Critique Super Smash Bros.

[Mogisthelioma]

Speaking of stages, I think I'd like to reiterate that they could've put their stage resources MOSTLY to new stages, and focus on stages like Poké Floats or Great Bay or Fountain of Dreams (not entirely Melee stages) that haven't been in the series for a while.

To be fair, we did get a lot of HD redesigns of some of the stages that were copy/pasted from Brawl. And we also got a few returning Melee stages.

 

[RawkHawk2010]

Categorically assigning all music from games not represented by a fighter to stages not represented by a fighter was stupid. Where should the Mach Rider theme play if not on a F-Zero stage? And it caused Tomorrow's Passion to no longer play on Boxing Ring despite that literally being a Little Mac theme! Altogether Boxing Ring had its music options reduced by half.

 

[UserKev]

Other bosses aren't necessary other than Master Hand, Crazy Hand, honestly. Or Giga Bowser . The rest are very rehashed.

 

[Perkilator]

Other bosses aren't necessary other than Master Hand, Crazy Hand, honestly. Or Giga Bowser . The rest are very rehashed.

…Can you be more specific? If you mean the rest of the current bosses, then Galleom’s technically the only rehashed one. The rest actually quite unique to Smash.

-Rathalos breathes fire, flies into the background, roars shockwaves that can actually stun you (at least on the ground), and slashes with its poison claws. In short, more of a dragon than Brawl’s Rayquaza.
-Ganon is basically a heavily expanded version of how he fought in Ocarina of Time (which was mostly just “big sword monster, slashy slash”). In Ultimate, Ganon spins his swords occasionally, jumps onto the ground, fires lightning from his swords, fires fireballs and dark lasers from his mouth, and charges towards you.
-Marx‘s attacks are primarily used from Kirby Super Star, as well as shoots black goop from his eyes, turns his wings into fiery veins, and extends his eyes into hexagonal spheres and shoots lasers across the screen.
-Dracula mainly uses his iconic attacks from the games (both forms), as well as some new attacks (magic orbs for the human form and poison lasers (I think) and a shockwave jump attack for the bat form) and attack formations.

Again, this is assuming you mean the current bosses. If you mean bringing back previous bosses, then I’m sorry for the misunderstanding.

 

[UserKev]

…Can you be more specific? If you mean the rest of the current bosses, then Galleom’s technically the only rehashed one. The rest actually quite unique to Smash.

-Rathalos breathes fire, flies into the background, roars shockwaves that can actually stun you (at least on the ground), and slashes with its poison claws. In short, more of a dragon than Brawl’s Rayquaza.
-Ganon is basically a heavily expanded version of how he fought in Ocarina of Time (which was mostly just “big sword monster, slashy slash”). In Ultimate, Ganon spins his swords occasionally, jumps onto the ground, fires lightning from his swords, fires fireballs and dark lasers from his mouth, and charges towards you.
-Marx‘s attacks are primarily used from Kirby Super Star, as well as shoots black goop from his eyes, turns his wings into fiery veins, and extends his eyes into hexagonal spheres and shoots lasers across the screen.
-Dracula mainly uses his iconic attacks from the games (both forms), as well as some new attacks (magic orbs for the human form and poison lasers (I think) and a shockwave jump attack for the bat form) and attack formations.

Again, this is assuming you mean the current bosses. If you mean bringing back previous bosses, then I’m sorry for the misunderstanding.

While the bosses you listed are otherwise improvements, the hands and Giga Bowser are classic that did their jobs well enough. They are legacy bosses and are honestly what Smash need at the end of the day. Rathalos, Ganon, Marx and Dracula are neat additions but get tiresome. They are still typically repetitive and barely functional.

 

[meleebrawler]

…Can you be more specific? If you mean the rest of the current bosses, then Galleom’s technically the only rehashed one. The rest actually quite unique to Smash.

-Rathalos breathes fire, flies into the background, roars shockwaves that can actually stun you (at least on the ground), and slashes with its poison claws. In short, more of a dragon than Brawl’s Rayquaza.
-Ganon is basically a heavily expanded version of how he fought in Ocarina of Time (which was mostly just “big sword monster, slashy slash”). In Ultimate, Ganon spins his swords occasionally, jumps onto the ground, fires lightning from his swords, fires fireballs and dark lasers from his mouth, and charges towards you.
-Marx‘s attacks are primarily used from Kirby Super Star, as well as shoots black goop from his eyes, turns his wings into fiery veins, and extends his eyes into hexagonal spheres and shoots lasers across the screen.
-Dracula mainly uses his iconic attacks from the games (both forms), as well as some new attacks (magic orbs for the human form and poison lasers (I think) and a shockwave jump attack for the bat form) and attack formations.

Again, this is assuming you mean the current bosses. If you mean bringing back previous bosses, then I’m sorry for the misunderstanding.

Don't forget how the Rathalos fight spawns items referencing common (anti-Rath) Monster Hunter strategies.

While the bosses you listed are otherwise improvements, the hands and Giga Bowser are classic that did their jobs well enough. They are legacy bosses and are honestly what Smash need at the end of the day. Rathalos, Ganon, Marx and Dracula are neat additions but get tiresome. They are still typically repetitive and barely functional.

This still doesn't really explain what makes the hands and Giga Bowser exempt from fatigue except for personal bias.

The hands do have a lot of new moves since Brawl, but at what cost? They have zero pattern to using them in Ultimate. Put them together and that often results in bull combos that are almost undodgeable. Success often comes down to just happening to be in the right place at the right time. Other bosses with more noticeable patterns might be more repetitive as a result, but it lets you practice and get good at fighting them. You can't really practice the hands together as they are because there's just too many variables.

 

[Perkilator]

Don't forget how the Rathalos fight spawns items referencing common (anti-Rath) Monster Hunter strategies.



This still doesn't really explain what makes the hands and Giga Bowser exempt from fatigue except for personal bias.

The hands do have a lot of new moves since Brawl, but at what cost? They have zero pattern to using them in Ultimate. Put them together and that often results in bull combos that are almost undodgeable. Success often comes down to just happening to be in the right place at the right time. Other bosses with more noticeable patterns might be more repetitive as a result, but it lets you practice and get good at fighting them. You can't really practice the hands together as they are because there's just too many variables.

This guy gets it!

If there’s anything really wrong with bosses, it’s that their health suddenly goes down slower when it’s at its last 1/3.

 

[UserKev]

This still doesn't really explain what makes the hands and Giga Bowser exempt from fatigue except for personal bias.

The hands do have a lot of new moves since Brawl, but at what cost? They have zero pattern to using them in Ultimate. Put them together and that often results in bull combos that are almost undodgeable. Success often comes down to just happening to be in the right place at the right time. Other bosses with more noticeable patterns might be more repetitive as a result, but it lets you practice and get good at fighting them. You can't really practice the hands together as they are because there's just too many variables.

Does there need explaining anymore after what you've written? That's the whole point. I don't want to fight a variety of tiresome bosses anymore, which is even more to want to keep track of. Keep it clean with less obstacles. Ok, maybe I shouldn't have listed Crazy Hand, which he can work greatly on his own and is just another version of Master Hand anyway. Both Master Hand and Giga are excellent core bosses that nothing else matters, the rest are for diversity's sake. Hand and Giga are long since established formulas. Newer additional bosses won't be missed because they are more rehashed and tiresome.

Either way tho, this isn't the point of the topic. This is not a debate thread.

 

[meleebrawler]

Does there need explaining anymore after what you've written? That's the whole point. I don't want to fight a variety of tiresome bosses anymore, which is even more to want to keep track of. Keep it clean with less obstacles. Ok, maybe I shouldn't have listed Crazy Hand, which he can work greatly on his own and is just another version of Master Hand anyway. Both Master Hand and Giga are excellent core bosses that nothing else matters, the rest are for diversity's sake. Hand and Giga are long since established formulas. Newer additional bosses won't be missed because they are more rehashed and tiresome.

Either way tho, this isn't the point of the topic. This is not a debate thread.

So if we had been fighting Rathalos since the original instead of Master Hand, would you like him then?

 

[UserKev]

So if we had been fighting Rathalos since the original instead of Master Hand, would you like him then?

Nope. He isn't even originally a Smash creation. Don't knock my bro Master Hand, bruh. He's the chosen og which is why Rathalos wasn't.

 

[meleebrawler]

Nope. He isn't even originally a Smash creation. Don't knock my bro Master Hand, bruh. He's the chosen og which is why Rathalos wasn't.

Technically he would be at the time, because Monster Hunter wasn't created yet.

 

[UserKev]

Technically he would be at the time, because Monster Hunter wasn't created yet.

Not here to fight with you, dude. Like I said, Rathalos, etc are neat additions and nothing more. Rathalos isn't and will never be a Smash creation.

 

[Perkilator]

Not here to fight with you, dude. Like I said, Rathalos, etc are neat additions and nothing more. Rathalos isn't and will never be a Smash creation.

...That's why you're calling the bosses repetitive? Who said a boss character has no choice but to be a Smash creation in order to be a boss in Smash in general?

If we faced no bosses but Master Hand and Giga Bowser since Melee (not even the bosses in the Subspace Emissary), I'd be crazy enough to call the Smash series' boss lineup as the Call of Duty if boss lineups.

 

[UserKev]

...That's why you're calling the bosses repetitive? Who said a boss character has no choice but to be a Smash creation in order to be a boss in Smash in general?

If we faced no bosses but Master Hand and Giga Bowser since Melee (not even the bosses in the Subspace Emissary), I'd be crazy enough to call the Smash series' boss lineup as the Call of Duty if boss lineups.

Triple triple triple face palm. Dude listen to me, just drop it.

 

[meleebrawler]

If the argument about other non-Smash original bosses pulling from their games that makes them rehashes...

Well I hate to break it to you, but a good chunk of Master Hand's moveset is inspired by Wham Bam Rock from The Great Cave Offensive.

 

[Perkilator]

Triple triple triple face palm. Dude listen to me, just drop it.

Well, okay, fine. I'll drop it.

Back on topic, I am slightly bummed--and this hit me at the start of the year--there weren't any special Classic Mode routes for specific combinations of any two characters. I made a thread for ideas for Classic Mode routes of this nature, just to see how and where these ideas go.

 

[Melee!]

Perkilator I like that Mario and Sonic classic route

 

[UserKev]

Smash Ultimate's gameplay is honestly awful. Mario is seeming more absent from the roster each new instalment and neglected.

 

[meleebrawler]

You could have called this the "unpopular opinion thread" if you just wanted to spout emotional responses without having to explain or defend anything. But noooo, you had to call it "critique" to make yourself sound smarter, only to invite anyone who loves taking things down a peg, Smash or otherwise.

 

[UserKev]

You could have called this the "unpopular opinion thread" if you just wanted to spout emotional responses without having to explain or defend anything. But noooo, you had to call it "critique" to make yourself sound smarter, only to invite anyone who loves taking things down a peg, Smash or otherwise.

Then this topic would have been locked a long time ago. Bruh, this honestly is an attempt to reboot the idea because it was a decent topic but was locked for the exact reason because specific people just don't want to respect opinions. I honestly did explain and your clearly butthurt in some capacity.

 

[Ryu Myuutsu]

Then this topic would have been locked a long time ago. Bruh, this honestly is an attempt to reboot the idea because it was a decent topic but was locked for the exact reason because specific people just don't want to respect opinions. I honestly did explain and your clearly butthurt in some capacity.

Arguing opinions isn't disrespectful, brother. Insulting other people for their opinions is.

And it also depends on what you say. If you say that you like vanilla ice cream over chocolate, it would be silly to argue you over that. If you say that the Earth is flat or the Sun is cold, then expect to see others contesting that idea and to have a compelling argument for that because "well, it's my opinion and you have to respect it" isn't going to cut it.

Speaking of the old unpopular opinions thread, someone there said once that they were ok with harassment and they tried to shield themselves in that old fallacy. It becomes shorthand for “I can say or think whatever I like” – and by extension, continuing to argue is somehow disrespectful.

I actually find it problematic when people like you think that you are being disrespected for having their own opinion contested, because it tells me that you think you are never wrong. That little display of yours above showcases this perfectly. No one has the right to stop you from thinking whatever you want, but it doesn't mean that your views have to be treated as serious candidates for the truth. Nobody is entitled to their opinion: they are entitled to what they can argue for.

Hey, this thread became more interesting now that we have some discussion going on, don't you think?

 

[UserKev]

Arguing opinions isn't disrespectful, brother. Insulting other people for their opinions is.

No. This is not the point of the topic. Write your critique and move on. Don't reply to any of my posts because I don't feel like debating with you.

And it also depends on what you say. If you say that you like vanilla ice cream over chocolate, it would be silly to argue you over that. If you say that the Earth is flat or the Sun is cold, then expect to see others contesting that idea and to have a compelling argument for that because "well, it's my opinion and you have to respect it" isn't going to cut it.

Yes it is because this isn't the point of the topic. Read the previous page and see posts from the admin and mods who agree with me. Write your own damn critique and leave it for who agrees. Its simple.

Speaking of the old unpopular opinions thread, someone there said once that they were ok with harassment and they tried to shield themselves in that old fallacy. It becomes shorthand for “I can say or think whatever I like” – and by extension, continuing to argue is somehow disrespectful.

God, not everyone has time to argue. Leave the scenario over there. Don't get my thread locked, bruh.

I actually find it problematic when people like you think that you are being disrespected for having their own opinion contested, because it tells me that you think you are never wrong. That little display of yours above showcases this perfectly. No one has the right to stop you from thinking whatever you want, but it doesn't mean that your views have to be treated as serious candidates for the truth. Nobody is entitled to their opinion: they are entitled to what they can argue for.

No. You all need to get over yourselves. Honestly, your the one who comes in to most topics with intelligent egos. I'm not debating because YOU can NEVER be wrong. Let people have their beliefs like you do.

Hey, this thread became more interesting now that we have some discussion going on, don't you think?

To be honest with you, no it really hasn't. I'm mostly sick of eye straining debates. There are tons of other debate threads you can easily go to. Chill out.

 

[meleebrawler]

No. This is not the point of the topic. Write your critique and move on. Don't reply to any of my posts because I don't feel like debating with you.



Yes it is because this isn't the point of the topic. Read the previous page and see posts from the admin and mods who agree with me. Write your own damn critique and leave it for who agrees. Its simple.



God, not everyone has time to argue. Leave the scenario over there. Don't get my thread locked, bruh.

You could just hit the ignore button for people whose posts annoy you frequently. Or, locking this thread could be seen as merciful at this point since most everyone have said their piece already, and this would for sure stop people from responding to your posts.

 

[---]

Reminder to everyone to READ THE OPENING POST. The thread has ONE rule it wants you to uphold. This is not a debate thread it's somewhere that people can come to critique Smash Bros and basically let loose.

Follow that simple rule and don't try to challenge other people's critiques and the thread can stay open. Otherwise we'll have to have it closed.

Thank you!

Please adhere to this threads rules. NSG has already reminded everyone, please take heed. Thank you.

Just as a reminder. Post your critique and move on. If you want to argue something take it to PMs.

 

[Perkilator]

You know, seeing as Sakurai is such a huge SNK fan, I’m actually surprised (and a little bummed) Terry’s DLC Spirit Board was only two pages of 11 Spirits.

 

[Swordmaster102]

Still waiting for Short-hop Aerial Tech to be optional in the control settings and Ryu’s N-air duration to be reduced. Wonder if I will ever get either of them, but one would make my day and I’d play Ultimate more if so.

 

[Blutrausch]

Inconsistent moveset design
A character like Sheik and Joker can drag down an airborne opponent (auto-link angle) and have enough time to perform a combo from such set-up. Samus, whose u-air was the original, cannot. In fact, her landing u-air had more frames added in SSBU, causing delay. Why can two of the three perform this combo set-up? Why add more frames for Samus? Clearly, the concern doesn't lie with fairness, nor originality in moves, else no character would have visually similar moves.

Unreliable frames, hitboxes, and misleading animation
Certain multi-hitting aerials will produce animations, but with which the hitbox doesn't match. This may be due to the fact that there isn't any collision detection on certain frames so that an attack may have an active hitbox on frames 3-5 and 10-12, but not any between 6-9. Why it's not something like 3-5, 7-9, and 11-13 is beyond me.

With a hitbox set like this, there is only 1 frame apart. This might help retain a multi-hit while reducing the window to completely ignore getting hit by the multi-hitting attack in spite of the fact that the animation showed the opponent getting hit. If it's possible for a hitbox to last from 3-12 and have the multi-hit effect, why not do that?

Ridiculous moveset concepts
Joker's Arsene, Hero's critical hits and random abilities, Banjo & Kazooie's Wonderwing, Terry's "Go!" effect are, to put it plainly, ridiculous. Yes, it's possible to deal with. These choices Sakurai and his team made would not, I suspect, pass the Make Your Move standards. Just because a character can do something canonically, doesn't mean it needs to be part of a moveset.

These could have simply been reserved for Final Smash, rather than being made as a portable Final Smash. These abilities, though cool and interesting theoretically, aren't essential, especially for those who are more competitive. In fact, it's almost as though these unique abilities are nothing more than assistance for the player who is losing or just not good at the game. Couple that with great players and it's just a mess.

Way too many characters
For some, this isn't a problem. For others, like myself, it is. I had a plan to learn match-ups for each character per week in alphabetical order. While I would learn the match-ups against Bayonetta in the first week, I'm sure I'd play against other characters in Quickplay. So what's the problem?

There were 69 characters originally. More were added during the first year. By the first year I would have only developed most experience against 52 of the 69 characters. I wouldn't be finished. If there were about 30 characters, I could learn more at a faster rate. This simply cannot be done with a large roster. Instead, you only learn certain match-ups in increments.

Another problem is the next Super Smash Bros. I know someone whose following on Twitter is 200+. He made a poll about SSB6, presented it in a way so that the game would have great content in all aspects, except that the roster would be reduced. Most preferred more characters than better content overall with fewer characters. In other words, SSBU amounts to nothing more than a laundry list of characters and that, I think, is why it's as popular as it is. Sad.

Global Smash Points and Elite Smash
I'd say I was decent at SSBU. I made it in Elite Smash on the first day I played online. In another recent file, I made it into Elite Smash after 9 games and fought 22 players before the 23rd person finally defeated me and scratched my 100% win rate out of both 10 and 50 games. So what's the problem?

GSP is a great way to improve. It, in my opinion, rendered local tournaments meaningless. Why pay to attend a local when I can play against people who will only improve? I'll go up the ladder to fight better players. GSP isn't perfect, but no awful player ever made it to Elite Smash, and if you're good, you'll earn points more than you'll lose.

The downside is that it burnt me out. I was too focused on points and maintaining them. I didn't focus on learning, so I lost interest through anger and frustration. Things improved. I gave SSBU a year. Yet, while I want to play at times, I've lost interest overall. I didn't quit because I was bad. I'd say I was mid-level. (I'm being modest.) GSP is just another factor that left me tired.

For these reasons, I just find the appeal in SSBU to be over-rated. The honeymoon phase has past for me, as it has for certain other competitive players I know. Hopefully I'll get the ideal SSB game with a smaller roster, better online, consistent mechanics and frames, and overall better content. But this is SSB, and that involves Sakurai and his team. I won't hold my breath.

 

[Mario & Sonic Guy]

I know that I've brought this up already, but Ultimate could've been better if it didn't ditch the contents that were introduced into Smash 3DS / Wii U. In fact, I showed more interest in Smash Wii U than I did with Ultimate, despite the former being released on a less successful system.

Smash Run could've had a lot of potential on the Switch. Fighter customizations should've been given another chance too, since the only real problem was the unlocking criteria for the custom specials; that's something that could easily be resolved.

Smash Tour can pretty much rot and die though.

 

[Tortfeasor]

Inconsistent moveset design
A character like Sheik and Joker can drag down an airborne opponent (auto-link angle) and have enough time to perform a combo from such set-up. Samus, whose u-air was the original, cannot. In fact, her landing u-air had more frames added in SSBU, causing delay. Why can two of the three perform this combo set-up? Why add more frames for Samus? Clearly, the concern doesn't lie with fairness, nor originality in moves, else no character would have visually similar moves.

Ridiculous moveset concepts
Joker's Arsene, Hero's critical hits and random abilities, Banjo & Kazooie's Wonderwing, Terry's "Go!" effect are, to put it plainly, ridiculous. Yes, it's possible to deal with. These choices Sakurai and his team made would not, I suspect, pass the Make Your Move standards. Just because a character can do something canonically, doesn't mean it needs to be part of a moveset.

These could have simply been reserved for Final Smash, rather than being made as a portable Final Smash. These abilities, though cool and interesting theoretically, aren't essential, especially for those who are more competitive. In fact, it's almost as though these unique abilities are nothing more than assistance for the player who is losing or just not good at the game. Couple that with great players and it's just a mess.

I substantially agree. There appears to be an over-reliance on giving new characters a "super mode." They sort of did the same thing with Cloud, but at least once he does a special, his Limit meter is reset (and a lot of the time it's spent fruitlessly on an up-B to recover). With Joker, I swear it feels like if you so much as look at him Arsene comes out and Joker has Arsene out (even without using down-B) most of the time. It's really to the point where they should've just had Joker with Arsene all the time. With Terry, his GO! only applies to a couple moves, but those moves make Warlock Punch look like Warlock Tickle. At least Terry balances his super mode with an abysmal recovery. If I were to change Terry's GO!, I would have the threshold be 125% so that it's not pretty much guaranteed every stock and is more a reward for surviving, not just an inevitable freebie. A super mode should be a bonus or reward, not a crutch.

My biggest critique of Smash is that sometimes it feels like the designers don't actually know what makes a character good or a move overpowered. Take Palutena for example, a fighter that is commonly considered to be high if not S tier. Her stats, such as weight and speed (ground, run, air etc.), are nothing exceptional and her height makes her a bit of a bigger target than a lot other characters. Her specials aren't extraordinary (even if her side-B can be annoying to work around). What makes her so dangerous is really only a couple moves; her Nair and Uair. Both moves are quick, active, and disjointed. Getting bodied? Nair. Need to rack up some damage? Nair. With Palutena, you can't really go wrong throwing out a Nair. And her Uair is a potent kill move that is active for an incredible amount of time. Palutena has other good moves, but changing either of these would drastically alter/nerf her character. Imagine if her Nair was similar to Samus for example; just a couple quick kicks. With just that change, would Palutena be so high-tier? Likely not. Undoubtedly someone more experienced with Palutena's nuances could offer more insight, but this is just a layman's assessment.

Or, similar moves between characters are inconsistent. Take for example teleport Up-B moves. Only a few characters use a teleport, including Palutena, Mewtwo, and Zelda. The basic design premise with a teleport, you would think, would be that in exchange for doing damage, you are able to avoid being hit yourself. Makes sense as you would expect the loss of damage would be balanced by a gain in survivability. Now consider Zelda's teleport where the only difference is she damages and knocks back opponents caught in the startup and landing zone. Looking at the frame data (and please correct me if I'm wrong) the startup for Zelda and Palutena's teleports have a difference of a mere 1 frame. Zelda is intangible on frames 17-34 and Palutena on frames 16-32. That means if you see Zelda or Palutena teleport, you have 34/32 frames to react (to be fair Mewtwo's teleport is much faster). With Palutena, whatever, but with Zelda, and especially if your online, you'd better hope you weren't doing anything else when her start up occurred because 34 frames is barely enough to time to complete a jab (obviously depends on the character). I've had matches against Zelda's that seem to consist of nothing but her using Up-B to fish for kills (and using Ridley it'd be harder not to hit me). I'm not griping about it as it usually comes down to me being too aggressive and not playing with my head, but it does seem like an odd inconsistency in design. You'd expect that if Zelda were able to teleport (thereby avoiding attacks), she either wouldn't cause any damage or if there was damage, she would have a longer startup or lag at the end (only 8 frames difference in end lag between Palutena and Zelda). It begs the question why Zelda has essentially the same frame data for her teleport compared to Palutena, but with the added kill power. What factors do the designers consider?

I could go on, but it just seems odd when similar moves don't operate on the same principles.

 

[Perkilator]

There was a problem fetching the tweet

This is more of a Brawl thing than an Ultimate thing, but still. Why couldn’t have been this is design?

Fighter customizations should've been given another chance too, since the only real problem was the unlocking criteria for the custom specials; that's something that could easily be resolved.

I’ve been thinking since October that maybe we could solve this issue by giving most of the Echo Fighters the custom moves from their original fighters. Here were some ideas I proposed:


-Dense Charge Shot
-Turbo Missile
-Screw Rush


-Sleepy Toad
-Flower Bomber


-Dashing Assault
-Heavy Blade
-Dolphin Slash
-Iai Counter


-Tempest
-Unyielding Blade
-Paralyzing Counter


-Wings of Icarus
-Amplifying Orbitars

 

[Swordmaster102]

Welp, 7.0 dropped the other day and the shotos got many buffs. Though, I simply don’t understand how through all the changes made to them Ryu’s n-air still hasn’t been made identical to Ken’s (frame data wise).

It’s simply ridiculous that this change hasn’t been made yet. Many of you don’t play Ryu or Ken, but this change would actually give Ryu his air game back that he had in Sm4sh. A change he truly needs.

 

[Necro'lic]

While we're at it, Rekzius mentioned in his 7.0.0 patch notes video that patch notes in Smash Bros are almost inconsequential, and I agree heavily. It seems like the balance team is so TERRIFIED of changing a character to the point of giving them actual new options a huge amount of the time.

I know fighters can't be balanced the same way as more complicated games like MOBAs, but goddamn they can't be this afraid to buff/nerf things.

 

[Sestetz]

I wish we had an unranked mode instead of just non elite and elite smash. As flawed as For Glory I was, I liked playing without the worry of try hards and gsp. It's a small thing, but on games like Rainbox six I MUCH prefer to play casual. Would be nice if we had a gsp checkmark we could just turn off or on so I can mess around on elite more

 

[Jomosensual]

Only issue I have is that I wish we got more 1st party series repped in the game. A little bummed that Arms and Astral Chain both didnt get playable characters and Xenoblade, who feels underrepped got nobody new either. I'm not really someone who usually cares about stuff like this but it really would have been nice to get at least one of those 3 a fighter.

 

[Perkilator]

Only issue I have is that I wish we got more 1st party series repped in the game. A little bummed that Arms and Astral Chain both didnt get playable characters and Xenoblade, who feels underrepped got nobody new either. I'm not really someone who usually cares about stuff like this but it really would have been nice to get at least one of those 3 a fighter.

Saaaaame. Would've loved to see DeMille from Tomato Adventure have been a fighter.

 

[Pwnz0rz Man]

My biggest criticism of Smash Ultimate is the macro C-Stick. If they completely got rid of that and reverted it to the way it was in Melee where a smash or a tilt on the stick performs a variant of it without any movement, spacing would be so much simpler to account for. I know tilt stick reduces it a good bit, but it's still a bit more movement than I'm happy with.

I'm not sure if this can be adjusted or not, but for a game that carries the Gamecube controller as a selling point, it doesn't work as well as it did on Gamecube. The L and R shoulders are still missing the light and hard press inputs. As it is, it only registers the light press. It's not a huge deal, but it's a minor annoyance I notice from time to time.

 

[Ryu Myuutsu]

Ridiculous moveset concepts
Joker's Arsene, Hero's critical hits and random abilities, Banjo & Kazooie's Wonderwing, Terry's "Go!" effect are, to put it plainly, ridiculous. Yes, it's possible to deal with. These choices Sakurai and his team made would not, I suspect, pass the Make Your Move standards. Just because a character can do something canonically, doesn't mean it needs to be part of a moveset.

These could have simply been reserved for Final Smash, rather than being made as a portable Final Smash. These abilities, though cool and interesting theoretically, aren't essential, especially for those who are more competitive. In fact, it's almost as though these unique abilities are nothing more than assistance for the player who is losing or just not good at the game. Couple that with great players and it's just a mess.

As you say, they are cool and interesting which is why they are there. Sakurai has stated that he wants to make movesets fun as well. It's interesting that you say that they aren't essential especially for competitive play, because that mindset showcases the dangers of catering too much to the hyper competitive crowd and it gives me the "characters are just functions" vibe. Reserving those traits to FS only would pretty much rob those characters of their individuality and homogenize them with the rest of the cast in an unfun way.

 

[zumaddy]

My number #1 annoyance with the game right now is that you can't change character or music in Arenas without leaving the queue. I play a lot of Arenas but if you're next in line with a big group you can't do anything or you get booted out. It makes no sense.

 

[Ze Diglett]

Honestly, I could go off on Smash Ultimate all day, but for the sake of this thread, I'll go over just a few of Ultimate's most (in my opinion) glaring issues.

First of all, the online is simply atrocious. This is non-negotiable; whether you like the game or not, you can't deny that the online is subpar at best. There are a cavalcade of issues that make this game's online basically unenjoyable, including (but not limited to):

• Everyone on Quickplay being thrown into the same matchmaking pool (and the matchmaker itself doing a pretty crap job of putting players into enjoyable games - similar rules, minimal latency, etc.)
• The netcode being mediocre at best
• The Online infrastructure in general being terrible
• GSP as a concept (doesn't provide a valuable metric of how good you are as a player, encourages players to play passively and even ragequit prematurely so they don't have to see their number go down, discourages casual players who just wanna get a few games in without worrying about their "rank", etc.)
• Players not being able to change their character, stage, music selection, look at the rules, or really do anything while waiting in the queue of a Battle Arena (don't act like this would be some impossible change, Mario Kart 8 Deluxe had this figured out nearly three years ago)
• Battle Arenas being a crapshoot in general (unless you're specifically coordinating with your friends, good luck finding an arena that isn't locked, has an agreeable ruleset, and doesn't close/have the host kick you immediately after you enter)

I could go on, honestly. And it's really frustrating because, believe it or not, this online system isn't totally unsalvageable; it could be largely fixed with just a few tweaks and overhauls to the system, like the addition of a dedicated Ranked and Unranked matchmaking system. (Y'know, like every other fighting game ever.) But Nintendo doesn't seem interested in doing that despite the fact that we're paying extra to play online now, which sucks considering modern fighting games basically live and die by how good the online is.

For another thing, while this is the best balanced Smash game thus far, Ultimate's balance is still pretty "meh" in the grand scheme of things. Sure, most of the characters are viable now (albeit to varying extents), but you still have a lot of characters who ultimately fall short and still need work. (Little Mac, Plant, probably most of the superheavies, etc.) This game's balance might seem good to us as Smash fans, but take a look at how well-balanced other fighting games are like Rivals of Aether and Tekken 7 and you'll see that Smash could do so much better if the devs were more in-touch with the community and willing to make big, committal changes in patches. Hell, those games don't even have agreed-upon tier lists because the gap between each character is so small, and they've been out for years. (For reference, a few years back, someone won an official international Tekken 7 tournament using Panda, one of the generally considered worst characters in the game at the time. @ me when a Piranha Plant player wins EVO.)

The last thing I'll go over in this post is that the core gameplay of Smash Ultimate just does not feel good. I anticipate there'll be a hefty amount of disagreement with what I just said since it is a pretty subjective statement overall, but to me, Smash Ultimate (hell, Smash as a series, really) feels messy and overly sloppy to play. The input lag and the, let's say, lenient buffer system speak for themselves, but even without those, it feels like Ultimate just doesn't have a whole lot of room for doing cool ****. In Rivals, for instance, if I land a stray hit in neutral, that can potentially set up for a sick juggle or combo or kill confirm or what have you. In Smash, I might get a few hits in and then immediately reset to neutral. And that's ultimately the problem with Ult's gameplay; it doesn't feel rewarding. Playing neutral isn't fun due to how stiff and restrictive the movement is, and winning neutral isn't even fun either because of how unsatisfying the rewards for doing so are. The immediate response might be that I just need to "git gud", but it's worth noting that I've been playing Smash for over 10 years, meanwhile I haven't even hit 100 hours in Rivals. Does this mean Rivals is just the easier game? No, not really, but I'd certainly say it's a hell of a lot more intuitive than Smash to play (which is ironic since Smash sets out to be accessible for all players and Rivals takes itself much more seriously as a fighting game). And that doesn't even go into more specific **** like the bubble shields and the fact that countering defensive play is still, and likely always will be, pure AIDS. (I understand that last part is subjective, but consider the general reaction people have when they run into a Samus or an Isabelle online.)

...yikes, that took longer than expected. At the end of the day, when you put all this together, you get a game that, in my opinion, is only really fun to play with friends. Which is fine, but it's like a movie that's only fun to watch with friends; at that point, are you even enjoying the movie itself anymore? And I will give Smash one thing: it is, and probably always will be, the king of couch multiplayer. But in the advent of online, couch play has only become more and more obsolete, so it's questionable how long Smash will be able to hold that niche anyway. (Not like Smash is going anywhere any time soon, since it'll always get by on sheer brand power and promotional value since people seem to care more about the characters that are in the game than the game itself these days.) I can't speak for anyone else, but I got tired of Ultimate pretty quickly compared to past Smash games, both due to how little there truly is to do in it and how frustrating it is to play, and that's a damn shame considering how cool it could be if the devs ironed out just a few of its core issues.

 

[Ryu Myuutsu]

For another thing, while this is the best balanced Smash game thus far, Ultimate's balance is still pretty "meh" in the grand scheme of things. Sure, most of the characters are viable now (to varying extents), but you still have a lot of characters who ultimately fall short and still need work. (Little Mac, Plant, probably most of the superheavies, etc.) This game's balance might seem good to us as Smash fans, but take a look at how well-balanced other fighting games are like Rivals of Aether and Tekken 7 and you'll see that Smash could do so much better if the devs were more in-touch with the community and willing to make big, committal changes in patches. Hell, those games don't even have agreed-upon tier lists because the gap between each character is so small, and they've been out for years. (For reference, a few years back, someone won an official international Tekken 7 tournament using Panda, one of the generally considered worst characters in the game at the time. @ me when a Piranha Plant player wins EVO.)

In the "grand scheme of things" most fighting games aren't even well balanced: Marvel vs Capcom, Killer Instinct, Guilty Gear, Blaz Blue, Dragon Ball Fighterz, The King of Fighters, Dissidia, Street Fighter, Tekken 1-6, Bloody Roar, Soul Calibur, Mortal Kombat, Injustice, Primal Rage, the first three Smash games, most anime brawlers, etc. I know little of Tekken 7 and Rivals of Aether but I know a lot about the previously mentioned games, and they sound like outliers in that regard which you seem to confuse as the norm. You have no idea how egregious ths was in the 90s and mid 2000s where fighting games wouldn't get patched so your god tier characters stayed broken and the crap tier ones remained weak. And yet, we played those games without giving that issue too much thought because they were fun.

A game's end goal shouldn't be to achieve complete balance. A completed balanced game does not equal a fun game. If you want every character to stand an equal chance against each other you will have to homogenize them and strip them of their individual traits. Street Fighter I is the perfect balanced game because you only have Ryu and Ken who play the same, giving the players an equal amount of options; but it's not very fun.

Modern games like Ultimate have the benefit of being able to be patched now, which is a great boon. The game already beats Melee and Brawl in this regard. So I find it laughable that it's balance is only considered acceptable if we have someone like Piranha Plant win EVO. No matter what, fighters will never stand an equal against each other, which actually makes upsets fun.