Fighting Game Community Vernacular

Rich Jammer

By the Numbers Accountant
Backers' Beta Tester
As I am not part of the Fighting Game Community I am mostly confused by some of the jargon used by people when they talk fighting games.

Like for example, a few months ago I was told to "go ham" and I was like "wha?" I think it was Cam who told me.
Heh heh, Jam was told by Cam to go Ham.

Anyway, other ones I've come across:
  • BnB
  • OTG
  • Oki
If you got more please list them and give a definition.
 

Rocketknightgeek

Backers' Beta Tester
Backers' Beta Tester
Feb 3, 2016
85
37
Go ham - No idea of the origin but it means 'go all in aggressive'.

BnB - Bread and Butter, referring to the most reliable and/or repeatable combo strings available to a character.

OTG - Off the Ground, referring to attacks that will either hit a prone opponent or will cause a ground bounce allowing an extension of your current combo.

Oki - Okizeme, or the wakeup game, referring to the options available to either player when one is recovering from a prone position.

Some other terms you may hear.

Yomi - Making your opponent think you have inhuman reactions or have a total read on them, often by 'training' them over the course of the match to react as you wish.

Frame Trap - Stringing two techniques together while the opponent is blocking in such a way as leave a gap just small enough for them to fall out of 'block stun' and punish them for their counter which will not come out in time.

Reset - Purposely (or accidentally ;P) dropping a combo midway through in order to remove the damage scaling and then starting another sequence from either a mix up or a frame trap instead.
 

Stridershy

The King Of Goat Style
Backers' Beta Tester
Feb 3, 2016
270
146
The Place Where Goats Are
Happy Birthday - Getting two characters in a combo at once. (Usually seen in Marvel. Dunno if there's a term for getting all three. I just called it Merry Christmas.)

American Reset - Dropping a combo, but getting your opponent in another one immediately after if he isn't blocking.

Tick Throwing - Using a quick move or intentionally whiffing a move to set up a grab.

Read - Correctly guessing an opponents move.
 

Svierrod

Backers' Beta Tester
Backers' Beta Tester
Feb 4, 2016
105
61
I've got quite a few of these. I might come back to this as I think of more things, but I'll start with a few I think are important

Frame - The smallest unit of time used when describing a fighting game. Since it's assumed the game is running at 60 fps, A "frame" is equal to 1/60th of a second. Often abbreviated as "-f", where the dash can be any number. For example, a 6f jab is one that finishes its start-up period in 6 frames, or 1/10th of a second, a throw-tech window of 30f will give you about 1/2 a second to break out of the throw, etc.

Active - A move that is "active" has finished the start-up period and is now able to actually hit stuff. Once the active part of a move ends, you get to . . .

Recovery - The vulnerable "end lag" after performing a move. Depending on the game, there are a few situational things you can do to "cancel" the recovery of one move into another move (this is how combos happen).

Reversal - A move with invulnerable start-up, and in return, a very long recovery period. These are very high risk moves, since it beats any aggressive action, but if it misses or gets blocked, you're in a lot of trouble. This one is often abbreviated to "DP", short for "Dragon Punch", the English name for Ryu's Shoryuken attack, since that move is the textbook example for a reversal.

Meaty - An attack performed "meaty" is timed carefully against a knocked down opponent so that they recover from the knockdown just as the attack goes active. Essentially, they stand up into the attack. This lets the attacker skip the start-up of their move (since the start-up happens while the defender is knocked down and can't do anything about it), and it forces the defender to either block or reversal. If they mash buttons or try to jump away or something, they'll get hit.

And this one doesn't apply as much as a general term that shows up all over the place, but it's still important to know and can be confusing if you don't know what it means:

Footsies - An elaborate game of poking and counter-poking that happens at the edge of a character's attack range. At least, that's how I understand it (this is a big term for Street Fighter, and I'm not really a Street Fighter player). High-level footsies usually involves a lot of dancing in and out of attack range, and a ton of feints and fake-outs. For example, purposefully whiffing a jab well outside the range where it will hit, hoping that your opponent will see your attack and try to punish, and end up overextending themselves.
 

Oreo

Keepin' It Stylish
Mane6 QA
Feb 2, 2016
270
418
35
D.M.V. FGC
No rules have been broken, but just a reminder to keep things PG-13. I could explain "ham", but doing so would break the language rules.

Also, "ham" isn't a strictly FGC term. It's just modern slang.

For the terms that aren't specifically related to game mechanics, Urban Dictionary is a resource that may help out. Just don't post the results in these forums if they do happen to have inappropriate language.
 
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