Arc System Works and Keeping Games Alive
Why it’s important that the developer has consistently shown community support
It’s been a wild time to get into the FGC over the past two years, especially if you played anime fighters. Granblue Fantasy Versus and Under Night In-Birth Exe:Late CL-R launched directly into the COVID-19 pandemic with poor netcode to boot. As a consequence, without live events, both games hemorrhaged players down to only the most dedicated, and the fan-led push for rollback netcode being implemented in modern titles grew stronger. Amidst official implementations of rollback in indie games like Them’s Fightin’ Herds and Skullgirls, outsourced third-party retrofits in SNK games like Garou: Mark of the Wolves, fanmade fixes that end up forcing direct action like in Street Fighter V, and totally unique projects like Slippi, it was clear how important it was to be able to play fighting games properly online.
Eventually, Arc System Works threw their hat in the ring ahead of the launch of Guilty Gear Strive. In the same breath, they announced that their upcoming title would have rollback netcode (after popular demand and several surveys,) and that the GGPO+R fan project would become an official part of the Steam version of Guilty Gear XX Accent Core +R. When GGPO+R was officially patched in, and then GGST’s rollback betas went live, it was clear that ArcSys had knocked their implementation out of the park. Once GGST finally came out, it would be the first modern Japanese-developed fighting game to implement rollback netcode successfully since Marvel vs. Capcom Infinite, and likewise the only non-Capcom title from Japan to have it in the current generation of titles.
ArcSys’s implementation of rollback clearly had a major impact on the rest of the genre, especially in Japan. Melty Blood Type Lumina launched with rollback netcode (although the implementation had some issues due to the small development team and the lack of a proper beta test) and SNK announced that King of Fighter XV would feature rollback for its online play as well. But this also left other games and communities in the dust in the meantime. ArcSys directors stated publicly that, while some games were out of their hands (namely games where other IPs and developers are involved, like Granblue Fantasy Versus and Dragon Ball FighterZ,) they would be looking into retrofitting rollback into the other titles in their library, as well as putting it into games they would be developing in the future, like Dungeon Fighter Online Duel. We don’t have any official word about whether DNFD actually has rollback or not, but I guess we’ll find out this coming weekend. (12/17/2021 edit: Our prayers have been answered.)
With DBFZ and GBVS improbable, and Persona 4 Arena Ultimax two generations removed, the only remaining games in ArcSys’s library were Guilty Gear Xrd, BlazBlue Central Fiction, and BlazBlue Cross Tag Battle. Eventually, ArcSys made good on their promise, and after CEO 2021 Guilty Gear Strive Top 8, they announced that both modern BlazBlue titles would receive rollback retrofits, with BBCF’s beta launching the next day and running until its official launch in February 2022. BBTAG’s rollback would debut sometime later in 2022, and both games’ implementations were once again being worked on by an officially contracted fan team, this time the developers responsible for the BBCF Improvement Mod. Furthermore, much to everyone’s surprise, ArcSys and Atlus announced a Steam, Nintendo Switch, and PlayStation 4 port of Persona 4 Arena Ultimax, updated to version 2.50, which succeeds the arcade patch never released on the console version.
I’ve written at length before about why supporting features like rollback, cross-play, and other robust online quality of life is important. I’ve also discussed how important it is to support games you may enjoy, new or old, even if those games lack such features. However, if your game is fortunate enough to receive developer updates long after its initial release cycle, and those updates retroactively add necessary quality of life, then a lot of the hard work the community has to put in to keep their game alive gets much easier. In the case of GGPO+R and the BlazBlue updates, it’s also a matter of ArcSys officially supporting fan efforts to improve the game. While we don’t know if P4AU2.50 will have rollback in it just yet, there will obviously be a fervent movement to confirm such details or add it to the game post-launch, which will likely be easier once the BlazBlue rollback implementation is completed. (12/21/2021 update: We’re 2 for 2 now, although this isn’t 100% confirmation.)
Arc System Works has quickly become a model fighting game developer in the span of the past two years. While previous works still lacked some basic features, and interviews from both Toshimichi Mori and Daisuke Ishiwatari waffled on whether they would implement rollback into their games, they took fan feedback into consideration when it mattered. (It should be noted that, contrary to popular belief, rollback was planned from the very beginning of GGST’s development. It probably took fan outcry, responses to surveys, and the success of GGPO+R to convince executives that the cost of implementation was worth it.)
ArcSys US, through community reps like Zack Shini, opened official channels of communication between their US team and their fanbase, and in turn convinced the Japanese branch that rollback was worth pursuing. They also supported fanmade projects when developers like Capcom and Nintendo wouldn’t dare to, and as a result have guaranteed the longevity of games that are over a decade old at this point (P4A’s original console release date was July 26th, 2012, and Guilty Gear XX originally launched on consoles in December 2002, with its final console update coming out in 2013.) As far as active development on their current titles is concerned, Strive has received healthy patches with detailed notes, as well as developer interviews with information about future updates and post-launch roadmaps.
It’s also extremely refreshing to hear ArcSys speak so candidly about their development processes. Fighting games from Japan are being developed in an era where Katsuhiro Harada talks down to other developers who ask him questions, and where the KOFXV developers still behave as though delay-based netcode is better for some titles. ArcSys adopting the approach from Killer Instinct’s development where the team is (relatively) transparent about what’s going on behind the scenes, as well as them casually referring to rollback and GGPO when other developers treat it like a slur, already lends them far more trust and credibility with the FGC than any other Japanese fighting game developer. Furthermore, while I am looking forward to Project L, and the Cannon brothers are great people, I’m still apprehensive about anything I do that supports a large corporate studio otherwise mired in controversy.
Thus, ArcSys has ticked all these boxes:
- They’re developing modern games with modern audiences in mind. This goes beyond balance and gameplay- it also includes addressing what players need in order to keep the game alive outside of the traditional offline event space.
- They’re supporting their old games by going back and making improvements long after development as ended. What’s more, they’re doing this in a way that’s smart for them while also fostering a good relationship with their community. By outsourcing to fan developers, they don’t have to dedicate any resources themselves other than their contract payment, and it also sends a message that ArcSys endorses derivative contributions and improvements to their own work.
- They keep that line of communication open with their fanbase to address concerns and take development in a direction that satisfies those needs. Writing up update roadmaps and posting detailed patch notes with specific information and reasoning behind balance decisions is, at the very least, better at creating a channel where fans can understand and respond to developer decision-making instead of curt and vague posts on social media.
- At least as far as I know, they haven’t been involved in any lawsuits with the State of California involving harassment in the workplace. So, there’s that, too.
This is an unironic and unpaid shill post, but it’s not like I’m making this short piece just because I’m a fan consuming ArcSys products without any critical thinking. There’s still other features that ArcSys games are missing that could greatly improve their quality of life, such as even better training mode features, cross-platform play, miscellaneous online components like Wi-Fi indicators and proper connection filters, and so on. That being said, I’m glad that ArcSys has been so greatly successful in recent years, and I’m also glad to continue supporting them, because I want ArcSys to be able to lead by example. I want other developers, like SNK and Capcom and Koei-Tecmo and Bamco and Nintendo, to see what ArcSys is doing with their games and their community, and I want them to see how successful it’s been, so that they can try to emulate that success and improve their own games.
Even if I’m already spoiled for choice between +R, GGST, BBCF, BBTAG, and French Bread offerings like MBTL, and even if I don’t end up playing games like KOFXV or some future Street Fighter 6, I want those future games to have the stuff that worked out in ArcSys games so that they can be top-quality on launch. I also want them to go back to their older games and fix them or at least provide top-notch re-releases with modern amenities. SNK has stepped up to the plate with this, but Capcom for instance hasn’t brought rollback netcode to Street Fighter 30th Anniversary Collection and has yet to bring games like Darkstalkers Resurrection to modern consoles. In a parallel-dimension, Bizarro-world future, we could even see Nintendo re-release Super Smash Bros. Melee with an official version of Slippi, or at least work with Bandai Namco on a rollback retrofit for Ultimate. If one developer can prove that rollback netcode, continued support of older titles, and endorsement of fan projects are all integral to the genre, then hopefully the rest of them will follow suit.
Of course, even if they don’t do anything like that, I’m still perfectly content just playing ArcSys games. New life has been breathed into BBCF and I’ve been having a ton of fun fooling around with the game, picking it up with other new players. I will also continue playing and running events for both +R and GGST, and when DNFD, P4AU, and the BBTAG update all finally come out I’ll probably give those games a shot too. DBFZ, GBVS, and Xrd players have been left out in the cold, but at least they have other offerings to try out in the meantime, and maybe someday they’ll get blessed with the same treatment in an official capacity. For now, it’s a really, really good time to be an anime player, and I couldn’t be happier with all of the great games that are out right now.
