Official DLC Speculation Discussion Volume II

[Þe 1 → Way]

If we’re talking worst stage, I can’t think of one half as bad as 75m. There is literally no fun way I’ve found to fight on it.

 

[SMAASH! Puppy]

As far as the worst stages go, the listed stage tends to be one of these:

• Lylat Cruise (Though that's probably just the competitive players)
• 75 m
• Hanenbow
• The Great Cave Offensive
• PAC-Land

I've also seen hate for Rainbow Cruise, Venom, Norfair, Palutena's Temple, Gaur Plain, and Wily Castle. Also Windy Hill Zone, but not because of any problems on the stage's part.

My opinion on these is that:

• Lylat Cruise is fine, just kinda boring. The music is kind of what kills it for me, which in Ultimate is kind of my fault, but I wanted the music selection to be different between the Star Fox stages, so Lylat Cruise got the songs that fit on it best; all the boring ones.
• 75 m. You might be right to consider it a design disaster, but I don't really have too many problems with it. This may or may not be because I never play on it.
• Hanenbow was massacred in Ultimate man! The stage used to sound pretty, now it just throws out random notes. Throw in any music tracks and you've got yourself a cacophony. It's the only stage in the game that I only allow a single song to play.
• The Great Cave Offensive is too big. You can't see what's going on if everyone's spread out.
• PAC-Land is fine. I genuinely don't understand why people hate it this much other than just wanting PAC-Maze.

Beyond that, I really like Rainbow Cruise. Yeah not a lot of fighting happens on the way up, but that's alright. Palutena's Temple is also a bit large, but it's honestly fine in 8 Player Smash, which is what it's for. Gaur Plain is my pick for the worst stage in the game. It's either walk-offs, or the pit of death for you. Also there's a mini-boss that stops CPUs from interacting with an entire side of the stage. And then there's Wily Castle...I never had a problem with the Yellow Devil in casual matches so I never hated this stage. My only gripe is that the platforms from Bright Man's stage are the incorrect color, but that doesn't really have much to do with the stage's function. I do kind of wish that the platforms stayed out longer though.

 

[Rie Sonomura]

Monolith Soft revealed their 20th anniversary artwork.
View attachment 328123

The blonde girl in blue in the bottom left… isn’t that “Idea”?

WHAT KIND OF PARENTS WOULD NAME THEIR DAUGHTER IDEA ANYWAY???

(context; there’s a spirit of said character)

 

[Metal Shop X]

Monolith Soft revealed their 20th anniversary artwork.

Wait, that artwork was revealed some time ago now.

Did something happen to make it noteworthy again? Or I am being a dumbo?

 

[Ivander]

Monolith Soft revealed their 20th anniversary artwork.
View attachment 328123

So...

• Shion & KOS-MOS from Xenosaga
• Shulk, Fiora, Melia and Riki from Xenoblade
• Elma, Lin and Tatsu from Xenoblade X
• Rex, Pyra, Mythra, Nia, Tora, Jin, Malos and Lora(?) from Xenoblade 2
• Kalas and Xelha from Baten Kaitos
• Sagi and Milly from Baten Kaitos II.
• Reiji and Xioumu from Namco X Capcom/Project X Zone
• Raymond Bryce from Disaster Day of Crisis.
• The characters between Raymond and the Xenosaga characters are from Soma Bringer.
• Don't know the last two characters on the far left beside Mythra.

 

[chocolatejr9]

Monolith Soft revealed their 20th anniversary artwork.
View attachment 328123

I still wish they'd buy the rights to Xenosaga...

 

[Evil Trapezium]

If we’re talking worst stage, I can’t think of one half as bad as 75m. There is literally no fun way I’ve found to fight on it.

They had 3 other levels to choose from that look like they could play way better in Smash and actually function properly.

Yet they decided to go with 75m. Mind baffling.

 

[Ivander]

I still wish they'd buy the rights to Xenosaga...

I mean, at least Namco still allows Monolith to do stuff with Xenosaga. Meanwhile, poor Xenogears...

 

[chocolatejr9]

I mean, at least Namco still allows Monolith to do stuff with Xenosaga. Meanwhile, poor Xenogears...

To be fair, Xenogears is a weird technicality: it wasn't technically made by Monolith Soft, just a group of devs who would later become the company known as Monolith Soft.

 

[SMAASH! Puppy]

The face of champions:

They had 3 other levels to choose from that look like they could play way better.

While I don't hate 75 m, why it wasn't 25 m that was picked will forever baffle everyone.

 

[DanganZilla5]

Unpopular opinion: I actually quite like Great Cave Offensive and all the other big stages. I don't play on them as often as other stages (Granted that's partially because I keep playing the same 15 stages or so), but it really doesn't annoy me that much. I like all the gimmicks and the stage itself looks cool. It almost feels like a level of Subspace or Smash Run, just without enemies.

Really, the only stages that I find to be borderline unplayable are Pac Land, 75M, and maybe Balloon Fight.

 

[DarthEnderX]

OK... time to debunk the hate on PAC-Land I've seen for so, so, long...

Way to debunk his opinion with your opinion...

 

[Þe 1 → Way]

Are Xenogears, Xenosaga, and Xenoblade in the same universe? Or does Monolith just really love putting Xeno before random words?

I actually like the bigger stages like Great Cave Offensive and Palutenas Temple. They can be a lot of fun to traverse, especially in 8 player battles.

 

[SMAASH! Puppy]

Are Xenogears, Xenosaga, and Xenoblade in the same universe? Or does Monolith just really love putting Xeno before random words?

As far as I know, they are about as connected as all three games in the Xenoblade Chronicles series are.

 

[Cutie Gwen]

Are Xenogears, Xenosaga, and Xenoblade in the same universe? Or does Monolith just really love putting Xeno before random words?

I actually like the bigger stages like Great Cave Offensive and Palutenas Temple. They can be a lot of fun to traverse, especially in 8 player battles.

Monolith are apparantly real xenophiles then

 

[DanganZilla5]

Are Xenogears, Xenosaga, and Xenoblade in the same universe? Or does Monolith just really love putting Xeno before random words?

I actually like the bigger stages like Great Cave Offensive and Palutenas Temple. They can be a lot of fun to traverse, especially in 8 player battles.

I'm not that knowledgeable about the Xenoverse outside of Xenoblade but to my knowledge there are a few references here and there which implies the three series could be set in the same universe but there isn't any conclusive evidence.

 

[Ivander]

Are Xenogears, Xenosaga, and Xenoblade in the same universe? Or does Monolith just really love putting Xeno before random words?

I think Xenogears was supposed to or was going to be connected to Xenosaga(since Abel looks like Fei, Nephilim looks like Elly and in Xenosaga 3, there is an superboss appearance by Weltall under the name Ω/Omega Universitas and later Omega Id), but I think due to Xenosaga getting it's story condensed, it didn't quite happen.

 

[Jondolio]

Can't really comment on worst stage since I almost exclusively play on Battlefield/Omega form cause **** hazards

 

[SKX31]

What is your opinion on this video? Do you agree or disagree?

Well, welcome to the MockRock fanbase.

As for the list, to go more in depth:

Spoiler

5. Luigi: Yeah the Poltergust's implementation has been problematic. Not just since a number of more casual Luigi players have picked up on that and likewise started to look for those combos - meaning it's arguably so central that anyone has to look out for it - but also since it's gotten to the point where he's become the subject of a joke PSA:

TBF, kinda thinking that making his grab a little more committal would help allieviate that. The rest is more or less okay though.

4. Hero: The Language Barrier is mostly an issue for competitive, where players from Japan do travel to American events, but it can rear its ugly head in a more casual setting too: should a visitor who's not comfortable with English visit an English-speaking country and play with people who are (or hell, any combination). The fact that the designers haven't patched in spell icons - when they're a thing in DQ - is extremely strange. Only possible reason I can see is potential space issues, but that can be solved too.

3. Olimar: And TBF, it's really difficult to solve the issue he talks about here. He's small, the Pikmin are smaller and the need for actions to be snappy does mean Olimar's commander position is more difficult to convey here than in the Pikmin games. Still, Olimar really could use a HUD showing the Pikmin order, and a slight redesign to his animations could help.

2. Little Mac: And not a surprising addition. While the design is on paper a good call, there's a good reason to say it hasn't worked. There's no shame in a volatile character, but the intended design runs across a fundamental aspect of platform fighters and was severely in danger of being undermined by subsuquent changes. Which Ultimate proved to be. Now yes he does have some ways to mitigate those weaknesses, but a redesign could be worth at least considering.

1. Sonic: I don't think he's the worst designed character since the time out strategy does not work as well in offline environments, that said there's a case to be made that he's still a bit too focused around the Spin Dash. It's not as bad now as it was in 4 where he could shield cancel or hold Spin Dash indefinetely, but I do believe that he could also use some fine tuning to emphasise the more offensive / stylish aspects of him. Which he's also well known for.

But on a more positive note, here's MockRock's video on the best designs.

Well, I’ll start out by saying the editing there is superb, Mock Rock has style. As for the characters themselves.

Spoiler: Sonic

SONIC SPEED SONIC SPEED SONIC SPEED SONIC SPEED SONIC SPEED SONIC SPEED SONIC SPEED SONIC SPEED SONIC SPEED SONIC SPEED SONIC SPEED SONIC SPEED SONIC SPEED SONIC SPEEDSONIC SPEED SONIC SPEED SONIC SPEED SONIC SPEED SONIC SPEED SONIC SPEED SONIC SPEED.

So you didn't get to experience the wonder that was Brawl Sonic?

As for best / worst stages?

Worst, I'm going to go with:

• PAC-Land since it forces the players to combat the stage's movement a lot. Never been a fan of auto-scrollers, especially horizontal ones. Several sections like the forest do not help since that obscures visibility on top.
• Gaur Plain can be a chore to traverse, and the walkoffs encourage a passive playstyle. Especially with items off - while items on encourages stage control and snowballing, items on at least give people a mini-objective to pursue on a casual stage / match.
• 75 M, which, yeah I do not need to discuss in great detail. Particular shoutout to some weird ledges that characters can snap to while they're standing on a nearby platform for no apparent reason.

Best though:

• Hyrule Temple - it is a really good casual stage because it has a lot of different areas and stuff one can decide to do. Whether it's the Fight Club or silly side stuff like the (Reverse) Hyrule Jump. It's not intrusive either.
• Pokemon Stadium 2 - as a competitive stage it's not too lopsided towards a lot of different playstyles, and the platforms' placements near the ledge offer a variety of different mini-tactics. As a casual one I've never found it too intrusive while the transformations are more consistent than the fun-but-janky PS1 counterpart.
• Poke Floats - okay exception to the above. There's a reason why it's featured in this video a lot. It not being brought back in Ultimate was a giant missed opportunity.

 

[SMAASH! Puppy]

What do you guys think about the DLC stages. My thoughts are:

• Mementos: This is the craziest of the DLC stages, and is probably the craziest stage of its type. It makes for some fun chaos in free for all matches, and when you turn the hazards off, it's fun on 1v1's too.
• Yggdrasil's Altar: Far and away the stage with the worst music overall. The stage itself is fun to play on though, albeit also nothing to write home about.
• Spiral Mountain: Why does it spin? It doesn't make sense. Beyond that, holy motion sickness Batman! I don't even suffer from it and even I find the spinning to be a bit much should I be looking at the background (it needs to slow down). As far as the stage's layout goes, it's actually pretty good.
  • EDIT: Forgot to add the fact that this is basically attention to detail: the stage, and I am here for it.
• King of Fighters Stadium: It's interesting how fun the walls make the stage. Not quite a fan of the music, but I still like the stage plenty.
• Garreg Mach Monastery: Flat stage 2: Electric Boogaloo. I don't have much of an opinion on the layout, but it is very pretty, and the music is great.
• Small Battlefield: Ironically, not Battlefield. It's fun as a competitive stage, but I'm not a huge fan of Super Smash Bros. Ultimate's Battlefield look so it's a bit plain to me.
• Spring Stadium: Another good stage with both hazards on and off, and consistently great music to boot. What's not to like?
• Minecraft World: Dis one's my furvrite. It looks ridiculous as an image, but in action, it looks great. I especially love the day/night cycle (why are there only 4 stages that have one?). And also it has one of, if not the best track in the game. Perfection. Actually I'm not too crazy about the hazards on version, but still.
• Northern Cave: Absolutely beautiful. The layout isn't much to write home about, but it doesn't have to be.
• Cloud Sea of Alrest: Love the gimmick of the stage. Not sure why you can't swim in the cloud sea, but it probably wouldn't be as good if you could.
• Mishima Dojo: It's pretty much just King of Fighter's Stadium, but slightly different. Still, it's pretty neat I think. Still not too crazy about most of the music though.

 

[DarthEnderX]

Are Xenogears, Xenosaga, and Xenoblade in the same universe? Or does Monolith just really love putting Xeno before random words?

Spiritual successors.

They resemble but are legally distinct from each other, as each one is owned by a different publisher(Square, Namco and Nintendo, respectively).

 

[Mushroomguy12]

Third episode of Harada's Bar with Sakurai guest starring premiered today.

 

[FreeFox]

The Squad.

I like it.

The Funky Bunch, because why not?

But Funky aint in the game yet.

Monolith Soft revealed their 20th anniversary artwork.
View attachment 328123

Absolutely beautiful and one more reason to start working on a new Project X Zone.

 

[The Rhythm Theif]

Also, point 3 is flatout wrong, the small blastzones means you literally get less room to move around in

I thought that only applied to stages without autoscrolling as the main focus?

 

[subterrestrial]

Hey I like Great Cave Offensive. Kirby's Fun Pak/Super Star is one of my favourite games of all time and I like how Sakurai handled the stage. Sure it's massive but it's great for 8 Player Smash which it was designed for.

yea imo they did a good job of translating the entire gamemode into a stage it rly feels like im exploring a dangerous underground cave lol no sarcasm

 

[Rie Sonomura]

I like it.

Absolutely beautiful and one more reason to start working on a new Project X Zone.

That makes two of us

I do believe it’s Namco’s call to get a new one made and not Monolith as the producer is with Namco, a tweet Harada QRT’d back in the day signifies as much. It’s technically a Namco IP, being the successor to Namco x Capcom

as for programming, idk. I think much of the talent left, as did the original creators. But IPs can go on without the creators, I mean look at Kirby

 

[SMAASH! Puppy]

I thought that only applied to stages without autoscrolling as the main focus?

No, the blast zones are how stage size is defined. The size of the platforms are also commonly used, but the blast zones denote the size of the stage as a whole.


The fact that "The edges of the screen...[are]...real close to the blast zone" however, is just how walk-offs work (though it may or may not be what Dragonzilla meant).

 

[SneakyLink]

Of all the stages in the game, Pac-Land I feel is both the least fun to play on, but also one of the most faithful.

The stage looks like Pac-Land and the hazards/mechanics are also pulled from the game:
1. Hydrants spit water and push you back
2. Water sprouts that damage you and a ship that makes platforms appear
3. Grabbing the Pac-Man with a S gives invincibility. Likewise grabbing Balloons gives health
4. Ms. Pac-Man has a cameo

In short, although not the most fun stage, it is definitely one of the more faithful recreations.

As for the last stage, I hope it is both faithful and fun to play on. Something like Minecraft World or Northern Cave.

Unrelated but Pokémon TV was added to the Switch.

 

[osby]

i actually like Pac-Land

 

[The Rhythm Theif]

i actually like Pac-Land

Dude, same here!

(Also, Festive Leviathan looks real cute, not gonna lie.)

 

[N3ON]

In their default forms, Pac-Land isn't the worst stage, because 75m and Great Cave Offensive exist. It is, however, by far the ugliest. Though when you alter their forms, 75m and GCO become fine, while Pac-Land remains an abject eyesore.

And tbh the unfortunateness of Pac-Land is only compounded by the absence of Pac-Maze, a stage which easily could've been tweaked for inclusion.

 

[Trevenant]

75M hazards are just busted, and they can literally find you from anywhere, hiding isn't even too good of an option. Combine that with the confusing layout and you have a stage that doesn't do much good outside of being a neat reference. Mario Bros has similar problems but to a lesser extent, as the layout, whilst being annoying, is still way too much of a campfest and Hanenbow has similar layout problems as it all looks weird with the leaves at weird angles and not being that visually pleasing. They're all right next to each other on the stage select too and stick way too close to their source material.

 

[Rie Sonomura]

Still find it funny that Ms. PAC-MAN appears on Pac-Land but isn’t a echo or alt or even Spirit

 

[GilTheGreat19]

Still find it funny that Ms. PAC-MAN appears on Pac-Land but isn’t a echo or alt or even Spirit

You say it’s funny
I say it’s sad

 

[The Rhythm Theif]

You say it’s funny
I say it’s sad

The Casino opening credits song should be playing any minute now.

... I need to choose my words more carefully.

 

[SMAASH! Puppy]

Ya' know, I am a little disappointed in how Super Smash Bros. Ultimate's Battlefield looks. They had a lot of ideas, but in the end decided to do more or less what Super Smash Bros. for Wii U did. I mean, they are a lot more different when you look at them side by side, and the stage has had the same idea since Super Smash Bros. Brawl, but I do think that this and the previous version give off similar vibes in a way that the older Battlefields don't (though part of that might be due to an increase in graphical fidelity).

I hope the next game goes for a different look. It doesn't have to be absolutely bonkers like some of the concepts they were going with, but I would like a change of scenery from bright ruined coliseum in the sky.

 

[Ivander]

Still find it funny that Ms. PAC-MAN appears on Pac-Land but isn’t a echo or alt or even Spirit

Copyrights and patents are a pain.

 

[Bobthealligator]

Here are two awful stages that no one really talks about, well, for one on one at least.

Peach's Castle (Melee) and Fourside:
In Free for alls, these stages are OK, but with one on ones, each player starts on different sides of the large tower, therein lies the problem. In order for the match to start, one of the two players must put themselves in a disadvantageous position, so between two players who know what they're doing, these stages cause the match to turn into a game of Chicken.
Though TBF Venom has this issue too, but Venom has much bigger issues.

 

[The Rhythm Theif]

Ya' know, I am a little disappointed in how Super Smash Bros. Ultimate's Battlefield looks. They had a lot of ideas, but in the end decided to do more or less what Super Smash Bros. for Wii U did. I mean, they are a lot more different when you look at them side by side, and the stage has had the same idea since Super Smash Bros. Brawl, but I do think that this and the previous version give off similar vibes in a way that the older Battlefields don't (though part of that might be due to an increase in graphical fidelity).

I hope the next game goes for a different look. It doesn't have to be absolutely bonkers like some of the concepts they were going with, but I would like a change of scenery from bright ruined coliseum in the sky.

I actually kind of agree with that. Heck, they could have the next Battlefield be located near a dark & gloomy castle, outer space, or even inside a futuristic boxing arena. I don't care, just make it different somehow!

 

[SMAASH! Puppy]

Here are two awful stages that no one really talks about, well, for one on one at least.

Peach's Castle (Melee) and Fourside:
In Free for alls, these stages are OK, but with one on ones, each player starts on different sides of the large tower, therein lies the problem. In order for the match to start, one of the two players must put themselves in a disadvantageous position, so between two players who know what they're doing, these stages cause the match to turn into a game of Chicken.
Though TBF Venom has this issue too, but Venom has much bigger issues.

I forgot to mention Venom when I talked about the other stages. Princess Peach's Castle and Fourside are fine in free for alls since the more players add a different dynamic, but Venom has the same issues in 1v1s and is awkward to traverse.