Their combo timing hasn't changed that much, I can still transition between the arcade and arrange mode timing for the characters I play with no problem. And more importantly, my gameplay doesn't change TOO much, since I wasn't a pokey pokey player anyway.

This will of course vary depending on how abuseable your characters normals were. If you were dependent upon the pokey pokeyness of some of your characters, you will probably be hurting more than I am, I guess.

[SonicWaver]

this "nerfing" to Gato and Kula tells me that indeed, programmers overpowered them in XI. (yeah, programmers do mistakes...and big ones)

I can only imagine Gato as close as he actually was in 2K3. (still dangerous but easy to beat...not as his arcade/original counterpart xD)


if only you could play like this at arcades....all those poor KGO lovers...broken. I´d pay to see that around here.

can someone verify if Ash still can´t connect close s.C>b. B into qcfx2+K ??

(maybe they fixed him that)

[J]-[UN]

actually...gato in 2k3 was really strong as well....but rather difficult to use...

If there was no KGO, it would be KKD (Kyo Kim Duck)...take ur pick

[Shirakani]

Ok, someone correct me if i'm wrong but this is what i've noticed with KGO, as well as some other chars in Arrange. Of course, this is not everything so feel free to add to the list.

Gato:
cB nerfed to near worthless, only possible link is cB cA, of which the timing is odd coz it seems like they made it so that it can ONLY cancel into cA. cA cancels into DM so the new combo is cB cA DM. close D executes a lot slower as well. combo of close D 1hit, +B, B, palm DM, is intact.

Kula:
Pokes still link, amazingly. +C feels REALLY odd tho, it seems to slide a bit on the ground THEN launch, not to mention it's invunerability SEEMS lesser but this could be a side product of the slower startup. +C can still combo off the poke B's.

Oswald:
cB cA now requires EXACT timing to link, you can't just tap cB cA with practically no timing and expect it to link. cA is still spammable but has a degree of timing as well. ACE followup seems to happen a LOT easier...But as a tradeoff, the big one, his Joker will NOT juggle off a lot of things now. In fact, i've yet to find a juggle that will allow this to combo now... Otherwise, the timing of Oswald's slash chains are pretty much untouched.

Malin:
LDM is no longer 0 frame startup, but it's still fast enuf to combo.

Eiji:
Odd, almost untouched...cA sC still links, but the activation distance seems shorter...cB's and cA's feel the same.

Duck:
Raped to near worthless, is my opinion...I can't find a single link for his A and B attacks barring cA sB, and the timing is EXTREMELY severe. Does he even have any OTHER options?

Kyo:
close C, f+B no longer links! cB cA +D much harder to time. Orochinagi seems to have more startup lag than before, now to juggle it off the +D,D, you must hesitate between the hits. Still no manual delay required like 2k3 tho. Why they nerfed Kyo and left Ex Kyo untouched is beyond me. As many ppl have prolly suspected, the NGBC chars do not have two modes since they are console specific, so there is only the one balance for them regardless of what mode you pick. So with the KGO nerfing here, this officially makes Ex Kyo the Duolon 2k3 of XI.

[Empyrian]

For there can be no true balance.

For those who desires a shortcut. Use Geese. Now go forth and crush the competition. XD

[Wolfie]

Already use Geese & others.







LMAO

[Iie-Kyo]

Kula:
Pokes still link, amazingly. +C feels REALLY odd tho, it seems to slide a bit on the ground THEN launch, not to mention it's invunerability SEEMS lesser but this could be a side product of the slower startup. +C can still combo off the poke B's.

* hop C is not as abuseable, as I said it won't be because of the lesser hitstun. Can't early hop C bs anymore - you can still do it, but now you don't automatically get a free std C into ghey combo. + C is more floaty, it goes more UPWARDS then forwards, which reduces the range. AND MORE IMPORTANTLY, you can recovery roll from the + C, which grabbers can grab you from the recovery lag after recovery rolling - ala 2k2.
* LDM does not have the juggle anywhere property, it is slower and Diana in the LDM travels lower, so it's not as easy to anti-air with it.

Malin:
LDM is no longer 0 frame startup, but it's still fast enuf to combo.

* Her yoyo comes out much faster - not as fast as 2k3, but you can actually throw it out while trying to zone and NOT get stuffed in the face - also less recovery lag from throwing the yoyo.
* Her air AC attack "moves" almost as fast as it did in 2k3, meaning, you can do the "next" part of the attack earlier, which gives her a little bit of the unpredictability she lost when they nerfed it in Arcade mode XI. She still "twirls" when she finishes it, though.

Kyo:
close C, f+B no longer links! cB cA +D much harder to time. Orochinagi seems to have more startup lag than before, now to juggle it off the +D,D, you must hesitate between the hits. Still no manual delay required like 2k3 tho.

* Close C, f + B LINKS, but doesn't combo - IMO this isn't a big loss, because you can still do close C, + D (1 hit) into whatever you want as a clutch.
* B isn't spammable, as I pointed out.
* B A timing isn't that strict IMO.
* Other than that, Kyo didn't get any significant changes in terms of move speed. The only other noticeable change he got was the Kamikura damage, but that's it. He is STILL very much solid.

Ryo:
* B isn't spammable
* far A isn't spammable

Terry:
* Very big change, the Buster Wolf is STILL fast, and it's still Gato-style omgwtf good, but the thing does about 30% more damage than it did before - so it goes from doing shit damage to GOOD damage.
* Terry's two hitter std C is back to its 2k3 style. The command is std C, E. In XI Arcade, you couldn't cancel the E part into a special like you could in 2k3. You could only link Terry's Buster Wolf from it, and when I mean link, I mean just do it, it doesn't cancel - his Buster Wolf was that fast. Now you can do it 2k3 style, std C, E, into whatever you want.
* B not as spammable.

Iori:
* Suffers less damage scaling overall - especially from his B&B std C into Aoi Hana.
* A still spammable - very scrub friendly.
* LDM is back to 2k3 speed, so can be used to cap people out of the air if they jump in wrong.
* Lily Break (i.e. Iori's air crossover kick) has a smaller hitbox, for some reason.

Kim:
* His x 2 + K DM is MUCH faster, almost 2k2 fast.

If there was no KGO, it would be KKD (Kyo Kim Duck)...take ur pick

In Arrange Mode, KKD is actually not that good of a team, since Duck apparently sucks. Kyo's decent, can't seem to tell what they did with Kim though...

More to come as I figure things out.

[Shirakani]

Yah, sorry, i meant Kyo's close C f+B doesn't COMBO, blah. Also, cB, cA +D 1hit is harder, much harder to combo off, seems to be back to KOF NW timing due to the loss of spam on the cA.

Kamikura, is it just me or does it do LESS damage?

Someone also needs to find out how to play Duck now...It seems to me after a bit of testing that his sole 'life' is now resting on doing nothing but abusing his blankaball. He can link practically nothing, at all...I've been doing stuff off his close D, but that's all that seems to work.

[Slapper Joe]

Griffon's s.A has been slowed down to mediocreness while his c.A is now Hugo speed, at least 3/4x faster than before. I'm seeing c.A (or 2), hcb+A being a major part of his game now. No other specials will combo of the c.A though.

Kensou can (obviously) no longer f+B in his juggles. A fireball is a lot faster now and that is going to hurt him. (air) qcb+P, c.Ax2 isn't as friendly anymore, one c.A is easy enough.

Can't find a single change for Athena. Syo changes are in his thread.