EXCLUSIVE: X-ism Interviews Capcom’s Seth Killian

As we get close to the release of Super Street Fighter IV, I don’t think there is a man out there working as hard as Capcom’s Seth Killian. As Capcom USA’s resident “Street Fighter Guy” (more professionally known as the Community Manager), he has been all over the place getting the word out about the newest installment in the franchise. As someone who was once a hardcore fighting game player and is now working for the very company who’s games he worked to master, he has become a great ambassador to the Street Fighter community.

With all that said, I somehow managed to slip in his busy schedule to interview him about various things about the Street Fighter brand and games and what some the processes are that go into making the great fighting games that Capcom does.

You work at Capcom and are also known as a great Street Fighter player. Is that coincidence or did your Street Fighter reputation have something to do with you landing a gig at Capcom?

I don’t know how many players still think of me as a great competitor, but it’s nice of you to say. I don’t have nearly enough time to practice competitively anymore, but playing Street Fighter did lead me indirectly to Capcom. I had a lot of success playing in tournaments, and then started running them. I would take a trip out to E3 every year to check out new games, and would go by the Capcom booth to hit them up for posters, keychains, etc. for the players at my tournaments. I got brushed away for a few years, but eventually ran into the right people. Not only did they send us some great stuff, they ended up offering me a job.

Can you clear up some confusion. I always hear about how Capcom USA owns the rights to Street Fighter even though the games are still developed in Japan. How exactly did this happen and who’s really calling the shots when a game like Super Street Fighter IV is being made?

It’s true that Capcom USA owns a few IPs, including the Street Fighter brand. That arrangement was made long before my time, so I’m not sure how it came about, but it was likely for unexciting tax or other financial reasons. SFIV and Super SFIV were developed in Japan, and we’ve worked closely with the teams to help make the games achieve maximum awesome.

There was a recent interview where the interviewer made a joke about expecting another Street Fighter game in about a year or so and in defense you said something along the lines of “Madden has been doing this for years and no one says anything”. Though Capcom’s original intention may not have been to have a yearly Street Fighter game, is it possible that if Super Street Fighter IV does extremely well fans may indeed get a yearly Street Fighter game much like how new Madden games are released?

I guess I just thought it’s funny that SF sometimes gets criticized for the same kind of things people actually look forward to in other titles. I’m impressed by the innovative stuff the Madden teams pull off year after year, and I’d love to have a fanbase that supported an annual installment rather than thinking we were “milking” a franchise. I love iterative design, and am a big fan of refining core mechanics over time.

Anyone who lurks around the Capcom Unity boards knows that the general consensus amongst Street Fighter fans is “more characters = better game”. Many fantasize about one day playing a Street Fighter game that features every single character from every Street Fighter game ever made. If my memory serves me correctly the most characters to ever be featured in a main Street Fighter game is 38. Super Street Fighter IV has 35. is there a breaking point where adding more characters becomes detrimental to the gameplay as far as balance and competitiveness go?

I don’t think more characters are necessarily detrimental, but they do create a greater challenge as far as balance and competitiveness. Adding one more character to SSFIV would add 35 new matchups to consider, so the extra work adds up really quickly. I think Super SFIV has a great character count, but its also true that having too many can water down your focus on the characters as a player–you just don’t know every character as intimately if there are too many. Capcom Vs SNK 2 had 50+ characters with 6 very different versions of each one, and that led to some of them simply not being played. I played a lot of that game, but I don’t think I’ve ever squared off against a P-groove Nakoruru, so at a certain point I think they don’t all make as much of an impact.

Since the game was announced the developers of Super Street Fighter IV have been keeping weekly blogs. These have been a great source of information for the hungry gamers who eat up any morsel of information about the game. At the same time it seems like when the game finally arrives on April 27th, there may not be much left to discover because we have already known about everything from the blogs. What is your stance on such transparency? Does it help or hurt the final product?

I’m generally a very big supporter of transparency, but it can be a balancing act. Capcom hasn’t always been the most open company, but we’ve been moving much more in that direction since I started. I think the watch-word might be “translucent.” You can see a lot of what’s going on, but not every single detail. Hopefully that’s enough to be interested and excited, without interfering with the joy of discovery or making anyone feel like the game was over before it’s even been released. Lord knows the developers are really looking forward to seeing what the players do with it, so the idea that we have all the answers just isn’t right–we’re as anxious for it to be released as everyone else.

As fans followed the development of Super Street Fighter IV it became clear that developers were indeed trying to listen to fans when it comes to many aspects of the game but where does Capcom draw the line in the sand and say, “We hear you but that would not be what is best for this game”? Can you think of any examples of this?

There are as many examples as there are fans, but basically we try and take all the suggestions from fans seriously. We don’t look at those ideas as marching orders, but more like another voice at the conference table when we’re coming up with stuff. So basically if the fans have a good idea, that will get discussed like any idea from a member of the dev team. If the fan idea survives the back-and-forth debate and seems like its a good idea, it gets implemented–time and budget allowing, of course. I think Super SFIV is an excellent example overall–almost every single major addition from SFIV to Super SFIV came from fan ideas.

I have heard you say that though there is not any DLC planned right now, besides the alternate costumes, there are more “hooks” in the game this time around if Capcom wanted to do more later. What are the chances of that actually happening?

I dunno if a percentage chance is really appropriate, but it would depend on a few factors. Obviously if the game doesn’t sell well, that gives us much less reason to think about DLC. It’s also a matter of balancing development resources across multiple projects–we have to have the manpower available, and often developers are moved quickly onto a new project once their current project has ended, so they may be booked when you want to use them again.

Though balancing is a huge part of what made Street Fighter IV work so well, a lot of emphasis has been put on tier lists. Are tier lists BS and and do they hurt the game?

I don’t think tier lists are BS, or that their existence necessarily hurts anything, but it’s certainly true that many players put far too much emphasis on them. It’s easy to understand why–if you lose because a tier list said you “should” lose, then your loss is Capcom’s fault, not yours. That’s a pretty seductive idea if you find yourself losing regularly: “it’s not me, it’s those goons at Capcom who are to blame!”

If you understand tier lists for what they are they can be a useful tool, but you have to keep in mind they are an imaginary, highly abstract concept–not some kind of reality carved into stone, and they won’t win (or lose) any matches for you. Think about it: how do you get a tier list? You play sets of 10 matches, where 2 players of equal skill with different characters (what does that even mean? how do we know they’re of exactly equal skill?) face off, with both players playing at their best, and not taking dramatic chances, but playing “by the numbers.” The # of wins is then tallied, and the match is judged to be, say, 5-5 for Sagat vs Dhalsim. Did anyone actually fulfill any of those criteria, or even play that set of 10 games? Probably not–instead, the numbers are just sort of the gut feeling of a lot of good players over time. That’s not to say that doesn’t matter (those feelings DO matter, and are based on real experiences), it’s just to show that just because there are numbers and a chart involved doesn’t mean you’re necessarily doing hard science.

Personally I’ve always been a Vega player in past games and was a bit disappointed about how he played in the original Street Fighter IV. I’m hoping that he plays a bit better this time around. So my fingers are crossed when I ask; out of all the characters, who’s buffs most dramatically change how good they are? Am I about to start getting my behind handed to me by Dan payers online soon?

It’s honestly a bit hard to say, since the 10 new characters have such a dramatic impact. It’s also true that the balance is very, very delicate–Vega is not considered very strong in the final SFIV build, but in a build maybe 1 month before the game was finalized, he was the 2nd strongest character in the game, so little things have a big impact. I’ll leave questions like this to the players to decide, but I will say that despite all the people claiming we “nerfed” Sagat, I think he’s still very strong (though in a slightly different way) and near the top of the rankings. I’m also hoping to surprise the internets with the power of Super SFIV Guile. Yes, Guile!

Lastly, let’s stop the fan bickering and confusion right now. As far as your concerned is Ingrid truly Street Fighter character? Because of the way she was introduced and the version of Street Fighter Alpha 3 she was in, people feel she does not belong. Please clear this up so fans know whether or not to complain about her not being included in Super Street Fighter IV.

Full disclosure: I’m a friend of Ingrid’s creator (who also snuck a few of her concepts into Yattaman #2 in Tatsunoko Vs Capcom: Ultimate All-Stars), so I might be biased. That said, while I’m not sure about her future, I do think her inclusion in Capcom Fighting Evolution cemented her place in the official Street Fighter canon.

Gotta thank Seth again for taking the time out to do this interview!