BEHOLD THE POWER OF DATA - Smash Census Results!

[GreatGonzales]

About a month ago, I embarked on a project I called "The Great Smash Census". I would like to add a subtitle: "How to prove with numbers what you've long suspected already." As I promised back then, please enjoy the detailed results of the census. A lot of my sweat and blood went into this, so I hope you like it!

Click Here to View Final Results in Full

First, I will share a few key details about this survey:

The census period ended with a whopping 733* respondents between the dates of 7/20/2013 and 8/12/2013. My goal was to poll the hardcore Smash community - those individuals who love the series the very most. My means of isolating such individuals, of course, was to post the survey on prominent online Smash communities such as Smashboards. The survey was shared at the following locations: Smashboards (Wii U General, Brawl General, Melee General, 64 General), GameFAQs, AllisBrawl, and the Smash Modding Community.

* An error on my part allowed 41 respondents to submit surveys on the dates of 8/19-8/21. These surveys have not been incorporated into my analysis.

Assuming a normally distributed random sample of the forum population (which may be a big assumption), we can be 95% certain that the reported values are accurate within a +/- 3.61% margin of error. This assumes that the total population of the forum smash community is 120,787, which is the number of registered Smashboards users as of writing this. I figure this is probably a conservative estimate of the total population since a large number of these users are inactive.​

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On with the show!​

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1. What is the most beloved Smash game?​

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Let's begin with the basic question: What is the favorite Smash game?​

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As you can see from the full results, a majority of respondents favor Super Smash Brothers Melee, then Super Smash Brothers Brawl, and finally Super Smash Brothers 64. But let's unpack those numbers a bit to see if there are any patterns...​

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N: Under 18 = 151; 18-24 = 497; 25 and Over = 78​

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We would expect that younger players to prefer newer games; older players to prefer older games. The data largely confirms this hypothesis.​

N: Competitive = 411; Non-Competitive = 315

I define a "Competitive" player as a player who has participated in at least one tournament, and has played the corresponding Smash game "a lot" or "a ridiculous amount". Melee is generally considered the most hardcore Smash title; Brawl the most casual. This data confirms that conventional wisdom.

N: Extremely Skilled: 76; Very Skilled = 253; Moderately Skilled = 368; Not Very Skilled = 29

Player skill was self-identified in this survey, so we should take this with a grain of salt. However, I must say that respondents were quite modest, only 76 claiming to be "extremely" skilled. Perhaps unsurprisingly, that group heavily favors Melee.

N: Uses Wavedashing/L-Canceling = 460; Does Not Use Wavedashing/L-Canceling = 266

Here, I have isolated respondents who utilize tech abilities "wavedashing" and "L-canceling" when playing Melee, which is the only game where these abilities appear. Those who use tech heavily favor Melee; those who do not use tech heavily favor Brawl.

N: Plays all 3 games a lot/ridiculous amount = 239; Played all 3 games, but not all of them a lot = 408; Hasn't played all 3 games = 79

This was my attempt to isolate the people who have played Smash the hardest and longest, using their self-identified play frequency as a guide. However, there doesn't appear to be a correlation here.

N: Always = 71; Usually = 91; Sometimes = 180; Rarely = 208; Never = 176

I like this graph. Look at how well a preference for Brawl correlates with high item usage, and how well a preference for Melee correlates with low item usage! I think that "item usage during non-competitive play" is a good way to assess the "casualness" of a player, so this graph tells us much about player attitudes towards the Smash games.

N: Most Played is also Favorite Game = 607; Most Played is NOT Favorite Game = 119

In addition to favorite game, respondents were also asked to identify their most played game. Unsurprisingly, there is high correlation between a game being the most played and also being the respondent's favorite game.

2. Attitudes towards wavedashing and L-canceling.

As everyone here knows, there's perhaps no subject more debated than the virtues/ills of including wavedashing and L-canceling in future Smash installments. I will break down the two camps across a number of variables. But first, we should ask the question - does everyone really CARE about wavedashing and L-canceling?

N: Yes = 473; No = 253

The answer is: Yes, mostly. But a significant portion - over a third - of the community simply does not care about whether wavedashing and L-canceling make it into future games. If you are one of those people, you can skip to the next section!

N: Uses wavedashing = 403; Does not use wavedashing = 323

N: Uses L Canceling = 419; Does not use L Canceling = 307

This is the question I was most interested in asking: How do respondents' attitudes on wavedashing and L-canceling break down if we isolate those who actually USE wavedashing/L-canceling, from those who do not? As you can see, users of these techniques are much more likely to desire them to be included in future Smash games, while those who do not use these techniques are more likely to oppose their inclusion, or, more likely, not care.

N: Super Smash Brothers 64 = 56; Super Smash Brothers Melee = 414; Super Smash Brothers Brawl = 256

N: Super Smash Brothers 64 = 56; Super Smash Brothers Melee = 414; Super Smash Brothers Brawl = 256

Here, I graphed wavedashing/L-canceling attitudes according to the respondent's favorite game. There is no clear correlation one way or the other among respondents favoring SSB64, but unsurprisingly we see Melee and Brawl favoring and unfavoring these tech abilities respectively.

N: Extremely Skilled = 76; Very Skilled = 253; Moderately Skilled = 368; Not Very Skilled = 29

N: Extremely Skilled = 76; Very Skilled = 253; Moderately Skilled = 368; Not Very Skilled = 29

When cross-tabulating according to self-identified player skill, we see a general trend of favoring wavedashing/L-canceling as skill increases, and apathy towards these tech abilities as skill decreases.

N: Competitive = 411; Non-Competitive = 315

N: Competitive = 411; Non-Competitive = 315

Wavedashing and L-canceling are generally considered to be high level techniques, so it is unsurprising that competitive players would favor their inclusion.

3. Gameplay preferences on the Melee to Brawl continuum.


All respondents were asked the following question: "There has been much discussion about the "ideal" smash game in terms of gameplay, especially regarding the fast-paced, hardcore gameplay of Super Smash Brothers Melee, compared to the slower, more casual gameplay of Super Smash Brothers Brawl. For Smash 4, place your gameplay preference on the Melee - Brawl continuum:"

A slight plurality of respondents chose the "Closer to Melee" option, and a majority of respondents chose either "Closer to Melee" or "Exactly like Melee". However, a significant portion of respondents prefer gameplay "In between Melee and Brawl". Let's see how these attitudes break down!

N: Under 18 = 151; 18-24 = 497; 25 and Over = 78

Generally, we see that younger players are more likely to prefer gameplay "In between Melee and Brawl", and older players are more likely to prefer gameplay closer to Melee.

N: Super Smash Brothers 64 = 56; Super Smash Brothers Melee = 414; Super Smash Brothers Brawl = 256

This one is pretty interesting. Unsurprisingly, respondents favoring Melee prefer gameplay closer to Melee. Not a single respondent favoring Melee chose "Closer to Brawl". Likewise, just 1 respondent favoring Brawl chose "Exactly like Melee". Not sure what that person was thinking.

I should also note - there was no option to choose an option favoring gameplay similar to SSB64, and for that I apologize to all you 64 folks out there! It is interesting to see how that group breaks down, with a slight preference for Melee gameplay.

N: Extremely Skilled = 76; Very Skilled = 253; Moderately Skilled = 368; Not Very Skilled = 29

There isn't an obvious correlation here, except within players identifying themselves as "Extremely Skilled". This group of players is the only one to have a plurality in favor of gameplay "Exactly like Melee".

N: Competitive = 411; Non-Competitive = 315

Once again, competitive players favor Melee-like gameplay over non-competitive players. To the informed viewer, this should come as no surprise.

N: Uses Wavedashing/L-Canceling = 460; Doesn't Use Wavedashing/L-Canceling = 266

Here, I isolated respondents who either use wavedashing or L-canceling, or both. This cross-tabulation has perhaps the strongest correlation regarding gameplay preferences.

4. Super Smash Brothers 64 Data.

Enough of that nonsense! Let's talk about preferences about characters and stages for Super Smash Brothers 64!

N = 677

All SSB64 players were asked to identify which characters they play on a regular basis. Therefore, respondents could select multiple characters. Here you see how character usage breaks down - Captain Falcon is the most used!

N = 677

Here, we see which were the most popular (and least popular) characters to "main". Respondents could only select a single character. There is a near three-way tie for first between Fox, Kirby, and Captain Falcon!

N = 87

This is the same as above, except limited to players who have participated in at least one SSB64 tournament AND played SSB64 either "a lot" or "a ridiculous amount". Top tier is basically the same, but there are some shakeups in mid-tier.

N = 677

This is just what it sounds like - the most popular stages among all SSB64 player respondents.

5. Super Smash Brothers Melee Data.


Onto Melee!

N = 714

These are the most used characters among Melee playing respondents. Marth is the big winner - better get used to that idea.

N = 714

Here are the most mained Melee characters using all Melee-playing respondents. Uh, Mewtwo?

N = 283

This is the same as above, except limited to players who have participated in at least one SSBM tournament AND played SSBM either "a lot" or "a ridiculous amount". I don't know about you, but I am surprised to see Link here!

N = 714

Here's a shocker - people love Final Destination!

6. Super Smash Brothers Brawl Data.


Last but not least, it's Brawl's turn!

N = 704

These are the most used characters in SSBB. Marth takes number 1 status yet again!

N = 704

I was expecting Metaknight to be number 1 here. Shows what I know!

N = 195

This is the same as above, except limited to players who have participated in at least one SSBB tournament AND played SSBB either "a lot" or "a ridiculous amount". Note the low percentages here - with so many characters in Brawl, there is not a lot of consensus on the best "main" character. But if this data is any indication, it is Captain Olimar!

N = 704

This was a tough one for a lot of people to decide I am sure, Brawl having a number of excellent maps. In the end, tbough, Smashville is the clear favorite stage.

7. Tier analysis for main characters in 64, Melee, and Brawl.

After doing the analysis of main character usage for all three games, I got to thinking about how "maining" behavior matches up with the generally accepted character tier lists. So I used the tiers found here to inform my analysis. But I had a problem - tiers are not all the same size, containing the same number of characters. This may be fine for the purposes of separating characters into meaningful tiers, but this is bad from a statistics perspective.

So, what I did was I took the number value for each character (for example, Kirby in SSB64 has value "2.36") and then split characters from each game into tier quartiles. Then, I simply took a percentage of character maining for each quartile for all players and also competitive players. I will define the quartiles for each game below.

Quartile 1: Pikachu, Kirby, Fox
Quartile 2: Captain Falcon, Mario, Yoshi
Quartile 3: Donkey Kong, Jigglypuff, Ness
Quartile 4: Link, Luigi, Samus

Quartile 1: Fox, Falco, Sheik, Marth, Jigglypuff, Peach, Captain Falcon
Quartile 2: Ice Climbers, Dr. Mario, Pikachu, Samus, Ganondorf, Luigi
Quartile 3: Mario, Mewtwo, Young Link, Link, Donkey Kong, Yoshi
Quartile 4: Zelda, Roy, Mr. Game & Watch, Ness, Bowser, Pichu, Kirby

Quartile 1: Meta Knight, Ice Climbers, Captain Olimar, Diddy Kong, Marth, Snake, Falco, Pikachu, Zero Suit Samus, Wario
Quartile 2: Lucario, King Dedede, Toon Link, Wolf, Fox, Mr. Game & Watch, Pit, R.O.B., Peach
Quartile 3: Kirby, Donkey Kong, Sonic, Ike, Sheik, Ness, Yoshi, Luigi, Pokemon Trainer
Quartile 4: Lucas, Mario, Samus, Bowser, Captain Falcon, Link, Jigglypuff, Zelda, Ganondorf

8. Analysis of item usage in non-competitive play.


This was just something I was interested in, and there isn't a good place to stick it in this post, so here it is!

N: Extremely Skilled = 76; Very Skilled = 253; Moderately Skilled = 368; Not Very Skilled = 29

There appears to be a moderate correlation between player skill and the extent to which a player uses items in non-competitive play. Look at the values for "Always" and "Never" across the skill levels.

N: Competitive = 411; Non-Competitive = 315

Likewise, we see competitive players using items less than non-competitive players.

9. Most desired characters in Super Smash Brothers 4.


All respondents were asked to identify their most desired unannounced character in Smash 4. I have cleaned the responses and separated veteran and newcomer characters.

N = 481

Coming in at number one is...Mewtwo! How about that. It does seem likely to me that we will see a Mewtwo return, albeit possibly in the new form.

N = 238

According to this data, Ridley is the most desired newcomer character. However, please take this with a grain of salt; as many respondents pointed out, this question was regrettably lacking in newcomer character options, so much of these characters were entered manually using the "Other" option.

10. Attitudes towards purchasing Smash 4.


This section wasn't planned until I noticed something interesting - 20% of respondents reportedly have no plan of purchasing Smash 4 in either form. I wanted to see if there were any trends related to these people who selected "Neither"...

N: Wii U = 243; 3DS = 53; Both = 287; Neither = 143

Check that out! There has been much talk of disgruntled Melee players, and here you have it - among respondents not planning to purchase Smash 4, an overwhelming percentage of them have Super Smash Brothers Melee as their favorite game. But we shouldn't end there:

N: Super Smash Brothers 64 = 56; Super Smash Brothers Melee = 414; Super Smash Brothers Brawl = 256

Pretty interesting! It's actually respondents who favor Super Smash Brothers 64 who are least likely to purchase Smash 4. What a strong correlation. One possible explanation is: older players tended to prefer Super Smash Brothers 64, and older players are also less likely to be eager gamers in the future. Speaking for myself, I'm 28 and definitely not as into games as I used to be. That being said, I do plan to purchase Smash 4, so...

Well, there you have it folks. Please take a look and let me know what you think. I have the capability to run custom reports, so if there is a question that wasn't answered in my analysis that you are curious about, let me know and I'll see what I can do.

 

[IhaveSonar]

This is incredible. Excellent work.

 

[TewnLeenk]

Wow man, that's actually really cool! Very good work! Hoping we see a Mewtwo comeback in SSB4. Everyone likes Mewtwo.

 

[Chris Sifniotis]

Wow, that's a very telling piece of work there. It's a shame I missed a piece of Melee pie.
*reads full report*
What's most intriguing is in all three games a large majority of players don't or rather have not competed, perhaps this might explain player modesty. It may also be of interest to discover the other reasons players select a main.

 

[Dr. James Rustles]

Very good, I'd like to see a modified census within a month after the release of Smash 4, and again after the first tier formation.

If I am reading this right, according to the main character analysis there's a strong correlation between the percentage of character use between casual and competitive players, and therefore tiers have little (statistical) impact on character use in competitive play?

It seems like common sense that the shape of a character's metagame is determined by the number of players using the character, but now there may be some evidence to support that. Drawing from the "Most Mained Characters in SSBB - Competitive Only" chart and the characters in the B and up tiers, 8 out of the 12 characters with the most significant tournament presence are also in the top tiers. It isn't conclusive since tournament attendance between competitive players varies, and a few higher tier characters like Ice Climbers and ZSS are not among the most used character yet have significant ability to win tournaments and vice-versa Link still has the weakest tournament performance despite being among the most played characters; Additionally, it might be that the presence of tiers affects tournament presence for characters, yet if I am reading the above correctly, it might not.

The chart and top tiers for comparison:

Spoiler

Quilt's verdict on the influence on tiers by character use: Plausible and Probably Significant

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Also, GreatGonzales, you didn't break much data down among age and gender differences. I'd like to see the most popular characters among older and younger generations

 

[greenluigiman2]

Good work man! Interesting stuff. Looks like Melee players are very opinionated, Marth is a very popular character and Pac-Man is a top 5 most wanted newcomer.

 

[FalKoopa]

I didn't know Toon Link was such a commonly used character, haha.

And yeah, like Quilt said, I'd like to see Most used/maimed characters separated by age-groups.

 

[Ghostbone]

Your character usage in Brawl (at least for competitive) is way off.

There was a thread on the usage of every Brawl character and their tournament winnings, taken from the results of as many tournaments as possible, MK dominated, Olimar was far from first.

 

[FlamingForce]

Why is Mewtwo so popular though? I never understood that aspect of the Smash community.

 

[BaPr]

Wow, that's a very telling piece of work there. It's a shame I missed a piece of Melee pie.
*reads full report*
What's most intriguing is in all three games a large majority of players don't or rather have not competed, perhaps this might explain player modesty. It may also be of interest to discover the other reasons players select a main.

It could be because of favorite video games, so they choose the character that goes into the game. That's what I did with Sonic, but when I wanted to start playing competitively, I mained Pit (I thought he was top tier with his arrow and fast attack).

 

[D-idara]

It's OBVIOUS that the annoying pricks who wavedash and L-cancel will want Wavedashing and L-Cancelling back, but anyone that wants to rely on actual skills and not game-exploiting glitches will be againist wavedash and L-Cancelling, because they're trying to turn SSB into Street Fighter, where the skill is defined by learning a ridiculous amount of ridiculously-complex commands to spam them over and over in chains.

 

[DakotaBonez]

So like, half of the people who are members of smash bros forums aren't even competitive players. I always assumed that only competitive players would be obsessed enough to join a forum about the game.

 

[BaPr]

I'm surprised that Melee fans will get the next smash more than brawl fans.

 

[GreatGonzales]

It may also be of interest to discover the other reasons players select a main.

In fact, there was a question I asked concerning the reasons that go into picking a main character. But I decided not to do any cross-tabs with this since the overwhelming response was "The character is fun to play" (76%). Still, might be interesting to unpack that a bit, maybe competitive players are more likely to main for different reasons. I think, at the end of the day, all smash players competitive and casual just love to play the game!

 

[GreatGonzales]

I'm surprised that Melee fans will get the next smash more than brawl fans.

This is actually not accurate. That graph you're referring to was attempting to take the magnifying glass on people's plan to purchase Smash 4, not on their favorite Smash game. I haven't run the numbers, but I'm almost positive that the group most likely to purchase Smash 4 is people who favor Brawl.

 

[BaPr]

Oh, well nevermind. That makes more sense.

 

[GreatGonzales]

Your character usage in Brawl (at least for competitive) is way off.

There was a thread on the usage of every Brawl character and their tournament winnings, taken from the results of as many tournaments as possible, MK dominated, Olimar was far from first.

Hey, I am a slave to the numbers man! I stated the margin of error at the beginning, and certainly there can be peculiarities of survey response rates for different types of people (maybe forum people are generally different than tournament people, I think this is likely).

 

[GreatGonzales]

Very good, I'd like to see a modified census within a month after the release of Smash 4, and again after the first tier formation.

Let me BREATH a bit man! This was a lot of work!

If I am reading this right, according to the main character analysis there's a strong correlation between the percentage of character use between casual and competitive players, and therefore tiers have little (statistical) impact on character use in competitive play?

Yeah, I was expecting a bigger difference in main character behavior between casual and competitive players. But it should be noted that I don't have a foolproof way to isolate "truly" competitive players. Like, if someone just participated in a tournament at their school filled with casual players, they may claim to have attended a tournament. I should have specified "smashboards tournament" or something.

Also, GreatGonzales, you didn't break much data down among age and gender differences. I'd like to see the most popular characters among older and younger generations

Yeah I can do that. Not sure about gender though, we only had 30 females respond after all!

 

[Beat!]

Marth is the best character ever.

 

[Moon Monkey]

I'm impressed. Good stuff!

 

[PrincessAzula]

Excellent data presentation and analysis!

Wow, there are so few Zelda mains.

 

[BaPr]

Excellent data presentation and analysis!

Wow, there are so few Zelda mains.

That's how I felt about Pit.

 

[Zonderion]

Capps is working on a database for the Smash tournaments in this thread. It would be really interesting to be able to compare data from your poll results and from the data collected at the tournaments.

 

[El Duderino]

It's OBVIOUS that the annoying pricks who wavedash and L-cancel will want Wavedashing and L-Cancelling back, but anyone that wants to rely on actual skills and not game-exploiting glitches will be againist wavedash and L-Cancelling, because they're trying to turn SSB into Street Fighter, where the skill is defined by learning a ridiculous amount of ridiculously-complex commands to spam them over and over in chains.

 

[GreatGonzales]

For some strange reason, the survey itself is switching from being turned off - to being turned on again. Now we have 774 responses, apparently. But! No responses were included in my analysis except for the 733 who submitted by 8/12/2013. Sorry!

Just wanted to clarify that in case people are wondering.

 

[BADGRAPHICS]

I am actually appalled by the number of Melee die-hards who say outright that they won't be getting Smash 4. Just because you prefer Melee doesn't mean you should regard all other games in the series as worthless. Granted, a few of you won't be picking it up for sensible reasons, but the numbers obviously indicate a severe level of belligerence in our community.

Way to support the creator of what is probably your favourite game. You guys really should be ashamed of yourselves.

 

[Smashoperatingbuddy123]

its very accurate to me nice research man

 

[GreatGonzales]

I am actually appalled by the number of Melee die-hards who say outright that they won't be getting Smash 4. Just because you prefer Melee doesn't mean you should regard all other games in the series as worthless. Granted, a few of you won't be picking it up for sensible reasons, but the numbers obviously indicate a severe level of belligerence in our community.

Way to support the creator of what is probably your favourite game. You guys really should be ashamed of yourselves.

Well holllllld your horses - it's actually 64 people where you should direct your ire, if anywhere! Look at this:

I think all we're seeing here is older players don't play games like they used to, so they are less likely to play games in the future?

I will update the OP with this graph as well.

 

[BADGRAPHICS]

Well holllllld your horses - it's actually 64 people where you should direct your ire, if anywhere! Look at this:

I think all we're seeing here is older players don't play games like they used to, so they are less likely to play games in the future?

I will update the OP with this graph as well.

Interesting points, though I'm not certain that older gamers less likely to play games in the future are going to be active on these boards. This is speculation, obviously; this new graph definitely shows a potential correlation with toward general disinterest of older gamers.

 

[GreatGonzales]

When I have more time I will create the same graph according to player age. Now I'm interested to see!

 

[link2702]

pretty much what my response would of been.

I could take the time explaining how ridiculous and foolish that guy sounded, and how little he really knows about the games and what actually does require skill in the game...

but it'd be a total waste of time and effort that could be spent elsewhere.

as for the topic at hand, kinda surprised at the most mained character chart....not sure how accurate that honestly is, with how ridiculously advantaged MK is against the rest of the cast, i can't see him not being the most used character.

 

[D-idara]

pretty much what my response would of been.

I could take the time explaining how ridiculous and foolish that guy sounded, and how little he really knows about the games and what actually does require skill in the game...

but it'd be a total waste of time and effort that could be spent elsewhere.

as for the topic at hand, kinda surprised at the most mained character chart....not sure how accurate that honestly is, with how ridiculously advantaged MK is against the rest of the cast, i can't see him not being the most used character.

Why did I sound ridiculous and foolish? Because I want the game to be based on actual skill and not hard-to-time and hard-to-learn commands that are actually physics exploits (Glitches) and should be removed from the game permanently? Melee was TOO fast and you needed ridiculous reaction times to land most complicated air moves, it was almost unfair, a good game is VERY easy to learn and hard to master, Wavedashing and L-Cancelling aren't easy to learn at all.

 

[D-idara]

So like, half of the people who are members of smash bros forums aren't even competitive players. I always assumed that only competitive players would be obsessed enough to join a forum about the game.

Maybe it's because competitive is a vague term when we talk about Super Smash Bros.
Let's see, we've got the competitive side who plays in tournaments and only uses Fox in Final Destination, which pretty much takes the fun from the game because it's supposed to be a cluster**** and a rumble fighter. And then you've got people like me, who are definitely very much obsessed with Smash and want to get much better at the game, but love the game as it is and don't hate stage hazards, items or Final Smashes. My cousin, for example, is one of the best Super Smash Bros. players I've seen, he's so much into the game and he plays perfectly, but he loves playing with items and loves hazardous, chaotic stages because they just add to the fun.

It really pisses me off to see fellow Smashers begging for more plain, featureless stages like Smashville or Final Destination...it's like these people are begging for the game to NOT be fun, every real Smash player wants stages like Spear Pillar, Big Blue, Green Greens, Rainbow Cruise, Norfair or Frigate Orpheon.

 

[GreatGonzales]

D-idara, as the smash census has demonstrated, there is diversity in the smash community. You're the only one here who is making demands about what smash should and shouldn't be. There's no reason why there can't be a game that appeases players who prefer featureless stages and those who prefer the more chaotic stages. Indeed - all 3 games have done this so far, so why should that change?

Regarding wavedashing and l-canceling, I do think it is important to have used these skills in order to have an informed opinion. I hazard to guess that you do not use them? No one wants smash to become street fighter, the fact that you would state this suggests that you do not understand the nature of these techniques.

 

[Curmudgeon]

Why did I sound ridiculous and foolish? Because I want the game to be based on actual skill and not hard-to-time and hard-to-learn commands that are actually physics exploits (Glitches) and should be removed from the game permanently? Melee was TOO fast and you needed ridiculous reaction times to land most complicated air moves, it was almost unfair, a good game is VERY easy to learn and hard to master, Wavedashing and L-Cancelling aren't easy to learn at all.

Dude, you can learn to wavedash like in 5 minutes

 

[[Corn]]

I like it alot. It seems kinda funny when viewing the things from a Melee vs Brawl perspective


Only thing I took some issue with is how some questions were proposed. It seemed very black an white to terms of information. On L canceling, I say that I do not want L canceling back but want less lag on aerials in general. That would put me in the group that does not want L canceling back. Thats one of the largest issues surrounding the thing. It would be as if I asked you that you wanted vanilla frosting on your birthday cake and you said no. Then I would be weird and think that you don't want frosting at all when in reality you just didn'twant that flavor.


Correct me if I am wrong or misinterpreted the info though

 

[GreatGonzales]

Only thing I took some issue with is how some questions were proposed. It seemed very black an white to terms of information. On L canceling, I say that I do not want L canceling back but want less lag on aerials in general. That would put me in the group that does not want L canceling back. Thats one of the largest issues surrounding the thing. It would be as if I asked you that you wanted vanilla frosting on your birthday cake and you said no. Then I would be weird and think that you don't want frosting at all when in reality you just didn'twant that flavor.


Correct me if I am wrong or misinterpreted the info though

Yeah, certainly that is a weakness of the data. The specific question was: "Do you want wavedashing and/or L-canceling in SSB4?", answer choices being "Yes - Wavedashing", "Yes - L-Canceling", "Both", and "Neither". So I didn't ask people to clarify their position beyond black and white, and certainly there are shades of gray here as you say. Take the data with sufficient grains of salt.

 

[GreatGonzales]

Double post.

 

[Dr. James Rustles]

I strongly encourage everybody to ignore D-idara. It is not worth derailing the thread because of a whining flamer.

Your character usage in Brawl (at least for competitive) is way off. There was a thread on the usage of every Brawl character and their tournament winnings, taken from the results of as many tournaments as possible, MK dominated, Olimar was far from first.[/quote

[quote="GreatGonzales, post: 15806694, member: 222086"Yeah I can do that. Not sure about gender though, we only had 30 females respond after all!

Please share the thread, Ghostbone. Do you think it's possible that there are people that are lying on some parts in the survey? I know of at least 5 people on the boards who have themselves listed as female but are actually men, and none of them are transsexual or identify as women in real life. Maybe some people don't draw the line between "favorite character" and "main character" and just have a separate category for characters they use in a tournament, even if they aren't their main. I have no idea how much Meta Knight stigma would affect the results. Maybe despite the fact Meta Knight users aren't on top, they still occupy the highest percentage of winning characters?

 

[GreatGonzales]

Please share the thread, Ghostbone. Do you think it's possible that there are people that are lying on some parts in the survey? I know of at least 5 people on the boards who have themselves listed as female but are actually men. Maybe some people don't draw the line between "favorite character" and "main character" and just have a separate category for characters they use in a tournament, even if they aren't their main. I have no idea how much Meta Knight stigma would affect the results. Maybe despite the fact Meta Knight users aren't on top, they still occupy the highest percentage of winning characters?

Sure people could be lying. But seems strange to me that people would lie about gender? Call me old fashioned.

The precise wording of the main character question is: "If you had to choose, which character is your "main"?" So, I don't think there is much room for misinterpretation there.

A lot of people are saying they are surprised by the character usage/maining results. Certainly we need to account for the margin of error, and normal amounts of error associated with polling in general. But we do have a very large number of responses, so I think these results are statistically significant. I'm pretty certain that there's something meaningful about these character results.