Execute win.exe

Don't you hate it when you're kicking ass at a game, only to have the computer execute some cheap catch-up tactic or bust out a killer combo? I'm not talking about artificial intelligence growing smarter and more difficult to defeat, just tactics and maneuvers a computer can use that human players can't. Although new games have some win.exe instances, I find that older games need to use these tactics to make up for an otherwise poor AI. I seem to trigger this secret executable a lot in old fighting games, especially Mortal Kombat II. I'm sure many will remember being thrown by a computer while your uppercut seems to go right through them.

Anyway, the point of this thread was to discuss with you guys the most annoying instances a computer ended up defeating you when it was on the ropes, whether this be "catch-up AI" in racing games, impossible combos in fighting games, or anything else you can think of. I think the most impossibly ridiculous situation was when I was little, playing the aforementioned Mortal Kombat II for the SNES. I wasn't very good at the game at a young age, so I spammed Scorpion's harpoon move on Very Easy. It seemed to work most of the time, but when I was fighting Jax, he kept ducking the harpoon for the whole match. After a while, the executable was triggered, and Jax CRAWLED (and by that, I mean magically came over while in his ducking stance) from the other side of the stage, all the while I was still harpooning, and uppercutted me. To this day, that still tops anything a game has ever thrown at me.

Discuss! =o

Jam it back in, in the dark.

Everything ALPHA-152 does in Dead or Alive 4 is a pretty good example of win.exe. Nearly uncounterable, unblockable 10-12 hit combos and throw moves that take off half your health. Tekken 4's Jinpachi is the same. Anyone who's fought him knows what I'm talking about.

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There are many instances I can recall from Soul Edge. The Edge Master mode had several battles that I couldn't clear because the enemies would continuously guard or simply use throw techniques as soon as I had reduced their health bars to less than half.

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

Speaking of Soul Edge, Soul Calibur 3 is pretty bad at doing that as well. Mitsurugi, for instance, as an AI opponent spams blocking. One of the more difficult (lol it's hard ._.) opponents cannot be seen at all -- the entire ring is black and so's s/he. Only time you can catch a glimpse of the person is when they enter the ever-so small cone of light your character is in. But then -- you've no idea where s/he's coming from!

lol Lose.

I am a dolphin, do you want me on your body?

The com has a one-up in all fighting games since it doesn't even have to input commands to do special moves. But I think the worst part is that its counter-attacks are practically triggered by your own input. I've never seen a computer opponent guess on anything. Either they let you hit them or they block you perfectly.

I was speaking idiomatically.

Mario Kart (mostly the original, but all of them to some extent) are fucking annoying about this.

- WraithTwo -

How ya doing, buddy?

Originally Posted by WraithTwo

Mario Kart (mostly the original, but all of them to some extent) are fucking annoying about this.

- WraithTwo -

Oh GOD, how I hated that game because of that. One random CPU would run win.exe and get constant mushroom-like speed and never stop. This would push you to 2nd place always. Thank god Mario Kart 64 didn't suffer from the same glitch.

FELIPE NO

Mario Party 3 was (and still is) really annoying. The computer opponents were cheap as hell.

Usually it goes something like this. I would be winning by 2 or 3 stars, but then...

First turn.
Wario takes 3 steps.
Wario finds a hidden block.
Wario gets a star.

Next turn.
Wario lands on an item game space.
Wario gets a Magic Lamp. (no matter what item game he plays)

Third turn.
Wario uses the Magic Lamp to get a star. (just when I was about to get it)

Fourth turn.
Wario lands on a Boo space.
Wario has 50 coins. (of course)
Wario steals my star.

Fifth turn.
I throw the Nintendo 64 out the window.

GAME OVER!

What, you don't want my bikini-clad body?

BLUE SHELL! BLUE SHELL! BLUE SHELL! *You get bananna* BLUE SHELL! BLUE SHELL!
5th!

Jam it back in, in the dark.

I noticed in sports games, teammate AI usually is very stupid compared to computer opponent AI. You'll go to pass to a guy right next to you, and he just turns away and watches the ball/puck/whatever sail right past him. Then one opponent just bowls right over one of your teammates.

There's nowhere I can't reach.

Originally Posted by WraithTwo

Mario Kart (mostly the original, but all of them to some extent) are fucking annoying about this.

- WraithTwo -

You could say that again. I always loved it how Mario or Luigi would activate their Starman in the SNES version just as I happened to be close enough to get hit by it. It got so bad, that my brother and I started playing as Mario and Luigi just so the CPU couldn't have that advantage. One thing is for sure about the AI in Mario Kart, it teaches you to be ruthless to win.

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

Originally Posted by WolfDemon

Tekken 4's Jinpachi is the same. Anyone who's fought him knows what I'm talking about.

Tekken 5 actually. Dark Resurrection's Jinpachi, or Magpachi as I call him, is no exception of win.exe . With him, win.exe isn't executed, it's on startup so to speak.

I am a dolphin, do you want me on your body?

There was one time i was playing Chrono Trigger, and i was fighting lavos. I'm doing pretty good, getting close to the end, when bam, he pulls out this spell i've seen plenty of times before, only this time it does over 1000 damage to each of my characters. That has never happened before, or since. And the thing is, he had already used it before in the battle, and it didn't do nearly as much. To this day, i haven't figured it out.

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It's called Halo 2. They actually bragged about how smart they made the AI for the game. But once you actually play the game on Legendary, you'll see the AI isn't the least bit smarter; they just up the AI's accuracy to 99% and increase the damage you take by ten times, then claim the AI is godly.

What kind of toxic man-thing is happening now?

Ah yes, the same goes for Resident Evil 4 on Professional mode. Enemies drop half the ammo, take twice the hits, and deal twice the damage. Genius.

FELIPE NO

for me it's RTS games in general. I like them but since you have to scroll/select your units before giving orders, it takes time while the computer can order all it's units simulatenously. there's been many times in Starcraft, Aoe3, Rise of Nations,Rise of Legends, etc that multi battles are happening and you have to jump back and forth to mange your troops. maybe I just need to use shortcuts more but it's really annoying in a rts like Aoe3 when your units just sit there and get killed while you are busy elsewhere...

What, you don't want my bikini-clad body?

Originally Posted by BIGWORM

Tekken 5 actually. Dark Resurrection's Jinpachi, or Magpachi as I call him, is no exception of win.exe . With him, win.exe isn't executed, it's on startup so to speak.

Yeah, I meant 5. Typos and such.

Vergil from Devil May Cry 3 is pretty bad about win.exe in the last fight. But at least his fight was fun. Beowulf was just frustrating.

Jam it back in, in the dark.

Mortal Kombat II and III arcade versions. I'd always get about 2-3 wins in a row then it's like the computer says "LOL U WIN ENOUGH! " Then I find myself being tossed and beaten and just sitting there like "WTF?" Even happened on the console version of MK 2 as well.

Fighting games seem to have this mostly, I don't know what it is, but it's almost like the developers don't want you to beat the game on one credit (in arcades).

There's nowhere I can't reach.

Originally Posted by WolfDemon

Vergil from Devil May Cry 3 is pretty bad about win.exe in the last fight. But at least his fight was fun. Beowulf was just frustrating.

I don't think that would be considered too much cheating. It's just that his DT'ed mode recovers so freaking much health, but otherwise I think the fight is a fair game for a boss battle. I thought Arkham was way worse than him and Beowulf in terms of frustration.

I haven't been playing any really challenging games, so I can't recall any AI that practically cheated. However, I do believe some of the older KoF bosses are impossible. All the fights preceeding those are ok, once you get there, the boss throws out totally overpowere/ranged/high priority moves, and it's really frustrating like that.

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

Originally Posted by dagget

Mortal Kombat II and III arcade versions. I'd always get about 2-3 wins in a row then it's like the computer says "LOL U WIN ENOUGH! " Then I find myself being tossed and beaten and just sitting there like "WTF?" Even happened on the console version of MK 2 as well.

Fighting games seem to have this mostly, I don't know what it is, but it's almost like the developers don't want you to beat the game on one credit (in arcades).

Yeah, exactly. -_- Especially Mortal Kombat II, I agree with you. That game didn't really have an AI. It was more like a reactionary command, because every action from the computer was completely based off of yours, and it always reacted perfectly. Not only that, it did things you couldn't. Sometimes moves would go through the computer when it threw you. O_o You had to basically "trick" the computers in those old games to win.

How ya doing, buddy?

A recent example is Guild Wars, and it's only been happening with my new character, a ritualist (typical low-health ranged support unit).
In this game you'll be playing as a group, and in this instance I've got 7 computer controlled allies with me.
I die this one time and I'm resurrected with death penalty (every time you die you get less health and energy while in a battle area).

Now the fun thing is, everytime I've died just this one time, every Goddamn enemy target me and kill me off instantly. EVERY TIME!
So I'm lying there till my AI-group kill the enemies off and I'm resurrected again. New group of enemies: "lets kill this guy fast for no apparent reason".

I mean, there's a monk right there. They're usually weak and favored to kill first, please go for him?
Or how about the two warriors right in front of you, slicing your faces? They're in reach...
NOOOOooooooooooo, we'll take that guy in the back or die trying!

Crap. Annoys the hell out of me. There shouldn't be any way for them to know if I have death penalty. My health bar should just show as full, as anyone else in my group.
Even so, there's no reason for them to lose all their defence just to reach and kill me first, so I can just lie there, not playing the game.
Is this fun NCSOFT? IS THIS FUN?

Oh I'm done >=(

How ya doing, buddy?

Nintendo are legends for this in both Super Mario Kart and Mario Kart 64. The cheating is still there in Double Rash, but not as blatantly obvious as the CPU CHARACTERS WARPING ACROSS THE MAP ON THE BOTTOM OF THE SCREEN THEN SOMEHOW GETTING A RED SHELL ALONG THE WAY.

What kind of toxic man-thing is happening now?

Originally Posted by Malmer

Now the fun thing is, everytime I've died just this one time, every Goddamn enemy target me and kill me off instantly. EVERY TIME!

Sounds like you would do real well as a tank instead Ahaha.

For me I've only really seen the win.exe in racing games such as NFSU2. U get a 10 second lead then within a matter of seconds, Mr. No. 2 comes rushing up at ya reducing the gap to a meer 1.32 seconds. Pah.

FELIPE NO

Ugh, Tekken 5's Jinpachi is a bastard. 'Sup, instant stagger that lasts the longest in any game, can be done from any position except in the air, interrupts every move (and every ground combo) in the game, and can be linked into an unblockable fireball that does 75% of your health's worth of damage in one hit.

And then there was NFSU2. I swear, that had horrible balancing. Easy was a borefest because the AI sucked ass, and Medium had you losing half the time because no matter WHAT YOU DID they ALWAYS managed to get ahead of you, especially on straightaways. I shudder to think of what Hard was - freaking infinite NOS for your competition? =\

What, you don't want my bikini-clad body?

It's true that the AI is often very unfair, but there are also usually unfair tricks that can be used to beat them. So it usually just balances out once you figure out the appropriate trick.

In MK2, we had Kitana and Baraka's bbb moves that could be spammed easily all the way to Shao Kahn.

MK3 had Cyrax's web that could be spammed.

DoA4 has the charge up moves that can be spammed on the boss.

Jam it back in, in the dark.