How do "Advanced Techniques" or "Game Physics" affect casual players?

[Eternal phoenix Fire]

double post

 

[Eternal phoenix Fire]

Um... um, what? What are you... *checks posts* Are we reading the same thing? Because I honestly have no idea what you're going on about. I... I'm honestly confused. If this is some sort of "play ********" gambit, it's working perfectly.

I never said the people you met didn't know what a Triangle Jump was. I explicitly assumed they did, and then said that they don't count in this discussion because they're obviously not casuals if they know what a TJ is. He can discuss things if he's here, sure, but you were explicitly talking about what casuals think about the game, then brought up the opinion of someone who was obviously not a casual player. That's... well, stupid.



I never argued against depth as a concept. Ever. Not once. In my life. I've argued against depth at the cost of accessibility, yes, but even then, only in relation to Smash. You want me to be a hypocrite because you think that somehow matters to my argument: even if I was a hypocrite, you'd still have to deal with the argument itself, the words on the screen independent of who I am, which you're apparently incapable of doing.

Besides, I view myself as the middle ground that Sakurai is aiming at; casual in execution, hardcore in theory, with a healthy appreciation for both and what both do well and what both fail at. Much better an approach in my eyes than "**** the casuals, I want what I want". I can defend both sides equally well (which you haven't seen because this isn't a "**** the competitive players" thread, this is a "the casuals are ruining our depth" thread). I find it funny that you dedicate a whole paragraph without talking once about Smash.



Um, what do you mean "doesn't affect him"? It would affect him very much, if he was playing the damn game. Especially since I'd try to use that stuff on him. He never once said that the players were disgusting, because they were using what was available to them. But, it disgusted him that the game was like that, that it allowed for it, and it disappointed him that, in the case of the speedrun, people considered that "beating the game" (and there's a legitimate argument that it's NOT "beating the game"). He felt better once I told him about 100% and natural route runs, though.



It's because he wasn't condescending? He thought abusing a glitch was cheating, which depending on the definition of "cheating"... IS cheating. Besides, this is all horribly off-topic. Now, you're just ranting, you're not even TALKING about Smash anymore. Get your head straight and come back when you're ready to get on topic again.

First and foremost, i'm not going to take the time and dissect your argument, it's unnecessary and often takes things out of context so i'm just going to go on in.

If you read everything clearly, you would be able to comprehend that I wasn't simply talking about casual players, I was referring to whoever was watching me play at the moment, and yeah, the dude who knows triangle jumps is a casual player; A casual smash bros player, so that doesn't disqualify him from anything. I don't see how that's stupid, ******** or any other obscenity you feel the need to use to describe something. Since you are a philosopher, i'm assuming you're doing what a philosopher does best; split hairs, so lets veer towards the other tangent of my argument you completely ignored, the receptiveness of the players and their responses to witnessing in a different element. These players chose to gain the knowledge from their losses out of deliberation to further understand why they lost instead of just being angry about it. When you mention those you are associated with I hear nothing but negative clamoring, which in my opinion sounds immature for anyone who is above the age of 12.

I challenge you, give me a clear example of something that sacrifices the cost of accessibility for the sake of depth. Essentially, a game at any level is accessible. The true depth of a game is brought about through progression and overcoming challenges. Saying depth sacrifices accessibility and vis versa is saying that the intricate mechanics of the game are forced upon you from the get go. This can only exist in blatant use of technical depth on the surface of the game, which would be an issue if we were playing something like Steel Battalion which has a 200 button controller just to play the game, we are talking about smash bros., a game that is accessible from the get go. Every character has the same series of inputs, so that's one layer of excess that is shed from the game. Now the more advanced portion of it is nothing more than using the tools at your disposal to your advantage. A SHFFL is nothing more than doing what you already know how to do a faster pace, only thing being omitted is the pressing of L or R in Brawl. A dash dance is just running then running back again quickly. Now if the game required that you dash back, buffer an input and dash again during a specific set of frames I would understand the issue of depth affecting accessibility, but it isn't, it's just something that I still feel that is being blown out of proportion.

Why do you insist on putting words in my mouth? When did I ever say, hell, when did I ever implicate in such a way that I just said "**** the casuals"? Yes, I can acknowledge that there was an instance where I complained about a player, but it wasn't just to target the casual playing audience, but to exemplify the kind of players who atypically opt for games being dumbed down so they can feel confident until they forget about the game and/or sell it. There is no point in deliberately catting to anyone with such a rotten attitude especially if it's in a game where we both have access to all the same tools. Simplification won't do anything, especially for a game that is simple to the naked eye; at that point it's just blatant alienation and something I can not respect from a designer no matter what prestige you have. What Sakurai needs to do is understand that he has already done what he is attempting to do in smash 4 and build up from there (No, this doesn't necessarily mean make the game harder) and revisit any fundamental flaws in the engine while enriching the experience of the player. Removing potential depth from the game limits accessibility in the long run as the engine can only grant the skill of the player a finite amount of options that forces the game to be penultimate to the players skill.

This whole speed run thing your friend has a vendetta against is ridiculous. There is no official rule for a speed run, its simply who can beat the game the fastest. When I see someone beat a game fast i'm not going to slap him with a digital asterisk for making use of an exploitation. There is no such thing as an 100% organic speed run because that's not a speed run, it's just playing the game from start to finish in a quicker fashion. And regarding your "friend", yeah, I still don't feel his opinion is warranted, and he can take it elsewhere and i'm sticking to my guns because the response is completely unnecessary and immature. It's not because of a personal offense, it's worse; you let an action in a video game drive you to disgust' an inanimate object. This person is subject to criticism because of the way he reacted, which inadvertently offended the players who have devoted their time to learning. That's like me getting in his grill about how dumb his hot key lay out is even though he is accustomed to playing in that fashion and it is beneficial to his game playing.

Now, you freely use the word Glitch, particularly towards wavedashing. I'll explain again, wavedashing is not a glitch, it is a result of the game carrying excess momentum during a collision due to the intricacies of the physics engine. Melee's physics engine is inertia based, hence why when characters run and jump they carry that same momentum. All that happens is when you are coming into the ground the game carries that excess momentum over into a slide that varies in distance depending on the angle of approach on your air dodge and the characters overall friction; nothing more, nothing less. L canceling, has been in smash since day 1 and was implemented on purpose. It was even in Melee's first trailer.

I don't get why you have this thing where you feel the need to constantly address what i'm doing wrong as apposed to seeing the argument for what it really is. I have my head on strait, and I know what i'm talking about, but I can't help but respond in a fashion that's not to your liking if you just say things that you feel are incorrect. So what if I wasn't talking about smash, you're a college man, you can figure out that what i'm talking about is related to smash since i'm on a smash bros. related website. Look dude, I don't know how you function or the people you associate with function, but that attitude you have? You need to check yourself. It's one thing to want to be superior at a debate, but you only achieve that through addressing both sides of the argument in a clear and concise fashion, not wave your education background around to gain a disposition, as you will steadily veer towards pretention and you will lose the faith of your peers. No philosopher I know of waves his degree around, especially if not asked. You lack humility, and for someone who goes to college, your choice of wording is less than graceful for someone who brought their education into the mix, as saying something like "play ********" just sounds immature.

I'm just here to help put in my two cents, i'm not labeling myself as any kind of intellect or superior of anyone. We all have an opinion, but you don't have the right to attack because of labels you gave yourself. Peace.

 

[StriCNYN3]

He must not care very deeply because he specifically says that he mostly doesn't incorporate feedback from high level players. If he cared for the competitive community, why wouldn't he listen to everything they say? He does say he appreciates high level play, but he also wants to avoid smash turning into a situation in which the game is only appreciated by a small group of players. I see this as Overswarm put it: we exist, but we're not a priority, and ATs or faster mechanics or whatever seem like things that would cater to us only.

Not incorporating M2K level feedback doesn't mean he doesn't care about the competitive scene in general. You're still cherry picking his words while not fully comprehending and reading the interview.

Sakurai has also said, "It's also very important for me to be able to accommodate the opinions of the most passionate players, of course, which tend to be the more advanced players."
That doesn't sound like not caring in the slightest.

He also goes on to say, "I don't really think this time we're in a situation where we're trying to accommodate that many new players like we did last time."
Which implies he's not going to dumb down mechanics such as ledge grabbing (If you watch the E3 Developer Direct vid, you'd see the magnet ledges Brawl had are removed)

This, coupled with the fact he's looking for a balance between Melee and Brawl as far speed and feel goes, shows he's willing to throw a bone for the hardcore players while still keeping the casuals happy, and really, who wouldn't want that? It makes a lot of sense to strive for this goal because it makes everyone happy in the end.

-nvm, found it-

First Q: Well, if Sakurai's trying to give us a perspective on how fast the game will be, Melee and Brawl are good references since they're on extremes. That doesn't say much about ATs, but as I said, I didn't know he commented on "game feel".
Second: Because he wants to let us know how fast the game will be.
Third: Everyone who plays Smash, not just the competitive crowd. Everyone who's played smash will most likely remember what each game felt like.

The AT's aren't the point, though. We're talking about the direction his statement was towards. Clearly it was heavily directed towards the competitive scene because why would a casual be worrying about the game's speed and feel when it was never their concern? They're likely more worried about what Smash provides at face value like characters and content.

We already know Sakurai listens to feedback. Why else would he have removed tripping?.

Again, you're dodging the point being made here. We know he listens to feedback like any competent dev should be doing. We're talking about where the feedback he's taking account is FROM, in which case it's from the competitive scene. Why? Because he's trying to reach out for all audiences this time around instead of actively removing a part of it like he tried with Brawl. This all comes together and demonstrates how what you're claiming isn't even what Sakurai is talking about.

If Sakurai does this:



In some way (maybe not story mode. Each smash has a how to play video) that explains everything the player can do, I wouldn't care how many ATs he puts in, because that's clearly the direction he wants to go in. Right now, I'm not convinced that he wants to go in that direction, so I don't see the point putting anything "advanced"/outside of the manual/tutorial in the game. Considering that Sakurai mostly focuses on 4 player FFAs anyway, and he says things like this:


http://kotaku.com/an-in-depth-chat-with-the-genius-behind-super-smash-bro-530744390

I'm not convinced that's the direction he wants to go in.

Hmm...pretty convenient how you cut off the following statement Sakurai mentions immediately afterwards, which I will repeat from my points from above.

"...That goes along with thinking about how I think each player should be able to customize the experience so we can accommodate different play styles. It's very important for me for everybody to have the play experience that they want. It's also very important for me to be able to accommodate the opinions of the most passionate players, of course, which tend to be the more advanced players."

Are you purposefully leaving out details for your argument?

And why does it have to be a "one thing or the other" direction dilemma for you? Why can't he strive for both? Smash 64 and Melee exists, you know? It's not some impossible feat.

Also, no one knows what AT's will be in the game. Smash 4 isn't even near finished yet. I'm assuming everyone here isn't particularly arguing MELEE'S AT's to return, just the fact that if Smash 4 retains similar and introduces new depths akin to Melee's and more, there's just no reason to take it out.

 

[Ulevo]

But you shouldn't have to invest crazy amounts of hours into a Smash game in order to have competitive-style battles OR to have fun with the game in a more sophisticated way. Win tournaments? Yes, you should need a lot of time. Have deep matches for fun? Not a lot of time. That's the game's fault.

Well, first of all. That all depends on your perception of what deep is. I'm also not talking about just winning the tournaments, since that would involve less than 1% of the people who play the game.

Secondly, no. You're still wrong. I still believe that's an irresponsible way to think. Playing Smash with a satisfying amount of depth and intuition is not so difficult to achieve that it's reserved for the select few. It never was.

 

[Ogre_Deity_Link]

I think what everyone here is missing is that even if they take every single last possible AT out of Sm4sh, (or at least the ones we all know of) people will still find more.

HARDCORE Competitive players seem to have an innate knack for complicating even the simplest of games. (I honestly wouldn't be surprised if someone found ATs for DROPKICK. -_-; )

 

[Eternal phoenix Fire]

I think what everyone here is missing is that even if they take every single last possible AT out of Sm4sh, (or at least the ones we all know of) people will still find more.

HARDCORE Competitive players seem to have an innate knack for complicating even the simplest of games. (I honestly wouldn't be surprised if someone found ATs for DROPKICK. -_-; )

Assuming the drop kick is a forward smash, that would be ridiculous is you were able to cancel a forwards smash in some way.

 

[otter]

Maybe he meant Divekick? The two button, one hit kill fighting game?

 

[smashmachine]

Maybe he meant Divekick? The two button, one hit kill fighting game?

hey now
Divekick is hype

 

[Ogre_Deity_Link]

hey now
Divekick is hype

Yeah, sorry, Divekick. My bad.

 

[smashbrolink]

Wait a second.....
Drop Kick = Dive Kick?
Cancellable Forward Smash?

Bowser's new forward smash attack might be more lethal than the trailer gave it credit for.
Beware the Koopa King, fellow Smashers.
Beware.....

 

[otter]

I hold a small hope that every charcter will be remade like Bowser, even though Link looks exactly the same so far.

 

[BSP]

Stuff

Cool.

 

[smashbrolink]

I hold a small hope that every charcter will be remade like Bowser, even though Link looks exactly the same so far.

Yeah, that ticks me off. I'm praying they at least did a bit of a boost to his damage or something in the end.
Or at the least gave him a really good amount of recovery in the end.

 

[Ogre_Deity_Link]

LINK FOR TOP TIER! >_<

Wait, wrong threat.

 

[Mr. Mumbles]

First and foremost, i'm not going to take the time and dissect your argument, it's unnecessary and often takes things out of context so i'm just going to go on in.

If you read everything clearly, you would be able to comprehend that I wasn't simply talking about casual players, I was referring to whoever was watching me play at the moment, and yeah, the dude who knows triangle jumps is a casual player; A casual smash bros player, so that doesn't disqualify him from anything. I don't see how that's stupid, ******** or any other obscenity you feel the need to use to describe something. Since you are a philosopher, i'm assuming you're doing what a philosopher does best; split hairs, so lets veer towards the other tangent of my argument you completely ignored, the receptiveness of the players and their responses to witnessing in a different element. These players chose to gain the knowledge from their losses out of deliberation to further understand why they lost instead of just being angry about it. When you mention those you are associated with I hear nothing but negative clamoring, which in my opinion sounds immature for anyone who is above the age of 12.

I challenge you, give me a clear example of something that sacrifices the cost of accessibility for the sake of depth. Essentially, a game at any level is accessible. The true depth of a game is brought about through progression and overcoming challenges. Saying depth sacrifices accessibility and vis versa is saying that the intricate mechanics of the game are forced upon you from the get go. This can only exist in blatant use of technical depth on the surface of the game, which would be an issue if we were playing something like Steel Battalion which has a 200 button controller just to play the game, we are talking about smash bros., a game that is accessible from the get go. Every character has the same series of inputs, so that's one layer of excess that is shed from the game. Now the more advanced portion of it is nothing more than using the tools at your disposal to your advantage. A SHFFL is nothing more than doing what you already know how to do a faster pace, only thing being omitted is the pressing of L or R in Brawl. A dash dance is just running then running back again quickly. Now if the game required that you dash back, buffer an input and dash again during a specific set of frames I would understand the issue of depth affecting accessibility, but it isn't, it's just something that I still feel that is being blown out of proportion.

Why do you insist on putting words in my mouth? When did I ever say, hell, when did I ever implicate in such a way that I just said "**** the casuals"? Yes, I can acknowledge that there was an instance where I complained about a player, but it wasn't just to target the casual playing audience, but to exemplify the kind of players who atypically opt for games being dumbed down so they can feel confident until they forget about the game and/or sell it. There is no point in deliberately catting to anyone with such a rotten attitude especially if it's in a game where we both have access to all the same tools. Simplification won't do anything, especially for a game that is simple to the naked eye; at that point it's just blatant alienation and something I can not respect from a designer no matter what prestige you have. What Sakurai needs to do is understand that he has already done what he is attempting to do in smash 4 and build up from there (No, this doesn't necessarily mean make the game harder) and revisit any fundamental flaws in the engine while enriching the experience of the player. Removing potential depth from the game limits accessibility in the long run as the engine can only grant the skill of the player a finite amount of options that forces the game to be penultimate to the players skill.

This whole speed run thing your friend has a vendetta against is ridiculous. There is no official rule for a speed run, its simply who can beat the game the fastest. When I see someone beat a game fast i'm not going to slap him with a digital asterisk for making use of an exploitation. There is no such thing as an 100% organic speed run because that's not a speed run, it's just playing the game from start to finish in a quicker fashion. And regarding your "friend", yeah, I still don't feel his opinion is warranted, and he can take it elsewhere and i'm sticking to my guns because the response is completely unnecessary and immature. It's not because of a personal offense, it's worse; you let an action in a video game drive you to disgust' an inanimate object. This person is subject to criticism because of the way he reacted, which inadvertently offended the players who have devoted their time to learning. That's like me getting in his grill about how dumb his hot key lay out is even though he is accustomed to playing in that fashion and it is beneficial to his game playing.

Now, you freely use the word Glitch, particularly towards wavedashing. I'll explain again, wavedashing is not a glitch, it is a result of the game carrying excess momentum during a collision due to the intricacies of the physics engine. Melee's physics engine is inertia based, hence why when characters run and jump they carry that same momentum. All that happens is when you are coming into the ground the game carries that excess momentum over into a slide that varies in distance depending on the angle of approach on your air dodge and the characters overall friction; nothing more, nothing less. L canceling, has been in smash since day 1 and was implemented on purpose. It was even in Melee's first trailer.

I don't get why you have this thing where you feel the need to constantly address what i'm doing wrong as apposed to seeing the argument for what it really is. I have my head on strait, and I know what i'm talking about, but I can't help but respond in a fashion that's not to your liking if you just say things that you feel are incorrect. So what if I wasn't talking about smash, you're a college man, you can figure out that what i'm talking about is related to smash since i'm on a smash bros. related website. Look dude, I don't know how you function or the people you associate with function, but that attitude you have? You need to check yourself. It's one thing to want to be superior at a debate, but you only achieve that through addressing both sides of the argument in a clear and concise fashion, not wave your education background around to gain a disposition, as you will steadily veer towards pretention and you will lose the faith of your peers. No philosopher I know of waves his degree around, especially if not asked. You lack humility, and for someone who goes to college, your choice of wording is less than graceful for someone who brought their education into the mix, as saying something like "play ********" just sounds immature.

I'm just here to help put in my two cents, i'm not labeling myself as any kind of intellect or superior of anyone. We all have an opinion, but you don't have the right to attack because of labels you gave yourself. Peace.

See the problem with your argument is that it uses words. Words are completely unoriginal and outdated. Can't you come up with your own system of communication? Why don't you go create glyphs that's very existence causes everyone to immediately understand what you would have said? See how much more convenient and conducive to an argument that would be. I swear, what would you guys do without me?

NOTE: I picked your post random-ishly.

 

[Mewter]

New players in my experience kind of struggle with learning to hit a direction and button at the same time to use a smash. After a while they get used to it and then it's easy.

Isn't learning to wavedash like that? It's not a complicated button press. It does take a while longer to make habit and use effectively, but in the end isn't it just a marginally more complicated charged side smash?

So, should we look at it this way, or is there something else we should consider too?

 

[Ulevo]

New players in my experience kind of struggle with learning to hit a direction and button at the same time to use a smash. After a while they get used to it and then it's easy.

Isn't learning to wavedash like that? It's not a complicated button press. It does take a while longer to make habit and use effectively, but in the end isn't it just a marginally more complicated charged side smash?

So, should we look at it this way, or is there something else we should consider too?

Most techniques in Smash are easy to learn and use, even the more 'advanced' ones. Wavedashing is comparatively hard to most basic techniques, but is not relatively hard by any means. It's just muscle memory that comes with repetition. I remember my first time ever playing Fox and finding how difficult it was to short hop with him. Now I can reliably execute most tactics in Melee outside of the exceptionally difficult ones like multi jump cancelled shines. Ironically the techniques that were the most difficult to perform were always Fox related, with Falco sharing some of them. The rest were relatively easy by comparison. Even without these heavily mechanical techniques, Fox was harder to handle with something as basic as L-Cancelling which would be easier on any other character just because how fast of a character he was.

I should note though that I am not an exceptional mechanical player. I'm pretty bad by comparison. If I had to say whether or not I was potentially limited by what I could do in competitive Melee if I were to ever play, it would be that I couldn't main Fox or Falco. That's a stretch though since they were never mains I practiced with.

Also, if you know anyone that has problems with using smash attacks that way, try it differently. What I like to do is use the C-Stick for Smash attacks, and if I want to charge them, I hit Z at the same time. The concept isn't as intuitive as hitting the direction + A and holding it, but I find the execution feels nicer. They might find it a better preference.