Ah yeah, thanks for reminding me about those "Raging Demon" input combos. Never could link them to standard combos, then again, I didn't know you could back then and they were always challenging to work with to be honest. I'm not sure whether I'd like to see them return; rather the moves that came from those inputs, sure, but the inputs themselves I think, might be a little unintuitive these days.
They're not supposed to be linked, but cancelled. Not sure how changing the commands to more traditional command inputs would work though, especially since Darkstalkers has never really used SF style double motion commands. It might also work against another unique mechanic in that command EXs can be cancelled into on whiff.
IIRC, when it came to Darkstalkers' combo system, you couldn't stack two mediums punches or kicks together, but you could for weak punches and weak kicks, but you couldn't flow from weak kick to weak punch or medium kick to medium punch. It had to be successive. In other words, you could go from weak kick to medium punch to medium kick to hard punch. I think there were some weird links where you could bend the rules depending on the character, but I think that while Darkstalkers 3 did have a pretty good combo system for its time, I don't think it would hurt to be a little more flexible.
There's a priority system for chaining normals. Basically, the order is LP, LK, MP, MK, HP, HK where LP is the "weakest" and HK is the "strongest."
Chaining lights into themselves is there for something called "Renda Bonus." Certain characters gain extra frame advantage on chaining lights into themselves (e.g. B.B. Hood's far st. LP is normally +10, but becaomes +13 with Renda). This allows certain links that wouldn't be possible normally. This is important because only linked normals can be cancelled into specials and supers.
Of course, I don't really wanna see Blazblue-style combos, but the more short-and-spry combo chains that you could do in SF3 and DS3. I'd like to see finishers, or special cancels become a little more universal or flexible and maybe even see some super cancels, but I don't know whether it would alter the balance for good or ill if everyone could do it. Maybe only certain supers could be super-canceled into.
Any changes to the rules would have to be well thought out. The system in VSav helps contribute to the game's pace in that there is a higher emphasis on pressure and good okizeme instead of combos.
While thinking about this, I had an odd thought. If there was a Darkstalkers 4, would you change the bulk of many characters' command throws to a 2-button input instead of a half-circle input? Considering that many characters had a special throw in the later games that required a half-circle (or in Demitri's case a full-circle input); in order to free up the half-circle input to add a new move here or there, would you consider switch some throws to a 2-button input? Normal throws would still follow the 1-button inputs like in the past games, and certain command throws would keep their legacy inputs. But others, like Felicia's or Talbain's would switch to a 2-button input. This would free up inputs currently taken up by the throws to allow new moves (or some old moves) to be brought in for various characters. Do you think this is a good idea?
No I would not. This would open up it's own can of forms in the form of kara-throws. IMO, while this mechanic works for slower games like SF where movement comes at a premium, it doesn't work as well in VSav especially since it comes at the cost of option selects. Also, adding moves isn't really a priority in a 2D fighter where, since space control is more important then providing multiple ways to mix up, characters don't need that many moves. As some OG players have stated, the perfect 2D fighting game character only needs 3 moves - a fireball (projectile), a dragon punch (anti air) and a tatsu (forward moving attack).
