Tekken Tag Tournament 2/System/Crush System

This series of lessons are aimed to introduce the offensive systems Tekken has, which include hit ranges, throws, crush system, frames and the combo system, in a way that the readers can take advantage of this system in a fight.

• Strikes and Hit Ranges
• Frames #1: Explanation
• Frames #2: CH-Hunting
• Frames #3: Block Punishing
• Crush System
• Hitboxes and Range
• Parries and Reversals
• Throws #1: Front, Side, Back
• Throws #2: Crouch, Ground, Air
• Throws #3: Shifts, Chains, Tackles
• Combos #1: Launchers and Bounds
• Combos #2: Stage Gimmicks
• The Art of Buffering

Crush System

Objectives

• To fully explain the crush system
• To show ways to take advantage of the crush system

Having trouble with how to use frames? Yes, we've all been to that. But don't worry, there's also other ways to inflict hurt to your opponent while you're learning on the way. On this page, we're gonna talk about a specific system introduced in Tekken 5, which called the "Crush" system.

Crush System

Have you ever wondered how some people with shorter bodies can still hang out with bigger people in a fighting competition? Aside from being nimble and quicker, smaller opponents use moves that attack, but also dodges other people's attack as well. Many arts have these kinds of attacks. Boxing, Muay Thai and some Japanese striking arts do swaying and ducking attacks to be able to attack while dodging attacks aimed at the head. In the same way, Tae Kwon Do, Capoeira and some Chinese martial arts implement flips and jumping attacks to dodge tripping lows.

Now, this is directly translated in Tekken by the crush system. The idea is, some ducking attacks should be invulnerable to high attacks, and jumping attacks should be invulnerable to low attacks, just like simple crouching and jumping dodges respective attacks. The attacks that are invulnerable to high attacks are called high crush (or sometimes TC which means technically crouching) moves and the attacks that dodge lows are called low crush moves (or sometimes TJ which means technically jumping). Remember, it won't matter if your opponent attacked you first, a crushing move will dodge it. That means you can throw away your frame data table and disregard frames for now, since you turn the calculations game to a rock-paper-scissors one. What you need to look for is the attack's hit range instead, whether if it's a high, or a low, and it's way easier to figure it out in a match, compared to figuring out the right block punish. Some characters, like Zafina, have a lot of crushing moves and revolve their game around them.

(Just a note though, there are no such thing as mid-crush.)

Taking advantage of Crushes

Taking advantage of crush moves almost share the same strategies as looking for a counterhit or a block punish, but they are used in a different way. You are not looking for a specific attack's speed (frames), but its hit range. So, what you usually do is try to figure out your opponent's favorite moves, and try to anticipate the attack to "crush" it. The most common application of this is using hopkicks. Hopkicks are jumping attacks that low crushes, so they are mostly done if you see someone spam low attacks like there's no tomorrow. Attacks from crouchdashes also are a popular high crush moves. They are often use when you see someone do jabs all the time.

Some people complain about crushes being a bit too broken in the game, because oftentimes it punishes people for spamming a supposedly "safe" move. I believe that's the whole purpose of crush moves, it punishes people who are being predictable with their attacks and being reckless. If you get hit by a low crush because you predictably threw out a supposedly safe and fast low, you gotta learn from it and not make the same mistake again. As a crusher, what you need to look at is people's attacking patterns; as long as they get predictable, crush their attacks and punish them for it.

Evading versus Crushing

In a previous topic, we have talked before about how attacks in a fighting game works by having the hitboxes of moves to collide with each other. But what if a move's hitbox doesn't collide to the enemy? Yep you got it, the move essentially missed your target... There are some attacks that uses this to make some moves miss. But let me tell you this, This isn't how the crush system works in this game!!!. Remember that if your attack crushes, it means you would be invulnerable to a specific attack range, no matter if the move is faster or its hitbox touched you. Why am I saying this? Because not every move that seems to crush isn't really crushing!!!.

The greatest example I could give is the generic handspring (ub~B). It explains the difference of both hitbox-type evasion and crushing. Generic Handspring is a low crush move, which means it is invulnerable to low attacks (which makes sense though, as it's a flashy way to dodge sweeps in action flicks). Now here's the magic, if Marduk uses his FC df+4 (a low that moves forward, giving it crazy range), you'll see that your backflipping character didn't get hit by it, even if his/her hands clearly getting hit by the low!

Now to compare, the generic handspring isn't a high crush move. It just uses pure hitbox-type evasion. The iffy hurtbox of the backflipping character combined with the fact that he/she is moving back fast makes it hard for most highs to hit it. It gives the illusion though that its a high-crush move, but it's not. If you use a high attack with a beefy hitbox range (e.g. DEWGF: Mishima's ff,n,d,df:2), The backflipping character would get hit.

This is important to know because some people will think a particular move crushes very well but then gets hit a move and feel cheated. Some people even felt that some moves and stances crush mids (which basically doesn't exist) like Xiaoyu's Art of Phoenix Stance, then they get surprised they get hit by a mid axe kick. Crush moves are there to balance some moves and reduce the inconsistencies of attacks on some characters who have big hurtboxes (this was a problem pre-Tekken 5 days). There are times when a jumping attact gets hit accidentally because the hitbox of the opponent is off by a big, and it happens alot before especially when having small chars fight big-sized chars.