To anyone here that plays/knows shit about fighting games, what are some particular things about how Phil conducts himself that are particularly bad? What stupid things does he keep doing? What characters does he gravitate too even when they don't work out? Things like that.
I'll say something about Tekken because it's the game I'm most familiar with. The fact that he seemed to play Paul a lot in Tekken isn't bad in itself, but he doesn't use the mixups or other scary shit he's known for. He probably just remembers in some recess of his gouty brain that deathfist is one of the most dangerous moves in the game when it actually hits.
I play fighters and just now saw this thread. So pardon the bump.
Phil's absolute worst mistakes when it comes to fighters is that he doesn't adapt and he doesn't do any lab work or research. What I mean by "lab work" is going into training mode and figuring shit out. It's called "hitting the lab." In the lab is where you figure out that Blank move is safe, blank move is plus on block and etcetera. Hitting the lab is something that anyone who really plays fighters does. It's impossible to "git gud" without putting in the work.
So Phil puts in the minimum amount of work in the lab. He'll figure out a combo, the application of the special moves/supers, gimmicky things, he'll learn an anti-air and that will be the extent of it. Then of course he bitches when he loses, blames it on something when 99.9% of the time it was his fault because he sucks and didn't put in the work.
As far as characters he gravitates to I would say he sticks to easy to understand characters (mostly zoners/shoto's*) and any character that was in ST.
*A "Zoner" is a character that can keep you out with fireballs and really good pokes. A "Shoto" is any character that has the following: a fireball, a shoryuken, and maybe a tatsu (some kind of move that let's them in and maybe bypasses fireballs). I.E. Ryu, Ken, Akuma, Sakura and Sagat.
I played a bit of Tekken and I can tell you that the kind of shit Phil does in that is very, very basic shit that anyone could figure out in a day or so.
Edit:
No, he is not decent, he is average at best. Everything he does can be learned in 1-2 months tops and I'm pretty sure everybody at my monthly locals can beat him in a ft5 or ft10. (And we're just some old fucks who haven't even played "competitively")
Just look at him playing old games like 3rd Strike or even MVC2 which he should be pretty decent in, but just isn't.
Honestly, I wouldn't even say he's average. Back in the day when there were fewer people playing these games then sure. But nowadays? No way. Phil is easily below average.