WHen done right, it allows for some serious Yomi. Puzzle FIghter is an example. The right way to win is to set up a 1-2 punch that kills, right? But if someone else who hasn’t set up the punch hits you with a moderately strong attack before you get your big attack in, it can be enough to kill you. The 1-2 punch has a counter strategy.

If people are throwing the game to get behind because it’s a winning strategy, then the game has been ruined by perpetual comeback.

As for slippery slope, I believe it’s unavoidable in many types of games. The main reason for putting in that slippery slope is to stop the phemonena where someone waits until they are almost dead to start really playing. And Tetris Attack is one of the worst examples here in my opinion. You can play like crap, and then when you are almost dead suddenly whip out chain after chain after chain for the win, whihc completely demoralizes said opponent. You can even take your hands off the controller until near death!

It can be frustrating being on the low end of a slippery slope. However, it’s even worse when you pour your heart out, almost finish the guy, and then he just destroys you anyway as soon as he decides to start playing.

True neutral slope is not desireable. The ideal situation for most types of games is a SLIGHTLY slippery slope. Most fighting games contain this. Being behind is a disadvantage, but not an insurmountable one. the potential for the comeback is nearly always there, but you really must be the better player to pull it off.

One horrible example of ring-out is bloody roar. A ring out is a match loss, not a round loss, but a ring out cannot occur in the first round. So you can lose the first round, then ring-out the person in thet second round for the win. If you are good at ring out, the first round becomes irrelevant. That’s BAD.

Dharok even allows for cases of some serious Yomi. There’s an obscure spell you can cast on yourself which bounces back about 75% of the damage from the next shot you take, and then dispels itself. Then you have to cast it again, during which time you are not attacking or healing or doing anything else useful.

If a Dharok player is at low health and whallops an opponent who has cast Vengeance on himself, the flashback could easily kill the Dharoker. Since it’s possible to cancel the animation for casting Vengeance, or disguise it as a healing animation, the Dharoker has to wonder whether he’s swinging at a vulnerable opponent who’s busy healing himself or committing elaborate suicide. If he balks, maybe he gets laughed at for letting his opponent heal up for free…but if he doesn’t, imagine the costs! It’s even worse if he gets burned either way - nearly killed by Vengeance flashback, nearly beaten by giving up his chance at exploiting perpetual comeback. The next time, he’ll be even more worried and distracted.

Which is, of course, when he gets spec-rushed and killed with “m”.

There is exactly one exception.

One set of melee equipment - Dharok - has an innate special effect that doesn’t depend on a special bar. The lower a Dharoker’s HP gets relative to his max, the higher his strength climbs. So the Dharok player isn’t playing Shot for Shot - he’s playing Chicken. Even years after the release of the equipment set, debates are ongoing as to how best to use it. Do you stay just outside his one-hit range and try to deliver the haymaker before he finishes you with a combo? Do you hover around half health - likely his two-hit range - and hope that gives you an edge in the game of Shot for Shot? Some players even flirt with going INSIDE their opponent’s one-hit range and try to land the biggest possible bomb before physically running away to heal up if it fails.

A deathmatch between two Dharok users is the most exciting thing in the game. It’s almost bound to end after only three or four blows, unless someone misses a lot. One player will connect first, likely eat a slightly meatier counter shot, launch a stronger one yet…I’ve seen Dharok duels end in an attack, a counter-attack, and a finisher from the first attacker. It’s wild.

When a player starts loosing, it feels as if the game is already decided prematurely. Instead it is felt that the games conclusion should stay indefinite until the very end. Who wants to know the books ending before the last page so to speak? And we want comebacks, everyone loves comebacks right, the twist in the plot? So the more comebacks, the better.

I’m going to argue against the above paragraph and the position outlined in it in several parts.

First, the idea that the game is prematurely decided and over with too soon. For example, a handful of peons killed at the start of the game. Elegantly this would apply to both chess and starcraft, in chess loosing even one pawn or worse a knight/bishop is usually seen as an almost fatal disadvantage that puts the loosing player on the backfoot for the rest of the game. If you loose a few SCVs, drones or probes at the start of an starcraft game you can easily find yourself economically behind to desperatly fight a loosing battle as the opponent soon has more units then you do due to the exponential nature of the starting economy in starcraft.

It’s easy to argue that this is of course bad, the game has barely started and there has certainly not been any epic battles yet or some heroic comabacks for us to enjoy. At best we got to enjoy some minor skirmish with a handful of peons :(

To be specific, lets pick a proffesional starcraft best of 5 important matchup between two star players in an epic final. At first it might seem like loosing a few peons is just a random occurance, something that just randomly happens at any time to anyone, even such progamers. wrong. The player who got in to his opponents base and killed off a few of these crucial peons has carefully studied his opponents previous games. He has analysed the patterns and behaviours of his opponent, discovered that his opponent has a penchant for greedy builds on this map. He has practiced for several days a rush opener, an alternative opener incase the previous 2 games would go in such a way that he would feel like changing his game plan. At the beginning of the game, he has to scout his opponent, perfectly pull off a build order specially tuned with building placement on the map to try and avoid the opponents scouting efforts. He then has to sneak past his opponents well practiced anti-rush tactics, and finally potentially outmicro the opponents efforts to save his peons.

My point is that the decisive moment, even if it happens early, is not just some random occurance that “just happens”. It’s the culmination of everything that happened in that game sofar and before it. It’s part of a whole. I find this much more beautiful then long drawn out games of battles back and forth, it’s simple, to the point. Like a samurai opting to do his best to finish off his opponent in one quick decisive blow. The opponent did have his chance, he could have done a hundred things to avoid his untimely demise. And in this case he has 5 games in a series to do it.

The comeback. Comebacks are good, their exciting. You thought you knew what was going to happen, but it turned out the other way! How delightful to be wrong. The problem is that the glory in the comeback is in it’s unlikelyness. If you force comebacks into the game, they pale. A comeback is awesome since you didn’t expect it.

There’s this idea that the game should be left undecided until the very last moment, preferably after at least some time. I would like to say that the outcome is decided even before the game in a way. The better player will win. It’s just that we don’t really know, who is the better at this moment? But one is, his preparations where better, but we don’t know so yet. We want to see the better player win trough a well executed gameplan, not the two players battle it out for a long time back and forth until one player finally comes out on top. A few such games are okay, variaton is always nice. But ultimately, if the game just flows back and forth in an eternal comeback cycle, it stops mattering what plans the player set out with. What they did in the initial stages of the game gets wiped out like drawings in sand. At the end, it’s mostly just luck that decides which way the pendulum finally swings all the way, if both players had a real chance at winning multiple times. You get a fractured game, with dozens of little battles that are not connected, you can’t speak of a game where this player pulled this awesome stunt and won, it was just a long drawn out game of this, that, then this and this and that.

Finally, the dreaded undead part of the game where a victor is felt to be assured and there’s no point continueing to play according to consensus. The loosing player has only a very slim chance of comeback, what to do? Of course, this is so simple, the looser GG:s, resigns.

There’s more though. Losing the first round means that in the second round, your attacks do more damage and your opponent’s do less. If you win the second round, the damage levels go back to how they were in the first round. Compounded onto that, the longer a player has a winning streak, the less damage their attacks do in subsequent matches. (I’m sure there’s a limit on this, I haven’t tested it thoroughly.)

Example: A is playing B at ping pong.
Suppose A wins the first 5 points. Consider the chance A gets the next 5 points.
Suppose instead B wins the first 5 points. Consider the chance A gets the next 5 points.
How do those probabilities compare?
Answer: They’re equal, so this is a neutral slope game.

Alternate game: Clay To Win. (Pictionary with modeling clay)
Each time a team wins a card, they get to remove a certain volume of clay from the opponents. A team wins when the opponents are out of clay.
Suppose team A wins the first 5 cards. Consider the chance A gets the next point.
Suppose instead team B wins the first 5 cards. Consider the chance A gets the next point.
How do those probabilities compare?
Answer: The first chance will be greater than the second, so this is slippery slope.

A good example of this is SNK games where characters low on health can actually become more powerful. It’s the reverse of a slippery slope, you actually gain abilities by getting behind. However getting behind is generally still not a good strategy because the abilities you gain typically don’t make up for the difference in life. (Although it does lead to weird things where taking a single weak hit might actually be a net positive if you are right on the edge of low health)

Street Fighter does have a slippery slope in terms of dizzies, and in terms of positioning as well, but these are both fairly minor in most cases. (Although in some getting stuck in bad position at the start can be a deciding factor for the entire match)

IMO whether or not a slippery slope is a good thing is a matter of game design and personal preference. I think most would agree that too much of a slope or the opposite problem (rewarding players so much for losing that losing is the better strategy) is a bad thing but there is plenty of room in between.