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Guilty Gear XX Accent Core Plus R

Guilty Gear XX Accent Core Plus R had fallen to the wayside of the fighting game community, but revamped GGPO netcode helped bring it back. 

The last time Plus R made it into the Evolution Championship Series was in 2009.

<h2>Local limitations</h2>
<figure id="attachment_11451" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-11451" style="width: 960px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img loading="lazy" class="size-full wp-image-11451" src="https://www.upcomer.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/gg-xx-1.jpg" alt="A screenshot of two characters in a fighting stage" width="960" height="544" srcset="https://legacy.upcomer.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/gg-xx-1.jpg 960w, https://legacy.upcomer.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/gg-xx-1-300x170.jpg 300w, https://legacy.upcomer.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/gg-xx-1-150x85.jpg 150w, https://legacy.upcomer.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/gg-xx-1-768x435.jpg 768w" sizes="(max-width: 960px) 100vw, 960px" /><figcaption id="caption-attachment-11451" class="wp-caption-text">For the first time ever, Plus R players from across the world can face off with little latency thanks to the new GGPO netcode. | Image provided by Arc System Works</figcaption></figure>
The last time Plus R made it into the Evolution Championship Series was in 2009. It then faded into relative obscurity, persisting as either a side title at majors or unofficially returning to Evo under the AnimEvo banner, organized by the community.
“The Plus R scene was pretty fragmented, between southern and northern California, Chicago, New York, Florida, Texas,” said Rodrigo “Honnou” De La Reza, who commentated at AnimEvo events and currently heads the largest Plus R community Discord server. “But just like any game without good netcode, these were largely dependent on locals and majors.”
Most major tournaments would only host one version of the game, Honnou said. Xrd was usually the logical choice, though some players deferred to the older title.
“When Xrd came out, it cannibalized the fan base for Plus R,” said Skeletal Minion. “It was an awkward situation because I loved the game but couldn’t find people to play. Before rollback, there was maybe one local that you’d have to drive out of state just to play seven people.”
Originally hailing from Alabama and later moving to Atlanta, Skeletal Minion was initially attracted to the game’s heavy metal aesthetic. He fondly recalls ordering DVDs from Evo 2004, before the ubiquity of streaming, to catch both Moment 37 and the finals of Plus R’s predecessor, Guilty Gear XX.
<figure id="attachment_11462" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-11462" style="width: 1600px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img loading="lazy" class="size-full wp-image-11462" src="https://www.upcomer.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/ggxx.jpg" alt="Character selection screen from +R" width="1600" height="900" srcset="https://legacy.upcomer.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/ggxx.jpg 1600w, https://legacy.upcomer.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/ggxx-300x169.jpg 300w, https://legacy.upcomer.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/ggxx-1024x576.jpg 1024w, https://legacy.upcomer.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/ggxx-150x84.jpg 150w, https://legacy.upcomer.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/ggxx-768x432.jpg 768w, https://legacy.upcomer.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/ggxx-1536x864.jpg 1536w" sizes="(max-width: 1600px) 100vw, 1600px" /><figcaption id="caption-attachment-11462" class="wp-caption-text">While the upcoming Guilty Gear -Strive- also uses rollback based netcode, the MIT license for GGPO made Plus R the only option for some time. | Image provided by Arc System Works</figcaption></figure>
Though he dabbled in Arc System Works’ other title, BlazBlue, Barron stuck with Plus R and traveled to major events around the country as his funds permitted. This culminated in a 2017 victory for Skeletal Minion at AnimEvo, during which he eliminated Sonoda “Kedako” Yuko, a famous Japanese fighting game player.
“It was a really rare experience to get [to play someone from Japan],” he said. “You just had to hope a Japanese player would show up at a major and travel to it. I’d only probably played less than five. I remember being so laser-focused that I shook his hand after winning the first game, thinking it was over.”
While successive Xrd titles headlined tournaments around the US and the world, Plus R remained an obscure title. Honnou mentioned that going back to 2019, the community’s Discord clocked in at around 3,000 to 4,000 members.
However, the COVID-19 pandemic decimated 2020’s chances of running in-person events, as the Fighting Game Community at large retreated to the safety of remote online play. Frosty Faustings, an annual Illinois event which spotlights the Guilty Gear series, was one of the last “majors” of 2020.
The pandemic also had an immeasurable impact on businesses worldwide, and Skeletal Minion’s situation took a difficult turn. With his job as a software engineer effectively terminated, a string of bad luck events with his car and health issues dog-piled on him.
“The things I was working so hard for over the past few years got yanked away from me,” Skeletal Minion said. “I was in a really bad spot, extremely depressed and in a very bad position money-wise. When rollback finally came out, it really turned around my mood in a more positive mental space.”
<h2>See me in the netplay lobby</h2>
GGPO’s release has had a meteoric effect on the community, well-illustrated by the concurrency numbers from SteamDB. The launch of the beta patch catapulted the player count from a measly 32 count to 2,330, an increase of more than 1,000%. Numbers don’t tell the whole story, however. GGPO helped break the netplay borders and the possibility of opening up to international play is what made events like Nok’s Valhalla possible.
<figure id="attachment_11445" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-11445" style="width: 946px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img loading="lazy" class="wp-image-11445 size-full" src="https://www.upcomer.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/GGPO-1.jpg" alt="SteamChart showing how new netcode for Plus R increased player base" width="946" height="544" srcset="https://legacy.upcomer.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/GGPO-1.jpg 946w, https://legacy.upcomer.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/GGPO-1-300x173.png 300w, https://legacy.upcomer.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/GGPO-1-150x86.png 150w, https://legacy.upcomer.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/GGPO-1-768x442.png 768w" sizes="(max-width: 946px) 100vw, 946px" /><figcaption id="caption-attachment-11445" class="wp-caption-text">Player numbers spiked as soon as rollback netcode became an option. | Provided by SteamCharts</figcaption></figure>
“It has been a dream come true for me to be able to play against some of the best players from overseas that I had never played against before,” Nok said. “I can&#8217;t thank the creators of GGPO enough.”
Organized in a style akin to Japanese arcades, the Waseda format sectioned players into 2v2 teams facing single elimination, which stands in contrast to the more typical double elimination brackets. Skeletal Minion said that made the tournament much more intense, but added that it wouldn’t have been possible at all before rollback.
“At that time, Japanese players felt like they were at a totally different class level,” Skeletal Minion said. “They could wax us really hard. But I feel that the skill gap has closed considerably.”
<iframe loading="lazy" title="【Valhalla】第二回Valhallaリプレイ動画【GGXXACPRオンライン大会】" width="640" height="360" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/W1KfM1Yvdk8?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Since Japan has always had a closer concentration of players, players in other countries relied more on Plus R&#8217;s netcode to meet each other. Some had good access to local venues and others saved up for majors. But with the GGPO update, players turned to online events for Plus R instead of the latest release, Xrd REV 2.
From 25v25 exhibitions, tournaments and leagues, the netplay tournament scene managed to ignore most of the negative effects of the pandemic. Streamers like <a href="https://www.twitch.tv/lunarphaselive">Lunar Phase</a> and Team Spooky hosted regular events and also ran bigger leagues with bigger guns, like the qualifier-only <a href="https://www.twitch.tv/videos/932286299">Magnum Opera</a> event.
Many new weeklies popped up. It’s now possible to find a Plus R tournament on any given weekday, complete with a stream, bracket runners and a crowd-funding tool, Matcherino, to additionally fuel the competition. <a href="https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCowLcE0hLZb1K6EgxmPmFrA">Casa</a> is one of the events that decided to include Plus R in its lineup soon after the beta release.
“There’s no way that we would be running this event without the GGPO patch,” said David Bunch, founder and sole owner of Casa, who used to host games at his house. “I would not be able to support that game without GGPO. It’s not perfect, but the netcode is the best I’ve seen in a while.”
Launched in January 2020, Casa focused on Street Fighter V at first and then added Granblue: Fantasy Versus to its lineup. The delay-based netcode proved to be a barrier for the latter, resulting in Casa eventually dropping the title.
Bunch is also exploring the possibility of inviting Japanese players to Casa, but he doesn’t want to “rush the process just for clout.” He is looking ahead to the release of Guilty Gear -STRIVE- while trying to build up relationships with Japanese players.
<h2>Striving onward</h2>
Delay netcode may very well turn into a relic of the past as the latest installment of the Guilty Gear series has already been praised for its implementation of netcode. Arc System Works committed to rollback with -STRIVE-, set to release in June, and players witnessed first-hand its impressively low ping values.
“A lot of the animations [in -STRIVE-] have holds up front so that they don’t look as jarring when they jump to the next frame,” said Lulolwen, who isn’t involved with the development of the game. “I’m speculating that the reason for that is because it works better for rollback.”
The future for netplay games, at least in the place of in-person tournaments, is looking bright and may even out the odds for those whose means prevent them from reaching certain competitive levels. However, Lulolwen stressed that many other games are extremely difficult to modify to use GGPO without developer support, and he hopes they extend a hand.
“Please release the source code for older versions of your games,” Lulowen said. “I think the Plus R project and Team French Caliburst have proven the value that fans can add to games and game engines. I would love to see a world where every ‘out of print’ fighting game has someone working on a rollback update, and if developers release the source code, those updates will almost certainly be written for free by fans.”

Guilty Gear XX Accent Core Plus R's netcode has revived a game and community that had fallen to the wayside due to the COVID-19 pandemic

New netcode brings Guilty Gear Plus R renaissance

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Luke "Woocash" Siuty is a games journalist and content creator. He specializes in fighting games and frequently streams on Twitch.

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Guilty Gear XX Accent Core Plus R&#039;s netcode has revived a game and community that had fallen to the wayside due to the COVID-19 pandemic

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