Does Sakurai know what he's doing with character balance?

[Senario]

A very cursory glance at the data shows that changing the view to filter to top 16 or top 8 has a minimal effect on the shape of the balance curve. It affects the particular a bit of which characters fall where, but it doesn't really make a big difference for either game how the distribution looks. Since the totals are so much bigger for "all" and therefore the data will have less randomness introduced by irrational overperforming individual actors, if the distributions are about the same, I feel like it's the best data set to use for this particular question of analysis. A sophisticated weighting algorithm would obviously be better, but that is pretty non-trivial to fabricate with the tools available to me. Capps has a team working hard on a data project for smash 4 that, if successfully integrated into the community, will allow us to conduct significantly superior analysis of the new metagame compared to what we can do for the old games, but I do think our current data is good enough to draw significant conclusions.

What you have done here is take my analysis of some data, say I'm wrong, and then tell me that reality is the complete opposite of what the data suggests. You then offer an anecdote about amsa and Axe who are only two players with Axe in particular clearly being a ridiculously huge outlier of the sort that data analysis always attempts to minimize. You then somehow insist that Brawl low tiers are amazingly bad and have no real hope without huge skill gaps despite this contradicting both all the data I've ever seen including what I've offered and the actual experiences of almost all real Brawl players. I truly don't even know where you get the last part since you do not seem to be a big Brawl player so it seems unlikely that you have extensive personal experience on this front, and you aren't presenting data either.

I'm sorry, but your argument here is not convincing at all. At best your experiences disagree with my data, but my experiences back up my data so it's a wash on the experiences with my data seeming to be the point that stands out. I do not want to bring even more Melee vs Brawl into the smash 4 forums than necessary, but this is a topic about Sakurai and his team's competence which is highly relevant to our view on the future for smash 4. My data may be imperfect, but you haven't really offered anything to counter it. If you have your own data, numeric analysis, or mathematical models that demonstrate that my analysis (which does not even suggest Melee is without merit; its balance curve does have some advantages) is wrong, I'd be very interested. Just telling me I'm wrong isn't going to do it; I need evidence.

In short, I should waste time on numeric analysis when it isn't my forte or field, gotcha. I'm just saying popularity and relative strength are as heavily correlated as you think. Strong characters attract more players, but the difference in balance is not accounted for. Meta Knight is vastly stronger than some of the rest of the cast and they have little chance of fighting back.

I'd love to waste time on providing you statistics had I the resources or time. But what I can say is that your data for the differences honestly doesn't seem like any substantial difference. In my field that much difference is so little that effectively it should fall within the standard deviation of any normal dataset for popularity.

 

[Tristan_win]

Threads like these make me think people believe Sakurai makes the game entirely by himself.

He has a full team that will balance the game as best they possibly can. Whether or not that translates to perfectly balanced 1v1 no item matches (i.e. a specific definition of "balance") is a very different question.

Sakurai might not be making the game entirely for himself but for Brawl he did take steps to make the game less competitive. He doesn't enjoy it when smash is played as a competitive activity as it prevents less experience players and smash veterans from playing on a even playing field.

edit: We are most likely only getting a 'improved' smash game because Nintendo and Namco don't fully share his ideals

 

[Amazing Ampharos]

Meta Knight is vastly stronger than some of the rest of the cast and they have little chance of fighting back.

I'm cutting your quote down to the exact problem I have here. You have convinced me that you're thoroughly unimpressed with my arguments and with those advanced by other Brawl players. However, you haven't really given any reason I can discern why you should be taken to be a credible source for statements like this. I've studied Brawl inside and out. I was a leader in the research into how Brawl mechanics actually work. I have done substantial work hacking Brawl for the purpose of adjusting character balance. I was a member of the Brawl tournament scene for years. At one time, I was even a BBR member. I feel like my default credibility on statements about how Brawl plays is pretty decent. I offered the data analysis mostly because I felt like it would be easier to defend and I could still say much in its defense, but given that you have just told everyone that their arguments are wrong without advancing any of your own, I think I can just fall back on my credibility here.

I'll tell you that from my years of experience I think the quoted statement here very poorly reflects on the reality of Brawl. Meta Knight is the best character. He is at an advantage in every match-up, and for a very large number of players, Meta Knight is the easiest character to learn to play well. No other character can claim this or anything like this. However, the magnitude of his advantage in most match-ups is not that large, and for few characters is he actually their single worst match-up. If you're legitimately good with another character, the advantage you can gain in Brawl by switching to Meta Knight is not that impressive, and that's why all these years later such a huge portion of the community primarily relies on non-MK characters even though obviously MK is the best. When you move beyond Meta Knight, Brawl is remarkably well balanced. There isn't really a plateau'd top tier where you have several characters about at parity, but from the top of the balance curve that ignores MK it's a pretty smooth ride down on the viability with you having to slide pretty low on that curve to find actual garbage characters.

This gets down to the real point. Brawl was not a poorly balanced game. Meta Knight was a significant balance mistake, but even then, he's not really *that bad* in the grand scheme of things (certainly far less bad than reading these forums would lead you to believe). That's Brawl, the game so many hate so much. It's not mainstream to consider smash 64 or Melee balance trainwrecks, and I certainly wouldn't assert that. The impressions from the smash 4 demo on balance are overwhelmingly positive from all quarters. Sakurai and the dev team deserve to be judged on the quality of their works, and their works have done nothing but give us reason to trust them. I have a very high confidence in the future balance quality of smash 4, I feel like I have a strong reason to believe that, and that's what this topic is really about.

 

[Deleted member 245254]

A very cursory glance at the data shows that changing the view to filter to top 16 or top 8 has a minimal effect on the shape of the balance curve. It affects the particular a bit of which characters fall where, but it doesn't really make a big difference for either game how the distribution looks. Since the totals are so much bigger for "all" and therefore the data will have less randomness introduced by irrational overperforming individual actors, if the distributions are about the same, I feel like it's the best data set to use for this particular question of analysis. A sophisticated weighting algorithm would obviously be better, but that is pretty non-trivial to fabricate with the tools available to me. Capps has a team working hard on a data project for smash 4 that, if successfully integrated into the community, will allow us to conduct significantly superior analysis of the new metagame compared to what we can do for the old games, but I do think our current data is good enough to draw significant conclusions.

What you have done here is take my analysis of some data, say I'm wrong, and then tell me that reality is the complete opposite of what the data suggests. You then offer an anecdote about amsa and Axe who are only two players with Axe in particular clearly being a ridiculously huge outlier of the sort that data analysis always attempts to minimize. You then somehow insist that Brawl low tiers are amazingly bad and have no real hope without huge skill gaps despite this contradicting both all the data I've ever seen including what I've offered and the actual experiences of almost all real Brawl players. I truly don't even know where you get the last part since you do not seem to be a big Brawl player so it seems unlikely that you have extensive personal experience on this front, and you aren't presenting data either.

I'm sorry, but your argument here is not convincing at all. At best your experiences disagree with my data, but my experiences back up my data so it's a wash on the experiences with my data seeming to be the point that stands out. I do not want to bring even more Melee vs Brawl into the smash 4 forums than necessary, but this is a topic about Sakurai and his team's competence which is highly relevant to our view on the future for smash 4. My data may be imperfect, but you haven't really offered anything to counter it. If you have your own data, numeric analysis, or mathematical models that demonstrate that my analysis (which does not even suggest Melee is without merit; its balance curve does have some advantages) is wrong, I'd be very interested. Just telling me I'm wrong isn't going to do it; I need evidence.

This is Senario you are arguing with. Expect very little facts, a heaping portion of misrepresentation of the Brawl competitive situation, and very little actual evidence to back up his grandiose claims to rationality in his ideas for making Smash 4, objectively, a better game. Also comes with : Melee mechanics circle-nyerking, sensationalist claims on the lack of competitive viability of Smash 4, and so on.

 

[Seagull Joe]

I can assure you we probably won't see the same in brawl where the bottom is completely shut out with no room to improve unless there is a massive skill difference between the players, you really don't get that feeling that the more you learn your character the better and farther you can take your character. There feels like there is a clean line where you don't pick these characters.

Half the characters in Melee aren't really usable. Brawl is about the same. Depends what types of results your looking at. At nationals the top and high tiers always occupy almost all the spots in at least the top 13. Usually one mid or low tier sneaks their way in there. This applies to both melee and brawl.

Could you point me to a place I can actually watch brawl? I can't seem to find it anywhere

You brawl players are always so sensitive about the balance of your own game. It has problems, deal with it. Melee has some too, but they aren't as severe. Plus the PAL version seems a lot more balanced minus a few things, recent lists for melee have improved a lot but for the longest time Yoshi and Pikachu weren't considered good until players like Axe or Amsa came along. My problem is not with you really, I don't care anything about brawl, it is a game that to me isn't the smash I grew up with so I don't consider it to be on an upward trend. I do the same for game series like Paper Mario, or Final Fantasy. Plus your comparisons are odd how did you come up with the numbers of "Oh this character is corresponding to that one on brawl's tier list". Pikachu corresponding to Wolf? Axe just placed like fourth ish at Zenith 2014. Ninth isn't even top 8 and as we all know it is progressively harder and harder to climb the bracket up.

Zenith had 1 of the smash gods. Apex is not comparable to zenith by any means. Zenith was basically a EC regional with Axe in it. You're an idiot lmfao.

 

[#HBC | Red Ryu]

I might not agree with Scenario at times but I wouldn't put him as far as any of that, that's a rude way to put it Zipzo. He has negative expectations, but from people who liked Melee and see how they didn't like Brawl I can see why he would be skeptical.

I do think Metaknight is almost the worst for a top tier Smash has scene, I think Smash 64 Pikachu is the worst but no one player it that far so I don't think anyone will see how dumb he is in that game.

Fox isn't far off from MK, if not on par. Right nor result wise he is worse in terms of what he brings for how much he pops up. I do think from my Melee expeirence and what I have scene from results Fox is pretty much on par with MK in terms of how dumb he is. What the difference is, is how the cast is different. The cast in Melee can handle Fox, in Brawl it' a lot harder. But at the same time, mmore of them will show up to try it.

Overall I think Brawl's cast on a whole is more balanced, Melee is a lot more top heavy so you get enough to satisfy enough people but overall it's worse than Brawl in that regard Pichu's aside. But balance wise either game is that far off, it's the game play that irritates people for one side or the other.

 

[Gidy]

I have little hope now after reading the article. Lag on many moves is probable.

 

[infomon]

I thought the article was very encouraging, sounds like Sakurai knows what he's doing a lot better than any of us.

"An Action game with fighting elements" Yup, that's why smash has always been an extremely unique game, unlike countless other fighters out there. Sakurai is smash. Hoping for the best, and this time (unlike Brawl) he's reaching out on all fronts to make it a great game for everyone -- including us "maniacs"

 

[DevaAshera]

Members of the Tekken Team are also working on Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS & Wii U, they're likely helping with the Balancing and should be doing a good job.

Also, you have to bear in mind that the balancing is based on normal gameplay. So all of the advanced techniques that you guys will discover from playing the game? They will almost definitely not have been taken into consideration.

This, this right here, is the most important thing to take note of.
Most of the time, the Advanced Techniques used in Super Smash Bros (and most other Fighters, such as Comboing in the original SFII, Guile's Handcuffs, and others) are actually Glitches or Exploits that the team balancing the game had no idea even existed. It is literally impossible to balance a game based on elements that you have no idea even exist and were completely unintentional (and if they were discovered, they'd likely be taken out or then made into full fledged features), they can only balance it based on the elements they do have knowledge of.

Also keep in mind that they also balance the characters in regards to Multiplayer Matches, Item Matches, and on all Stages. For an example of stage balancing, in Mario Kart 8, bikes and karts were balanced so that Bikes were better for stages with more sharp turns while karts were better for stages with more straightaways, its logical to assume that some Smash Bros. characters work better on certain stages then others, like Little Mac is great on flat surfaces such as Final Destination, but poor on stages that require jumping and being in the air more often like Palutena's Temple and 3D Land.

 

[Senario]

I might not agree with Scenario at times but I wouldn't put him as far as any of that, that's a rude way to put it Zipzo. He has negative expectations, but from people who liked Melee and see how they didn't like Brawl I can see why he would be skeptical.

I do think Metaknight is almost the worst for a top tier Smash has scene, I think Smash 64 Pikachu is the worst but no one player it that far so I don't think anyone will see how dumb he is in that game.

Fox isn't far off from MK, if not on par. Right nor result wise he is worse in terms of what he brings for how much he pops up. I do think from my Melee expeirence and what I have scene from results Fox is pretty much on par with MK in terms of how dumb he is. What the difference is, is how the cast is different. The cast in Melee can handle Fox, in Brawl it' a lot harder. But at the same time, mmore of them will show up to try it.

Overall I think Brawl's cast on a whole is more balanced, Melee is a lot more top heavy so you get enough to satisfy enough people but overall it's worse than Brawl in that regard Pichu's aside. But balance wise either game is that far off, it's the game play that irritates people for one side or the other.

Thank you, for once somebody doesnt attack me and just recognizes we dont agree on everything. Means a lot considering how the smash 4 boards are lately. Community I hope is not showing its true colors towards competitive play. Otherwise what reason would I have to get the new game even if it is good enough? People arent friendly lol.

 

[pizzapie7]

snip

lmfao the callouts, did he pee in your cheerios or something?



Brawl and Melee both have balance issues. The only way you can prefer one or the other is if you want a game with 1 (2?) (4?) extremely dominant, metagame shaping forces, an extremely wide, balanced middle, with stragglers on the backend. Or you can prefer a game where the top 6 (8?) (10?) (14?) are all pretty close with the rest of the cast being irrelevant. In my opinion, a balanced top is better than a balanced middle because the top is always going to be more popular at all levels of competitive play, from losers bracket at locals to top 8 at Evo.

But neither is balanced and anyone claiming that my game is more balanced than your game is dumb and should try to recognize that no game in this series is perfect some are just less perfect than others.

 

[#HBC | Red Ryu]

Still in terms of balance vs other games they still are way better than most other fighters.

Only street fighter I know off hand is more balanced. Otherwise pretty every othe fighter I know about it's cast balance is worse.

 

[josh bones]

My 2 cents, smash 64 has everybody become killers, melee has half the roster viable, brawl has and also.

 

[RascalTheCharizard]

The most balanced fighting game I know of is Sonic the Fighters. No, really. 8 characters, all are perfectly viable.

 

[Eternal phoenix Fire]

This is Senario you are arguing with. Expect very little facts, a heaping portion of misrepresentation of the Brawl competitive situation, and very little actual evidence to back up his grandiose claims to rationality in his ideas for making Smash 4, objectively, a better game. Also comes with : Melee mechanics circle-nyerking, sensationalist claims on the lack of competitive viability of Smash 4, and so on.

And what are you doing besides exacerbating the issue?

Half the characters in Melee aren't really usable. Brawl is about the same. Depends what types of results your looking at. At nationals the top and high tiers always occupy almost all the spots in at least the top 13. Usually one mid or low tier sneaks their way in there. This applies to both melee and brawl.

Zenith had 1 of the smash gods. Apex is not comparable to zenith by any means. Zenith was basically a EC regional with Axe in it. You're an idiot lmfao.

And aren't you the pinnacle of knowledge and tact in the smash community? Resorting to personal insults? Just how ****ing baked was the person who thought it would be ok to admit this fine kettle of fish into the back room?

Scenario may not be right all the time, and the balance between both games are negledgable, but there is no way you can justify Brawl's glaring imbalances. There was a set limit on grabbing the ledge because of one character. Letting a character go into a guaranteed kill move is a huge design flaw, and DACUS absurd because not every character can use it. I know some characters in Melee have a bad wavedash/land but at least everyone can use it.

You call him an idiot but you honestly aren't acting any smarter than he is.

 

[Seagull Joe]

And what are you doing besides exacerbating the issue?

And aren't you the pinnacle of knowledge and tact in the smash community? Resorting to personal insults? Just how ****ing baked was the person who thought it would be ok to admit this fine kettle of fish into the back room?

Scenario may not be right all the time, and the balance between both games are negledgable, but there is no way you can justify Brawl's glaring imbalances. There was a set limit on grabbing the ledge because of one character. Letting a character go into a guaranteed kill move is a huge design flaw, and DACUS absurd because not every character can use it. I know some characters in Melee have a bad wavedash/land but at least everyone can use it.

You call him an idiot but you honestly aren't acting any smarter than he is.

He said stupid misguided things with no actual justification other then his own bias. That in itself is stupidity to the highest degree. GG to me tho I guess.

 

[Eternal phoenix Fire]

He said stupid misguided things with no actual justification other then his own bias. That in itself is stupidity to the highest degree. GG to me tho I guess.

Everyone says ridiculous things, but looking at the negative as the focal point of the issue just spurs more negativity. You have to look at the silver lining of a statement, as everyone can't express things the same way. Even if a statement is fearful or brash, try to look at the point instead of how it's worded. Unless you call someone a bunch of names, then that's idiotic.

 

[LancerStaff]

I'd say Sakurai knows how to balance pretty well. KIU has 108 weapons and none really break away from the pack in either direction. Even when we figured out how to make weapons with "impossible" stats it didn't effect much.

 

[Fenriraga]

Do I think Sakurai can do it himself? Yes, but perhaps not as well as we would hope.

But considering he's got Namco backing him, as well as their generally good track record with balanced fighting games, I'm optimistic. Even then, Smash finally has the possibility of getting update patches, so I'd like to think we're in good hands now.

 

[New_Dumal]

The biggest problem in balancing Smash is what some members pointed it out:

There's 2 very distinct types of gameplay there.

o How 80% of people (or more) plays Smash
and
o How the competitive-scene plays Smash.

I, and that is my personal opnion, don't believe that is possible to do a great balance in both scenarios.
First of all, the "perfect balance" thing is crashed when you insert the number 2 (not clone) character in a game.

While Melee balance is pretty bad, and Brawl balance is pretty bad too, I completely understand the problem.
Sakurai seems to balance Brawl (I has little experience playing Melee to talk about) creating characters that are good in FFA and others that are good in 1V1 (he even already says that about SSB4, doesn't ?)

At high level skill that don't work because the most silly things in FFA just don't happen as expected in FFA.
And then they looked at 1V1, but less than the casual play.
Metaknight looks more powerfull in Brawl than Fox in Melee because he has less flaws or counters to deal with.
You can't pick Marth in FD and say that you considerably lowered the top-tier advantage.

But when you look at the game general balance, so many Melee characters are soooooo bad.
And Fox AND OTHERS HIGH TIERS can destroy them much easier than the same situation in Brawl.
Even when MK seems to be more dominant, Brawl don't have more characters to just "don't pick " than Melee.

I think that 1V1 was more worked in Brawl that it was in Melee, but problems with game-design build AT's that create the high/mid division to exist.

And I think they are looking much more to 1V1 now... We have positive signs that SSBU is the most balanced to date yet (1v1)...
But if a character we don't even saw yet has another infinite chaingrab , or other AT that negates all the work in balance?
We are far away to know.
(But SSB it's just to hard to balance for all publics, don't build expectations with or withouth Namco)

-------
Sorry for the giant post in a discussion like that.
I'm not a professional player of Brawl neither Melee to talk, but I don't think something as balance in the new game requires that to bring a discussion.

 

[infomon]

The biggest problem in balancing Smash is what some members pointed it out:

There's 2 very distinct types of gameplay there.

o How 80% of people (or more) plays Smash
and
o How the competitive-scene plays Smash.

Yeah.. Sakurai himself has pointed this out. It's almost as if he knows a lot more about this game than we give him credit for

 

[New_Dumal]

Yeah , I'm really a fan of Sakurai work, even with the problems with design that Brawl (and Melee, and 64) have.
If you look withouth much deep, everyone can see his efforts.
MK has a horrible Final Smash (what he thinks all players would add in the gameplay), Hyrule tier have good ones.
Pit has a great recovery, great projectile game, and average reach ... Low kill power.

He knows what to do... He just balance how slow a strong character has to be or how weak a versatile guy has to be too extreme.
Snake and MK are his biggest mistakes after all. (Since MK don't has problems to kill neither die, and Snake is strong, with a stupid reach, and strong projectile game, plus weighty and average distance recovery)
Yeah, I don't like how Snake was implemented :/

 

[DevaAshera]

Yup, along with what some us pointed out earlier about competitive strategies using either glitches or exploits that were never intended to begin with and were, thus, impossible to balance for.

 

[Senario]

Yup, along with what some us pointed out earlier about competitive strategies using either glitches or exploits that were never intended to begin with and were, thus, impossible to balance for.

Wavedashing I give you as an exploit but l cancelling was fully intended. Look at the manual for 64 its there.

Generally though I dont think I agree with inconsistent balance for ffa and 1v1 a good thing. Sakurai really cant balance the game well due to this inconsistency. There are very few characters in melee that are a case of "dont pick them". As players have consistently shown if you know your character and matchups you can take characters far. I honestly cant think of many characters that donthave at least have some tools available to them. As opposed to brawl where some characters get caught in infinites easy.

 

[victinivcreate1]

Can Sakurai balance properly? YES. Question is, WILL HE DO IT.

The man favors his creations. Kirby was good in 64, MK god in Brawl. Kirby and Pit both look to be strong characters in Smash 4 as well.

You also have to look at balance this way. Brawl was unbalanced because as soon as MK/ICs/Olimar/Snake/Diddy/Wario/Falco got lead, they'd never EVER have to approach again. This is further exacerbated by the fact that comeback potential is very limited in Brawl because of the lack of combos. In Melee, you could combo your qay back into victory, even if your down 3 stocks (cough Amsah).

Smash 4 has combo potential and has nerfed projectile/ledge camping (actually not the main type of camping problem in Brawl so that solves nothing) so its already CONSIDERABLY more balanced than Brawl. However, in its current state (and likely completed state), it does not allow for longer combos, thus limiting combos to 2-3 hits before resetting to neutral. I could argue that because of this, both Melee and 64 are better balanced than smash 4 will ever be. Combos are extremely real and boy they are lengthy.

 

[Eternal phoenix Fire]

Can Sakurai balance properly? YES. Question is, WILL HE DO IT.

The man favors his creations. Kirby was good in 64, MK god in Brawl. Kirby and Pit both look to be strong characters in Smash 4 as well.

You also have to look at balance this way. Brawl was unbalanced because as soon as MK/ICs/Olimar/Snake/Diddy/Wario/Falco got lead, they'd never EVER have to approach again. This is further exacerbated by the fact that comeback potential is very limited in Brawl because of the lack of combos. In Melee, you could combo your qay back into victory, even if your down 3 stocks (cough Amsah).

Smash 4 has combo potential and has nerfed projectile/ledge camping (actually not the main type of camping problem in Brawl so that solves nothing) so its already CONSIDERABLY more balanced than Brawl. However, in its current state (and likely completed state), it does not allow for longer combos, thus limiting combos to 2-3 hits before resetting to neutral. I could argue that because of this, both Melee and 64 are better balanced than smash 4 will ever be. Combos are extremely real and boy they are lengthy.

Dude.

64 stun would be pretty sweet.

 

[victinivcreate1]

Agreed. I don't mind 64 being campy. Because 64's offense is DANGEROUS.

 

[#HBC | Red Ryu]

Wavedashing I give you as an exploit but l cancelling was fully intended. Look at the manual for 64 its there.

Generally though I dont think I agree with inconsistent balance for ffa and 1v1 a good thing. Sakurai really cant balance the game well due to this inconsistency. There are very few characters in melee that are a case of "dont pick them". As players have consistently shown if you know your character and matchups you can take characters far. I honestly cant think of many characters that donthave at least have some tools available to them. As opposed to brawl where some characters get caught in infinites easy.

64 only really has it on the website back when it was released in April 26, 1999. That really isn't accessible considering the internet is a whole different now than what it was back then. If it was meant to be a think entirely, they really didn't tell anyone about it in the game's manual in 64 or melee.

Also while I agree Brawl has really ****ty with it's grab and infinite shinanigans, seriously how the heck did no one see D3 could regrab after a Dthrow :/ seriously that's like basic testing, Melee really isn't that much better off with how bad these can screw over some of the low tiers like Link and Roy who have Shiek/Ganon/Climbers grab then and pretty much do the exact same thing.

The point of balance is mostly this. Melee has a bigger top/high tier, but then has this huge drop off in balance after that where a lot of characters are that much worse. In Brawl Metaknight sits at the top by himself, but balance smooths out pretty well after that.

 

[Bladeviper]

Can Sakurai balance properly? YES. Question is, WILL HE DO IT.

The man favors his creations. Kirby was good in 64, MK god in Brawl. Kirby and Pit both look to be strong characters in Smash 4 as well.

You also have to look at balance this way. Brawl was unbalanced because as soon as MK/ICs/Olimar/Snake/Diddy/Wario/Falco got lead, they'd never EVER have to approach again. This is further exacerbated by the fact that comeback potential is very limited in Brawl because of the lack of combos. In Melee, you could combo your qay back into victory, even if your down 3 stocks (cough Amsah).

Smash 4 has combo potential and has nerfed projectile/ledge camping (actually not the main type of camping problem in Brawl so that solves nothing) so its already CONSIDERABLY more balanced than Brawl. However, in its current state (and likely completed state), it does not allow for longer combos, thus limiting combos to 2-3 hits before resetting to neutral. I could argue that because of this, both Melee and 64 are better balanced than smash 4 will ever be. Combos are extremely real and boy they are lengthy.

we have video of some combos being between 4-6 hits so that might not be a problem in the long run

 

[TurnUp]

I have a feeling it's going to be as balanced as a 4 player party game with 45+ characters can be.

Balance patches are definitely something that's probable, especially if NoA can push it to the devs to make it more balance and competitive friendly, since it seems they see great potential in this.

 

[D-idara]

I have little hope now after reading the article. Lag on many moves is probable.

Yes, because the commitment of using a strong move should be zero. Some attacks are gonna have low landing lag, some are gonna have high landing lag, why is that so hard to understand?

 

[Senario]

64 only really has it on the website back when it was released in April 26, 1999. That really isn't accessible considering the internet is a whole different now than what it was back then. If it was meant to be a think entirely, they really didn't tell anyone about it in the game's manual in 64 or melee.

Also while I agree Brawl has really ****ty with it's grab and infinite shinanigans, seriously how the heck did no one see D3 could regrab after a Dthrow :/ seriously that's like basic testing, Melee really isn't that much better off with how bad these can screw over some of the low tiers like Link and Roy who have Shiek/Ganon/Climbers grab then and pretty much do the exact same thing.

The point of balance is mostly this. Melee has a bigger top/high tier, but then has this huge drop off in balance after that where a lot of characters are that much worse. In Brawl Metaknight sits at the top by himself, but balance smooths out pretty well after that.

Well the thing is besides ice climbers (who can wobble on anybody) the Sheik had chain grabs based on reads. You had to predict where your opponent was going to tech so you can chase them, it is entirely different than being truly inescapable because that is based on skill. I wish I could say you should just take my word for it but I personally play Roy for fun and have several friends who like messing around with link and they don't really have chain grabs that are too crazy. It may seem that way esp for marth vs spacies but that actually balances out the matchup between marth and fox in it's own odd way. There aren't many chaingrabs from ganon from what I remember he just hits hard.

And it is in the smash 64 manual, there is a PDF of it if you google it. It is a little bit hidden though, you look under controls and look at the Z button and it has very specific text saying something along the lines of "press this button to resume your fighting stance". It isn't direct but it is there. And it is still an intended mechanic because you cannot mess up coding so bad that you play entire separate animations for a move by pressing a single button, they are separate files.

 

[victinivcreate1]

we have video of some combos being between 4-6 hits so that might not be a problem in the long run

I've seen some of these. None of them are true. The shorter combos are. Not the long ones.

 

[LancerStaff]

Wavedashing I give you as an exploit but l cancelling was fully intended. Look at the manual for 64 its there.

Generally though I dont think I agree with inconsistent balance for ffa and 1v1 a good thing. Sakurai really cant balance the game well due to this inconsistency. There are very few characters in melee that are a case of "dont pick them". As players have consistently shown if you know your character and matchups you can take characters far. I honestly cant think of many characters that donthave at least have some tools available to them. As opposed to brawl where some characters get caught in infinites easy.

L-canceling was added so CPUs could cheat, and it just so happens that Sakurai decided to make it a real imput/player usable because "It's not like a competitive metagame will revolve around this move, right? Riiight?"

 

[Beats]

L-canceling was added so CPUs could cheat, and it just so happens that Sakurai decided to make it a real imput/player usable because "It's not like a competitive metagame will revolve around this move, right? Riiight?"

To be honest, if you add something in a game that obviously improves a player's chances of winning, it'd be silly to think people wouldn't take advantage of that. I just don't really believe this would be something Sakurai didn't grasp.

 

[Senario]

L-canceling was added so CPUs could cheat, and it just so happens that Sakurai decided to make it a real imput/player usable because "It's not like a competitive metagame will revolve around this move, right? Riiight?"

It is in the manual so it is legit. That is not to say the mechanic could use some updating to be more accessible but it should not be taken out period. If landing simply = less lag all around then it would be the same thing. And it is really hard to ignore that it is intended since it is right there in the manual, you can do it, and the animations for L canceled air moves are SEPARATE FILES in the game's code and to make use of the files it had to be intended. The developers and people who play the game shouldn't worry of the intended effects of mechanics. If they are there you use them plain and simple.

Street fighter devs invented combos by accident but kept them in because they were cool. Competitive players in all game series find ways to link together moves or use techniques to give themselves an advantage and nobody questions it. Wavedashing in Marvel? Everybody is ok with it, Bold cancelling on dante into a volcano? All good. Jin being able to convert off any hit with fast enough reflexes and 25 meter? Also good.

To me, lower landing lag across the board is essentially Smash's version of the combo glitch in street fighter where it gives you the ability to string together moves and be competitive in the game. If the game didn't have either then you end up with an extended and overly defensive footsie game and that is not interesting to watch. Ultra shows this, people can now rush down and do combos although footsies are still prevalent. The only time you footsie somebody to death though is if they play a grapple character from what I saw, mostly cause grapple chars are 50\50 guesses till you die (getting chunked every time you get grabbed).

 

[JamietheAuraUser]

To be honest, if you add something in a game that obviously improves a player's chances of winning, it'd be silly to think people wouldn't take advantage of that. I just don't really believe this would be something Sakurai didn't grasp.

I'm guessing Sakurai thought the input timing was far too tight for players to learn to reliably perform it. Hence the high tech skill barrier for getting into those games competitively.

 

[Senario]

I'm guessing Sakurai thought the input timing was far too tight for players to learn to reliably perform it. Hence the high tech skill barrier for getting into those games competitively.

I think his only problem is that instead of simplifying the mechanic like Pokemon did with EV training/Supertraining he took it plain out. He could have just reduced landing lag across the board and nobody would have noticed if that was how it was in brawl.

 

[JamietheAuraUser]

I think his only problem is that instead of simplifying the mechanic like Pokemon did with EV training/Supertraining he took it plain out. He could have just reduced landing lag across the board and nobody would have noticed if that was how it was in brawl.

I was more referring to his inclusion of the technique as a way for CPU players to cheat. Obviously it would be unfair to have a special AI-only move like that, so he simply added a very precisely-timed command under the assumption that players wouldn't be able to pull it off reliably. Except, lo and behold, they did.

 

[LancerStaff]

To be honest, if you add something in a game that obviously improves a player's chances of winning, it'd be silly to think people wouldn't take advantage of that. I just don't really believe this would be something Sakurai didn't grasp.

It is in the manual so it is legit. That is not to say the mechanic could use some updating to be more accessible but it should not be taken out period. If landing simply = less lag all around then it would be the same thing. And it is really hard to ignore that it is intended since it is right there in the manual, you can do it, and the animations for L canceled air moves are SEPARATE FILES in the game's code and to make use of the files it had to be intended. The developers and people who play the game shouldn't worry of the intended effects of mechanics. If they are there you use them plain and simple.

I don't think he cared what it'd do. He probably saw it as move of a useful easter egg then anything else, much like Wavedashing.

Separate files? It's called "being thorough." Game development is a tricky thing, after all.

Z button to "resume fighters stance?" Ukemi, or teching to you. You better find a better translation then that to convince me.

It's there, and it's just there for fun. Do you really think he cared more about competition then compared to now? That's the only way you could both justify it's inclusion and removal.