So what do you think is the best VF?

VF 4 evo with 3 as a close second, I've seriouslly spent a thousand plus hours with this game. 3 was cool for me because the landscapes were in 3-D and the graphics were so much better than any namco fighter at the time. It took me three years before I would even see it in an arcade, but deffinately worth the wait. I also liked Taka who for some reason they mysteriously took out of the game.

 

Fighters Mega Mix , Evo.

 

VF4evo followed by VF3. Vanity, not sure if you were talking about the arcade or consoles versions of VF4evo, but I have to agree for the most part(if it is the console version) even though I have one complaint: There is no way for a friend to load their character so you can face each other, it's all in one memory card. Boo Sega, Boo.

 

Because I get to take Shang to school

 

Gah! SiYkO LIVES!

Welcome back, man. /versus/images/graemlins/cool.gif

 

I haven't played VF4:FT... that said... Out of what I have played...

Best: VF4 Evo
Favorite: VF3tb
Purest: VF2

I think the VF4 sub-series took VF in a very natural, fun, and technical direction. They provided more complex options and layers that were enjoyable, competition felt very fierce for the most part. The pace of play was perfect. I think the battles were probably the most cunning in the 4 series and that's why I think they're the best of the franchise. I like to think they truly represented the evolution of Virtua Fighter (minus the voices).

VF3tb is my favorite, though VF3dc was where I really learned VF beyond the casual level. It is partly my favorite for all the memories on the DC and arcade TB, but it is mainly my favorite for how the battles played out and all of the variables. The options were complex enough, slopes had an effect on how you played (at the expense of some BS), it was still a very pure VF game, the character balance was nice enough, and I loved all the fancy/cheezy stuff ( k-stepping, uramawari, wall combos, slope combos, OTB combos, ringout moments, etc...). VF3 was intense enough with lots of cunning too, it might sound odd now, but I think it plays in the middle between VF2s purity and the cunning battles that exist in the VF4 games. What is also fun to see in VF3 is how you can usually see how experienced someone was at the game by the pace they played at--beginners were always extremely slow (clumsy) while the more advanced players were either fast and direct or elegantly indirect. However, VF3 probably had the slowest overall pace of the whole series, but it was still quite fast at the higher levels. There were a lot of indirect variables and indirect techniques that I just loved in the VF3 games--it was a big playground with lots of fighting.

VF2 is the purest Virtua Fighter title. I said VF4:Evo had the cunning battles with VF3tb's being intense enough (still very close to as cunning as VF4 even), but VF2 was the game that let you know who your daddy was. Battles were very direct and mistakes were fatal. VF3 and VF4 battles were cunning because the intiative is fought over rapidly over time with layers of defense neautralizing lots of offense. However, in VF2, the initiative was settled quickly and if you guessed wrong, you were mostly screwed. The person who knew more AND executed accurately more was pretty much the winner in VF2. In the later VF games, advanced techniques mainly served to give one more opportunity, but I think the advanced techniques in VF1 and VF2 gave clear advantages--if you could do them in the heat of the moment, you probably killed your opponent already. And yet despite this immediate advantage, VF2 was still a game where proper defense and flow was crazy necessary (as it is in the whole series)--the virtua fighter series succeeds most, imo, in encouraging active defense while still stimulating forward offense (though machi/chicken/turtle-play has their moments throughout the series). And the pace of play in VF2 was very, very fast--it could put you in a daze if you were an observer. The only time the pace ever seemed to die was if you jumped (ah yes, the crazy high jumps of VF1 and 2). Furthermore, nobody saw anything like VF2 when it came out (in Japan, it came out even before the first Tekken) and it had the whole package--great videogame music, the look is still great to this day, wonderful sound effects, the characters all looked gorgeous (at the time, it was just mind blowing), and the game glided--everything about it was fast. As much as I really like the original Virtua Fighter, Virtua Fighter 2 was the first truly great 3d fighter and it set the gold standard. I guess some could say, "Virtua Fighter 2 was the truth."

-Chanchai

 

VF3 followed by VF2.
From what I've played so far VF4 FT is what VF4 should've been of the bat.