After the SDCC tournament yesterday... I'm having doubts Smash 4 will be a good competitive game.

[Cassio]

Also, aside from general mechanics, it's worth noting that when players actually get good at fighting games, top level play overall becomes more defensive, because consistency is key competitively. Most of the exceptions to that involve skill gaps, like Mango who has spacing that is literally impossible and can't be replicated competitively due to his reaction time.

More of the problem with Smash aside from REALLY obviously stupid things like ledgestalling, no grab teching, and airdodge hitstun timers is just...really hilariously bad character balance honestly lol. Though no grab teching makes bad character balance ESPECIALLY obvious.

Which is why I believe Namco deserves respect when I hear Marth has been nerfed, tether grabs aren't terribad, and other things.

Agree about games usually become more defensive. Even Mango became more defensive actually, lol. Though ironically, Brawl started out so defensively that top level play became more offensive, especially after the Japanese showed us up. Of course it still settled as more defensive oriented, but the progression went opposite.

Also I agree that theyre making some pretty good design decisions on things like tethers, spacing characters not being so OP, ledge tactics, etc.

I'm not going to sit through hours of gameplay for you. Here's something noticeable from the very first video. I only watched until the first stock was taken, but it shows everything that I dislike about the game and why many of the complaints people have about it are completely valid. MK vs MK on Battlefield. After jumping around throwing out hitboxes and in general just looking menacing at each other for no real purpose for 10 seconds, neutral colored MK glides through dark MK into a full forward tilt auto combo into a forward air into... nothing. He essentially worked 12 seconds for chip damage. Dark MK then misses a down tilt and neutral MK punishes with a tornado which led to nothing again. Following more neutral game, dark MK hits a falling forward air, correctly reads neutral MK's air dodge and punishes with a short hop nair, and then misses the follow up. All the time between 1:28-1:36, where both players are just rolling and shielding and down tilting, may as well have been camping. The game consists of waiting out in neutral for extended periods of time, hitting/getting hit for marginal percent, and resetting the game back into neutral, until someone is at kill percent, at which case the other person begins fishing for kill moves. I don't have to watch more. I don't want to watch more. I understand the importance of footsies in Brawl, I understand how others may find the defensive game enjoyable. Hell, I found it enjoyable for the first few years of it's existence. But it doesn't entice me as a player to want to go out and do it.

Compare that to http://youtu.be/SOnYtXIyfW4?t=8m55s Similar situation, top level players at APEX 2014 playing on Battlefield with the best characters in the game.
Following Falco teching Fox's shine, Falco sh down airs Fox, which is immediately punished with a second shine leading into a tech chase for 50% with Falco finally escaping (more like Fox just ending it) but still in an unsafe position, a position where he's punished again which leads to a loss of stock. In the amount of time where neutral MK landed two hits, Falco is already dead. Brawl's offensive game stinks, and it doesn't make defensive gameplay enjoyable to watch either. That is why Brawl has a waning popularity. That is why people wrongly believe Brawl is an uncompetitive game. That is why people rightly believe that it is a worse competitive game than it's predecessor.

This is easily rectifiable in Smash 4 as long as offense is actually rewarding and defense doesn't dominate.

I dont mean this to be offensive, but youre viewing with eyes that don't observe top level play. Top level players dont play in neutral for no real purpose (thats mid-level play), theyre both watching the opponent and making choices. Nairos up B was sooooo smart in that situation. If youve watched zero before or even pay attention in this match, you can see that he likes sh fairs on his opponent. In this case nairo wasnt sure if zero would retreat the fair or not, but up-b covered both since hes not left in a terrible position after up-bing a retreated fair. Forward tilt did not auto-combo, Zero SDI'd out. On top of that nairo cornered him into a bad position that netted him a tornado, which is still part of the same punish game he got from his up-b. Even here the game was still punishment (with one shift in momentum) all the way until 1:28 when the game finally returned to neutral. Also MK's forward roll is an important approach which is being used to get in on the opponent, but they suspect the wrong option from their opponent once they get in. This happens 3 times, with the third time landing in a succesful hit. Also that was probably the worst segments to use as an example in terms of game speed since they were both making frequent mistakes in their punishment games, while you also picked one of the best for melee. Skip to 3:34 for a better example.

Also melee really isnt more competitive/competitively viable nor would I say it or Brawls defensive mechanics (which are overblown) are the reason for Brawls decline (specifically in regards to gameplay itself btw, not subjective things like viewer enjoyment which definitely matter). The biggest problem with people making this statement is they dont seem to have a full grasp of how brawl functions and make judgments based on an incorrect perception of the game (being able to distinguish things like the punishment and neutral game, whats happening in neutral, etc. is really important).

 

[Mensrea]

People who are saying Brawl is competitively viable. You are 100% right. It is a completely viable game for competitive play, and anyone who makes an argument saying otherwise, is making an asinine argument.

That being said, I think Melee is more suited for the scene. There is a higher skill ceiling, it's much faster and the popular consensus is that it's fun to watch. It's better balanced, and it just has a whole lotta depth. That's why it has overtaken Brawl.

 

[HeavyLobster]

There seem to be a few things that we can see in the demo build that are unlikely to be drastically changed, and they can tell us a lot about this game, even if they can't give us the whole picture.

• This game's fall speeds are in between Melee's and Brawl's
• Combos do exist to a greater extent than in Brawl(excluding chaingrabs) but are limited compared to Melee
• Recoveries in this game are very strong, and more characters have strong recoveries than in Brawl, even if a few of the more ridiculous ones(Pit) have been nerfed
• Shields appear to be relatively strong in this game, though how strong is unclear. They drop faster, but are also easier to break
  
• Rolls are faster
• Projectile camping appears to be less effective compared to other Smash games
• Airdodges have more lag than in Brawl
• Ledgehogging no longer works, and you get bumped off the ledge if you try it
• Hitstun cancelling no longer exists

There's still a lot of missing pieces to the puzzle that need to be filled in before a verdict regarding the game's competitive viability. However, it seems as though this game will differ from both Melee and Brawl in a number of key aspects, especially Melee. This game will almost certainly not play at the same pace Melee did, with the most jarring difference being how much stronger recoveries are. Finishing off a recovering character will frequently require landing a spike or high knockback move offstage rather than merely disrupting the opponent's recovery. The game will likely not be played at a 4-stock pace, and the standard ruleset will probably be 3-stock. At least some characters will develop some sort of combo game, even if most of the combos are only 2-3 hits, and extended strings will likely depend on reading opponent air dodges. The number of characters and the extent of the combos will depend on landlag changes, but a few characters like Fox shouldn't have any trouble comboing even without changes. This game will probably be more defensive than offensive, but the key question at this point is how defensive the game is, and whether it will be sufficiently accommodating to offensive playstyles to allow for an interesting and varied metagame.

 

[Amazing Ampharos]

Another thing to note about Brawl's defensive play is that most attacks in Brawl literally do no damage to a shield. The only reason the shield shrinks from standard attacks is because of the natural decay from holding it out. Jab combos? 0 damage to shield. Mach Tornado? 0 damage to shield, but still ridiculous shield pressure because it forces you to hold it out. Only specific moves, like Marth's Shield Breaker, have any shield damage properties at all. If you were to go into every single character's files and add shield damage matching the attack's normal damage, that shield wouldn't hold up for anywhere near as long.

This post is factually incorrect. It is true that most moves have a 0 for their shield damage property, but the reason is that shields always take damage from being hit by damaging hitboxes (I don't recall if staleness affects it, but it does use the full damage). Shields have 70 HP at base and tick down with time (though I don't think they do when you're in blockstun and they definitely don't while in shieldhitlag) but also lose health every time they are hit. The shield damage property is just a property by which moves can do bonus shield damage (total shield damage is the damage the move does plus the shield damage property, zero for most moves but a real number for stuff like Shield Breaker on Marth). This is easily tested in-game by just blocking a high damage move and watching the shield bubble shrink down or just trying to block one of the more ridiculous final smashes and watching how quickly your shield shatters. I am truly scared by the feeling that it seems likely that the reason I'm the first to correct this is that most other posters didn't even realize it wasn't true.

To get to the substance of this thread, I think I should delve into what we're even talking about with "defense" here. Brawl is a defensive game, but that's primarily because evasive play is so powerful. Ledges are fortresses, and jumping around to run away is really strong. These things are such a bigger deal than the shield since they're what make not attacking a winning strategy in the long term since they make running the clock extremely practical. If you take that away and have a game where it's often easy to punish attacks but the game dynamics make running away and avoiding conflict weak, you have, well, Street Fighter. That's a footsies war primarily focused around defense and smart use of pokes, and it's the most successful fighting game of all time that is also substantially more successful than every offensively oriented fighter out there (super combofest anime fighter is never a popular game).

I would point out that the ledge changes and airdodge changes in smash 4 are pretty much laser focused on changing exactly this, the power of evasive play. I think smash 4 is not precisely like Street Fighter and like I was saying before think the power of the shield in this tournament was exaggerated by the fairly weak day -70ish metagame of spamming really unsafe attacks that were easy to hit with. However, I do think it will lean a lot toward emphasizing the smash style of "footsies" based on what I've seen, and yeah this does involve lots of chances to throw out safe pokes or set up traps for defensive opponents which we really did see the Bowser players starting to do as they got near the end of the tournament and had their maximum understanding of how to play. As before, I remain extremely optimistic about the long term potential of this game; I just see more and more every time I see this game in action that makes me convinced it's going to be great.

 

[Halfhead]

I don't know why shields are being portrayed as godly, they pop very fast. Just about any of Bowser's moves go right through most shields.

 

[pizzapie7]

I dont mean this to be offensive, but youre viewing with eyes that don't observe top level play. Top level players dont play in neutral for no real purpose (thats mid-level play), theyre both watching the opponent and making choices. Nairos up B was sooooo smart in that situation. If youve watched zero before or even pay attention in this match, you can see that he likes sh fairs on his opponent. In this case nairo wasnt sure if zero would retreat the fair or not, but up-b covered both since hes not left in a terrible position after up-bing a retreated fair. Forward tilt clearly did not auto-combo, Zero SDI'd out, haha. On top of that nairo cornered him into a bad position that netted him a tornado, which is still part of the same punish game he got from his up-b. On top of this the game was still punishment all the way until 1:28 when the game finally returned to neutral. MK's forward roll is an important approach till which is being used to get in on the opponent, but suspect the wrong option from their opponent once they get in. This happens 3 times, with the third time landing in a succesful hit.

Also melee really isnt more competitive/competitively viable nor would I say it or Brawls defensive mechanics (which are overblown) are the reason for Brawls decline, the biggest problem with people making this statement is they dont seem to have a full grasp of how brawl works (no offense, but being able to distinguish things like the punishment and neutral game, whats happening in neutral, etc. is really important).

I agree that my knowledge in Brawl is likely lacking compared to yours or anyone who's reached top level play, but I was simplifying it because that's honestly what people watching are going to see. New players aren't going to see neutral game as a battle of stage control or pulling incredibly small strings in an attempt to get slight advantages (or large ones) over the opponent, they just see players throwing out hitboxes. They aren't going to see that entire sequence as one drawn out punish game. Brawl is uninteresting to watch to most new players because of how slow the game is. Brawl's just odd. People who have no knowledge will see Meta Knights just whiffing aerials and then jump to conclusions like "if this game was good they'd actually be attacking each other". Brawl being so defensive hurts it from drawing in new blood because it's a slower game and plenty of it's interactions don't have real noticeable effects. I think you've said in threads before that Brawl is the hardest Smash game for a new player to become good at. I might be quoting you wrong, but you've definitely said something like that. I think this is a key reason why. A slight win in a Brawl match isn't a twelve second stock, it's coming out of a 30 second interaction into a neutral reset with either stage control or a percent lead.

idk if you're agreeing with me or not actually

 

[Cassio]

Sort of, I kept re-editing my post. I think offensive games are easier to like, but I dont think defensive games are unlikable to newer players inherently. I think players are around long enough to get the 'vibe' of the scene and if the vibe is that the game is cool theyre likely to enjoy it (gonna use USF4 as an example again).

Also I late edited this into my other post, but that was probably one of the worst segments to use as an example of Brawl in terms of pleasant gameplay. By that I mean thats the bottom line and its only better after that (except maybe vs ICs?). An MK ditto where both are making frequent mistakes in their punishment games at the beginning of a set where theyre more inclined to feel each other out. Skip to 3:34 for another more pleasant example. Actually the rest of the game was overall better in that sense.

Super late edit: I know a lot of people probably wont see this cause its an edit, but heres a response from an AMA from the second place finisher of SDCC:

[–]free_subs 5 points 4 hours ago
I noticed that you were pretty good with baiting attacks from your opponents. What offensive approaches did you find worked really well with the E3 build, and what approaches did you find were highly punishable?

Thanks for doing this AMA, great job this weekend! :D

• Dashing into your enemy and quickly shielding helped out for me. Sometimes a simple dash attacked worked! I think approached that have a lot of landing lag are highly punishable. You don't want to air dodge near the ground either. It really leaves you open and i forget that sometimes.

 

[Raikou3322]

Approaches*

Typos :s sorry about that

 

[Second Power]

Boring?

Street Fighter 4 would like to have a word with you.

 

[topspin1617]

As stated by others here, having strong defensive options doesn't necessarily have to be a bad thing. I think if this game can achieve something in between Melee and Brawl it will be amazing; the offensive potential of Melee mixed with the mindgames and decision-making that are important in Brawl? Yes please. (Not to imply that mindgames don't happen in Melee... I just think with the more defensive setting of Brawl, their impact is more apparent.)

From what I've seen, the shield doesn't seem to be too defensively overpowered. Running in and shielding sounds more like an extra offensive option than a defensive one to me. As far as the matches you cite with the Toon Link etc... the one that stands out to me was on Gerudo Valley I think? I think that was just a case of the Toon Link going back to the same attacks OVER and OVER (dash attack, get punished, dair, get punished, repeat) when they clearly weren't working. If a couple of those dash attacks were grabs? Some of those dairs, nairs instead? I think you're looking at a different game. Bowser probably still would have won, the player definitely seemed more skilled, but I think what we saw came down to the Link simply not altering a failing strategy.

I'm more optimistic about the competitive potential of Smash 4 after the SDCC tournament. Even though a lot of the players didn't seem that good (then again I wasn't there, so I don't really have room to talk), a couple of the last matches of the tournament really made me think that I can see this Smash really being something interesting competitively.

 

[UltimaLuminaire]

I don't know why shields are being portrayed as godly, they pop very fast. Just about any of Bowser's moves go right through most shields.

No one was making that assumption literally, but I get what you mean. Actually, any information you could give about your experience with the shield on the 3ds would be wonderful despite the game still being the demo from E3. I know that, as Kirby, you weren't shielding as much, but this thread has left me thirsty for knowledge about Smash4 shield changes. All I could make out from the SDCC live stream was that, for Bowser vs Toonlink in the top bracket, Bowser's shield did not regenerate all that much when attacked again after 2-3 seconds, and that most characters have a move that deals a decent chunk to shields, such as Shiek's side b. This was pretty glaring since Brawl Bowser's shield could regenerate a descent amount in that same time frame.

 

[Renji64]

There seem to be a few things that we can see in the demo build that are unlikely to be drastically changed, and they can tell us a lot about this game, even if they can't give us the whole picture.

• This game's fall speeds are in between Melee's and Brawl's
• Combos do exist to a greater extent than in Brawl(excluding chaingrabs) but are limited compared to Melee
• Recoveries in this game are very strong, and more characters have strong recoveries than in Brawl, even if a few of the more ridiculous ones(Pit) have been nerfed
• Shields appear to be relatively strong in this game, though how strong is unclear. They drop faster, but are also easier to break
  
• Rolls are faster
• Projectile camping appears to be less effective compared to other Smash games
• Airdodges have more lag than in Brawl
• Ledgehogging no longer works, and you get bumped off the ledge if you try it
• Hitstun cancelling no longer exists

There's still a lot of missing pieces to the puzzle that need to be filled in before a verdict regarding the game's competitive viability. However, it seems as though this game will differ from both Melee and Brawl in a number of key aspects, especially Melee. This game will almost certainly not play at the same pace Melee did, with the most jarring difference being how much stronger recoveries are. Finishing off a recovering character will frequently require landing a spike or high knockback move offstage rather than merely disrupting the opponent's recovery. The game will likely not be played at a 4-stock pace, and the standard ruleset will probably be 3-stock. At least some characters will develop some sort of combo game, even if most of the combos are only 2-3 hits, and extended strings will likely depend on reading opponent air dodges. The number of characters and the extent of the combos will depend on landlag changes, but a few characters like Fox shouldn't have any trouble comboing even without changes. This game will probably be more defensive than offensive, but the key question at this point is how defensive the game is, and whether it will be sufficiently accommodating to offensive playstyles to allow for an interesting and varied metagame.

This is the most accurate post i have seen so far.

 

[Halfhead]

No one was making that assumption literally, but I get what you mean. Actually, any information you could give about your experience with the shield on the 3ds would be wonderful despite the game still being the demo from E3. I know that, as Kirby, you weren't shielding as much, but this thread has left me thirsty for knowledge about Smash4 shield changes. All I could make out from the SDCC live stream was that, for Bowser vs Toonlink in the top bracket, Bowser's shield did not regenerate all that much when attacked again after 2-3 seconds, and that most characters have a move that deals a decent chunk to shields, such as Shiek's side b. This was pretty glaring since Brawl Bowser's shield could regenerate a descent amount in that same time frame.

Yeah, it seems that the way they are balancing sheilding is by making sheild stun very ineffectual on the sheilding player, but also making the sheilds a less long-lasting option.

This might be the first Smash game where remembering how much sheild you have might actually be important. You can't just depend on it to have regenerated.

 

[Egg-Off the Conquerer]

There seem to be a few things that we can see in the demo build that are unlikely to be drastically changed, and they can tell us a lot about this game, even if they can't give us the whole picture.

• This game's fall speeds are in between Melee's and Brawl's
• Combos do exist to a greater extent than in Brawl(excluding chaingrabs) but are limited compared to Melee
• Recoveries in this game are very strong, and more characters have strong recoveries than in Brawl, even if a few of the more ridiculous ones(Pit) have been nerfed
• Shields appear to be relatively strong in this game, though how strong is unclear. They drop faster, but are also easier to break
  
• Rolls are faster
• Projectile camping appears to be less effective compared to other Smash games
• Airdodges have more lag than in Brawl
• Ledgehogging no longer works, and you get bumped off the ledge if you try it
• Hitstun cancelling no longer exists

There's still a lot of missing pieces to the puzzle that need to be filled in before a verdict regarding the game's competitive viability. However, it seems as though this game will differ from both Melee and Brawl in a number of key aspects, especially Melee. This game will almost certainly not play at the same pace Melee did, with the most jarring difference being how much stronger recoveries are. Finishing off a recovering character will frequently require landing a spike or high knockback move offstage rather than merely disrupting the opponent's recovery. The game will likely not be played at a 4-stock pace, and the standard ruleset will probably be 3-stock. At least some characters will develop some sort of combo game, even if most of the combos are only 2-3 hits, and extended strings will likely depend on reading opponent air dodges. The number of characters and the extent of the combos will depend on landlag changes, but a few characters like Fox shouldn't have any trouble comboing even without changes. This game will probably be more defensive than offensive, but the key question at this point is how defensive the game is, and whether it will be sufficiently accommodating to offensive playstyles to allow for an interesting and varied metagame.

This is the post I was hoping to see in this thread.

As for how interesting this game will be to watch? It almost certainly will be more interesting than brawl. If it can add good character variation and multiple legitimate strategies then it may be better than melee as a spectator sport, if only because of shiny HD goodness.

The only thing I'm worried about is how floaty it is. The main reason I personally don't care for brawl is it just feels like I'm playing melee drunk. So I hope movement options feel a bit more natural and intuitive

 

[JV5Chris]

Can we move away from the offensive/defensive debate to talk about the actual impact this shield is having on the gameplay?

You see Bowser here using the quicker shield to guard his approaches, reset to a standing state, and follow with any attack. It's like a Melee running crouch cancel where you're awarded shield frames instead of knockback protection at low %s. What are people's thoughts on that specifically?

 

[Egg-Off the Conquerer]

Can we move away from the offensive/defensive debate to talk about the actual impact this shield is having on the gameplay?

You see Bowser here using the quicker shield to guard his approaches, reset to a standing state, and follow with any attack. It's like a Melee running crouch cancel where you're awarded shield frames instead of knockback protection at low %s. What are people's thoughts on that specifically?

I feel like that match was so one-sided because sheik didn't shield enough. She missed a lot of shield grab opportunities. I think the grand finsl is a better overall example of how this game is shaping up

 

[UltimaLuminaire]

Can we move away from the offensive/defensive debate to talk about the actual impact this shield is having on the gameplay?

You see Bowser here using the quicker shield to guard his approaches, reset to a standing state, and follow with any attack. It's like a Melee running crouch cancel where you're awarded shield frames instead of knockback protection at low %s. What are people's thoughts on that specifically?

I feel like that's an exaggeration based off of what we can see from the finals. There is still enough time from when Medina puts up the shield to when it drops that it feels much slower than the crouch cancel. If it's relied on too much, count on a grab, crouching shield poke from characters like Marth, or a Diddy Kong face-hug-karate-chop.

 

[JV5Chris]

I feel like that's an exaggeration based off of what we can see from the finals. There is still enough time from when Medina puts up the shield to when it drops that it feels much slower than the crouch cancel. If it's relied on too much, count on a grab, crouching shield poke from characters like Marth, or a Diddy Kong face-hug-karate-chop.

It's not as instantaneous as a Melee running crouch cancel, but it really doesn't need to be given the slower pace of this game. I have no idea how practical this is to punish with a grab, but it can't be a big window when the shield drops that quickly.

Has there been any confirmation that shield poking exists in this game btw?

 

[Skyblade12]

Wrong.

And lets not take it there.

No talking about Brawl or Melee or how they compare.

We're talking about Smash 4

(trying to avoid unnecessary flame wars/closing a thread. Melee vs. Brawl debates close threads)

No, we're not. This is more about Melee and Brawl than it is about Smash 4. Read the OP. Half of it is talking about other games in the series. This entire thread is about how Smash 4 measures up to Melee, and Melee's "just right" shields.

The only problem with his statement is that he is not arguing against the fact that a competitive player may know balance better than he does himself. (Though the competitive player in question worded it fairly badly). What he is doing is poisoning the well and questioning the person's credibility rather than their actual point. It makes it a very uphill battle to try and argue against that when people no longer take you seriously because the opponent attacked you for an unrelated point.
I know you aren't saying competitive players have no idea but it was an irresponsible comment made by Sakurai imo. The part after where he said the team was full was fine, but that statement to me just screams of bad argument. It is like saying political scientists have no say in politics because they haven't run for office.

Actually, he is arguing against it, and doing so quite effectively. He's just summarizing his argument into a simple, concise statement.

Competitive players don't know what makes a game good or well balanced. They know what makes a game competitive, or balanced in a particular situation. Sakurai has already mentioned several times his desire to balance the game in both 4 man and 2 man situations. That immediately throws away 90% of a "competitive" player's input. Because it's a situation into which the competitive player has very little, if any, insight.

Competitive players know the competitive scene. The whole "Fox only, Final Destination, No items" trope exists for a reason. It's not true, not by a long shot, but it still demonstrates that a game developer has to look well beyond the competitive scene. The statement "oh, if you make a good competitive game, you'll make a good casual game" is simply not true, because the two games are played so very differently.



Not to mention, there are some game design fundamentals that almost every competitive player I've ever talked to has missed. A game isn't, and shouldn't be, perfectly balanced, even though every competitive player seems to think it should.

Have you ever heard the concept of "perfect imbalance"? It's a pretty major game design point, but one that often gets overlooked. Essentially, it's the idea that different characters are better in certain situations. We'll just say that Little Mac is the perfect, absolutely highest tier character (I'm not making this a claim, it's just a convenient example). But he sucks in the air. So when everyone starts using Little Mac because he's so OP, the top tier players begin to rotate to a new character, one who can take advantage of Little Mac's lack of air game and beat him consistently. This makes that player the new top-tier champion, as everyone flocks to that player for a time, because of how effective they are against the reigning king. This trend finally boils down to every character being viable, because they're all viable in different situations, against different foes.

This is a pretty important design concept (and does a lot for casual viability of a game), and a lot of competitive players will tell you that it's flat out wrong. Yet it leads to more variation among competitive teams, more rotation among characters, and leads to more characters being competitively viable, because each has their niche.



The argument that playing a game puts you in a position to make a game is just arrogant and asinine. Have you ever tried to develop a game? Do you have any idea how complex and arduous a process it is? How many factors there are to consider from any number of takes on a situation? Good game design is not easy, and playing games, no matter what level you play them at, is not sufficient background to make a good designer. If you disagree, you've got a map editor in Brawl. If you have such fantastic design skills, go show us the "perfect" map. You have the tools, it should be easy, right?



Sakurai's statement was entirely on the mark. If you haven't designed a game, if you haven't built a game and it's components, you have no idea how complex the task is. Go ask the guys who worked on Project M how simple the task was. Then realize how Project M actually measures up to designing or even tweaking a full game.


Also, this thread is the most depressing one I've read since joining Smashboards, and I really wish people could just be hyped about the awesome game.

 

[Egg-Off the Conquerer]

No, we're not. This is more about Melee and Brawl than it is about Smash 4. Read the OP. Half of it is talking about other games in the series. This entire thread is about how Smash 4 measures up to Melee, and Melee's "just right" shields.



Actually, he is arguing against it, and doing so quite effectively. He's just summarizing his argument into a simple, concise statement.

Competitive players don't know what makes a game good or well balanced. They know what makes a game competitive, or balanced in a particular situation. Sakurai has already mentioned several times his desire to balance the game in both 4 man and 2 man situations. That immediately throws away 90% of a "competitive" player's input. Because it's a situation into which the competitive player has very little, if any, insight.

Competitive players know the competitive scene. The whole "Fox only, Final Destination, No items" trope exists for a reason. It's not true, not by a long shot, but it still demonstrates that a game developer has to look well beyond the competitive scene. The statement "oh, if you make a good competitive game, you'll make a good casual game" is simply not true, because the two games are played so very differently.



Not to mention, there are some game design fundamentals that almost every competitive player I've ever talked to has missed. A game isn't, and shouldn't be, perfectly balanced, even though every competitive player seems to think it should.

Have you ever heard the concept of "perfect imbalance"? It's a pretty major game design point, but one that often gets overlooked. Essentially, it's the idea that different characters are better in certain situations. We'll just say that Little Mac is the perfect, absolutely highest tier character (I'm not making this a claim, it's just a convenient example). But he sucks in the air. So when everyone starts using Little Mac because he's so OP, the top tier players begin to rotate to a new character, one who can take advantage of Little Mac's lack of air game and beat him consistently. This makes that player the new top-tier champion, as everyone flocks to that player for a time, because of how effective they are against the reigning king. This trend finally boils down to every character being viable, because they're all viable in different situations, against different foes.

This is a pretty important design concept (and does a lot for casual viability of a game), and a lot of competitive players will tell you that it's flat out wrong. Yet it leads to more variation among competitive teams, more rotation among characters, and leads to more characters being competitively viable, because each has their niche.



The argument that playing a game puts you in a position to make a game is just arrogant and asinine. Have you ever tried to develop a game? Do you have any idea how complex and arduous a process it is? How many factors there are to consider from any number of takes on a situation? Good game design is not easy, and playing games, no matter what level you play them at, is not sufficient background to make a good designer. If you disagree, you've got a map editor in Brawl. If you have such fantastic design skills, go show us the "perfect" map. You have the tools, it should be easy, right?



Sakurai's statement was entirely on the mark. If you haven't designed a game, if you haven't built a game and it's components, you have no idea how complex the task is. Go ask the guys who worked on Project M how simple the task was. Then realize how Project M actually measures up to designing or even tweaking a full game.


Also, this thread is the most depressing one I've read since joining Smashboards, and I really wish people could just be hyped about the awesome game.

Competitive (even in a casual sense) games follow different rules. Do you know the card game Magic the gathering? They will literally hire tournament winners to help design and or balance cards and sets and they are an extremely successful game

Street fighter 4 also has many ex-pro fighting game players working on design and balance testing

The funniest part of all of this is that sakurai himself was apparently a pro fighting game player at some point which was part of his justification for attempting to balance brawl all by himself

He's working with namco bandai right? Another company known for hiring pros as game designers/developers. And we have heard reports that some pros were invited to NB headquarters.... I wonder what they could be doing.

 

[Skyblade12]

Competitive (even in a casual sense) games follow different rules. Do you know the card game Magic the gathering? They will literally hire tournament winners to help design and or balance cards and sets and they are an extremely successful game

This is a fair point. However, it is worth noting that this input (and any player input) is reactionary in nature. Touching up a final product by adding new cards and abilities is not the same thing as offering an input into shaping a project in the making.

Also, that doesn't invalidate my point. Magic (and League of Legends) are both games that strive to follow the "perfect imbalance" design philosophy. They can also bring more up because they're constantly shifting in new cards/heroes, so their game is never perfectly balanced.

Street fighter 4 also has many ex-pro fighting game players working on design and balance testing

And I'm betting a lot of them received pretty substantial backgrounds in game design before they actually started giving input.

The funniest part of all of this is that sakurai himself was apparently a pro fighting game player at some point which was part of his justification for attempting to balance brawl all by himself

Interesting. I didn't know that.

He's working with namco bandai right? Another company known for hiring pros as game designers/developers. And we have heard reports that some pros were invited to NB headquarters.... I wonder what they could be doing.

I'm not saying that competitive players can't offer insight, or meaningful input to a game, but just that being a top-tier competitive player in no way qualifies you to make a game.

 

[Egg-Off the Conquerer]

This is a fair point. However, it is worth noting that this input (and any player input) is reactionary in nature. Touching up a final product by adding new cards and abilities is not the same thing as offering an input into shaping a project in the making.

Also, that doesn't invalidate my point. Magic (and League of Legends) are both games that strive to follow the "perfect imbalance" design philosophy. They can also bring more up because they're constantly shifting in new cards/heroes, so their game is never perfectly balanced.



And I'm betting a lot of them received pretty substantial backgrounds in game design before they actually started giving input.



Interesting. I didn't know that.



I'm not saying that competitive players can't offer insight, or meaningful input to a game, but just that being a top-tier competitive player in no way qualifies you to make a game.

Game design is a team effort. Its not like some ex-pro goes in there and makes the game exactly how they want. They're there to add insight that would not exist otherwise-they are there to design and judge games from a perspective of "what would be fun and interesting for people like me" not "how can i make this game fun for only competitive players". The rest of the team makes up for all the shortcomings each other has and more

And of course they receive training on game design, companies (especially japanese ones) always train new employees

The fact of the matter is, other fighting game companies DO hire pros, sometimes temporarily as testers or designer and sometimesas permanent members that receive game design training

Game design is a team effort.

 

[san.]

I think that it's a great qualifier as long as that player also has the necessary critical thinking skills to understand the ramifications of gameplay additions and alterations. My personal idea of balance is offering a variety of vastly different gameplay options per character, then the balance of how these styles interact create the current power balance. I personally don't fully agree with this "perfect imbalance" philosophy.

Considering the poor quality of most games on the market, I don't think you need to be some sort of rocket scientist to understand the basic concepts of design if you have played enough and capable of rational thought.

 

[κomıc]

The funniest part of all of this is that sakurai himself was apparently a pro fighting game player at some point which was part of his justification for attempting to balance brawl all by himself.

I think that is an inaccuracy. Sakurai worked on the balancing for Melee all by himself, not Brawl.

Brawl had 4-6 people testing balancing. For Smash 4, it went from 4 to now 12 people. It was mentioned at the roundtable last month at E3.

 

[Deap]

As a melee player I can only say Wait for the game to be released.

 

[Egg-Off the Conquerer]

I think that is an inaccuracy. Sakurai worked on the balancing for Melee all by himself, not Brawl.

Brawl had 4-6 people testing balancing. For Smash 4, it went from 4 to now 12 people. It was mentioned at the roundtable last month at E3.

Really?? God I really gotta check sources. I remember very distinctly that in an interview this year he said that he balanced all previous smash games alone, but this time he was given a team to work on it eith him (he goes on to say that he didnt like what they did so he was imputting all the frame data and balancing for smash 4 alone, but i think this changed again)

 

[κomıc]

Really?? God I really gotta check sources. I remember very distinctly that in an interview this year he said that he balanced all previous smash games alone, but this time he was given a team to work on it eith him (he goes on to say that he didnt like what they did so he was imputting all the frame data and balancing for smash 4 alone, but i think this changed again)

He probably did all the finalizing for balancing with the help of a small team. But for Smash 4, for sure, a bigger team is involved with the balancing and he's happy that it has taken the stress off of him.

 

[Egg-Off the Conquerer]

He probably did all the finalizing for balancing with the help of a small team. But for Smash 4, for sure, a bigger team is involved with the balancing and he's happy that it has taken the stress off of him.

Its a bit confusing, but he does input all parameters and hitboxes himself

http://nintendoeverything.com/masahiro-sakurai-on-smash-bros-development-workload-more/

http://nintendoeverything.com/masah...kload-for-super-smash-bros-wii-u3ds-and-more/

 

[κomıc]

Its a bit confusing, but he does input all parameters and hitboxes himself

http://nintendoeverything.com/masahiro-sakurai-on-smash-bros-development-workload-more/

http://nintendoeverything.com/masah...kload-for-super-smash-bros-wii-u3ds-and-more/

Right but the balancing isn't totally done on his own. He does have the final say so I'm guessing when the group comes to a consensus Sakurai puts in all the data for the character's hitboxes among other things using information gathered from meetings and conversations with the team. It sounds more like he's more familiar with inputting data and would be more comfortable taking care of that job himself instead of assigning someone else to the job.

 

[SamuraiPanda]

To get to the substance of this thread, I think I should delve into what we're even talking about with "defense" here. Brawl is a defensive game, but that's primarily because evasive play is so powerful. Ledges are fortresses, and jumping around to run away is really strong. These things are such a bigger deal than the shield since they're what make not attacking a winning strategy in the long term since they make running the clock extremely practical. If you take that away and have a game where it's often easy to punish attacks but the game dynamics make running away and avoiding conflict weak, you have, well, Street Fighter. That's a footsies war primarily focused around defense and smart use of pokes, and it's the most successful fighting game of all time that is also substantially more successful than every offensively oriented fighter out there (super combofest anime fighter is never a popular game).

I would point out that the ledge changes and airdodge changes in smash 4 are pretty much laser focused on changing exactly this, the power of evasive play. I think smash 4 is not precisely like Street Fighter and like I was saying before think the power of the shield in this tournament was exaggerated by the fairly weak day -70ish metagame of spamming really unsafe attacks that were easy to hit with. However, I do think it will lean a lot toward emphasizing the smash style of "footsies" based on what I've seen, and yeah this does involve lots of chances to throw out safe pokes or set up traps for defensive opponents which we really did see the Bowser players starting to do as they got near the end of the tournament and had their maximum understanding of how to play. As before, I remain extremely optimistic about the long term potential of this game; I just see more and more every time I see this game in action that makes me convinced it's going to be great.

Ampharos! A name I recognize and still respect today. Good to see you're still part of the scene.

I see what you're saying about defining defense in Brawl and I believe you bring up strong points that are all valid. I do disagree that evasive maneuvers being so good are the reason why defensive play was so strong in Brawl. I still believe the shield mechanics, perhaps in conjunction with a few other things like the ledge being a fortress, were a huge deterrent to offensive play but I feel like we could argue this for hours.

I wasn't really judging the viability of the game based on the players; I was making assumptions based on mechanics and changes I was able to observe while they were doing their thing. There is nothing I'd like more than for Smash 4 to be an offensively oriented game and I hope you're right that with the changes they've made to some of the strong defensive options in Brawl that they've shifted the balance.

 

[Exor]

This post might sound really dumb but I'm just gonna throw it out there.

If the competitive scene embraces customizable moves, I feel like the "watchability" of the game will increase. Personally I'm having a blast watching the game already, but I feel like the ability to counterpick/change moves between games/sets would be huge for the meta. Perhaps a player is being far too campy so the opponent switches to a more effective projectile for the next game? Or someone is throwing out way too many shields so you switch to a move that could easily break it? I think the custom moves could potentially bring an entirely new dimension to competitive Smash if they are viable/embraced by the scene. It would require not only knowing the potential of each individual character, but each combination of moves. And watching the changes in strategy between each game unfold would be fantastic.

Also, have we ever considered making doubles a more emphasized tournament format? Smash 4 doubles sets are going to be literally nuts to watch. Little Mac especially I think will turn out to be an amazing doubles character because of how his KO meter works (you could take friendly fire to build meter for a KO punch).

 

[Ehn Jolly]

I feel the only big issue with Custom Moves are if some are just unbalanced. Like it's a great idea, but I feel like custom moves are being held back because they're not getting the testing of other moves. If they're tested and balanced, I'd love to see them embraced by the competitive community.

Also yeah, always sort of wondered why doubles wasn't a more widespread format, since it seems like it could be a lot of fun.

 

[ToothiestAura]

Why can't anyone ever wait before voicing their opinion? This isn't the final build, this may not represent the final game. It's fine if the demo doesn't support competitive matches because no one will be playing that. You are worrying about a demo.

The Brawl demo's were built of Melee's old engine and played very similarly to Melee. And Brawl played very differently. This demo was likely built off of Brawl's old engine. This means nothing. Come back in two months and then we can talk.

 

[Ulevo]

Why can't anyone ever wait before voicing their opinion? This isn't the final build, this may not represent the final game. It's fine if the demo doesn't support competitive matches because no one will be playing that. You are worrying about a demo.

The Brawl demo's were built of Melee's old engine and played very similarly to Melee. And Brawl played very differently. This demo was likely built off of Brawl's old engine. This means nothing. Come back in two months and then we can talk.

Remind me again what is wrong with preemptive criticism in this scenario? It can only serve to potentially improve the final product, assuming we are being listened to. Doing nothing does not help anything, avoiding discussion does not help anything. And it isn't like we have no reason to be skeptical, critical, and apprehensive about the upcoming changes. Players are concerned, and for legitimate reasons. And we won't see it solved when the game comes out. I really hope no one replies with "patches" because I don't feel like elaborating more than I need to.

 

[ShredPix]

Why can't anyone ever wait before voicing their opinion? This isn't the final build, this may not represent the final game. It's fine if the demo doesn't support competitive matches because no one will be playing that. You are worrying about a demo.

The Brawl demo's were built of Melee's old engine and played very similarly to Melee. And Brawl played very differently. This demo was likely built off of Brawl's old engine. This means nothing. Come back in two months and then we can talk.

But this is a version of the game that they think is presentable. While it may not be completely representative of the final product, we're not wrong to assume that it will be relatively close to it.

EDIT: That being said, I am happy with how it is turning out.

 

[Eternal phoenix Fire]

Street Fighter 4 would like to have a word with you.

All 20 of them?

I'll stick to 3rd Strike

 

[ToothiestAura]

Remind me again what is wrong with preemptive criticism in this scenario? It can only serve to potentially improve the final product, assuming we are being listened to. Doing nothing does not help anything, avoiding discussion does not help anything. And it isn't like we have no reason to be skeptical, critical, and apprehensive about the upcoming changes. Players are concerned, and for legitimate reasons. And we won't see it solved when the game comes out. I really hope no one replies with "patches" because I don't feel like elaborating more than I need to.

It's just pointless to discuss a build that doesn't represent the final game. If this topic is listing concerns and sending them to Nintendo, I misunderstood. I thought people were just complaining and not actually doing anything.

 

[Kuragari]

Ugh this argument again. If you dont like Smash 4 dont play it. Go have fun playing a 13 year old game instead then.

 

[Eternal phoenix Fire]

Ugh this argument again. If you dont like Smash 4 dont play it. Go have fun playing a 13 year old game instead then.

And if you don't like people criticizing the game, then don't come in the thread and complain about it. We all want to play the game; that's why we're here.

Just because we are hesitant to put our faith into a game that we may not enjoy in the long run doesn't mean we won't like smash 4, we just won't like it for the same reasons others would.

 

[Hong]

Ugh this argument again. If you dont like Smash 4 dont play it. Go have fun playing a 13 year old game instead then.

That's a horribly outrageous statement.

There is nothing wrong with a little critical analysis. The second part of your post is only implying that you assume everyone who would assess the design of Smash 4 is a Melee die-hard, which is a bit curt IMO.