There is a middle ground between playing “deliberately badly” and choosing to use the same strategy over and over and over because it guarantees victory. The better player can recognize that one strategy is going to ensure victory, but be boring as hell, and choose a different strategy.
Oh absolutely.
I think we probably need to distinguish between a computer game where a player uses the same ‘attacking move’ endlessly and a game like chess or table tennis, where there are many strategies + tactics.
I teach chess professionally. I’m always happy to play training games, where I let students take moves back, play badly to offer them opportunities to find a strong move etc.
But if a new student really wants to play me competitively, I play blindfold. This gives them a sense of wonderment, proves chess is pure skill and that I know exactly what I’m doing. 
Well, but take chess as an example. Suppose I am playing glee, and he has figured out that he can play a particular line of the Sicilian Defense and I haven’t figured out how to get to a middle-game where I’m not hopelessly mired down and easy to pick off. Would I consider it “cheap” of glee to continuously use the Sicilian as black every time we play? No, I would have to go get some understanding of the defense and find a way to counter it that left me with a fighting chance.
There seem to be two different threads going on here. One thread is focusing on the use of a particular tactic in electronic gaming, such as a fighting move. When this tactic is unstoppable, this seems “cheap” to the other players. The answer to this is simple: if the game truly has no counter to this move, then it is poorly designed. Either agree as a playing group not to use it, or don’t play that game with anyone who does. If the tactic is not unstoppable, simply find a counter and then move on.
The other thread deals with games like chess or tennis, where a particular tactic can be countered, but a player continually uses the tactic against a person known to be weak in the ability to counter it. In this case, the move isn’t “cheap.” But one has to consider the social aspect of games in deciding what to do about such a player. If I’m in a chess tournament, I can hardly complain if my opponent picks on a known weakness I have (oh, god, not aNOTHER rook and pawn endgame! :eek: ). But if I’m playing casual chess with someone for fun, and they do that, and it annoys me, I should speak up, and we can try to find a workaround. At some point, casual games (either sport or board/card) are about having fun, rather than winning, so a person who continuously picks on opponents’ weaknesses will find themselves lacking playing partners.
Nah, this was an actual arcade console in the lobby of my old dorm. No difficulty settings. Looking at Wikipedia, I think it was “Champion Edition”.
By the time I left that dorm, I could get perfect games against the CPU on a couple of characters. Vega just took the least skill.
the arcade machines could be set on various difficulties but as I recall you had to open the cabinet to do this. also i would have flash kicked you out of that so easy. you could also do blankas roll or ken and ryu’s super punch, a bunch of zangief grabs, etc. you were playing with noobs 
I was going to post the exact same thing until I read your post.
Vega’s slide kick. Ugh.
My friend and I used to play Street Fighter 2 like crazy. He was always Vega and he was constantly taking me down with volleys of slide kicks. He thought he was a tactical genius.
This is an endless debate in football games, where “cheap” tactics are known as “cheese.” There are many – far too many – players that are ready to label anything that beats them as cheese. They are the ultimate scrubs. But there is absolutely known cheese when it comes to football games, and these fall into two main categories.
First is glitch cheese. The anecdote of the 100 yard pass would be one example. I personally find this dubious, having played a metric assload of Madden, but let’s assume it works. It’s definitely cheese. Another example was the horrendous ESPN 2k5 football, which couldn’t spy the QB. This meant that if the defense was in man to man coverage – which is easy to determine – you were guaranteed at least a 5 yard gain if you scrambled, even with Drew Bledsoe. God forbid you had Michael Vick or Donovan McNabb. Thus you had to either play all zone, or come to a gentleman’s agreement not to exploit the glitch.
The second type of cheese is strategy. This debate is endless and brutal, with no winners on either side. “Play real football!” is the rallying cry, with much disdain heaped upon those who go against the tide. The other side points to the actual NFL, where they do these same strategies and yet their opponents don’t cry cheese. (Well, the Redskins did against the Patriots this year, but whatever.)
For example, going for it on 4th down is seen as a big no-no. Super cheese. I remember going for (and scoring) a TD on 4th and short early in a tie game in Madden and getting roundly criticized. I was, of course, the Giants. A couple days later, the real life Giants went for (and scored) a TD on 4th and short in a 10-7 game early in the second quarter against the Rams. (It’s not a Toomer!) I felt completely vindicated. Hell, I was simming the Giants accurately. Oddly enough, everybody still felt it was cheese despite it being an accurate simulation of the real NFL.
Basically, the second type of cheese is an unwinnable battle. If you or anyone you play with cries cheese at a strategic move, my only advice is to not play them anymore. Both sides are too sure of their position, and the righteous indignation is oppressive.
all games comes with rules, and good games comes with good rules. when you want to play variants (games without a ‘cheap’ move for example), all players should agree on it for everyone to be happy. i find that most complaints about cheap moves are either bad game design or just a disparaging way for the weaker player to get back at their opponents who steamrolled them.
the other players would have to be criminally apathetic for the australian tactic to be unbeatable. even if you manage to get the continent on the first round it is by no means a sure ticket to victory.
i disagree. the single player campaigns are great, but the single player skirmish games are certainly boring with no need for strategy at all. (mass cruisers anyone?) when you skirmish against the computer there is absolutely no need for strategy or an expectation of any kind of surprise attack. the AI just can’t compare to a live opponent. not fun imo.
part of the game is certainly about learning the myriad build orders and micromanagement, it is a real-time game after all, but there is certainly no single, always-winning strategy. when i last played it every single strategy has a counter.
you didn’t say multiplayer is ‘cheap’ so this is not directed at you, but this is a good example where a player might incorrectly label something as a ‘cheap move’ because the game is not played with a variant they prefer.
With Madden, it’s different. There has always been a glitch in the way the computer does the coverage. There have always been offensive plays or patterns that exploit the AI.
Ssshhh… don’t get everyone started again
I got back at my younger cousin for pulling a similar stunt not to long ago.
We were playing a basketball game. Naturally, even though I had never played the game before, chose some incredible team, so I choose to humor him. About half way through the game I’m down 60-36 and I realize some thing’s fishy. He’s shooting about 70% from three point land. Strangely though, he can’t hit a damn free throw.
So for the entire second half, I do nothing but intentionally foul him every time he touches the ball. 
He can’t hit shit from the foul line (seriously it might have been a bug or something, it was fricking impossible) and I come back to win by 3 points…with all but 6 guys on my team fouled out. 
Ahhhh, yes. The ole TE steam. The “WR/TE in” coming across the formation. WR out and up in the madden games of the late 90s.
My brother’s favorite was from the mid 90s Madden games. Trips right and they all run ins or posts. RB runs a delayed pattern in the recently vacated right flat. Didn’t matter what you called. Every LB and DB bit. Every single time.
“HB Look” was the play to use a couple years ago. The AI still has problems with the good old flag route. It handles it MUCH better than it did.
Also, for the past two years, if the computer is playing man defense and you’re running off tackle, you can usually pull the man in motion to pull the defender to the other side and get some daylight unless the middle linebacker beats the block or your offensive lineman completely eats grass.
I think the big difference is between tournaments and casual gaming. For tournaments, the linked article is right: don’t complain about cheap tactics, play to win.
For casual gaming, however, my goal isn’t to win: my goal is to have fun. Winning is an important secondary goal, but not the main one.
When I used to play M:tG, I invented what I called the Asshole Deck. It consisted of a bunch of stuff that could tap the opponent’s cards, and a bunch of stuff that hurt the opponent when their cards were tapped (mostly hurting them by destroying their cards). Unless you were very lucky or had designed a deck specifically to fight mine, as soon as I got one of the many combos into play, you’d quickly have nothing to do, since your cards would be systematically destroyed by this deck.
It was a fun deck to play against someone once, so they could see how it worked, but it was not something I played a lot, since it was so frustrating for the opponents (unless they figured out the quick counter to it, a counter that was useless if I played any other deck but that would destroy this one).
If I’m playing a game against someone, and I know there’s a tactic that can beat them consistently, I’ll ask them whether they want me to use that tactic, or if they’d like me to teach them the counter to it (if I know it). Games are more fun for me if they’re competitive, if I don’t know who’s gonna win.
Daniel
a very very long time ago I learned something about games, I dont recall who said it but the quote was simple elegance
“you have to play within the rules of the game”
note it doesnt say anything about the rules you “Think” are the game, just the rules of the game. I have noted over the years that its very very true that most players dont understand this concept at all.
one easy example for me is the use of voice chat in pvp games. way back when windows 98 was new and shiny my friends and I were playing Tribes and I discovered this neat program that would allow us to talk to each other instead of having to type and keep an eye on the chat bar all the time. was there some rule we were breaking? no. did it make life miserable for the other team? oh hell yes. even if it was only 2 of us playing the communication advantage was crazy. the same when we played everquest on the pvp servers. we got called cheap a lot because most people didnt understand, they thought we were hacking or just flat out magically owing them. These days if you dont use voice chat you are pretty much a moron, back then we were almost unstoppable and we could tell when we came across another group using voice chat, because the game got a whole lot harder all of a sudden.
I had one of those! Of course mine was designed around annoying the hell out of people and not winning. I considered it a win when someone would say, “That’s the most annoying deck I’ve ever played against.”
I had something similar happen in Starcraft. My friends and I used a chat program called “Playing in the same office as one another.” We’d just shout out comments to one another. Granted, we were pretty lousy at the game overall (one of my friends was convinced that the best offense was a good defense, and nothing I could say would change his mind), but the fact that we could instantly communicate threats or strategies meant that we’d win more often than not. At the time I felt kinda bad about it, since we were using an advantaage unavailable to other players–but I figured it evened out, since we weren’t all that good anyway.
Daniel
I hear you (so to speak). The higher levels of World of Warcraft, whether pve or pvp, are literally impossible without voice chat.
The linked article lost me because I can’t think of any video/computer game that I’d be willing to spend an indeterminately lengthy amount of time playing just to learn the counter-strategies for “cheap” moves. Games are a diversion, an entertainment, to me; not something to obsess over. IOW, the moment it stops being fun, I just quit playing.
You spent countless hours learning the tiny intricacies of the game? Good for you.
I was only looking for a few minutes of fun.
We have such entirely different outlooks on the game and motivations for playing it that the only way for us to both enjoy the game is to not play each other.
Exactly. Not to mention the idea of a “competitive video game player” calling anyone else a scrub is pretty ballsy.
Ah yes, chess. I used to play occasionally against some guy down at the pub who couldn’t understand why I’d adopt a resolute exchanging policy once I was two or three pawns ahead. “Man for man, I just don’t understand it,” he’d complain, as though I was engaging in some weird stratagem that had no moral right to work. And the next time we played and I was material ahead, he’d be no closer to understanding why he was going to lose that game too.