Let's not turn this thread into a PM vs Smash Wii U arguement please..
It was supposed to be for the children!
It's not smash 4 vs PM. I am arguing that they are basically incomparable, both designed in completely different ways.
L-canceling, short hopping, and other techs were in both Smash64 and Melee. Melee's popularity wasn't hurt, at all, by people who had mastered these skills on Smash64. That's because the vast majority of Smash's fans don't care to master these skills, and play with friends that don't care to master these skills.
Even when you have competitive players are playing with casuals, this isn't an issue. A couple weeks ago I played 8-player Smash on the Wii-U with a bunch of casual players. Timed battles, items on. I won most of the games, because of my experience with previous Smash titles. Everyone still had a blast.
My little cousins playing Project M don't know the basic mechanics, and they would have been beaten by a wide-margin everytime, except we had items on, we were playing four player free-for-all, and I spent a lot of my matches either messing around with characters I wasn't familiar with, or practicing Link's Ocarina. I did so because resoundingly defeating someone that isn't good at the game isn't something I find fun.
You need to stop using words like "mastery" or "competitive." Let me give you a situation. This exact same thing happened in PM, and almost made me want to give up on it. Somebody is friends with somebody who plays smash with a group of friends casually. That friend invites that somebody to come play. They play free for all, and none of them are any good, but the new guy still feels like he just doesn't know how to play the game and doesn't feel like he can compete. If I hadn't gotten decent at brawl, I probably would have just quit there and if I had more hobbies, I would have just quit there.
That's not me getting four stocked by competitive smash players, that's me dying first is most free for alls accidentally killing myself with the new melee air dodge and never being able to use an aerial because L-canceling is SO important. Those people I played with weren't good at all, they were completely casual players. I could four stock all of them easily now, with the exception of a few.
Most people get introduced to smash by their friends, and that first experience with the game decides whether they will become fans of the series or not. Nintendo is targetting a casual audience, and that audience doesn't want to put time into games to get the most enjoyment out of them. That means new smash games have to be as accessible as possible.
Also, your argument is SO INCREDIBLY FALSE. Yeah, when people are at a tournament, they are going to sand bag for little kids who want to play. However, teenagers aren't going to want to sandbag hard in teams or free for all every single game for their new friend. Everyday I see one vs ones happen, I see at least one fourstock. The only people in my group who sandbag AT ALL are the few people who have topped at tournaments (4 including myself). That's not representative of the smash community. For some reason, that I don't understand at all, smash players tend to be super chill and humble in person. Casual smashers on the other hand, not at all.
My main point is, if brawl and smash 4 worked off melee physics, the playerbase would be significantly smaller, like all other fighting games. Smash, as the only casual fighting game, has a different strategy to others.
Also, lol @64 comparison. Nobody even knew what soft landing was outside of the tournament scene. Also, teching was much harder and less important (outside of tournament). Not to mention, short hopping isn't that important if you don't L-cancel.
(I want to make it clear, I'm not saying this is a flaw in PM, just that it fills a different niche. That's one of the reasons nintendo doesn't give a crap about PM. The communities don't interfere with eachother)
