EVO 2015: Melee or Smash 4?

[Captain_Puff]

I honestly think it depends on how the early meta turns out. If Smash 4 becomes campy like brawl we might see melee again. However, I think if Smash 4 is fast paced enough then i would be ok for seeing smash 4 for evo

 

[Spralwers]

If I have to pick, Melee.

We know that melee can be a hype game, with an insanely high skill ceiling, and the craziest turns of events. We also have the community itself, complete with intense rivalries and whatnot.

I'd like smash 4 to develop a scene and some form of meta before we put it on the stage of the biggest fighting game tournament in the world. I'd like to know that it too is a hype game, insanely fun to watch, crazy high skill ceiling, etc, when it's featured on the biggest stage of the FGC. If smash 4 does end up being like that, then we'll luck out, but if smash 4 turns out to be a flop at that point in time in the meta, then its reputation will be embarrassed pretty horribly and I don't want to take the risk.

This would be a much easier discussion if this was Evo 2016, when Smash on WiiU has been out for a while and we know if it's the type of game that will look good in front of thousands of non smash players. If I had to make the decision now, I'd just pick the safe route and go with Melee.

 

[DarkDragoon]

If we can't have both I'd honestly prefer that neither game were taken, and then the community can host it's own gigantic major around the same time specifically for Smash games.

We could even call it Genesis III or something cool like that.

 

[greenluigiman2]

Our efforts really shouldn't lean towards trying to get one into EVO over the other. Our efforts should be trying as hard as humanly possible to get both there. Either one not being there would be absolutely disastrous for everyone involved.

From Nintendo's point of view, Smash 4 can't not be at EVO. Every other company always has their newest game there, and it would be a PR nightmare for Smash 4 to be skipped over in favor of an old game that's not even the previous most one in the series. There's also the fact that Smash 4 will bring about an influx of new competitive players along with a lot of Brawl and even PM's top players that deserve a chance to showcase their skills on the big stage. Melee really holds a large portion of the community back.

From the point of view of Melee players, not only are they really stubborn and vocal, but they've also come to expect Melee to be at all the big tournaments. Melee at the moment is the go to competitive Smash game and the most well known Smash players are Melee players. With other fighting games the players tend to move on to the next game, and while a surprising amount of Melee players will probably try their hand at competitive Smash 4, they're simply not going to "move on."

This is a major dilemma and it has to be handled with care. If I had to choose between the two I would go with Smash 4 because I really want to see players from other parts of the smash community get their chance to shine, and I prefer Smash 4 to the other Smash games anyway, but at the same time Melee is just too cherished by the community to not see the light of day at EVO. Simply put, we gotta find some way to get both of these games at EVO, because not only would it satisfy almost everybody in this community, I'll go as far as to say that it will unite the community like never before.

 

[Zork]

We've been over this. There is a zero percent chance of both Smash games being on the main Evo stage. It's just not going to happen. One will have to be a side tournament.

Also, I find it interesting the Melee community has largely banned wobbling over the years at most tournaments. I mean in Brawl, where Ice Climbers are much better (top 2 in the game, many consider to be the best character period if only FD was legal) have never had their chaingrabs banned.

 

[Snakeyes]

Regardless if Melee and 64 are more interesting, this is the game that Nintendo made with the competitive community in mind, we need to show them our gratitude and thanks.

Please. If anything, the majority of the changes in Smash 4 clearly show that the development team barely did any research on what the competitive community liked about the previous games when balancing characters and programming the game's physics.

 

[greenluigiman2]

We've been over this. There is a zero percent chance of both Smash games being on the main Evo stage. It's just not going to happen. One will have to be a side tournament.

I'm not even going to sugarcoat it, your point of view is pathetic.

Even if there's only a small chance, which is debatable, there is not even close to a zero percent chance. Not only that, but with effort, that chance could rise each passing day.

 

[2Fox]

Holy **** is this even a question? Smash 4 wasn't made to be competitive Sakurai said it himself. Melee is THE competitive game. Nintendo can throw a giant party with hats and cake for this new party game. Evo is about competition and Melee is best suited for this.

Is it better PR for smash 4 to be there? Yes of course. And obviously Nintendo and Evo probably want the potentially bigger audience (it would be watched out of mystery not hype). But we aren't being asked what Nintendo wants this is about what WE want.

Personally I'd like to see both because I am intrigued by Smash 4, but if we have to pick one for the love of 14 years, The Big 5 and hype surrounding so many great players, and the insane amount of work put into the Melee community and revival, let Melee survive. Melee players live for the COMPETIVE aspect so it should be on the biggest competitive stage. Smash 4 can't be allowed to erase all that just because, and this is literally the only reason, it's new.


This is all moot if Smash 4 meta turns out to be somehow better than Melee but we already almost know it won't be.

 

[KMS]

Please. If anything, the majority of the changes in Smash 4 clearly show that the development team barely did any research on what the competitive community liked about the previous games when balancing characters and programming the game's physics.

I think the dev team did do their research. They figured out what made Melee good, and then purposefully chose to remove those elements.

 

[greenluigiman2]

Holy **** is this even a question? Smash 4 wasn't made to be competitive Sakurai said it himself.

None of the smash games were made to be competitive. Not even Melee. The community made Melee what it is today. They did the same thing with Brawl and 64, and based on what I've seen they're going to do the same with Smash 4.

 

[Chzy]

I vote for Melee. I think smash 4 will be too young and the meta too underdeveloped. Melee would be a better flagship game for next year. In the future though, it'll depend on how Smash 4 develops.

 

[LuigiKing]

Please god melee. Melee will always be the most hype spectator sport. Maybe smash 4 can play with the big kids (marvel, sf4, etc) after its been around for longer, but for right now I don't think its earned its place at EVO quite yet.

 

[Snakeyes]

I think the dev team did do their research. They figured out what made Melee good, and then purposefully chose to remove those elements.

 

[KMS]

blindly adopting the "new" game over the proven one just because it's new is a surefire way to kill a healthy competitive scene. Especially if the new game is dubious in its spectator quality and competitive mechanics compared to its predecessor.

You can see this play out in almost every single e-Sport scene .. CS 1.6 vs CS:Source, Halo 2 and its sequels, Starcraft: Broodwar vs Starcraft 2 in Korea (Starcraft pro-scene is barely a shadow of its former glory in Korea), and even Melee vs Brawl. All of these games had great competitive scenes that were basically killed off thanks to vastly inferior sequels.

So yea, let's wait for Smash 4 to prove itself first. Melee for EVO 2015 please.

 

[Yeniths]

Please do not make the mistake of running Smash 4 over Melee.

 

[Redact]

Melee 2015, smash 4 or both 2016. Smash 4 needs time to prove itself and melee needs to prove it will be strong after smash 4 has been out for a long period.

I have no doubt myself that smash 4 will not cause melee to die out, but if melee is not supported where it obviously deserves to be there will be damage done imo.

Smash 4 needs time to solidify on a ruleset and a strong metagame so it actually has the community and spectator support to bring the numbers evo wants for a game to be run year after year on the main stage.

If we push smash 4 too early and there are issues (just like brawl) we could possibly see smash not at evo again for years, which hopefully does not happen.

I really hope that both games stay strong enough that we have both games at evo 2016 onwards

 

[DarkDragoon]

I think the dev team did do their research. They figured out what made Melee good, and then purposefully chose to remove those elements.

The research was more on the side of "What made Brawl really bad for some people?" and not "What made Melee really good for people."

That's why you see things like tripping and hitstun and tethers and gliding and ledge mechanic changes, and starting with Brawl as their base.

They did very little looking back to Melee. They just looked at Brawl and said "we need to improve this."

And they did, they did it incredibly well.

 

[Zork]

I'm not even going to sugarcoat it, your point of view is pathetic.

Even if there's only a small chance, which is debatable, there is not even close to a zero percent chance. Not only that, but with effort, that chance could rise each passing day.

Do you know how Evo works? Clearly not.

They have a limited number of spots they can give for the main stage. A series is pretty much only given one spot there. The other spots will be reserved for other fighting games.

The only exception for this that has occurred is for SF and SF is the main FGC game and always has been. Smash was just accepted by the FGC 2 years ago. And for the last few Evos even SF hasn't been given two spots.

So it doesn't matter how optimistic you are, or how badly the community wants it to happen, it has zero chance of happening.

Heck the head of Evo if you read the OP, literally asked what game the Smash community wanted for Evo. Not what game(s). He also made a poll on SRK for this very purpose.

 

[C-SAF]

If one had to be chosen I'd say Smash 4. We need to show Nintendo that we appreciate their attempt to make Smash 4 more competitive and them embracing the competitive community

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAAAAA!

They don't care still they just want the money competitive smashers will throw at them when they say the word tournament.
Look at the actual game, its literally brawl 2.0 with faster falling speeds, and duck hunt dog is the new metaknight........(lol what if he was)

 

[Zork]

Also one of the reasons Evo reserves spots for different series is because the company that makes that series usually sponsors Evo. So even if Mr. Wizard personally wanted two Smash games on the main stage and would ditch another game for it, it simply can't happen or he'll upset a sponsor like Neathrealm,, Namco, SNK, etc. He's not going to lose a sponsor just because the Smash community can't decide over which game they want.

 

[2Fox]

None of the smash games were made to be competitive. Not even Melee. The community made Melee what it is today. They did the same thing with Brawl and 64, and based on what I've seen they're going to do the same with Smash 4.

You're right, I meant it was intentionally made to be not competitive, and they took extra care to succeed (it was easy to piggyback Brawl and easy to avoid the "mistakes" of Melee).

If one had to be chosen I'd say Smash 4. We need to show Nintendo that we appreciate their attempt to make Smash 4 more competitive and them embracing the competitive community

They did a pretty terrible job. Even a scrub could tell them why it's not anything close to as competitive as Melee (assuming the game isn't wildly different than what we've seen so far). At best they made an effort and gave it absolutely no research and had, somehow, zero knowledge of what makes Melee great. At worst, it was a PR plot with no substance designed to just sell as much as possible before people realized.

 

[Jace08]

Melee all day

Did people already forget that brawl happened? Whatever the heck smash 4 turns out to be, I see a .01% chance of it being better than melee. Melee's a perfect accident that's incredibly unlikely to ever happen again while we're still breathing. Why would we settle for less?

 

[Macdaddy53156a]

Concerning all pro smash 4 people, I'm gonna state thing same thing stated earlier in this form. Are you guys going to even go to evo? Will you put away the money for transportation, housing, and entry to go? Will you even plan your schedule around making the trip?

I know the melee people will make the flights. And I know melee people have remained loyal to their games. Any brawl dudes have deserted the scene for PM, Melee, N64, and SSB4. Melee is going to take a massive hit soon because of smash 4's release, and needs the support and understanding of the whole community. I'd say unless Smash 4 is the total ****, and completely overtakes melee, melee has done more than enough to warrant evo.
And I really want to hear the people support smash 4 state if they are going to go.

 

[KoRoBeNiKi]

I am voting for melee, quite simply since I don't want to see a brawl-esque game on stage.

This poll is hella early but for now.

Does anyone REALLY want to see Duck Hunt Dog vs DHD in grand finals or any other similar characters. Good luck getting viewers.

 

[King~]

i wanna see smash 4 get in now, just to see how the melee community handles it lol

 

[JAHCruncher]

I want both, but I support Smash 4.

Melee

Also the thing about Melee is that Melee is "finished" in the sense that pretty much every trick has been found explored and exposed. So there really are no gimmicks in Melee that are left. 8 months is not enough time to find all the "so called unbeatable techiques" so we may have some random player cheese his way through evo into winning.

If someone cheeses into a major tournament victory, then more power to them. That is just part of metagame development.

 

[EPsilon933]

Smash 4 should be at EVO 2015, not Melee

But that's if only 1 Smash game can be there. Ideally, both should be there

 

[Macdaddy53156a]

Smash 4 should be at EVO 2015, not Melee

But that's if only 1 Smash game can be there. Ideally, both should be there

Are you going to evo or are you just watching? Cause the people going should get to play the game they want on stream.

 

[C-SAF]

Smash 4 should be at EVO 2015, not Melee

But that's if only 1 Smash game can be there. Ideally, both should be there

Says your signature.....

 

[-Ran]

Melee. I support the success of all of the Smash series out there, but Melee has earned its spot and has proven that it is a competitive game worth the grandscale that is Evo. Let's let Smash 4 spend some time in our grass root events and determine its worth before we pass a crown from the still living King.

 

[EPsilon933]

Are you going to evo or are you just watching? Cause the people going should get to play the game they want on stream.

Only the tournament players matter. Let's not have a stream then since viewers don't matter

 

[KoRoBeNiKi]

Also adding this from what I posted on SRK

For below, I am being a bit unfair to Smash 4 but honestly, how can I compared adding a game to EVO that will have I don't know, a half a year to be played on the WiiU vs a game that's been developing competitively for almost a decade and a half.



I'd find it a bit odd that a game that took first in viewer numbers outside of (It's) Mahvel (Baby) and had 970 entrants would be removed just for the new game. It reminds me more of MLG than Evo and in a really bad way.

I would have honestly preferred this post be in 4/5 months so we can see how slow/fast the metagame for smash 4 is developing. For now, the game looks a bit brawl-esque (I mean honestly, we don't even have GC controllers yet outside of modded games) and the finals would take way too long.

Add it next year when people are more used to smash 4 controls/the gameplay is actually developed.

 

[Macdaddy53156a]

Only the tournament players matter. Let's not have a stream then since viewers don't matter

Viewers matter much less than the players. They're the show in general, and their the ones paying to be there. You get to watch for free, and are not owed anything. And don't worry, at worst, a different stream would handle SSB4's side event.

 

[john!]

how can you even ask this question when smash 4 doesn't even have a competitive scene yet

give us a couple months after the wii u release and then we'll be able to tell whether smash 4 is competitive enough for evo.

if i had to guess, i'd say melee will win out in the long term. lots of people played brawl in 2008 because we didn't have any conception as a community about what makes a game viable for high-level competitive play... but now we do. smash 4 will have to be significantly better than brawl to have a chance at dethroning melee.

 

[EPsilon933]

Viewers matter much less than the players. They're the show in general, and their the ones paying to be there. You get to watch for free, and are not owed anything. And don't worry, at worst, a different stream would handle SSB4's side event.

85% of the revenue competitive gaming leagues make are from online ad revenue. Viewers are worth more in money collectively

 

[Macdaddy53156a]

85% of the revenue competitive gaming leagues make are from online ad revenue. Viewers are worth more in money collectively

The community has been here for years with nil money, so their fine without it. This is about the players, not the money.

 

[EPsilon933]

The community has been here for years with nil money, so their fine without it. This is about the players, not the money.

EVO is a business. Businesses want money

 

[synesthe-sia]

I voted Melee because it's the definitive Smash game.

 

[DarkDragoon]

85% of the revenue competitive gaming leagues make are from online ad revenue. Viewers are worth more in money collectively

Not for EVO. All of the stream view money goes towards their charity. They make up their costs with their venue fees and such.

Besides, Melee has broken the world record for most people tuning into a fighting game stream twice in a row (and both times immediately broken again by UMvC3). Melee has no problems bringing in massive stream viewer counts, but 9 months from now after JWitts and Shofu and everyone else streaming Smash 4 "causally" dies down, Smash 4 might not bring the same numbers you're seeing now anymore.

 

[BlueXenon]

While I do think melee is the best smash game and it has the most depth necessary for high level play, the way the melee community treated other smash games is disgusting and after what they did to brawl, I currently have no desire to support their game. I even stopped watching melee streams because of how horrible their twitch chats are to non-melee players. I will do whatever I can to support smash 4 getting into EVO, even if it's underdeveloped.