I'll try to keep this brief. I went to a tournament in Des Moines this weekend, and while I didn't do particularly well, there are some things that I noticed that I think are worth talking about. These things not only apply to improving your G&W, but improving at Brawl in general. So here they are.
1) Landing the kill:
While Game & Watch has some ******** powerful smashes, landing them on a competent, campy, and cautious opponent can be tricky. There are few reliable ways to land a hit on these types of players, and you've mostly got to rely on punishing the opponent's mistakes. If your opponent doesn't make very many mistakes, this can be difficult. You can also gimp, but again, this too is often ineffective against these kinds of opponents. It's pretty discouraging to play G&W, known for killing early, and not actually being able to KILL. So how do we deal with these types of characters? Are there any strategies that make killing any easier? This leads me into my next point...
2) Patient Play:
When you get into this situation, where your opponent has reached killing percentages, the worst possible thing to do (that I do pretty often, and I'm sure the rest of you have all been guilty of at one point or another as well!) is to get greedy for the kill. You start to play sloppy and desperately, and this is especially bad for G&W, a character who relies on tight spacing and being unpredictable with predictable moves. The real difficulty here is that your opponent will be playing even more cautiously when they get to high percentages, and you'll have less chances to punish their mistakes, and also, that G&W is light, and needs to kill earlier to negate his weight issue, and can take fewer hits from an opponent that is consistently surviving to silly percentages. BUT...does this mean that greed for the kill is bad? As G&W mains, we don't want our opponent to hang around forever, with multiple opportunities to damage us as we wait for the right moment to kill them. So how do we reach the balance between patience and greed?
3) Adaptation:
Game & Watch is a predictable character. When you're playing a G&W, what do you expect? Turtle. Turtle. Turtle. Not to say that the turtle isn't an awesome move - it is. But against different opponents, you've got to use it differently, in different situations. You cannot play every opponent the same, and you can't approach from the same angle, and sometimes, you shouldn't approach much at all. Everyone has a pattern, and you've got to exploit that - G&W is one of the best punishers out there. The easiest way to do this, as you probably know, is to learn to watch your opponent more than you watch yourself (you can practice this against CPUs to get used to watching your enemy). Additionally, you've got to notice when your opponent is adapting to you. This is more difficult. G&W can't afford to be very predictable, however, it's difficult to be UNpredictable. So, what are the most important things we can do to be unpredictable? How can we teach ourselves, not only to play unpredictably, but effectively, and without reliance on one or two attacking patterns, wonderful though they may be? If we do not learn to keep our opponents guessing, we are going to get beaten more and more. And come on! We play G&W - the 4th or 5th best character in the game! He is a nearly unbeatable character, played correctly, up there with the likes of Meta Knight, Falco, Snake, and DDD. And yet his tournament showings have recently been poor - WHY? If unpredictability is the key (and I think it is), why are we playing so predictably? How can we improve?
Most of this is pretty common knowledge, but I did think these points were worth discussing, especially because they are all related. A few of my fellow G&W mains are quitting him in search of a better character, which is really disappointing, because there aren't very many better characters. Game & Watch isn't the problem, it's the humans controlling him, we are the reasons that we lose confidence in G&W.
Discuss (or flame me
)
1) Landing the kill:
While Game & Watch has some ******** powerful smashes, landing them on a competent, campy, and cautious opponent can be tricky. There are few reliable ways to land a hit on these types of players, and you've mostly got to rely on punishing the opponent's mistakes. If your opponent doesn't make very many mistakes, this can be difficult. You can also gimp, but again, this too is often ineffective against these kinds of opponents. It's pretty discouraging to play G&W, known for killing early, and not actually being able to KILL. So how do we deal with these types of characters? Are there any strategies that make killing any easier? This leads me into my next point...
2) Patient Play:
When you get into this situation, where your opponent has reached killing percentages, the worst possible thing to do (that I do pretty often, and I'm sure the rest of you have all been guilty of at one point or another as well!) is to get greedy for the kill. You start to play sloppy and desperately, and this is especially bad for G&W, a character who relies on tight spacing and being unpredictable with predictable moves. The real difficulty here is that your opponent will be playing even more cautiously when they get to high percentages, and you'll have less chances to punish their mistakes, and also, that G&W is light, and needs to kill earlier to negate his weight issue, and can take fewer hits from an opponent that is consistently surviving to silly percentages. BUT...does this mean that greed for the kill is bad? As G&W mains, we don't want our opponent to hang around forever, with multiple opportunities to damage us as we wait for the right moment to kill them. So how do we reach the balance between patience and greed?
3) Adaptation:
Game & Watch is a predictable character. When you're playing a G&W, what do you expect? Turtle. Turtle. Turtle. Not to say that the turtle isn't an awesome move - it is. But against different opponents, you've got to use it differently, in different situations. You cannot play every opponent the same, and you can't approach from the same angle, and sometimes, you shouldn't approach much at all. Everyone has a pattern, and you've got to exploit that - G&W is one of the best punishers out there. The easiest way to do this, as you probably know, is to learn to watch your opponent more than you watch yourself (you can practice this against CPUs to get used to watching your enemy). Additionally, you've got to notice when your opponent is adapting to you. This is more difficult. G&W can't afford to be very predictable, however, it's difficult to be UNpredictable. So, what are the most important things we can do to be unpredictable? How can we teach ourselves, not only to play unpredictably, but effectively, and without reliance on one or two attacking patterns, wonderful though they may be? If we do not learn to keep our opponents guessing, we are going to get beaten more and more. And come on! We play G&W - the 4th or 5th best character in the game! He is a nearly unbeatable character, played correctly, up there with the likes of Meta Knight, Falco, Snake, and DDD. And yet his tournament showings have recently been poor - WHY? If unpredictability is the key (and I think it is), why are we playing so predictably? How can we improve?
Most of this is pretty common knowledge, but I did think these points were worth discussing, especially because they are all related. A few of my fellow G&W mains are quitting him in search of a better character, which is really disappointing, because there aren't very many better characters. Game & Watch isn't the problem, it's the humans controlling him, we are the reasons that we lose confidence in G&W.
Discuss (or flame me
)
