Help me, smashboards, you're my only hope!

[WNF]

Apologizing ahead of time for my overall inability to locate any of this with the search function and browsing to the best of my abilities. I suck at forums, it'd seem.

I've been in love with SSB since my big brother rented it for our N64 when I was too young to even comprehend what was going on in the game on any level at all. Since, I have grown to have a soft spot in my heart for SSB in all of its incarnations -- especially Melee. While I had a very, very brief stint playing in my local tournament scene in Project M, I never truly tapped into Melee the way I always wanted to.

So here I am, smashboards, on the precipice of what could possibly be one of the biggest decisions I have ever made, as far as a hobbie goes. Is it too late to get into Melee?

If not, then I have a few questions for you guys.

• If I was to have the optimal setup (display, console, controllers, whatever else), what would it be?
  • I value mobility over almost anything else. I move around a lot and will want to take my setup (display included) with me.
• What are the tiers looking like? Exactly how important are they?
• Any and all tips for somebody who lives in a relatively remote area with a small scene that will likely want to branch out after a year or so.
  • How do you afford to travel to big tournaments?
  • How do you arrange accomodations for that kind of adventure?
  • Is me being from Canada going to be a huge detriment to my chances?
• Any other pieces of advice you can think to offer to somebody with a great deal of competitive gaming experience but minimal competitive Smash experience outside of two small-time (under fifty entrants) tournaments.

Thank you so much for any and all responses, smashboards. You're a beautiful community and I am honoured just to be a fledgling in what is without a doubt the coolest subculture of gaming I've ever been a part of.

 

[JustYuck]

First of all I do not think it is too late by any means to get into competitive smash, the skill ceiling on this game is so high that I believe it will thrive for years to come. There are tons of people jumping on the competitive smash train right now and you should too.

So I myself am not a big time tournament goer either, just a few regionals. But I want to do my best to help!

• If I was to have the optimal setup (display, console, controllers, whatever else), what would it be?
  • CRTs are almost a must, a lot of people won't even play on flatscreen monitors because of lag, I carry around a 15 inch CRT I picked up on craigslist for free! A Wii will allow you to play the 20XX mod, which is allowed at some tournaments and makes everything a little bit easier, but even without the mod Wiis tend to be cheaper and a little easier to find, gamecubes can be expensive today. You need a copy of the game, obviously, but this can be anywhere upwards of $50 USD, expensive right? And finding a controller YOU LIKE is important, a lot of people use the new white ones, but nintendo just released the smash 4 GC controllers, and I know a lot of people like those. So just find your personal preference and play it from there.
• What are the tiers looking like? Exactly how important are they?
  • So Fox/Falco/Sheik/Jigs/Marth/Peach is what you will be seeing a lot of today. IMHO, the tiers are not THAT important, we see new players come out of the woods a lot with some weird new character and wreck shop with them, look at AmSa and his Yoshi. Obviously choosing to main a higher tier character will make it a little bit easer to find information on them, but don't feel restricted.
• Any and all tips for somebody who lives in a relatively remote area with a small scene that will likely want to branch out after a year or so.
  • FIND PEOPLE TO PRACTICE WITH, seriously. Find a buddy of a similar skill level and get them to take it up with you, you two will constantly be duking it out to get an edge up on one another and its practically the best way to up your skill without traveling all over the country. With that said tourneys are good for improving your skill too.
• • How do you afford to travel to big tournaments?
    • I have never been to a big tournament, but there are some alternative methods of travel a lot of people don't think of. For example my University has a smash club and they all took a bus to APEX this year, and apparently it was pretty affordable. Having a community of players is going to make things like this easier, so either find one or start one!
  • How do you arrange accomodations for that kind of adventure?
    • Again, having never been to a big tourney I don't feel well equipped to answer, sorry!
  • Is me being from Canada going to be a huge detriment to my chances?
    • I don't want to say yes but I don't want to say no. Certainly, if you lived in NY or an area with a lot of great smashers you would have an easier time finding people better than you to play with, that is probably the biggest thing, if you can find a group of people to play with you that are constantly urging you to become a better player it should have no impact at all, but finding that group can be tough.
• Any other pieces of advice you can think to offer to somebody with a great deal of competitive gaming experience but minimal competitive Smash experience outside of two small-time (under fifty entrants) tournaments.
  • So this is where we have a lot in common! I come from the competitive COD/CS scene and I find that a lot of the same ideas and principles carry over. E-sports all share the common ground of human opponents, the mind game is still there, keep your cool and understand that you will probably get bopped and endless number of times before you start winning anything. The biggest thing about melee that makes it so different is that there is no online play to constantly hone your skills with other players, you have to actually go out and find people to play with. This can be weird at first but you should get used to it in no time.

Thats about all I got, if you have any other questions feel free to DM me! I am no expert by any means but I am just sharing what I have learned over the past month or so.

 

[OninO]

On the subject of controllers. Just get a new one, whatever one you pick up will basically become your preference, you will adapt to it.

 

[StokeTheForge]

First of all I do not think it is too late by any means to get into competitive smash, the skill ceiling on this game is so high that I believe it will thrive for years to come. There are tons of people jumping on the competitive smash train right now and you should too.

So I myself am not a big time tournament goer either, just a few regionals. But I want to do my best to help!

• If I was to have the optimal setup (display, console, controllers, whatever else), what would it be?
  • CRTs are almost a must, a lot of people won't even play on flatscreen monitors because of lag, I carry around a 15 inch CRT I picked up on craigslist for free! A Wii will allow you to play the 20XX mod, which is allowed at some tournaments and makes everything a little bit easier, but even without the mod Wiis tend to be cheaper and a little easier to find, gamecubes can be expensive today. You need a copy of the game, obviously, but this can be anywhere upwards of $50 USD, expensive right? And finding a controller YOU LIKE is important, a lot of people use the new white ones, but nintendo just released the smash 4 GC controllers, and I know a lot of people like those. So just find your personal preference and play it from there.

You seem to know a lot about this:
I've got a Samsung HDTV which appears to have no lag. I can tell(?) because when I've played on other peoples' HDTVs, lag (if present) has been noticeable. Is this just my imagination, or do I really have an acceptable HDTV?

 

[Massive]

I've got a Samsung HDTV which appears to have no lag. I can tell(?) because when I've played on other peoples' HDTVs, lag (if present) has been noticeable. Is this just my imagination, or do I really have an acceptable HDTV?

It is your imagination, there are no acceptable HDTVs without an upscaler or HDMI converter, and even that idea is hotly contested.

Check your TV in the database to see what the lag is like under ideal conditions, and realize that unless it has a native 480p mode, the chances of it being lag-free are nearly zero.

 

[StokeTheForge]

Ah, f**k. Well, it does have native 480p, but thanks for the tip.

 

[Blarg]

I've got a 1 ms gaming monitor and the Sewell hdmi adapter for Wii. I think that's about as good as it gets without a CRT. I still plan to get one at some point but this setup is sufficient for the time being. Of course, most LCD TVs aren't nearly as fast as good monitors.