Potential methods to increase tournament attendance

[0Room]

Well I don't feel like it should be so staunchly divided between "Pros" and "Amateurs". I feel like Pound V had a good idea, with a normal bracket and an amateur bracket for those that got knocked out of pools. In that, we don't feel like we have to stay in amateur bracket because we're afraid of the Pros [there's a huge skill gap between high and pro, I'm sure everyone knows that by now] but we also get the chance to play other people around our skill level, or a pro if we're lucky/unlucky.

I feel like this idea or the Pound amateur bracket idea needs to be attempted a few times to kind of "feel it out" before anything is really decided. Personal experience is the best teacher.

Also, I feel like TOs should stop being one man armies and become more of a team. I know that most players love to play, but some are there for social aspects, and so I feel like during the planning phase of the tournament, the TO needs to ask for 2-4 volunteers to help him out and manage some of the tournament aspects. In that, then you could do some of the side things you were talking about.

Overall I think talking about these kinds of things is less important and informative than doing them. If you try it and it works, great, if not, oh well. But speculation only gets us so far.

 

[Brookman]

The most ideal way to foster the community is to get support from Nintendo or a large organisation like MLG/EVO. Unfortunately, we all know melee is sakurai's ******* child.

 

[Zivilyn Bane]

Well I don't feel like it should be so staunchly divided between "Pros" and "Amateurs". I feel like Pound V had a good idea, with a normal bracket and an amateur bracket for those that got knocked out of pools. In that, we don't feel like we have to stay in amateur bracket because we're afraid of the Pros [there's a huge skill gap between high and pro, I'm sure everyone knows that by now] but we also get the chance to play other people around our skill level, or a pro if we're lucky/unlucky.

I feel like this idea or the Pound amateur bracket idea needs to be attempted a few times to kind of "feel it out" before anything is really decided. Personal experience is the best teacher.

Also, I feel like TOs should stop being one man armies and become more of a team. I know that most players love to play, but some are there for social aspects, and so I feel like during the planning phase of the tournament, the TO needs to ask for 2-4 volunteers to help him out and manage some of the tournament aspects. In that, then you could do some of the side things you were talking about.

Overall I think talking about these kinds of things is less important and informative than doing them. If you try it and it works, great, if not, oh well. But speculation only gets us so far.

The problem with Pound 5 amateur brackets is it is basically rewarding those that are worst in the tournament. My idea actually rewards the masses of smashers that don't always travel to tournaments because of the costs.

 

[Strong Badam]

entrance fee is usually the last thing on people's mind when it comes to tourney costs. it's the actual getting there and housing part.

 

[Battlecow]

not everything is based on money or whatever other programs you have going. your calculations are...extensive, but i don't think they'll have much impact. if people wanted to play the game, they simply would.

you're looking at a game that's 10 years old with limited quality condition discs available used on a dead system with increasingly difficult to obtain controllers to use on a non-flat screen TV, all 3 of which haven't been made in years. the community has no public advertisement, tournaments have no online capability, the median age is very high, and even higher are the skill entry barriers to competitive play. i just don't think it's realistic to expect any kind of community growth, in spite of whatever efforts you may produce.

as it stands, we've had a good run with this game and it's been a long ride. at this point, every player is best off getting whatever he/she personally can while people still play it and slowly transition into the next stage of your life, whatever that may be. the sooner you realize it's coming, the more likely you'll have no regrets when the time comes to make the transition.

64 puts the lie to your entire second paragraph. Online for melee is a possibility in the near future, the TV's, games, and controllers will last into the foreseeable future (and are honestly pretty easy hardware difficulties to overcome). Community growth? Maybe not. Maybe so. Hard to tell. Third paragraph is lol to the max; if people are already playing this game and loving it, why wouldn't they keep playing? Nothing's going to change.

 

[Kason Birdman]

Good post, I don't know how well this would work. It would work a lot better if melee had a MASSIVE fanbase and we saw more like 1,000 people comming to our nationals opposed to 300. Good read though.

 

[Deleted member]

64 puts the lie to your entire second paragraph. Online for melee is a possibility in the near future, the TV's, games, and controllers will last into the foreseeable future (and are honestly pretty easy hardware difficulties to overcome). Community growth? Maybe not. Maybe so. Hard to tell. Third paragraph is lol to the max; if people are already playing this game and loving it, why wouldn't they keep playing? Nothing's going to change.

1. 64 is effectively a dead game. there are a handful of diehard players that are never going to quit, but it's basically dead.

2. if melee could be played online, they'd already be doing it. the game is like 10 years old.

3. i'm not telling anyone to quit, but to think that people as a whole will keep playing or that nothing will change is just flatly naive.

if you have a problem with tournament attendance already (!) and you want realistic solutions, you must first realistically evaluate the problem and come up with some kind of feasible response to it. trying to have a community like ssb64, relying on someone else to make it playable online, or just relying on the current players to keep playing indefinitely are all highly unrealistic answers that suggest no real problem to begin with. you're kicking yourself in the *** on two different levels.

 

[0Room]

The problem with Pound 5 amateur brackets is it is basically rewarding those that are worst in the tournament. My idea actually rewards the masses of smashers that don't always travel to tournaments because of the costs.

I don't believe it was rewarding those who are worst in the tournament at all. It's giving them a second chance, at most. The only problem I really see with your idea is that I feel like there's a huge middle ground for high level players, where they're not good enough to really pose a threat to Pros but they're better than amateurs.
So we need a place for them.

 

[Battlecow]

1. 64 is effectively a dead game. there are a handful of diehard players that are never going to quit, but it's basically dead.

2. if melee could be played online, they'd already be doing it. the game is like 10 years old.

3. i'm not telling anyone to quit, but to think that people as a whole will keep playing or that nothing will change is just flatly naive.

if you have a problem with tournament attendance already (!) and you want realistic solutions, you must first realistically evaluate the problem and come up with some kind of feasible response to it. trying to have a community like ssb64, relying on someone else to make it playable online, or just relying on the current players to keep playing indefinitely are all highly unrealistic answers that suggest no real problem to begin with. you're kicking yourself in the *** on two different levels.

Competitive 64 is as big as it's ever been since Melee came out, maybe bigger (largely due to online). Competitive 64 was never near as big as melee is now because Melee came out so fast that there was no time for a competitive scene to form.

Online melee exists, and while it sucks ATM, advances in computin' technology are bound to make it a very, very real option in the not-so-very distant future

If nothing has changed since 2003 or w/e for 64, why should things change for melee? Is your community noticeably shrinking ATM?

 

[0Room]

I think the biggest problem with 64s community is that it never got a chance to really get started. Melee was much more fortunate in that aspect. I do believe that Melee has a lifespan, but not indefinite one. I doubt it will be like Street Fighter 2: Turbo, where there are still tournaments in Japan and some in America, but it is possible.

As long as there are people who love the game and are willing to do whatever it takes to keep it alive, I think Melee will continue to live and grow. It just really has to be a community effort.

The difference this game has over say, Halo, and the reason why we're still playing this after all these years is mostly the fact that there's a huge ocean of technical depth and understanding that we still haven't completely pierced. [While Halo 2 had a good amount of tech skill, there have been two games out since it, which a lot of people have flocked to, and Xbox Live doesn't even support it anymore.]

People love the ability to be a master something, and anyone who plays games has probably played smash at one point. That makes it perfect for those who have that drive to keep playing, and keep playing, and keep playing. The main problems are the amount of time i takes to attain mastery [I'd say it takes about 2 years to really start playing at a high level] and motivation from the player themselves. People now just don't really have the attention span for that kind of that. Everyone hits a rut at some time or another, they just have to be sure to come back to play again, no matter how much they don't want to. I've done that, and I ended up loving the game more from it.

So yes this game has a definite lifespan, but we really shouldn't end it before it's time to go.

If there's 1 thing I worry about the most it's probably the next Smash game. When Melee is 2 of 3, it's still relevant, but 2 of 4, and 10-x years old, that's going to be a little bit harder of an argument. Some people still believe that all of this was Sakurai's intention, and I'm not entirely sure about that, but it's clear in interviews he gave about Brawl that he does not want to return to this style of play. So some are still kind of "waiting out" on the next Smash game, but I don't think it's really going to be the savior they hope for. Just my .02

 

[Strong Badam]

2. if melee could be played online, they'd already be doing it. the game is like 10 years old.

there is a huge spec gap between n64 and gcn. the switch from cartridge ROM to disc is a huge obstacle to emulate. the N64 cartridge had a maximum of 64 MB of space, while the GCN discs were all 1.5GB. that's 24 times the capacity. there's also an exponentially larger amount of in-game variables, floats, and subroutines in comparison to N64 games. this means significantly more data than just inputs need to be transferred in packets during online play to keep from desynchronization, because the input itself doesn't determine whether Luigi misfires or which turnip Peach pulls.
advances is internet speed (broadband as opposed to uh DSL being the usual in like 2003, and sooner or later fiber-optic) have also contributed to making online play more feasible for GCN games, as well as an increase in coding knowledge and computer specs. to emulate a console, your specs usually need to be significantly higher than that of the original console, which was easy enough for the N64 but not so much for the GCN due to how much of a difference there is between the two.

 

[Massive]

Even if the emulation was perfected the gameplay would still be limited by the speed of light, and therefore a bit laggy.
Additionally, the way internet-based console emulation works is that you're either sharing controller input data between consoles and waiting for an ACK (sort of like how brawl does it), or sharing memory state data, which works fine for N64/NES/SNES emulation, but is nearly impossible for gamecube with current internet speeds).

We could do it the way brawl does it, sharing projectile location memory and input data, but it would require a very specific and large scale reverse-engineering of the melee game data.

By far the best way I can envision melee being successfully played online is through a client-server setup where clients connect to a remote melee server that does all of the input processing and resends the results to the clients (cloud computing style). Gameplay would still be laggy, but at least the players would have an even playing field.

 

[Strong Badam]

yeah there's no way we'll get 0 frames of lag, regardless.

 

[Battlecow]

Should probably refer to it as "delay" to differentiate it from actual lag

1-2 frames of delay isn't bad for 64 (I don't notice 1 frame at all unless I look for it), some people play very well in as much as 6, but Melee's more technical than 64 so IDK (probably depends on character). With a good connection you could reasonably expect to get 1-2 frames p2p with everyone who was within a 200 mile radius or so of you.

Melee Desynchs like a mother****er the way Dolphin is now; I almost never manage to finish games. However, the tech guys seem to think that if someone who knew their stuff redid an emulator/Kaillera specifically for melee, this could be drastically improved.

It will never be console, but it could be exceedingly workable, especially for friendlies, etc.

 

[PEEF!]

entrance fee is usually the last thing on people's mind when it comes to tourney costs. it's the actual getting there and housing part.

Exactly, and no amateur would ever go to a tournament "expecting" to win the amateur bracket either. If you want to increase tournament attendance by making more money available, you simply must have sponsorships and lots of them. Enough to basically make the tournament free for everyone. The largest costs still come from gas/plane, and eating out.

 

[Strong Badam]

lol gosh, it'd be obnoxious to sync variable and constant states with how melee functions. multiple such variables could change on a single frame!

 

[Korrupshen]

Online melee would just kill the melee community offline-wise. There would be less traveling and less meet-ups. Online play would really hurt the community. Nothing is more fun than playing a guy face to face. Plus online melee will never be as stable as 64 online till computers get on steriods which will be like 8 years from now....

I can play melee online....I did a couple a matches, but out of all of them I only finished one. Because like Battlecow said, it desynchs like a *****.

 

[0Room]

Online melee would just kill the melee community offline-wise. There would be less traveling and less meet-ups. Online play would really hurt the community. Nothing is more fun than playing a guy face to face.

I don't necessarily agree, and I'll tell you why: Halo did the same thing, and it survived. There are some important differences [such as being designed for online], but I feel like it's a good comparison.
Let's take a close look at Halo when compared to Smash. Both 1st games were the "most competitive", so they say, even though neither of them really got off the ground. The second entry for both games had glitches/exploits that become central to the game, and they were both featured in huge tournament series at the same time [MLG, obviously]. But what am I trying to get at?

Halo had online.
But when it came to tournaments, they met face to face. Every team had their setups, where they linked xboxs and had their own separate TVs. When it came to game time, there was no online. It was always face to face. There's no reason to think that Smash would be any different in this respect. No one will ever play with lag tournament [unless they don't give a ****] so it will always come down to doing what they always have done: traveling and meeting face to face. Traveling to tournaments is a big part of the community, and I don't really see any evidence that online would change that. It might deter some people from going to tournaments, but those people aren't exactly motivated to play competitively then, either.

So I think online wouldn't stop us from going to tournaments. It might actually increase tournament attendance, because then you wouldn't have to just play the people around you. You would have a better idea of what you're up against, and get more practice before tournaments. But that's all speculation. Overall, I think it would have no affect/very little effect on tournament attendance.

 

[KishPrime]

Wait, who besides Isai says 64 Smash is most competitive?

 

[Massive]

Melee Desynchs like a mother****er the way Dolphin is now; I almost never manage to finish games. However, the tech guys seem to think that if someone who knew their stuff redid an emulator/Kaillera specifically for melee, this could be drastically improved.

It could be improved, but it is a substantial effort to do so. Pruning down the 24MB of active memory used for gameplay to the handful of kilobytes you can quickly send per packet is a pretty huge undertaking.

 

[Battlecow]

Wait, who besides Isai says 64 Smash is most competitive?

How do you judge if something's "most" competitive? Is it the number of competitors? The fierceness of the competition? Kind of a woolly statement thar

 

[tera twin]

competitive in terms of gameplay, bro.

...I hope

 

[KishPrime]

Let's take a close look at Halo when compared to Smash. Both 1st games were the "most competitive", so they say, even though neither of them really got off the ground.

I didn't say it.

 

[Battlecow]

competitive in terms of gameplay, bro.

...I hope

What does that even mean? Competitive in what sense? The game is as competitive as its best player, if I'm reading your use of "competitive" right; until you're the undisputed best around, there's always someone to compete with, and the competition will be just as stiff.

Spoiler

and 64 Isai>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Melee Dr. Peepee/Mango, so 64 is more competitive.

 

[Deleted member]

lol wow these arguments are unusually atrocious even for smashers.

I think it's fair to say that online play for melee isn't going to be quality any time soon, and I don't think most melee players would want that kind of community anyway.

 

[Anomic_Punk]

I liked a lot of the ideas in the OP, I'll be trying some variations of them out during Tipped Off 7 this year.
Great thread! =)

 

[Zivilyn Bane]

I liked a lot of the ideas in the OP, I'll be trying some variations of them out during Tipped Off 7 this year.
Great thread! =)

Awesome. Please do post here afterwards and share what you used and how it went.

 

[Orion*]

tell people women will be attending.

why didn't this just win the thread

get *****es

more basement dwellers will come

 

[Elyssa Xey Hexen]

I think this is quiet a plausible means for tournament to include an amateur bracket and it work out well. This idea of a 75/25 or 85/15 split seems like it would work well in keeping pro players in pro bracket. However, other people's arguements are correct, there would be a higher entree of amateur entrees than pro bracket.

However, I am not sure if this really solves much of a problem. Having the amateur bracket certainly makes it seem like lower skill levels get the chance to win, but at a large enough tournament, a few pro players will think they have a better chance at winning in amateur. And you end up with the problem still of mid level players having no chance at winning at all.

This still leaves people with the sense that they have no way of winning.

Melee is not an organized system of competition. Smash tournaments are rather informal tournaments that get organized and posted. Larger tournaments and success simply happen to give more people community fame rather than complete recognition from an authoritative source. If you really want to see an increase of touranment performance and therefore compeitition, getting recognition from a source like MLG was the best bet.

 

[GK_]

I think that you should like...umm...Like hire kittens? Or something. Like something fuzzy n cute so we all have something to cuddle with. n____n Like, cause that would be like all cute and cozy. And we should all like totally dress up in our PJ's and have like super cool fun sleepover-thingies at each tournament! n______n Nyan nyan nyuu~

 

[amiedema121]

I think this is quiet a plausible means for tournament to include an amateur bracket and it work out well. This idea of a 75/25 or 85/15 split seems like it would work well in keeping pro players in pro bracket. However, other people's arguements are correct, there would be a higher entree of amateur entrees than pro bracket.

However, I am not sure if this really solves much of a problem. Having the amateur bracket certainly makes it seem like lower skill levels get the chance to win, but at a large enough tournament, a few pro players will think they have a better chance at winning in amateur. And you end up with the problem still of mid level players having no chance at winning at all.

This still leaves people with the sense that they have no way of winning.

Melee is not an organized system of competition. Smash tournaments are rather informal tournaments that get organized and posted. Larger tournaments and success simply happen to give more people community fame rather than complete recognition from an authoritative source. If you really want to see an increase of touranment performance and therefore compeitition, getting recognition from a source like MLG was the best bet.

This is where Elo ratings come in (Although I do not fully understand Elo ratings this is my perception and my opinion of them). People would know their skill level and the bracket they should be in. I Like the idea of Elo ratings because:
1.) People would know where they stand in comparison to Grand Masters, to know how much they would need to improve
2.) Tournaments could instantly be more organized
3.) It very well could increase the whole community's numbers

In my opinion people would have the ability to jump brackets to a higher Elo Rating bracket. People that are more skilled would welcome newbs to teach them while taking their money Grand masters or anyone from a higher bracket would not have the option of moving down just to pwn the competition. This seems like a very fair system to me. If you wanted the ability to say to your friends: "I got to play a match agains M2K" (or any pro for that matter) you could pay the money and enter the higher bracket. Those who are not up to that competitive level or amateurs to tournament play would be more apt to enter because this would allow them the opportunity to earn some money.

Consider this quick dialogue "What do you do for work?" "eh I work at the local movie theater, what do you do for work?" "Oh I'm a semi-pro gamer" "Oh? What do you mean?" "Well I earned $300 last week by playing this sweet game called Super Smash Brothers" "wow dude I hardly made $250 last week, I hate my boss, and I swear to God If I see any more frickin movie trailers I'm going to shoot myself. How can I get into what you are doing?"

Oh and one last idea to help improve numbers, draw in one aspect of texas hold-em which has a huge community; Satellites. Winer of bracket or top 3 or whatever the TO decides gain free entry (or a seat for poker terms) to the next higher bracket in the next tournament.

Many things posted on this thread all together are great business ideas on how to grow any community. I think there's some serious money here.

-Amie, business owner and fellow smasher. are you DTS?

 

[Wschl]

I approve this idea

 

[Divinokage]

This is where Elo ratings come in (Although I do not fully understand Elo ratings this is my perception and my opinion of them). People would know their skill level and the bracket they should be in. I Like the idea of Elo ratings because:
1.) People would know where they stand in comparison to Grand Masters, to know how much they would need to improve
2.) Tournaments could instantly be more organized
3.) It very well could increase the whole community's numbers

In my opinion people would have the ability to jump brackets to a higher Elo Rating bracket. People that are more skilled would welcome newbs to teach them while taking their money Grand masters or anyone from a higher bracket would not have the option of moving down just to pwn the competition. This seems like a very fair system to me. If you wanted the ability to say to your friends: "I got to play a match agains M2K" (or any pro for that matter) you could pay the money and enter the higher bracket. Those who are not up to that competitive level or amateurs to tournament play would be more apt to enter because this would allow them the opportunity to earn some money.

Consider this quick dialogue "What do you do for work?" "eh I work at the local movie theater, what do you do for work?" "Oh I'm a semi-pro gamer" "Oh? What do you mean?" "Well I earned $300 last week by playing this sweet game called Super Smash Brothers" "wow dude I hardly made $250 last week, I hate my boss, and I swear to God If I see any more frickin movie trailers I'm going to shoot myself. How can I get into what you are doing?"

Oh and one last idea to help improve numbers, draw in one aspect of texas hold-em which has a huge community; Satellites. Winer of bracket or top 3 or whatever the TO decides gain free entry (or a seat for poker terms) to the next higher bracket in the next tournament.

Many things posted on this thread all together are great business ideas on how to grow any community. I think there's some serious money here.

-Amie, business owner and fellow smasher. are you DTS?

Melee had serious money when MLG sponsored it and right now it seems like only a few companies would be willing to sponsor tournaments, only if it's big enough of course. It looks like Genesis 2 will get bonus prizes for the top players but that's about it. Do you really think companies would sponsor underground tournaments of 20-30 players? Major tournaments don't happen very often either. You also have to realize that it's not poker and creating tournament series seems only feasible regionally. Poker tournaments happen ALL THE TIME and it's HUGE! When someone wants to fly in a top player, it comes out.. out of the smasher's pocket money, we don't fly in for free around the world. That stuff is expensive and there are no players that have that for free, so we really have to pick popular tournaments to go to as we don't have a lot of money.

So how do you think there is a lot of money in Smash? There's no way in hell you can live off it right now. You need a job in the first place to travel which already you are losing money and 300$ = usually something you make when there are 40 players at a tournament AND you win 1st place.. and we all know there is only room for 1 guy for this... it's simply not doable. So personally I don't think it's about the money, it's not a good motivator at all.. It's about the love and dedication to smash in the first place, if people forget that then there's simply no more good reason to continue to play. At every tournament, I'm very sure it was always about having fun and having the time of your life.. ****ing around and doing what you want.

 

[Orko]

+1 Kage

The only people worried about money are high end players. IMO the only way to increase tournament attendance is by increasing the player base.
Honestly, current players who don't go to tournaments, AREN'T going to start coming for some wacky reason. Whether that reason be money or rankings, I don't know any reason why a current player who won't go to tournaments now will start going to tournaments.

 

[Divinokage]

+1 Kage

The only people worried about money are high end players. IMO the only way to increase tournament attendance is by increasing the player base.
Honestly, current players who don't go to tournaments, AREN'T going to start coming for some wacky reason. Whether that reason be money or rankings, I don't know any reason why a current player who won't go to tournaments now will start going to tournaments.

At this point, I'd say the Elo rating is pretty pointless. We already know more or less how everyone's skill level is. Labeling a number on someone might or might not encourage players. I got some feedback from the newer players I brought in for the tournament last saturday and they are all very happy since even if they lost pretty bad, they got a reality check that there are always stronger opponents out there. They said to me, they didn't expect the guys from Ontario to be stronger than them and then now they are really motivated to improve.

To increase the player base, you have to listen to everyone and help them if you can. You really have to be active and get **** done. Find ways to keep people interested.. words can go a long way, just saying to them, "hey man you've improved greatly since last time" inspires them, especially if it comes from a top player. =P Everyone wants recognition, everyone needs it.. being left out REALLY sucks... you have to show people that you care. (Which is why I'm trying to do something with the Melee state of the game for starters.. answering some questions for the curious ones and just showing that the melee scene is friendly.)

Getting new players is extremely hard though, how would someone go about advertising smash? A 10 years old game? So far, for me, it's been really like friends that know other friends and then they become interested when you show them what's it like... I'd say especially the pro level, if they felt it first hand, then now they have something much greater to look forward to. (At least that's how it was for me)

 

[Orko]

I mostly agree.

People <3 this game. There is something extremely special about this game. No matter how old it gets, if you pull it out at a party, people will play.
If you mention it around friends, everyone knows what it is.
And among this mass of people, there are people who WANT to sit around and play with there friends and get better.
I submit there ARE players out there, but they just don't know people still play smash. That's the #1 response people have. If you play, they will come. But there seems to be a gap between people who play and people who play all the time.

At the same time, I feel like ELO is a huuuge step to returning Smash to it's former glory. Rankings mean legitimacy. Legitimacy means sponsors. Sponsors mean money. Money means coverage, and coverage breaks that gap. Right now we are a group of people who take our game seriously, and we need to show that through effort put forth into the community.

 

[amiedema121]

OOOh other potential way to increase popularity. Make Smash mobile. Come up with a way to use a car battery or something. I want to be able to Smash outside in a park or at the beach or something along those lines.

 

[Bones0]

OOOh other potential way to increase popularity. Make Smash mobile. Come up with a way to use a car battery or something. I want to be able to Smash outside in a park or at the beach or something along those lines.

At Pound 5, someone had a mini television attachment that you could hook up to the cube. You plugged the cube's audio, video, AND power (it had a battery pack with it so you can play on the go!), and there were no frame rate issues or anything. I couldn't believe it. lol

Found it:
http://www.nesrepairshop.com/online_shopping/?productID=756

 

[Life]

This gives me a thought. What if you potentially got a buttload (depending on the venue) of extension cables together and projected one of the screens against the side of the building? Especially in super-urban areas where you have people walking around and stuff, it would be great as a minor form of advertising. (Just have to watch the projector so it doesn't get stolen, haha.) Legal?

 

[-Tempest-]

Legal? Maybe. Depends on the area. Probably a permit of some kind involved, though, I'm sure.