Convinced my wife to try Super Smash Bros. Ultimate at Launch

[Mr Chance Pants]

Long-time fan of the series, though I never got the chance to play past Brawl. With Ultimate on the horizon, Ms Chance Pants is just about done hearing every detail regarding my love for the game, and has decided that she's ready to try it. She's played brawl before, but only for a short while at a friends house.

What's the best advice you guys can give her for starting with Ultimate?
I'm not allowed to "Let her win" so how can I not utterly destroy her?
Apart from Mario as a good all-around starter, who should she attempt as her first character?
Should I immediately turn off "Tap to Jump" in her settings before she even tries to play? Or what would be a safe control scheme for the joy cons/pro controller for her to learn on?

I've shared my love of gaming with her ever since we met, and she's be supportive enough to even find her own games that she binges. But fighting games have never been her cup of tea. So I will not let Smash be just another fighting game to her!!

I haven't been around lately to know the right answers to these questions... So I thought this would be a fun forum because.... well why not??

 

[Frizz]

My advice would be to let her pick whatever character that intrigues her the most, whether it's character-wise or by appearance alone. If she has little to no knowledge on these characters, feel free to give a short description (both about their playstyle and character) about them and what games they're from as you unlock them so that she can get invested in their character outside of Smash. If she likes having a good recovery, she should start with Kirby. If she likes using lots of projectiles, Link or Samus. A powerhouse? Donkey Kong. Things such as that.

Before you two play against each other, you should probably play with each other at first. Play Team Battle for a while, and after she's got a good understanding of both her character and the game in general, play on different teams. Once it's shown that she can clearly hold her own in a fight, make the switch to 1v1s. Try to play other characters and on other stages so that it doesn't start to get stale after a while. Maybe put on items too if you're both comfortable with it.

As for controls, let her find out if she likes playing with Tap Jump on or off by letting her configure her own controls so that she feels comfortable with the controller.

That's all the advice I could offer right now, hope this helps.

 

[FirestormNeos]

"Tap to Jump" was a mistake, and you should be turning that crap off, anyway.

 

[lucasla]

I really hate Tap to Jump. I'm also used to jump with the B button on the ProController in most games. So, disable Tap to Jump and invert the Attack and Special Attack to Y and X, and set Jump to A and B (repetitive, but there's nothing else to do with the extra button), are the first things I will do before even start playing. This makes the game much more natural to play for me.

 

[nirvanafan]

IDK, maybe do some co-op stuff with her for a little bit to start with like some team matches or classic mode or something. Set it to an easy difficulty and let her learn a bit from the the cpus. IDK just an idea.

 

[Mogisthelioma]

What a smooth way of saying, "BTW I have a wife."

 

[PichuMain]

Long-time fan of the series, though I never got the chance to play past Brawl. With Ultimate on the horizon, Ms Chance Pants is just about done hearing every detail regarding my love for the game, and has decided that she's ready to try it. She's played brawl before, but only for a short while at a friends house.

What's the best advice you guys can give her for starting with Ultimate?
I'm not allowed to "Let her win" so how can I not utterly destroy her?
Apart from Mario as a good all-around starter, who should she attempt as her first character?
Should I immediately turn off "Tap to Jump" in her settings before she even tries to play? Or what would be a safe control scheme for the joy cons/pro controller for her to learn on?

I've shared my love of gaming with her ever since we met, and she's be supportive enough to even find her own games that she binges. But fighting games have never been her cup of tea. So I will not let Smash be just another fighting game to her!!

I haven't been around lately to know the right answers to these questions... So I thought this would be a fun forum because.... well why not??

I think the BEST way of doing it, is to let her figure it out AS you help her.

Give her the basics. And I mean absolute basics. "A is to attack. Move up to jump. You can attack on the ground, and in the air. If you're falling, Up-B is your recovery." I'd say. If she's still confused, visually show her the basics, but KEEP it simple!

I'd let the person pick her own character. "Whichever you want." I won't say if they're hard or not. I'd just let them pick and play. They'll get the hang of the character with a little bit of practice. If they don't like it, they'll obviously switch.

After, I'd put the person up against an AI. What I did for my friend was put the AI on Lv. 2, without letting my friend know. All I said to her was "Good luck." And cheered her on as she tried to take the AI down. Afterwards, she'll discover things, then she'll get the hang of it. Little by little, I'd increase it till I hit Lv. 5-6. Either one works for the AI.

Now she knows the basics! Afterwards, its up to her with what she wants to do. And I think the same works for you too.

If ya want, you can say, "Cool. Nice job. Now its my turn." And challenge her. If she says yes, you have 2 options:

Play super offensively, but leave yourself wide open for attacks, or play super defensively, and let her come to you.

Its what worked for me (and the one I convinced refused to play Smash and called it dumb. Lol), but you know your wife better than I do, so take small steps! Very small steps.

 

[Mr Chance Pants]

What a smooth way of saying, "BTW I have a wife."

I'm from utah. Everyone has a wife here.

 

[lucasla]

I think that explain that the game also gives a lot of options on how to play is important.
For example, on the Pro Controller we have by default two jump buttons. Two grab and shield buttons. And the Right Analog Stick as an shortcut for the Smash Attacks (it's easier to just charge your smash attack with right analog stick than the quick press of left analog + attack button).

 

[objectionLogic]

What a smooth way of saying, "BTW I have a wife."

Lol this.

Years ago when my fiancee and I first met, she didn't play a lot of games. One day I was like "Have you ever heard of Super Smash Bros?" And she didn't. So we started playing Brawl.
Years later, she got Smash on 3DS and loves it still. It wasn't some sort of mythical revelation, and wasn't that big of a deal lol.

Smash isn't some niche franchise that's hard to get into, it's a fun, popular franchise that can be played as a party game. If anyone's ever enjoyed a Nintendo game in their life, they'll probably enjoy Smash Bros.