[collapse="Smash 4 Impressions"]
Okay, so, here's all my Marth impressions:
Dashing:
No dash dancing. (or if there is, the window is super tight)
Dash cancel works like Brawl, can cancel with DB.
Dash to shield seems about the same as Brawl.
PIVOT CANCELING NEW META: Out of a dash, if you pivot, you can cancel into a jab/tilt/smash/grab out of the animation. Really fast, and will be a hugely important mechanic. I found it by accident while attempting to pivot grab.
Normals:
Aerial lag seems higher. 6-10 frames on each aerial. Feels really bad.
Range feels pretty much the same. Fair maybe slightly buffed in range, but nerfed in recovery.
D- tilt IASA is like Brawl, you seem to be able to shield, not sure if IASA shield.
Jab is identical, no finisher.
SHDF and SH Fair -> Uair don't work. Fair recovery seems increased.
Unable to test Footstool dair due to difficulty of footstool in FFA.
Bair facing works like Brawl, bair feels really good.
Nair still feels godlike.
U-tilt seems both slower to start up (very slightly) and slower to recover. Still has back-side strong hitbox.
Specials:
DB timing is slightly stricter, might just be the TVs.
DS recovers much faster when used from the ground. Not sure about I-frames yet.
RCO lag definitely still there. orz
Dancing Blade has AWFUL recovery if you stop it early. Like, gotta be around 25 frames. DB1 mixups are toast for sure. 4th hit feels a great deal stronger. Likely only safe if you stop after 3rd hit down due to backstep. Stopping after first two hits would be suicide.
Upwards ver. of Dancing Blade has more range I think.
DB1 air 'mini-jump' still works.
Grabs:
No follow ups to grab. Kirby at 0 went about as far as he would at 70 in Brawl from f-throw.
D-throw sent pretty much totally vertical.
Grab range seems slightly nerfed, slightly more recovery? (Grabs in General seems slow to recover)
Pivot Grab still works, still godlike.
Greninja:
Bair is great. Fast, great range, excellent for edge guards.
Fair is a bit slow, but has decent range/power.
Uair is amazing and I was able to get a few legit follow ups from throws/other moves.
Dair (hereforth known as Footdive) is actually pretty good for a stall n' fall, and you can move freely after bouncing. Can probably chain it on big characters at specific percents.
Smashes seem okay. U-Smash seems good, D-Smash has a booty hitbox and is kinda slow.
F-Smash has decent range, but it also a bit slow and not that strong.
F-tilt has fast start-up and great range, but awful recovery.
D-tilt is way too short-range to be used as a poke.
U-tilt is like a smaller version of DK's u-tilt.
His throws all seem decent, and I'm somewhat confident you can get follow-ups from them.
Side-B can be held to travel additional distance. Gren can still move while doing this, but he can only walk slowly. Releasing the button activates the attack. Pretty fast. Apparently his shadow moves while he's charging it, to indicate where he'll appear.
Water shur is great, good aerial mobility while charging.
Sheik:
F-tilt with Sheik is just as good. All tilts are still good.
Uair is multihit now.
Nair animation is different but still good.
Bair feels about the same.
Up-B seems to move slightly less before the poof.
Side- B bombs are super slow, I have no idea if they're actually good or not or where you'd even viably use them.
Down-B is just weird, startup is pretty slow as well. Can get a sizable wall-jump if you contact a wall during the flip.
Pit:
Arrows are awful now. Start-up is way worse, so is recovery, and they move slower.
F-tilt is godlike. Has IASA frames and amazing range. It's like Marth's d-tilt level of good.
Bair is still great, has seemingly very little landing lag.
Stages
I would say, from first impressions, I would have 5/8 stages legal
Battlefield and City&Town (Nu Smashville) are perfect
Skyloft is basically Delfino without water.
Mario stage is the same idea, with predictable transformation timing. Around 40 seconds per transition.
Colisseum would be banned. Too damn big for singles.
Boxing Ring banned for sure. Walk-offs, walls, and stalling on top of the arena lights. (they respawn after 5 seconds if you break them, so it's not a viable anti-stall)
Wily's Castle would've been godlike if the Yellow Devil wasn't a thing.
I can't remember the 8th stage
<Notes from Croi, our Wario main>
Kirby:
Back throw feels nerfed. Frame data is really bad but cooldown is low. Can't follow it up with anything.
Inhale feels nerfed slightly.
Bair is buffed; comes out faster and sourspot hits harder.
Shield is larger.
Final Cutter damage/knockback is buffed; the shockwave is *drastically* nerfed, presumably to keep scrubs from spamming it online.
Stone has longer startup but is otherwise the same.
Fair feels slightly buffed; less frames in-between each kick.
Dair feels nerfed, smaller hitbox.
Grab game in general feels stronger, but it might just be the animations making it feel more rewarding for landing one.
Donkey Kong:
He's ****ING MASSIVE. Larger than Bowser by a decent margin. His bigger body is possibly a buff for singles (longer range) but a detriment to doubles. (Probably like 20-30% bigger)
Recovery feels buffed vertically and horizontally, but is slower.
Dsmash is faster but is possibly weaker.
Punch has a weird charging animation; possibly a shorter range?
Aerial down+b confirmed. Spikes softly but is faster than dair.
Fair frames feel buffed slightly.
Ground Pound still has silly range.
Dash attack acts like it does in P:M, but is slower.
Mario:
Mario feels like he'd make high tier easily. He's basically just Brawl Mario, but everything is faster, hits harder, and is just easier and more rewarding. He can fair all day like it ain't no thang.
Aerial fireball is nerfed; it travels mostly straight down. Probably to make it harder to recover high.
No real criticisms otherwise. Of the characters that I've tried, I'd main Mario in a heartbeat.
Fox:
Can act out of Fox Illusion, including using Fire Fox, but not Fox Illusion again. If this is intentional, Fox's recovery is STUPID GOOD.
Most of his attacks are heavily nerfed. Fresh uair at 70 barely did anything. He has the speed for decent combo games, though.
Frame data feels roughly as good as Brawl, nowhere near Melee obv.
Laser does not cancel on landing. Camping is massively nerfed as a result.
Shine cannot stall like it could in Brawl.
Wii Fit Trainer:
Recovery is terrible, but maybe I'm just using it wrong? I pressed up+b and she barely went anywhere. Maybe you have to press it repeatedly, or maybe jiggle the stick? Either way it was crapass.
Frames in general feel generous and she *feels* like she hits decently hard. Her specials are generally pretty booty, though.
Her "Praise the Sun" projectile is slow and weak, even fully charged, but it charges quickly. Not a good trade since you typically charge attacks when the opponent is offstage anyway.
"Focus" offers too little for too much and can fail entirely if your timing is off.
Volleyball is actually pretty neat. Angle can be adjusted slightly and I believe it can be smashed, like Samus's missiles.
Overall Wii Fit Trainer feels very technical. She could potentially be devastating but I can't put in the time or the effort with a limited Best Buy beta demo to say for sure.
Sonic:
Can't jump out of spindash???
Recovery feels about the same as in Brawl.
Dash attack hits like Project: M's side+b, but can't jump out of it. Good for pressuring shields regardless.
Fair is buffed; has almost no landing lag.
Dair is strong but has a gross amount of landing lag, moreso than Brawl.
Overall feels pretty bad and possible the most "unfinished" character I've played. Nothing with him really feels good or rewarding, despite how flashy some of his aerials look.
Little Mac:
Not a good choice of character for a Wario main.
*Very* strong ground game. Jabs, tilts, smashes, grab game, everything on the ground is very rigid and powerful.
Recovery is literally the worst I've ever seen. Side+b and up+b are useless in the air (both are very strong on the ground).
Uncharged fsmash does 20%.
Uncharged usmash killed Rosalina on Battlefield at ~80%.
OHKO (which isn't, by the way) has very good frame data: just a little slower than his jab and has super armour, possibly invincibility, until end.
General:
You can't act out of hitstun, so combos like Melee are possible, although as it is, it feels like most attacks are too strong at low percentages, specifically to discourage them.
I've only tried Mario and Little Mac, but pivot grabs feel much stronger than in Brawl.
Pivoting in general is a whole tech in itself: you can tilt/smash/grab/jab out of a pivot.
The visuals are great without being overwhelming. They look confusing and distracting on Twitch and Youtube, but in practice, it's all very easy to digest while still being entertaining and enrapturing. The 60 FPS jump also makes a massive difference.
The demo feels very unfinished and rough, but you can get a general feel for the direction the game is going in, and it feels great. There are some oversights, some rather drastic (i.e. Fox's amazing recovery), but I'm looking forward to the finished product, especially if the Nintendo reps are paying as close attention to player feedback as they say.
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