for managing your expectations: boxing (and wrestling/mma/etc) games aren't really designed like fighters any more than action games or open world games with melee combat are. don't expect any more skill transfer from than you would from gauntlet, the witcher, or trying to melee/not get meleed in halo.
a couple other things i remembered that are unusual for the home gamer to care about outside of fighters:
the d-pad is much better than the thumbstick for 99% of people on 99% of games,
if you're having trouble with motion inputs on a pad try using a different make of pad if you can, i've heard bad things about the ps5 pad but the dualshock 4 and recent xbox pads are usually fine.
if you can borrow an arcade stick or a hitbox "leverless arcade stick" give those a try too because the different mechanical dexterity might feel better, but it's hard to recommend the investment if you're not sure you'll even like the genre.
more generally, if anyone is hitbox-curious, playing a fighter on a keyboard is broadly similar although the layout and switch-feel might have you brood war-ing the keys. if you like it on keys you'll probably like it better on real arcade buttons.
for managing your expectations: boxing (and wrestling/mma/etc) games aren't really designed like fighters any more than action games or open world games with melee combat are. don't expect any more skill transfer from than you would from gauntlet, the witcher, or trying to melee/not get meleed in halo.
Good point, I’ll keep that in mind
a couple other things i remembered that are unusual for the home gamer to care about outside of fighters:
the d-pad is much better than the thumbstick for 99% of people on 99% of games,
if you're having trouble with motion inputs on a pad try using a different make of pad if you can, i've heard bad things about the ps5 pad but the dualshock 4 and recent xbox pads are usually fine.
if you can borrow an arcade stick or a
hitbox"leverless arcade stick" give those a try too because the different mechanical dexterity might feel better, but it's hard to recommend the investment if you're not sure you'll even like the genre.more generally, if anyone is hitbox-curious, playing a fighter on a keyboard is broadly similar although the layout and switch-feel might have you brood war-ing the keys. if you like it on keys you'll probably like it better on real arcade buttons.