Impressions on sonic and his useability.

[Sonic The Hedgedawg]

For all the negative I see in Sonic, I will say this:

He is really fun to play.

If you can start to get him and his speed down... the way you can pressure your oponents is ridiculously fun.

 

[MrLegend]

What exactly is wrong with his down smash? It looks pretty fast to me.

Also, please don't say HyphenSmashing. Its a stupid name that makes no sense. The term was coined because someone thought "dashsmashing" (which actually makes sense and describes the move) sounded lame.

 

[DannyMDEFactor]

So he's fun, but he's the worst character in the game? I guess you mean he's statistically the worst character since he doesn't have much combo potential? I don't know, it's hard to say that he's bad, I mean, it depends on the player.

 

[Sonic The Hedgedawg]

What exactly is wrong with his down smash? It looks pretty fast to me.

Also, please don't say HyphenSmashing. Its a stupid name that makes no sense. The term was coined because someone thought "dashsmashing" (which actually makes sense and describes the move) sounded lame.

the downsmash has too much startup lag for a move with such a small hitbox. The move only hits enemies right next to you on the groung (like charizard's downsmash) and has terrible priority. It has great knockback, can KO enemies on two sides at once, and since you won'r use it much, chances are, it won't have been affected by move decay very much, but it's still not great because of how difficult it is to connect with.


As for "hyphensmashing" or whatever... sonic can do it well... it's a dumb name... but whatever.

And @ danny, yeah that's what I mean. He's fun, but he's not good.

 

[J18]

*sigh* well maybe with all these bad impressions, i won't see a sonic in every single WiFi match i play. i could care less about how bad he is, i'm still going to be maining him

 

[MIRAI87]

His intense speed coupled with the seemingly necessary needling of attacks sounds like it's right up my alley. Also, in teams he seems to be one of the more helpful characters, with a heavier character delivering kills and sonic racking up damage.

I'm still excited to play sonic.

 

[Crab-Meat]

Hehe, Mewtwo was actually the first character I compared Sonic to. Too much of one attribute (in this case, speed) and not enough of another (power).

This was very informative, but I'll wait 'till Brawl hits the US and reserve judgement on Sonic.

 

[Dark Sonic]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8N5LwAGsv7s

Sonic>>Bowser, so he's not exactly the new Mewtwo.

 

[Sonic The Hedgedawg]

there is no real equivalent of mewtwo, the game is just more balanced that way top to bottom.

Still, the sonic is the closes thing we have to mewtwo

 

[Slaysya]

I think you just need to actually play him a long time to get a hang of his speed. His attacks come out quick, and most moves are predicted easily. But he has speed to make up for it, and here is a list of my favorite sonic videos

Lucky(Sonic) v.s. Nes(Peach) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=05oROcchaTY

Gimpyfish(Bowser) v.s. Lucky(Sonic) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8N5LwAGsv7s

 

[BlueTerrorist]

We need more time with Sonic before we write him off. I barely ever had a problem using Sonic. I do agree that he is weak in terms of power. Instead of whining about all his negatives, we should work on working around his weaknesses. It takes time, people don't uncover a characters full potential overnight.

Either you're giving up too fast or he doesn't fit your playstyle at all (if this is the case, turn your attention to another character).

I know that last part may have been harsh, but that's what i'm seeing right now.

Regardless, I still respect your opinion and Sonic's weak attack strength is something we shouldn't ignore.

 

[MrLegend]

Is down smash really that bad? I've seen videos where players missed a chanced to down smash and rolled or ftilt instead and got punished for it. I've only seen it be used no more then 5 times. Maybe I'm to used to Doc and Sheik's awesome down smashes.

 

[Sonic The Hedgedawg]

Is down smash really that bad? I've seen videos where players missed a chanced to down smash and rolled or ftilt instead and got punished for it. I've only seen it be used no more then 5 times. Maybe I'm to used to Doc and Sheik's awesome down smashes.

his down smash has poor priority and doesn't have a huge hitbox BUT it's pretty strong, which is something sonic needs, it hits on both sides of him so it can punish rollers. and it dips under a lot of aerials or high attacks... just like his U smash goes over a lot of ground attacks.

it's not terrible, but it's definitely a move you shouldn't pull out too often. But always keep it in your back pocket for a surprise.

His down B and side B have some awesome potential since it hits once each time it changes direction or is jumped out of. This means you could do a spin attack hit an enemy with it, turn around, hit them again, make it jump, hit them again and then aerial attack out of it.

the problem is, it takes a lot of great timing and prediction to get your aerial to hit after the other 3 attacks (the homing attack can be used instead of an aerial if the enemy ends up farther away, or has a chance of punishing you). but it can rack up damage, or even kill with the right aerial (neutral or dair (both can occasionally kill) or bair), but the right aerial is always going to depend on where the foe ends up in relation to you, and that's not something you have much controll over.

And, @ Blue Terrorist
it's not just playstyle... he just has a few glaring weaknesses that take a lot of effort to try to cover up.
-a: he has no projectiles or antiprojectiles (honestly, they could have gotten rid of one of his superfluous spin attacks for a power-ring throw)
-b: he's light
-c: a lot of his moves have some pretty bad priority.
-d: (the big one) he has some of the most limited killing options you'll ever encounter

 

[-Shion-]

SO it looks like Sonic is a pseudo Fox?

He is fast but has weak "a" moves...

I don't know, he is unique in his own way.

I want to try this guy out to see how he plays.

 

[MrLegend]

his down smash has poor priority and doesn't have a huge hitbox BUT it's pretty strong, which is something sonic needs, it hits on both sides of him so it can punish rollers. and it dips under a lot of aerials or high attacks... just like his U smash goes over a lot of ground attacks.

it's not terrible, but it's definitely a move you shouldn't pull out too often. But always keep it in your back pocket for a surprise.

His down B and side B have some awesome potential since it hits once each time it changes direction or is jumped out of. This means you could do a spin attack hit an enemy with it, turn around, hit them again, make it jump, hit them again and then aerial attack out of it.

the problem is, it takes a lot of great timing and prediction to get your aerial to hit after the other 3 attacks (the homing attack can be used instead of an aerial if the enemy ends up farther away, or has a chance of punishing you). but it can rack up damage, or even kill with the right aerial (neutral or dair (both can occasionally kill) or bair), but the right aerial is always going to depend on where the foe ends up in relation to you, and that's not something you have much controll over.

Thats how I said the homing attack could be useful before. And I thought you hated the spin dash?

 

[Black/Light]

We need more time with Sonic before we write him off. I barely ever had a problem using Sonic. I do agree that he is weak in terms of power. Instead of whining about all his negatives, we should work on working around his weaknesses. It takes time, people don't uncover a characters full potential overnight.

Either you're giving up too fast or he doesn't fit your playstyle at all (if this is the case, turn your attention to another character).

I know that last part may have been harsh, but that's what i'm seeing right now.

Regardless, I still respect your opinion and Sonic's weak attack strength is something we shouldn't ignore.

I concur.

Im very much sure not EVERYONE will be able to cope with Sonic's weak power/ fast speed/ few kill moves because thats the point of having different characters. Not everyone can get around [insert character] down falls/ playing style so find one you can use if you can't use [insert character] effectively. . . simple.

Calling Sonic "low tier" because, with the limated time you had nad the small amount of people you have played, you have not become good with him is as premature as that guy who says Pitt is broken because he can beat people who play w/e character with his Lucas but he can't beat a Pitt player.

 

[Digital Angel]

I concur.

Im very much sure not EVERYONE will be able to cope with Sonic's weak power/ fast speed/ few kill moves because thats the point of having different characters. Not everyone can get around [insert character] down falls/ playing style so find one you can use if you can't use [insert character] effectively. . . simple.

Calling Sonic "low tier" because, with the limated time you had nad the small amount of people you have played, you have not become good with him is as premature as that guy who says Pitt is broken because he can beat people who play w/e character with his Lucas but he can't beat a Pitt player.

We're not calling him low tier, we're saying he's likely to be low tier. It doesn't look like Brawl is going to have anywhere near the same hidden developments in the competitive scene as Melee did.

Don't look at me, I'm as pissed as anyone about this.

 

[MrLegend]

Sonic the Hedgedawg is calling him low tier. But that doesn't really matter.

What I'm starting to worry about is match ups. If Sonic does have such low priority then Marth or Ike or anyone with a sword would eat him up.

 

[Black/Light]

Don't look at me, I'm as pissed as anyone about this.

You should calm down than. Really, a hand full of people's impressions shouldn't dictate how you feel about any character until you see how they play first hand. With or with out Brawl having melee's amount of competitive play I can tell you that people's impressions on these characters will change once it's out for a few months in the states.

No one is a expert after playing a fighting game that has limated exposure to the general fan-base for a 100 hours or so therefore their impressions should be taken as just that. . . impressions after playing for a well with a select full people.

 

[Sonic The Hedgedawg]

Thats how I said the homing attack could be useful before. And I thought you hated the spin dash?

oh no, it's great... I mean it's weak but it has potential... what I hate is that he has two B- button moves which do essentially the same thing... I mean, granted, they have their slight nuances, but they might as well be identical... it's a waste of a slot if you ask me.


@ -shion- fox din;t have weak moves in melee... did you SEE his Usmash, or Uair?


other comments:
-it's too early to tell if there will be more secret techniques, but sakurai looks like he did his very best to remove all of them, so characters that look bad probably will be bad, and visa versa... or at least, their ranking won't likely change from nift secrets.

-The game's more balanced... expect 3 teirs at the most I'd think... and since sonic seems to be in the bottom 3rd of characters with Captain falcon, DK, yoshi, etc... I mean it just seems likely. It might not be set in stone yet, but early impressions are better than no impresions at all.

- the scary thing about fighting marth is that you HAVE to rush him. you have no projectiles, and your attacks don't have range, so you can't snipe or poke and run. you have to wait for an opening and stig relentlessly close to him. Luckily, marth's recovery sucks hard, so off the edge kills aren't impossible, but it's definitely an uphill battle.

-And don't get me wrong about his downsmash guys, it's great, it's just hard to hit with... however, it has a GREAT sending angle... almost straight sideways and with high power. if only it had more priority... lamesauce.

-I suppose it's good that his spin dashes parry most projectiles and attacks, but sonic tends to be prone from the pary longer than his oponent, so it's not much of a gift since he normally eats it in the face promptly afterwards.

 

[InterimOfZeal]

Oddly enough, I haven't been having trouble with Marths, and it's not because CO Marth players are weak (lolololol, Yang is smrt). It's just waiting for Marth to mess up, and going in to punish him, really. Spacing is pretty essential, but since Marth has no moves that cover a great deal of territory (Ike's >b), annoying projectiles (Toon Link), or a CG that you really have to avoid as best as possible (D3), you can just kinda camp outside their range and wait for those cute little 6 or so frames of lag you need to zip in and grab, then uthrow uair, and start the prediction game.

CO hosted their second tournament, the vids should be up in a week or so. When it happens, I'll link you to my matches. I took 3rd, using Sonic for every round except the last one, where I switched to D3 to see if he could CG Luigi (and was promptly ***** thereafter). You guys'll see some okay combos/set-ups Sonic can do, as well as a badass springboard spike against Pit at 60% on Battlefield.

 

[Milln]

Excellent. Hey, guys? I was gonna save this and keep it to myself, but I have an idea.

Instead of his dash attack which seems so ridiculously vulnerable on block and even kinda on hit, how about using his nair? Dash, fake your dash attack and just short hop your nair on 'em. It's one hit, so you don't have to worry about being blocked; your speed will take you far out of harm's reach. And then, while they're recovering and thinking that they can get back at you, do a quick Homing Attack, or the Spin Dash that you can't charge and try to combo from there. Does that help out with percentange dealt or mindgames?

 

[Sonic The Hedgedawg]

you have to charge both spin dashes, and his nair is scarcely better than his awful dash attack.

honestly, why give a character that you KNOW will be running lots such a dismal dash attack?

 

[TheMagicalKuja]

I played with sonic some more yesterday, and when I started smacking foes off the stage, attempting to actually chase them and gimp their recovery instead of relying on weak weak power attacks I fared SO much better.

Doesn't save him from crap priority but it's erroneous to call him "the closest thing to Mewtwo". If anything, I feel like that honor goes to Ganon. :/

 

[Sonic The Hedgedawg]

I played with sonic some more yesterday, and when I started smacking foes off the stage, attempting to actually chase them and gimp their recovery instead of relying on weak weak power attacks I fared SO much better.

Doesn't save him from crap priority but it's erroneous to call him "the closest thing to Mewtwo". If anything, I feel like that honor goes to Ganon. :/

not really since mewtwo's faults were that he couldn't kill things and that he was easy to kill... ganon's got his own shortcomings, but they aren't along the same type as sonic and mewtwo.


And, yes, you can play sonic so he doesn't suck... but he still ain't great either way

 

[TheMagicalKuja]

Easy to kill? Sonic is easy to kill? He's not a featherweight like Mewtwo. If anything, Sonic's shortcomings mirror Young Link's in Melee.

 

[InterimOfZeal]

not really since mewtwo's faults were that he couldn't kill things and that he was easy to kill...

Someone never played Taj. D:

I think Sonic's killing problem is closer to Mario's in Melee. It's not QUITE as bad, but it can be a problem. Once opponents are above 160%, I really have a hard time doing anything to them.

EDIT: Sonic has pretty decent survivability. With proper DI, I've managed to survive a fresh fsmash from Ike on FD at about 100%.

 

[da K.I.D.]

this whole thread and one of the last comments is very upsetting to me personaly. #1 i take the hedgeDAWG's opinion to heart even though sonic may very well just not fit his playstyle. and 2#. sonic and ganon were the 2 ppl i wanted toplay most in this installment. so it seems like i have a lot of disapointment to get over. but other than that. when i play melee my roommate always get mad at me for hit him with "cheap crap" which is basically anything i do that kills him. but one of the things that pisses him off the most is when i play someone like jiggly and follow him off stage and off screen to hit him for the kill. and given the lighter (weight of characters) nature of the game it seems like ill have infinitely more oppurtunities to do just that and also... i cant wait to say to my roommate... (SPRING SPIKE FOR THE WIN, BABY!!!) its like the new shine spike

 

[RedrappeR]

this whole thread and one of the last comments is very upsetting to me personaly. #1 i take the hedgeDAWG's opinion to heart even though sonic may very well just not fit his playstyle. and 2#. sonic and ganon were the 2 ppl i wanted toplay most in this installment. so it seems like i have a lot of disapointment to get over. but other than that. when i play melee my roommate always get mad at me for hit him with "cheap crap" which is basically anything i do that kills him. but one of the things that pisses him off the most is when i play someone like jiggly and follow him off stage and off screen to hit him for the kill. and given the lighter (weight of characters) nature of the game it seems like ill have infinitely more oppurtunities to do just that and also... i cant wait to say to my roommate... (SPRING SPIKE FOR THE WIN, BABY!!!) its like the new shine spike

^^ Posts like that was what I was talking about Hedge. If people disagree with you, and you just shoot them down with the " NO! NO! IT'S THIS WAY! HOW WOULD YOU KNOW?!! I'VE PLAYED THE GAME MORE!!!", when we clearly try to debate with you, and you're whole argument is proving how misinformed, dumb, and so called "wishful" we are-- we're going to have cats like that jump to conclusions without making an opinion about the game themselves.

Anybody who comes into this thread needs to know it's a discussion, and that Hedge is no more right than anyone else who's played the game at this point and seen differently... and that works vice a versa too, for anybody crying to the stars that Sonics 'Headbutt to the face' tier.

 

[Sonic The Hedgedawg]

^^ Posts like that was what I was talking about Hedge. If people disagree with you, and you just shoot them down with the " NO! NO! IT'S THIS WAY! HOW WOULD YOU KNOW?!! I'VE PLAYED THE GAME MORE!!!", when we clearly try to debate with you, and you're whole argument is proving how misinformed, dumb, and so called "wishful" we are-- we're going to have cats like that jump to conclusions without making an opinion about the game themselves.

Anybody who comes into this thread needs to know it's a discussion, and that Hedge is no more right than anyone else who's played the game at this point and seen differently... and that works vice a versa too, for anybody crying to the stars that Sonics 'Headbutt to the face' tier.

How am I supposed to debate you if you don't want me to stick to my guns.

regardless, my only problem is when people try to debate me using youtube videos as thee only premise for judgement... unless you've actually played, I doubt you really know what playing him is like.

for those of you who haved logged a good number of hours, I might disagree with you, but that's my perogative, but at least you too have a leg to stand on

 

[LuCKy]

ive played many hours........lol but i pretty much have a good idea of where sonic stands right now.ill be on later to talk my thoughts on sonic

 

[Sonic The Hedgedawg]

ive played many hours........lol but i pretty much have a good idea of where sonic stands right now.ill be on later to talk my thoughts on sonic

I'll try to be on to discuss with you.

 

[LuCKy]

I'll try to be on to discuss with you.

lol ok but i dont intend on listening to what anyone has to say.......im am gonna say the honest truth from my experience in tournament and many hours of game play

 

[Sonic The Hedgedawg]

lol ok but i dont intend on listening to what anyone has to say.......im am gonna say the honest truth from my experience in tournament and many hours of game play

okay... I'll take what you have to say into consideration then, becuas eI haven't done a tournament yet

 

[samper]

Hey all, I posted what I'm about to say in the yearning for sonic pwnage (or however you spell that) thread, but figured that since there are some guys that actually have the game at their disposal in this one that I'd get a better response here, so sorry if this is old news to you all.
I was poking around in the general forum when i happened across a competitive video match thread with some sonic fights. I started watching one between sonic and pikachu when I noticed that close to the end of the fight sonic did his down air attack pretty close to the ground, and the instant he landed he did a down a attack and bypassed the usually recovery time that his down air has.
You can see the video here: http://youtube.com/watch?v=DOLWKzVPvTA
It happens around 3:45-3:46, only time the guy uses it but i found that to be pretty interesting. If the only way to get around the usual lag that down air has is to use down a right after I'm not sure how much good that would do, but I think it's worth looking into, especially if you can cancel the lag with other attacks. Note that he does not use up b to get around the lag like normal.
(also, can someone explain two things for me? 1: why is it sometimes sonic's forward smash throws his target high but close and other times far and low? is it aim-able, dependent on how close you are when you hit them [like Ike's forward smash], or is it random? and 2: I read somewhere that the down air was a spike, which I'm pretty sure means it throws them straight down, but I've never seen it do that. Is that false or do you just have to hit them with it really early into the attack while they're in the air [like right as it starts up when the little spark appears on sonic's foot]?)

 

[InterimOfZeal]

It happened because he got hit by Pikachu's rapid jab. D:

You can angle the fsmash.

 

[Milln]

That Sonic loves eating Pikachu's fsmash. xD

But it looks like he does dair and goes straight into a dtilt. Interesting, indeed. HOWEVER. I think he gets tapped by pikachu's neutral A headbutt thing and that's what's cancelling out the lag.

 

[Chojo]

Ok, everybody, especially the topic creator, Sonic the Hedgehawg, look at this:

http://youtube.com/watch?v=ihP_E8aeamU

The problem is that even though people know he has no good kill moves, they try to use him as if he DID. Now observe the person in the video. From it alone, we now have 2 reliable kill moves:

1. Homing attack OFF OF THE STAGE (why haven't more people tried this??) when the opponent is attempting to recover, followed by an up+b to get back.

2. Jump, up-air, second jump, up-air, up+b to chase one more time and up+air to send them into the sky.

Do you see the similarity between these two tactics? Sonic gives a constant chase to finish off the opponent, never giving them a chance to recover.

Many of you have yet to use tactics such as chasing the opponent off the stage and not letting them recover as opposed to waiting for them to come back. Correct me if I'm wrong, but even our more skilled Sonic users such as Lucky have not deeply explored the possibilities of extensive off-stage guarding/chasing. Hell, even the Dojo acknowledges that this is how Sonic was meant to be played.

Quote Sakurai on Sonic's Character Page: "Keep Pursuing!!"

Didn't you guys ever wonder why Sonic got so many recovery moves? I'm a firm believer that until we play Sonic as the chaser he was meant to be, we'll never see his true potential.

So take one more look at the video.

Yes, Sonic can be good.... as long as we USE HIM PROPERLY!!

 

[samper]

yeah he does, takes 2 points of damage right as he lands, oh well that's two questions answered. can anyone answer my question about the down air as a spike? I mean, a lot of other characters have sweet spots on their spikes that make it to where if you don't hit it at just the right time their targets fly off in some other direction like yoshi, mario, and i want to say dk too, and i think theirs are all right around when the big spark pops up, maybe sonic's has a sweet spot too. I'd double check to make sure I read that article correctly, but it was on sonic's page of the smash wiki and its apparently down at the moment.
Oh, and one more thing. sorry if this has already been discussed/debunked but i remember seeing a video that was posted somewhere here of a guy fighting a cpu dk and using the homing attack to cancel his second jump since he was in the air and couldn't really get away.
here's the video: http://youtube.com/watch?v=ihP_E8aeamU
It happens around 0:20. It's against the cpu so i know it probably won't work very well against a person, but i don't think i've ever seen anyone using it like that in a real match, so if someone could test that out and see if it's a legitimate tactic that would be appreciated.

 

[shrinkray21]

I don't think he's nearly as bad as many people are saying that he is...yes the fact that he doesn't have a kill move is definitely the worst part about him...but combo-ing doesn't look awful at this point in the game

P.S. The dair doesn't spike ever to the best of my knowledge...watched a ton of videos but I haven't seen it done in game.