newcomers with pretty tough learning curves. Is this a good or bad thing?

[Busterbie]

Many of the newcomers so far seem to have a gimmick that will make them tough to learn.
Rosaline and her luma, robin with the tones, shulk with the buffs and de-buffs.
Do you think this is good or makes the characters too hard to pick up for smash standards.
Im gonna give my thoughts latter, but im from eu, so it's soon bedtime.

 

[Substitution]

Why not? People love a good challenge.

 

[ECHOnce]

Many of the newcomers so far seem to have a gimmick that will make them tough to learn.

Do you think this is good or makes the characters too hard to pick up for smash standards.

Oh, if only Sakurai could see this irony...

Jokes aside, no aha. They may be harder to get into relative to the rest of the cast, but the few gimmicks these newcomers have are probably something players will be able to adjust to within a few games of play. Luma seems to be the most janky out of all of them, but he/she definitely doesn't seem to compare to IC's desyncs. Sakurai's aim was to make a more diverse cast, but still keep them accessible to less skilled players. And I'm sure that with him in charge, nothing will end up being all that hard to grasp - he'd be going against anything he's ever said, otherwise.

 

[Niala]

I love it.

However I think you're overstating the complexity.

Perhaps at an incredibly high level of play, the complexity of micromanaging Shulk's buffs, Luma, and the tomes is very relevant. But for the majority of people, you can play the characters quite well without having to make effective use of them.

Look at Olimar in Brawl. His complexity is very similar. It's about micromanagement-- using Pikmin properly to have the most effective damage and zoning. But are new players incapable of playing Olimar? Absolutely not. They will certainly not be as effective as others who are very good at it, but even a new player can figure out that you swing little plants around with him in order to do damage, and if you lose them all, you can pluck more.

 

[Morbi]

Many of the newcomers so far seem to have a gimmick that will make them tough to learn.
Rosaline and her luma, robin with the tones, shulk with the buffs and de-buffs.
Do you think this is good or makes the characters too hard to pick up for smash standards.
Im gonna give my thoughts latter, but im from eu, so it's soon bedtime.

Not necessarily, no character seems overly complicated and Rosalina does not appear to be the standard marionette character. This is Smash after all, none of the inputs are going to be odd or complex and players still have normals to rely on in the event that the player does not wish to use every tool available to them.

 

[Kokusho]

I'm pretty sure most people won't switch mode and for the few that will they ll most likely use the one that fits their playing style the most and go only with that. Only hardcore player will try to make full use of mode switching which sounds good to me.

 

[Khao]

The game's already full of simple, easy-to-use characters, I don't see how getting a few more complicated ones could be a bad thing, if a character is too difficult to use, just switch to a simpler one.

Also, in practice, I doubt Robin is gonna be difficult to understand. He's like any other character, except that you eventually lose stuff after using them too often.

 

[KaZe_DaRKWIND]

The whole point of the game is depth over complexity. This is perfect for that.

 

[TheKryptoKnight]

I'm a HUGE fan of the newcomers this time around for exactly this reason.
It's exactly in line with what I believe the vision of this game is. EVERYONE will be able to pick up and play these characters... But there's a lot going on here, and the best Robin player is going to understand how to use Robin in a way that the average Robin player doesn't even really think about. Both will find some success, but the better player will win every time.

 

[AncientArk]

I think its a good thing.
Experienced players will have new characters to properly learn and get used to.

 

[pickle962]

Take Seth from Street Fighter 4. While he has pretty much all of the other fighters moves, his low HP compared to most means that one fatal wrong move and BAM, your seth is dead!

However, when someone knows precisely how to manage someone like him...

 

[fogbadge]

Isn't olimar one such character? If so then I guess there's no problem

 

[Big-Cat]

We'll be fine. Sure, these characters have a high learning curve, but they will still be fun enough for beginners to play. Someone may want to try to find different things with Luma and (s)he may be playing casually.

 

[Xermo]

A tech heavy character is all the more satisfying to play when you've mastered them.

 

[Scourge The Hedgehog]

A tech heavy character is all the more satisfying to play when you've mastered them.

Pretty much this. Characters who take more time to master are usually more fun in my opinion. Though nothing wrong with the Plug and Play characters.

 

[Raijinken]

Luma is the only one that seems tricky for newcomers, and that's little worse than the Ice Climbers. Robin, Shulk, and Mac's mechanics are pretty simple. After all, for Robin, it just means "You might go a few moments without this attack." and for Shulk, there's nothing forcing you to swap between them (as far as we know).

 

[Saikyoshi]

Honestly, I think it's kind of hypocritical.

I mean, Sakurai's made it clear that he does not want to make a competitive game, yet he makes sure the newcomers have gimmicks that the target audience will most definitely have no interest in learning.

It's like he's trying to throw us a bone while he's telling us that he hates us. I'm conflicted about it.

 

[TheKryptoKnight]

Honestly, I think it's kind of hypocritical.

I mean, Sakurai's made it clear that he does not want to make a competitive game, yet he makes sure the newcomers have gimmicks that the target audience will most definitely have no interest in learning.

It's like he's trying to throw us a bone while he's telling us that he hates us. I'm conflicted about it.

I believe you're simplifying things way too much.
It's all about depth vs. complexity.
Sakurai wants everything to be very simple and have very low barriers to entry. Shulk is very simple. Anyone could pick him up and know how to use all of his moves right away. Know how to do everything Shulk can do to manipulate spacing/ect. A "casual" isn't going to have a deep understanding of the character or know how to use the moves effectively, but there will be no point where they'll be saying "What was that?/How did you do that?" They'll know the move was a forward smash after changing to the speed mode. They'll know how to do that, they just might not ever think to use it effectively. This is a random, simple example, but basically they're never asking "......what was that?"

What Sakurai is against is a situation like you see with high level Melee play. Go watch any video of high level play. I'm not capable of moving like that. I don't know what to push, when. I don't know any of the timing. Dash dancing makes the game look glitchy to me, even though I know what it is, and know it's not a glitch.. He wants the difference in skill to be knowing how to use these "complicated" characters most effectively, not in using techs that are outside of the character's intended toolbox.

I'm trying to make this sound non-antagonistic. I think high level Melee play is fantastic for those interested. I have no negative view of the community at all! But I also completely understand Sakurai's vision, as someone who's played Smash for 15 years, considers himself "skilled," but has no idea how to do anything the pros do. High level Melee play doesn't even look like Smash to me, and all of my knowledge of Smash would be COMPLETELY useless in a competitive Melee environment.

 

[SpectreJordan]

Shulk looks pretty tricky, this could hurt him like a similar gimmick hurt Iron Fist in Ultimate Marvel vs Capcom 3.

 

[Raijinken]

Shulk looks pretty tricky, this could hurt him like a similar gimmick hurt Iron Fist in Ultimate Marvel vs Capcom 3.

For newcomers and low-depth players, that'll just manifest in having one less move, an issue Sheik or Zelda (or any of the Trainermons) dedicated mains have put up with for a while, which is to say, it won't raise the skill floor significantly (at least at a glance, the changes either aren't permanent, or aren't on by default, so you can probably ignore them entirely). For high-depth players, those tricks will give him a high skill ceiling and some extra strategic depth.

 

[Ursaguy]

Shulk really doesn't seem all that complicated to me. You could be constantly switching forms to gain the upper hand, but I'd think most people (even some who don't consider themselves casuals) will just end up picking the form they like best and staying exclusively in that.

 

[JamietheAuraUser]

Casual Shulk players will probably just alternate between their favourite mode and Smash mode when they want to land a kill.

A basic guideline for newbie Robin players would simply be to avoid running out of more than one weapon at a time. Other than that, probably not too hard. You have to be really careful not to run out of Elwinds at the same time as your other magics and Levin Sword though, since that's your only recovery move and you'll need all your options to stay alive at high percents when it's not around.

Little Mac looks pretty simple to pick up, and only becomes more complicated when you want to make use of his limited aerial game to extend combos. Even then, the only difficulty is the speed and precision of inputs required for things like DTilt > short hop forward > NAir > NAir > NAir > UTilt > Spiral Uppercut (especially with NAir's incredibly short range meaning you have get that short hop forward up close and personal during hitstun while going just the right speed), which I think is probably going to be a pretty bread-and-butter Little Mac combo based on what we've seen so far. UTilt > Spiral Uppercut appears to be a legit combo since we see him do that in the trailer (out of dash no less), DTilt has been said to have good pop-up for combos, and NAir appears to be like an aerial jab in terms of speed while having very low or non-existent landing lag.

 

[Busterbie]

Hey everyone im back to give my opinions:
I pretty much agree with the conclusion most of you are coming to.
While i can surely see these being hard to master for competetive players, for people just coming over because of a party, will probaly not even know what they're doing and press random buttons, seriusly i know that from experience.
Sorry it took me so long to say my opinions on the matter

 

[Vintage Creep]

I love the fact that many characters seem complicated.

 

[Mysteltainn]

It's the one of the main things I really like about this batch of newcomers, actually. The fact that the majority of them can't be picked up and won with by mashing buttons like a lot of the kids in Brawl (then they spam taunts for the remainder of the match and dodge for the last minute) is nice. Even pros will have to put time in to master the precision and mechanics of some of the characters like Rosalina, Robin and Shulk to name a few. That being said, I doubt they've been made so daunting that they'll be completely foreign to newer players, which is what I think Sakurai was going for. Easy ~ moderate to pick up, but hard to master.

 

[guedes the brawler]

there's the good (peals to a more niche part of the fanbase) and the bad (doesn't appeal to most peopel)

just look at how olimar and Rob were fairly under-utilized.

 

[Renji64]

They have no playstyles they don't look difficult. Just some new stuff to try.

 

[JamietheAuraUser]

They have no playstyles they don't look difficult. Just some new stuff to try.

Can you stop throwing out baseless attacks on the new game, without evidence, before it's even out? It's really pretty obnoxious.

 

[ToothiestAura]

Well, I was worried about Rosalina being complicated but I played her at Smash Fest and it was fine. I don't think they will be hard to play, just hard to master (and that's applicable to every character).

 

[Renji64]

Can you stop throwing out baseless attacks on the new game, without evidence, before it's even out? It's really pretty obnoxious.

What did i attack? None of the characters look that tough to learn imo. Mastering is a different story. Nope I won't stop.

 

[JamietheAuraUser]

What did i attack? None of the characters look that tough to learn imo. Mastering is a different story. Nope I won't stop.

I'm sorry, I thought I heard you say "They have no playstyle". That's hardly fair, every character has a playstyle unless they're just horribly designed overall.

 

[Petrichor]

What did i attack? None of the characters look that tough to learn imo. Mastering is a different story. Nope I won't stop.

Given that every other post you make on the Smash 4 boards is a baseless attack on the new games (something that you aren't exactly denying), it's not hard to see how someone might come to the conclusion that you were doing it again. If you didn't think the new characters were difficult to learn then perhaps you should have said that initially rather than that they "have no playstyles", a phrase that doesn't even make sense. That sounds more like a criticism than an observation.

As for my take on the matter, I think the new characters are quite a good representation of the Smash series as a whole. Newcomers will be able to pick them up and play them without a whole lot of difficulty, but they also have a lot of depth and potential for people who want to explore them more deeply. I think it's great that these characters exist, and I'm definitely looking forward to trying out some of the more strategically demanding characters like Rosalina, Robin and Shulk.

 

[PingPongCop]

I love it. The newcomers are really pleasing me because of how tricky some of em might be. It's just so satisfying when you master a hard character to play. Newcomer + high learning curve = Heck Yes!

 

[pickle962]

What did i attack? None of the characters look that tough to learn imo. Mastering is a different story. Nope I won't stop.

I've said it before in the "proof sakurai is in touch" thread @Zipzo made and I will say it again. Going forward as we near the release dates of the 3DS and eventually Wii U versions of smash 4, we (the people excited for smash 4) will not I repeat WILL NOT tolerate people like you @ Renji64 who contribute nothing positive to the smash 4 conversations and instead make baseless unwarranted attacks on a game many of us are looking forward to playing as well as learning and developing the meta game. The Brawl community had people similar to you who always hurled their unnecessary two cents, yet the sub community for that game managed to hold their ground and thrive in their section of the forums and will still probably thrive for a good while longer.

I'm not asking this to be nice, I've had it up to here with ignorant trolls like you mercilessly bashing on an unreleased game that looks not only surpass Brawl, but arguably Melee as well. If you actually had constructive well rounded criticism for the game, it would be another story, but since we've time and again called you out on your insane troll logic towards 4 trying to get you to leave us alone, yet you've spat in our kind faces and continued with your ignorant anti smash 4 ways, its only fair we give you this one and only ultimatum. Either...


A. Bug off and retreat to the Melee/Project M forums since your posts make it clear that nothing is going to replace either game in your eyes.

B. Continue to be a jerk about a game you really don't know zilch about as its currently unreleased, but know that if you continue your short sighted ways, we as a smash 4 sub community will report every single post you make on here from this point forward which judging by your track record, it will make it easier for us to do so with no hard feelings.

On topic: As I said before with the Seth example from Street Fighter 4, once you master the intricacies of characters that require a bit of dexterity and a sharp mind for mind games, their weaknesses should be the least of your problems so long as you are bringing your entire A+ game with you.

 

[Wintropy]

I'm a HUGE fan of the newcomers this time around for exactly this reason.
It's exactly in line with what I believe the vision of this game is. EVERYONE will be able to pick up and play these characters... But there's a lot going on here, and the best Robin player is going to understand how to use Robin in a way that the average Robin player doesn't even really think about. Both will find some success, but the better player will win every time.

I believe you're simplifying things way too much.
It's all about depth vs. complexity.
Sakurai wants everything to be very simple and have very low barriers to entry. Shulk is very simple. Anyone could pick him up and know how to use all of his moves right away. Know how to do everything Shulk can do to manipulate spacing/ect. A "casual" isn't going to have a deep understanding of the character or know how to use the moves effectively, but there will be no point where they'll be saying "What was that?/How did you do that?" They'll know the move was a forward smash after changing to the speed mode. They'll know how to do that, they just might not ever think to use it effectively. This is a random, simple example, but basically they're never asking "......what was that?"

What Sakurai is against is a situation like you see with high level Melee play. Go watch any video of high level play. I'm not capable of moving like that. I don't know what to push, when. I don't know any of the timing. Dash dancing makes the game look glitchy to me, even though I know what it is, and know it's not a glitch.. He wants the difference in skill to be knowing how to use these "complicated" characters most effectively, not in using techs that are outside of the character's intended toolbox.

I'm trying to make this sound non-antagonistic. I think high level Melee play is fantastic for those interested. I have no negative view of the community at all! But I also completely understand Sakurai's vision, as someone who's played Smash for 15 years, considers himself "skilled," but has no idea how to do anything the pros do. High level Melee play doesn't even look like Smash to me, and all of my knowledge of Smash would be COMPLETELY useless in a competitive Melee environment.

Literally everything you just said with a cherry on top.

Will you marry me and bear my open-minded universally-tolerant babies?

 

[Road Death Wheel]

I've said it before in the "proof sakurai is in touch" thread @Zipzo made and I will say it again. Going forward as we near the release dates of the 3DS and eventually Wii U versions of smash 4, we (the people excited for smash 4) will not I repeat WILL NOT tolerate people like you @ Renji64 who contribute nothing positive to the smash 4 conversations and instead make baseless unwarranted attacks on a game many of us are looking forward to playing as well as learning and developing the meta game. The Brawl community had people similar to you who always hurled their unnecessary two cents, yet the sub community for that game managed to hold their ground and thrive in their section of the forums and will still probably thrive for a good while longer.

I'm not asking this to be nice, I've had it up to here with ignorant trolls like you mercilessly bashing on an unreleased game that looks not only surpass Brawl, but arguably Melee as well. If you actually had constructive well rounded criticism for the game, it would be another story, but since we've time and again called you out on your insane troll logic towards 4 trying to get you to leave us alone, yet you've spat in our kind faces and continued with your ignorant anti smash 4 ways, its only fair we give you this one and only ultimatum. Either...


A. Bug off and retreat to the Melee/Project M forums since your posts make it clear that nothing is going to replace either game in your eyes.

B. Continue to be a jerk about a game you really don't know zilch about as its currently unreleased, but know that if you continue your short sighted ways, we as a smash 4 sub community will report every single post you make on here from this point forward which judging by your track record, it will make it easier for us to do so with no hard feelings.

On topic: As I said before with the Seth example from Street Fighter 4, once you master the intricacies of characters that require a bit of dexterity and a sharp mind for mind games, their weaknesses should be the least of your problems so long as you are bringing your entire A+ game with you.

Yay one post is about to turn this into melee vs brawl.
But seriously chill. your keyboard can only take so much punishment.

 

[pickle962]

Yay one post is about to turn this into melee vs brawl.
But seriously chill. your keyboard can only take so much punishment.

I appreciate your concern and I didn't intend for my last post to be the catalyst that leads to another tired argument over whether Melee or Brawl is the better game. I'm just sick of seeing the same anti smash 4 peeps come in here and dump their ill crafted posts on here without actually taking the time to make a well rounded and though out constructive post for those would be another matter entirely. I can only hope the mods here step up their game when the 3DS version drops and make it clear that such behavior won't be tolerated at all

 

[Road Death Wheel]

I appreciate your concern and I didn't intend for my last post to be the catalyst that leads to another tired argument over whether Melee or Brawl is the better game. I'm just sick of seeing the same anti smash 4 peeps come in here and dump their ill crafted posts on here without actually taking the time to make a well rounded and though out constructive post for those would be another matter entirely. I can only hope the mods here step up their game when the 3DS version drops and make it clear that such behavior won't be tolerated at all

Well rengi's been an ass for a while its best to ignore him somtimes

 

[pickle962]

Well rengi's been an *** for a while its best to ignore him somtimes

one step ahead of you. Back on topic though...which characters seem the most complex to you in smash 4? I'm thinking Rosalina and Robin at the bare minimum are looking to be this.

 

[Hong]

Folks,
While I don't agree with @ Renji64 , I would advise against bashing him. If it is an outright attack, it is flaming, and if the post is not related to the thread, it is only spam. If you don't like someone, the worst thing you could do is allow them to get you into trouble. It's not worth it.

Of course argument is perfectly fine, but on a personal level I wouldn't recommend it, as my best advice. There have been myriads of attempts to get him to sway his opinion, and none have succeeded. This is not at all an attack on Renji64 or any parties, so much as my advice to save both him and yourself the time.

@ B Busterbie
I moved your thread to the character discussion forum.

which characters seem the most complex to you in smash 4? I'm thinking Rosalina and Robin at the bare minimum are looking to be this.

Rosalina or Villager, IMO. The latter is very unorthodox.