NocturnalQuill
Smash Journeyman
- Joined
- Apr 10, 2014
- Messages
- 281
I was discussing 3rd party characters in another thread, and it made me think about how much stress Sakurai was really under during development.
The first Smash Bros was more or less an accident. It wasn't even originally going to be a Nintendo all-stars game. Sakurai truly had a blank slate to work with. All he had to do was make a passable game. Nobody expected it to spawn a massive franchise and be one of the best-selling Nintendo series of all time. However, Sakurai went above and beyond, creating one of the most addictive Nintendo games ever. The game only had a dozen characters, a handful of stages, one single-player mode, and a simple concept. It was a minimalistic masterpiece.
Melee was interesting. Nintendo knew that Smash Bros could be a goldmine. Melee was much larger in scope, but even so I don't think Sakurai faced a lot more pressure. Smash Bros 64 was a very simplistic game, all Sakurai had to do was build on it, add a few more features and characters, refine the physics, and fans would most likely be satisfied. Sure, people wanted a bunch of characters, but most people were grateful with the more than doubled roster. The physics and mechanics were refined too. Melee was by and large considered objectively better than SB64. In short, as long as he didn't screw up, he was fine.
Brawl was a completely different matter. People were starting to make large demands of Sakuai. Brawl went into development before the Wii exploded, so Nintendo had no idea how well the Wii would actually perform on the market. Melee had also saved the GameCube from dire straits. As a result, Brawl would've probably been Nintendo's backup plan if the Wii's sales were lukewarm. I can't even begin to imagine the stress this put Sakurai under. He had to meet a lot of demands, including things like a story mode, tons of new characters, pristine graphics, etc. If Brawl was going to work as a backup plan, all those demands had to be met. Snake was added because the creator begged him and he couldn't say he didn't have time this time around. While it was never explicitly stated, I sincerely believe that Sonic was added for marketing reasons. Half of the game space was devoted to the SSE alone, because fans demanded it. It does make me wonder how much of it was actually Sakurai's vision rather than things he was pressured into adding. In addition, he had to choose between maintaining Melee's competitive nature or softening things up a little for a wider audience. Pleasing everyone was impossible.
Brawl is by no means a bad game. It gets way more hate than it deserves. However, Sakurai was under tremendous amounts of pressure, and it shows. I'm not sure why I felt the need to post this, it just seemed interesting.
The first Smash Bros was more or less an accident. It wasn't even originally going to be a Nintendo all-stars game. Sakurai truly had a blank slate to work with. All he had to do was make a passable game. Nobody expected it to spawn a massive franchise and be one of the best-selling Nintendo series of all time. However, Sakurai went above and beyond, creating one of the most addictive Nintendo games ever. The game only had a dozen characters, a handful of stages, one single-player mode, and a simple concept. It was a minimalistic masterpiece.
Melee was interesting. Nintendo knew that Smash Bros could be a goldmine. Melee was much larger in scope, but even so I don't think Sakurai faced a lot more pressure. Smash Bros 64 was a very simplistic game, all Sakurai had to do was build on it, add a few more features and characters, refine the physics, and fans would most likely be satisfied. Sure, people wanted a bunch of characters, but most people were grateful with the more than doubled roster. The physics and mechanics were refined too. Melee was by and large considered objectively better than SB64. In short, as long as he didn't screw up, he was fine.
Brawl was a completely different matter. People were starting to make large demands of Sakuai. Brawl went into development before the Wii exploded, so Nintendo had no idea how well the Wii would actually perform on the market. Melee had also saved the GameCube from dire straits. As a result, Brawl would've probably been Nintendo's backup plan if the Wii's sales were lukewarm. I can't even begin to imagine the stress this put Sakurai under. He had to meet a lot of demands, including things like a story mode, tons of new characters, pristine graphics, etc. If Brawl was going to work as a backup plan, all those demands had to be met. Snake was added because the creator begged him and he couldn't say he didn't have time this time around. While it was never explicitly stated, I sincerely believe that Sonic was added for marketing reasons. Half of the game space was devoted to the SSE alone, because fans demanded it. It does make me wonder how much of it was actually Sakurai's vision rather than things he was pressured into adding. In addition, he had to choose between maintaining Melee's competitive nature or softening things up a little for a wider audience. Pleasing everyone was impossible.
Brawl is by no means a bad game. It gets way more hate than it deserves. However, Sakurai was under tremendous amounts of pressure, and it shows. I'm not sure why I felt the need to post this, it just seemed interesting.
