Sakurai "aiming to make Super Smash Bros. best character game in the world"

[Jumpman84]

Please quote where I did that. All I did was say that he shouldn't be applauded for removing a **** mechanic that nobody wanted, nobody (aside from apparently one poster in this thread) liked, and nobody is going to miss. Is it really all that super specific?

I liked it, therefore your argument is invalid. Actually, I don't mind Sakurai removing it in order to make the game better competitive wise, but apparently SOME people have to complain about EVERYTHING...

I haven't even talked about Smash 4 as a game in this thread. I've only talked about Sakurai's blatant two-facedness. Something that I have every right to call out and something that is plain as day. Something that is incredibly blatant if you've read this interview in conjunction with a lot of the other things he's said.

Or am I not allowed to question glorious mashed potato samurai-sama?

Except there is no "blatant two-facedness" in that interview whatsoever. Please do a better job at reading it next time.

 

[Shiliski]

If I'm going off win % right now, brawl actually has a lot more characters show up, in number and percentage.

Fox is actually more dominant in Melee than MK is in Brawl.

Still I think MK is far more broken in Brawl but number wise I can't deny Fox is worse in terms of dominance right now.

Huh, well I can't argue with that. Brawl having more diversity in the competitive scene is a good thing.

Still, I hope for a better tomorrow with Smash 4.

 

[#HBC | Red Ryu]

People should turn down the notches, like all of them.

This is turning into another venom filled thread and I'd rather not close this.

 

[pizzapie7]

And no, Blue Shells and Lightning are very much the game screwing you over, like tripping. The game decides when someone gets these items, and they require so little thought to use (you literally just hit the button as soon as you see the item in your item slot) that they may as well be random events that happen without that player input. They are just the same as tripping.

You wouldn't use a Blue Shell right before first place is going to go through a barrel cannon where it would disappear, nor would you use it while first place has that a mushroom or that new speaker thing and can dodge it. You wouldn't use a lightning bolt while people have stars or bullet bills active. And it's far more economical to use them when you can get your opponents to fall into some sort of trap. On top of that, the longer you sit on your blue shell/lightning bolt is more time you are vulnerable to attacks from people who are behind you. These are very much your opponent screwing you over, just like you could argue items in Smash have a similar function.

If you want to argue that it wasn't poor game design because of it's context, then the context is equally poor. There is nothing good about losing control of your character for no reason because of a random chance. Like I said, you're racing and your car decides to turn left instead of right. Having control of your character is fundamental to both a racing game and Smash and basically any game I can think of that isn't turn based, and taking that control away from the player on a random chance is not good game design. That's the difference between randomly tripping, randomly going the wrong direction, and you getting hit with a Blue Shell.

I liked it, therefore your argument is invalid.

Oh wow two whole people! My argument doesn't work anymore because I didn't take into account another poster!!! My apologies for being hyperbolic... or something I guess? I'm not all too sure about what your point is.

 

[Shiliski]

I agree that tripping was a bad choice, due to the fact that things like "random death" and "random failure" can be very bad for game design. Tripping due to a banana is okay, tripping due to someone using a down-tilt is okay, but a random chance to trip every time you dash isn't that great. Fortunately it's a low chance. Even more fortunately it's gone in Smash 4.

 

[Flaxr XIII]

Please quote where I did that. All I did was say that he shouldn't be applauded for removing a **** mechanic that nobody wanted, nobody (aside from apparently one poster in this thread) liked, and nobody is going to miss. Is it really all that super specific?

I haven't even talked about Smash 4 as a game in this thread. I've only talked about Sakurai's blatant two-facedness. Something that I have every right to call out and something that is plain as day. Something that is incredibly blatant if you've read this interview in conjunction with a lot of the other things he's said.

Or am I not allowed to question glorious mashed potato samurai-sama?

You didn't. It was just the attitude you gave off. And while I quoted you, my rant was meant for everyone in general. I apologize that it seemed I was only referring to you.

On another note, am I the only one who has never died from tripping? Not that I like tripping, but I've never seen it as more than a mild nuisance.

 

[Johnknight1]

a great job at balancing melee? please tell me you're being sarcastic about this. melee was horribly balanced.

How=???

The top 8 at Melee at EVO 2014, aka the biggest tournament ever for Smash (970 entrants), saw the top 8 players in top 8 use 10 different characters.

i saw more variety of characters at brawl tournaments than at melee ones.

"I saw more of this in one particular instance, therefore it is true."

At the last major I went to (it had 180 entrants) I faced 9 people in pools and they used 7 characters.

Then again 5 of them used ONLY Samus, which was weird, and not something I think I'll ever see again. I didn't even know 5 people main'd Samus.

not saying brawl isn't unbalanced as well, but melee i felt like i was seeing more of the higher tiers like falco and fox more and brawl i at least saw some more variety, even mid tiers at tourneys.

Meta Knight mains have won OVER HALF OF ALL BRAWL TOURNAMENTS!!!

He also makes half of the cast irrelevant because he's a counter to half the cast.

Look at the top 5 Brawl players. They play at most 3 characters.

The top 5 at Melee right now (Mango, HBox, Armada, PewPewU, and M2K) main 5 different characters, and play an additional 5 or so characters among them.

Seriously dude. If you paid a little bit of attention to both games competitively, you'd know you're dead wrong.

 

[The Slayer]

If I'm going off win % right now, brawl actually has a lot more characters show up, in number and percentage.

Fox is actually more dominant in Melee than MK is in Brawl.

Still I think MK is far more broken in Brawl but number wise I can't deny Fox is worse in terms of dominance right now.

And I'll never see that as a problem. Fox's dominance came with a long time of trial/error (over a decade if I recall) and has more exposed weaknesses to his prowess. He's never the perfect pick and quite difficult to master perfectly, so you'll bomb hard if you don't know what you're doing with his match-ups. MK on the other hand...there's not much you can do about him normally. He's literally a character that covers his weaknesses with little to no trouble. It's been several years and he's pretty much stapled to his current position. Only time he'll move if he's banned or PJ:M is enabled. And to me, that just sounds like people given up on the original and just make some heavy modifications for their own benefits. But oh well, to keep things competitive I guess.

Obviously, it won't be as easy to modify for this next generation, but being ban happy sounds very possible. Will it happen? I'm not sure, but knowing when a character is taking most of the high placement results is going to influence it even more and we know how that went well the first time.

 

[Johnknight1]

Well gee, when you **** on the developer's efforts and call the game trash BEFORE IT'S EVEN RELEASED and before YOU have personally played it just because it doesn't LOOK to adhere to YOUR super specific standards and act like the game is fundamentally broken and unplayable, then yes it comes off as entitled.

You're entitled to want things changed in a product you plan to purchase with your money to be as good as it can be to you.

It's called capitalism.

Just because you oppose these capitalistic principles doesn't mean you should tell people what to do.

Tripping wasn't poor game design in the context of it's implementation.

This isn't even close to true and this statement is quite frankly ignorant of really understanding of game design.

The point of platformers and fighting games (like smash) is to give all the control to the players with their character.

Taking it away with a random mechanic like that literally destroys the principle on which it stands.

In other words, IT MAKES VIDEO GAMES NOT PLAYABLE AND THUS NOT A VIDEO GAME!!!

To say otherwise is just tomfoolery.

 

[TeenGirlSquad]

You're entitled to want things changed in a product you plan to purchase with your money to be as good as it can be to you.

It's called capitalism.

Just because you oppose these capitalistic principles doesn't mean you should tell people what to do.

Did you really just advocate for capitalism right now LOL.

 

[Johnknight1]

Did you really just advocate for capitalism right now LOL.

No because the ability to complain about a product and the survival of the fittest way with capitalism is a basis of gaming that should force innovation, making a game people (specifically fans of a genre will enjoy), and most of the time forces game developers in the long run to make consistently worthwhile products.

That's an infrastructure Nintendo is well aware of, and what they market themselves as, even though it isn't too uncommon for them to have games that disappoint fanbases.

Brawl created a fair share of disappointment (specifically on Reggie's notion that "it's the best smash bros. ever" and the idea that it would surpass Melee as some people felt), although there's quite a bit of a split on that.

A game that big time failed at this was Yoshi's NEW Island on nearly all levels. Also Paper Mario: Sticker Star.

 

[Flaxr XIII]

You're entitled to want things changed in a product you plan to purchase with your money to be as good as it can be to you.

It's called capitalism.

Just because you oppose these capitalistic principles doesn't mean you should tell people what to do.

I see. Well the point of my post was to state that they are "entitled" so you sir have confirmed my suspicions.
Still, if you expect everything to be 100% catered to you, then you're gonna be living a sad life buddy.

 

[κomıc]

Ew, Yoshi's New Island. I never played it but hearing the music speaks for itself. Sticker Star wasn't a bad game and I appreciate that Intelligent Systems love to experiment with their games but I think they went a little too far. That's what happens when you have Miyamoto trying to simplify the series. It's really the only reason the game ended up being the way it did.

 

[JV5Chris]

There's a difference between expecting a good game that is generally designed well for it's intents and purposes that appeals to a wide audience

Going to stop you right there to make a point. Smash has a very gamer centered demographic. It's about fighting with Nintendo mascots after all. Anytime you hear Sakurai talk about reaching new players, that's code for the next generation of Nintendo consumers, children. Nothing wrong with catering to young kids, but keep in mind the theme does lend itself to audiences more familiar with the material that also tend to have higher expectations.

Having expectations, even highly specific ones, does not mean someone is acting entitled btw. They could be behaving in other ways mind you, but that specific label implies something quite different.

 

[Johnknight1]

Melee wasn't balanced all that great. The difference between Mewtwo and Fox is huge.

It's not as big as people think it is. I mean, Taj almost beat Mango before a few times with his Mewtwo against Mango's Fox.

In Melee you got half the roster as major players, and the character and player match ups are super deep. That's pretty good for a game without any patches.

I see. Well the point of my post was to state that they are "entitled" so you sir have confirmed my suspicions.
Still, if you expect everything to be 100% catered to you, then you're gonna be living a sad life buddy.

100% cater to you depends. It depends what you expect or want.

I mean, I want games to 100% live up to my expectations, but I don't expect them to to give me 100% what I wanted.

I mean, I know Simon Belmont will never be playable in a Smash game anytime soon, and I know it sucks, but that's the way the cookie crumbles.

In the meantime, I still expect a really good roster of characters that would totally be dope to play as or against.

 

[#HBC | Red Ryu]

And I'll never see that as a problem. Fox's dominance came with a long time of trial/error (over a decade if I recall) and has more exposed weaknesses to his prowess. He's never the perfect pick and quite difficult to master perfectly, so you'll bomb hard if you don't know what you're doing with his match-ups. MK on the other hand...there's not much you can do about him normally. He's literally a character that covers his weaknesses with little to no trouble. It's been several years and he's pretty much stapled to his current position. Only time he'll move if he's banned or PJ:M is enabled. And to me, that just sounds like people given up on the original and just make some heavy modifications for their own benefits. But oh well, to keep things competitive I guess.

Obviously, it won't be as easy to modify for this next generation, but being ban happy sounds very possible. Will it happen? I'm not sure, but knowing when a character is taking most of the high placement results is going to influence it even more and we know how that went well the first time.

I actually agree here.

Melee top area is better balanced at dealing with Fox, just once you hit 10-12 there is a sharp drop off.

MK is at the top, but he is by himself, after him, everyone else in the cast has at least 1 bad my somewhere, and it's really not oppressive outside of good Ice Climbers. And even they lose to at least 4 other characters.

 

[Eternal phoenix Fire]

Well gee, when you **** on the developer's efforts and call the game trash BEFORE IT'S EVEN RELEASED and before YOU have personally played it just because it doesn't LOOK to adhere to YOUR super specific standards and act like the game is fundamentally broken and unplayable, then yes it comes off as entitled.

He never said the game was bad ; you're poppin' off like a kid and putting words in others mouths.

There is nothing wrong with expecting the worst when the previous installment failed to live up to its expectations.

 

[Senario]

He never said the game was bad ; you're poppin' off like a kid and putting words in others mouths.

There is nothing wrong with expecting the worst when the previous installment failed to live up to its expectations.

I wish i could like this several times as it is how I feel about smash 4. It'll be a cool game for some but for personal expectations from what I've seen? Could be better.

 

[κomıc]

He never said the game was bad ; you're poppin' off like a kid and putting words in others mouths.

There is nothing wrong with expecting the worst when the previous installment failed to live up to its expectations.

What exactly were those expectations?

 

[RascalTheCharizard]

I agree that tripping was a bad choice, due to the fact that things like "random death" and "random failure" can be very bad for game design. Tripping due to a banana is okay, tripping due to someone using a down-tilt is okay, but a random chance to trip every time you dash isn't that great. Fortunately it's a low chance. Even more fortunately it's gone in Smash 4.

This is why I find it near-impossible to take Pokémon seriously. No matter how good my strategy, reads and subterfuge are, there's always a 6% chance that I'll lose my most valuable Pokémon (****ING CRITICAL HITS RAAAAAAAAAAH). Same deal with Paralysis, which oddly makes me lose more turns than Confusion, despite being half as likely to do so.

Granted in this case it's Pokémon; a game for kids that doesn't exactly focus on the multiplayer, especially not competitive multiplayer. But still, I just don't get how people can play that competitively. I've got a clip that I'm going to upload to Youtube sometime where my buddy lost a match in the Battle Maison because he got critted 3 times in a row and then missed with Heat Wave twice in a row.

 

[Deleted member 245254]

You're entitled to want things changed in a product you plan to purchase with your money to be as good as it can be to you.

It's called capitalism.

Just because you oppose these capitalistic principles doesn't mean you should tell people what to do.

This isn't even close to true and this statement is quite frankly ignorant of really understanding of game design.

The point of platformers and fighting games (like smash) is to give all the control to the players with their character.

Taking it away with a random mechanic like that literally destroys the principle on which it stands.

In other words, IT MAKES VIDEO GAMES NOT PLAYABLE AND THUS NOT A VIDEO GAME!!!

To say otherwise is just tomfoolery.

Um, I'm just going to assume you are from America with this post, but you don't exactly get to plug "capitalism" as a means to support your argument when your economy is so far in the toilet as a result of your brilliant capitalism.

What was it like, 1% of the entire country (USA) owns 70% of the total existent wealth?

Puh-lease.

 

[Eternal phoenix Fire]

Um, I'm just going to assume you are from America with this post, but you don't exactly get to plug "capitalism" as a means to support your argument when your economy is so far in the toilet as a result of your brilliant capitalism.

What was it like, 1% of the entire country (USA) owns 70% of the total existent wealth?

Puh-lease.

Bet you watched the Daily Show for a full day to draw such an astute conclusion.

 

[ミスティック Speed]

This is why I find it near-impossible to take Pokémon seriously. No matter how good my strategy, reads and subterfuge are, there's always a 6% chance that I'll lose my most valuable Pokémon (****ING CRITICAL HITS RAAAAAAAAAAH). Same deal with Paralysis, which oddly makes me lose more turns than Confusion, despite being half as likely to do so.

Granted in this case it's Pokémon; a game for kids that doesn't exactly focus on the multiplayer, especially not competitive multiplayer. But still, I just don't get how people can play that competitively. I've got a clip that I'm going to upload to Youtube sometime where my buddy lost a match in the Battle Maison because he got critted 3 times in a row and then missed with Heat Wave twice in a row.

Should of carried Flamethrower over Heat Wave. xD

 

[RascalTheCharizard]

Should of carried Flamethrower over Heat Wave. xD

He pretty much only plays Doubles/Multi so Heat Wave is more useful on average, but yeah, the little extra accuracy from Flamethrower can go a long way.

 

[Jumpman84]

You're entitled to want things changed in a product you plan to purchase with your money to be as good as it can be to you.

It's called capitalism.

Just because you oppose these capitalistic principles doesn't mean you should tell people what to do.

This isn't even close to true and this statement is quite frankly ignorant of really understanding of game design.

The point of platformers and fighting games (like smash) is to give all the control to the players with their character.

Taking it away with a random mechanic like that literally destroys the principle on which it stands.

In other words, IT MAKES VIDEO GAMES NOT PLAYABLE AND THUS NOT A VIDEO GAME!!!

To say otherwise is just tomfoolery.

The only tomfoolery I'm seeing is in your posts. Tripping in Brawl somehow makes it no longer a video game? Do you honestly realize how idiotic that sounds? Next thing, you'll be telling me that I'm not an actual person, that these words are magically typing themselves!

You call others ignorant of game design, yet I seriously doubt that you even know what a video game is. Let me help you...

A video game is an electronic game that involves human interaction with a user interface to generate visual feedback on a video device.

All that matters is that you play it with a controlling mechanism (whether controller, keyboard, or Power Glove). It has nothing to do with the mechanics of the game. Even something as atrocious as E.T. is still a video game. A BAD video game, yes, but a video game nonetheless.

Fortunately, Brawl is one of the greatest video games of all time, despite what some people on this forum think. The scores speak for themselves and if that's with tripping included, I can only imagine how much more awesome Smash 4 will be...

 

[ミスティック Speed]

The only tomfoolery I'm seeing is in your posts. Tripping in Brawl somehow makes it no longer a video game? Do you honestly realize how idiotic that sounds? Next thing, you'll be telling me that I'm not an actual person, that these words are magically typing themselves!

You call others ignorant of game design, yet I seriously doubt that you even know what a video game is. Let me help you...



All that matters is that you play it with a controlling mechanism (whether controller, keyboard, or Power Glove). It has nothing to do with the mechanics of the game. Even something as atrocious as E.T. is still a video game. A BAD video game, yes, but a video game nonetheless.

Fortunately, Brawl is one of the greatest video games of all time, despite what some people on this forum think. The scores speak for themselves and if that's with tripping included, I can only imagine how much more awesome Smash 4 will be...

Could we be looking at a potential perfect score? o.o

 

[Jumpman84]

Could we be looking at a potential perfect score? o.o

Well, Brawl did get a lot of perfect scores from various media. That includes Famitsu, a magazine known for only giving a select few games that status. For comparison, Melee got a 37/40 and the original got 31/40. From everything we've seen, I feel confident Smash 4 will pull it off.

 

[Senario]

Could we be looking at a potential perfect score? o.o

Eh, I stopped looking at scores for all games I play. I dont believe they are all that accurate of quality for you as a player. For example, Resident Evil 6 got dumped on by reviews but after playing the game I honestly can say at worst it was a 7.5/10 I had fun with it and the only problems were quick time events and somewhat confusing story. Or another series I've famously heard scores terribly in the west, Dynasty warriors. It is not a very deep game but it is pretty fun for killing time and if you just want to destroy things. Sorta like most beat em ups except with a ton of characters on the screen. I find it fun and definitely worth an 8/10 if you space out which ones you buy (don't buy every one, there are way too many). Nit pick point: Raising the difficulty to the hardest mode doesn't make the game harder in a way that is fun. You get chunked for HP for taking one hit so it is the wrong way to go about it. They should just make the AI more aggressive and work better together, maybe decrease the health drops you can get.

It is all relative, what do you enjoy? What does the game offer? Do you think that game offers what you want? How good a game is for you is not a reflection upon the score of the game by critics. Similar to how movies are not good or bad based on critic opinions but your own opinion. I personally loved Iron man 3, not the best of the three (that would be iron man 1) but definitely not bad. 8/10 imo.

 

[pizzapie7]

The only tomfoolery I'm seeing is in your posts. Tripping in Brawl somehow makes it no longer a video game? Do you honestly realize how idiotic that sounds? Next thing, you'll be telling me that I'm not an actual person, that these words are magically typing themselves!

You call others ignorant of game design, yet I seriously doubt that you even know what a video game is. Let me help you...



All that matters is that you play it with a controlling mechanism (whether controller, keyboard, or Power Glove). It has nothing to do with the mechanics of the game. Even something as atrocious as E.T. is still a video game. A BAD video game, yes, but a video game nonetheless.

Fortunately, Brawl is one of the greatest video games of all time, despite what some people on this forum think. The scores speak for themselves and if that's with tripping included, I can only imagine how much more awesome Smash 4 will be...

Is this whole thread just you being purposely dense? All I've seen from you are posts flying over your head. Of course he didn't mean it literally, why you seem to take every post you respond to 100% literally is beyond me.


And I wasn't aware people took reviews and scores seriously anymore, or ever really. Next you're going to be telling me Royals was the best song (no disrespect to Lorde) because of the Grammy's. Video games reviewers are like the worst reviewers of any entertainment/art medium dude.

 

[Tristan_win]

I would really like to know what Sakurai himself consider what a party game to be. What features does he think define a party game and then I would like him to define what features prevent a game to be labeled as a party game.

I mean before the internet was as big as it is now my friend and I use to gather together and have Halo parties. Halo to my knowledge has never been consider a party game but we use to play all sort of whacky modes. Better yet with each new version of Halo that has come out the options for whacky modes have only increased. I almost want to start a argument that Halo 4 is a better 'party game' then Smash could ever be.

edit: If done correctly Smash could become the best fighting game series to be ever made but the developer doesn't care about that so he's pursing the 'lofty' title of best party game...the sad thing is it would be much easier if he pursued the best fighting game title instead.

 

[Phantom High]

Sakurai should understand that he already accomplished his goal of drawing in new players by having the likes of Mario, Sonic, Mega Man, PAC, Pikachu, and Link in this game.

That's the biggest appeal to cross over games like Marvel vs Capcom and Smash. The ability to play as your favorite character. I admitted that I bought umvc3 after mvc3 because Phoenix ****ing Wright was in.

However I do think Sakurai should make the game be interesting (by beingmore offensive). I mean I haven't played Brawl in years and begun replaying Melee.

Unfortunately, I fear Sakurai is making some similar mistakes like with Brawl. Still I'm cautiously optimistic like Ken, KDJ, and M2K advised.

 

[#HBC | Red Ryu]

Video games reviewers are like the worst reviewers of any entertainment/art medium dude.

It's a lot more person dependent than media dependent.

 

[Tagxy]

Just got back from a free pizza party and won a $150 melee tournament so having a good night. Thought Id take the time to chat with yall smash 4 boarders.

First of all I think folks arent using correct context or should improve on picking up contexual uncertainty. I doubt sakurai intends to label smash directly as a party game. In previous interviews in fact, hes been against tying any label to the game. Based on the full quote, it sounds like he wants as many people as possible to enjoy the game.

He's not quite blatantly been trying for some middle ground outside of what he's been saying. Tripping was fundamentally flawed in every since imaginable, not only competitively. He's removing something that should have never existed. That's not something we're supposed to be giving him kudos for. That's something we're supposed to expect at a minimum. A balance team isn't going to change whatever Sakurai designs, they're just going to balance the game, another thing that we're supposed to expect.

This isn't even close to true and this statement is quite frankly ignorant of really understanding of game design.

The point of platformers and fighting games (like smash) is to give all the control to the players with their character.

Taking it away with a random mechanic like that literally destroys the principle on which it stands.

In other words, IT MAKES VIDEO GAMES NOT PLAYABLE AND THUS NOT A VIDEO GAME!!!

To say otherwise is just tomfoolery.

This is incorrect. Keeping in mind that tripping was added to complement its competitive aspects and not platforming. Chance is a prominent (and likely essential) part of competition. Peeps who get rustled about things like 'luck' like to measure things such as "percieved skill" instead of victories and make excuses for losses. A very strong argument could be made that true competition always includes elements of chance.

That being said, tripping was bad game design. You dont need to introduce chance into the game or if you do it could be done in a much more fun/appealing way (i.e. peach turnips). But it doesnt strongly affect the games competitive viability. Anyways, I would say in this case your statements on tripping are mostly incorrect.

As master roshi says, "Luck and strength go hand in hand"

Wait, expecting a good game qualifies as entitlement these days? The **** is going on around here?

You're entitled to want things changed in a product you plan to purchase with your money to be as good as it can be to you.

It's called capitalism.

Just because you oppose these capitalistic principles doesn't mean you should tell people what to do.

The issue here is the statement "good game". This doesnt apply strictly to what pizza said or tripping, but rather the general sentiment of the statement that tends to exist among a certain crowd. Obviously people are entitled to ask for what they want. What they are not entitled to is defining what a "good game" is. This is the biggest issue most have with certain melee peeps is they have a very specific and personal definition for what a "good game" is, which they then generalize to something that applies broadly and to everyone. It gets even worse when they start asking for very specific mechanics like wave dashing or dash dancing. If this doesnt apply to your perspective then its not worth worrying about.

Melee wasn't balanced all that great. The difference between Mewtwo and Fox is huge. It's just that Brawl was even worse with its God-tier character. You can honestly just feel how weak Zelda is compared to Meta Knight when you play them. Every move that Meta Knight makes is a good one, whereas some of Zelda's moves might be horrendous except in some situations depending on the matchup.

I feel like Sakurai's balancing methods are a bit naive and don't really take into account the kinds of things that actually happen in the game. For example: trading power for speed is not always an even trade (Slower characters like Ganondorf or Bowser vs. Fox or Marth in Melee), nor is trading damage potential for KO potential (Meta Knight in Brawl). Having 3 more (possibly naive) people only made things worse. Having 12 good people will hopefully make it better.

And I'll never see that as a problem. Fox's dominance came with a long time of trial/error (over a decade if I recall) and has more exposed weaknesses to his prowess. He's never the perfect pick and quite difficult to master perfectly, so you'll bomb hard if you don't know what you're doing with his match-ups. MK on the other hand...there's not much you can do about him normally. He's literally a character that covers his weaknesses with little to no trouble. It's been several years and he's pretty much stapled to his current position. Only time he'll move if he's banned or PJ:M is enabled. And to me, that just sounds like people given up on the original and just make some heavy modifications for their own benefits. But oh well, to keep things competitive I guess.

Obviously, it won't be as easy to modify for this next generation, but being ban happy sounds very possible. Will it happen? I'm not sure, but knowing when a character is taking most of the high placement results is going to influence it even more and we know how that went well the first time.

How=???

The top 8 at Melee at EVO 2014, aka the biggest tournament ever for Smash (970 entrants), saw the top 8 players in top 8 use 10 different characters.

"I saw more of this in one particular instance, therefore it is true."

At the last major I went to (it had 180 entrants) I faced 9 people in pools and they used 7 characters.

Then again 5 of them used ONLY Samus, which was weird, and not something I think I'll ever see again. I didn't even know 5 people main'd Samus.

Meta Knight mains have won OVER HALF OF ALL BRAWL TOURNAMENTS!!!

He also makes half of the cast irrelevant because he's a counter to half the cast.

Look at the top 5 Brawl players. They play at most 3 characters.

The top 5 at Melee right now (Mango, HBox, Armada, PewPewU, and M2K) main 5 different characters, and play an additional 5 or so characters among them.

Seriously dude. If you paid a little bit of attention to both games competitively, you'd know you're dead wrong.

I've played both games competitively, and melee certainly has more balance issues than Brawl. The biggest issue for "balance" with brawl is that meta knight is simple to succeed with below top level, while spacies are not. However once you get to top level the situation reverses, spacies becomes pretty dominating. Actually I think in the last four Brawl nationals an MK has won only once. Additionally, Mk's prominance is attributed to those who use MK as a main or secondary. With this standard, evo top 8 had 50% using a spacies and all of the top 5 use spacies.

To discuss the interview, I cannot express enough how much I hate hate hate hate hate hate this "sweet spot" he keeps talking about between old players and new. Firstly because he's done practically nothing to show that he's actually tried to do this and secondly because it's probably the worst uses of the golden mean fallacy I've ever witnessed. It's a talking point and nothing more, and I can't even buy it because of mostly everything else that he's said. And if you have a fantastic game and a game that ranges (depending on who you ask) somewhere between an abortion to simply underwhelming, you don't balance between the two.

I believe youre the one using a similar fallacy, that the solution only exists at an extreme. Its also false that he has done nothing to improve the game that appeals towards melee fans.

Edit: Oh yeah one last thing. Simma down folks. Theres been a lot of complaints lately (in general and among higher ups) that things here are becoming too rowdy and people arent putting enough thought into their posts. Obviously not all subjects need deep analysis, but for topics like this simply saying your opinion just to say it, or repeating things said many times or otherwise not putting much analysis into your posts should be avoided.

 

[pupNapoleon]

As far as what Sakurai wants to accomplish with Smash 4, it's pretty obvious that he's trying to add as many customization options to the multiplayer as possible in order to give players as many options as possible. Whether it's custom movesets, custom equipment, Smash Run, or the ability to train your own Amiibo, Sakurai wants to make players feel as though their chosen characters are extensions of themselves and their preferred playstyles. Sakurai's main critique of the traditional "competitive" fighter is that it ultimately tends to boil down to repeating a few optimal strategies to win, and becomes repetitive. That's why he's always interested in finding new elements to mix things up and make each match feel unique. (Random tripping was a really stupid way to try to make this happen)
Interestingly, Melee's success and longetivity has a lot to do with it's versatile movement options which allow for a lot of variety in playstyles, so Sakurai unintentionally succeeded at implementing this aspect of his philosophy.(Whether he realizes this is unknown) Where Melee seems to have frightened him, however, is the fact that competitive play is highly demanding and inaccessible to newer players, and that conflicts with his second critique of the traditional fighter, which is the fact that they tend to be difficult for new players to pick up and learn. Brawl was a reaction to this fear of the series becoming too exclusive and restricted to hardcore players. With Smash 4, Sakurai wants to keep Brawl's accessibility while incorporating new elements to allow for a greater variety of playstyles, and to keep the game fresh for years.

Beautifully said, captain. Sincerely the best statement that has been said on the storyboard of Sakurai's take on competition and evidence for it, thus far. Should be receiving more recognition.

Anytime you hear Sakurai talk about reaching new players, that's code for the next generation of Nintendo consumers, children. Nothing wrong with catering to young kids, but keep in mind the theme does lend itself to audiences more familiar with the material that also tend to have higher expectations.

Megaman and Pacman are not the friend of children these days. Wii Fit Trainer is not geared towards children, nor is a puppeteering character easier to use.
Nintendo's entire marketing strategy for the Wii was blue ocean, to reach audiences that didn't even know they were part of the demographic. I think Sakurai is trying to reach out to more of these people- and then with inclusions like Pacman, Megaman, and Little Mac, reach out to more classic gamers. New gamers to a game does NOT mean children, sorry bub. Smash is popular but it does not mean everyone with a console had it.

 

[The Slayer]

I've played both games competitively, and melee certainly has more balance issues than Brawl. The biggest issue for "balance" with brawl is that meta knight is simple to succeed with below top level, while spacies are not. However once you get to top level the situation reverses, spacies becomes pretty dominating. Actually I think in the last four Brawl nationals an MK has won only once. Additionally, Mk's prominance is attributed to those who use MK as a main or secondary. With this standard, evo top 8 had 50% using a spacies and all of the top 5 use spacies.

And only two of the five actually used it in said EVO this year, which (once again) isn't all that bad than it sounds. WHOBOs banned MK, so that doesn't count too much. SKTAR 3 is probably the only national that isn't MK heavy, but previous SKTAR slightly was (fortunately, not too many at top 8). I'm not saying things haven't gotten better for either game, but it still is what it is.

 

[laces]

Could we be looking at a potential perfect score? o.o

I think I'd only care if it got more people to play. Other than that I know it'll be at least a 9/10 for me.

 

[JV5Chris]

Megaman and Pacman are not the friend of children these days. Wii Fit Trainer is not geared towards children, nor is a puppeteering character easier to use.

Nintendo's entire marketing strategy for the Wii was blue ocean, to reach audiences that didn't even know they were part of the demographic. I think Sakurai is trying to reach out to more of these people- and then with inclusions like Pacman, Megaman, and Little Mac, reach out to more classic gamers.

To my point, Smash's mascot fighter theme really isn't for an expanded audience. It appeals to a specific gamer demographic that yes, they want a bigger portion of.

New gamers to a game does NOT mean children, sorry bub. Smash is popular but it does not mean everyone with a console had it.

Children are not the only potential new audience, but they are the primary group Sakurai is referring to when justifying his design decisions to ease in new players. Think about it, Megaman, Punchout, and even Pacman are difficult games by today's standards. They're not the group that needs hand-holding, not that Smash has ever required much in the first place.

 

[Jumpman84]

Is this whole thread just you being purposely dense? All I've seen from you are posts flying over your head. Of course he didn't mean it literally, why you seem to take every post you respond to 100% literally is beyond me.

I'm not the one making up stories about Sakurai firing people or saying that tripping made Brawl not a video game. And no, that's not me being dense. That is what he actually said, as baffling as it was.

In other words, IT MAKES VIDEO GAMES NOT PLAYABLE AND THUS NOT A VIDEO GAME!!!

His words, not mine. And based on his previous posts, it seems pretty obvious to me that he meant it literally. And it's not just him. A lot of people treat tripping like it's the apocalypse when it wasn't really that bad. Tripping only had a 1% chance of happening and only when trying to dash did that factor come into play. Granted, people would be trying to dash a lot in competitive play, so the tripping occurrences would pop up more.

Instead of complaining about it making the game "less fun", why not factor it into your strategy? If you know there's a random chance of tripping when you dash, don't dash as much or anticipate the trip. It's the same principle with items, you use them to your advantage or learn to anticipate them. The difference is that there was no way to turn tripping off. If there was, then I doubt anyone would even be talking about this today.

And I wasn't aware people took reviews and scores seriously anymore, or ever really. Next you're going to be telling me Royals was the best song (no disrespect to Lorde) because of the Grammy's. Video games reviewers are like the worst reviewers of any entertainment/art medium dude

Never heard of this Royals song, but if people don't take reviews seriously, then why do reviewers still exist? Why do we have so much controversy when a reviewer scores a game too low (like the infamous 8.8 of Twilight Princess)? Why are some developers denied their bonus if they don't reach a certain Metacritic score? You may not take reviews seriously (since you think they're not very good), but you are not "people", you are just one person. Many people use reviews as a guideline to determine if a game is worth their time to play. High reviews across the board? Then it's probably worth your time and money. Low scores? Perhaps I should hold off on that one and get this other game instead. Reviewers are being paid to see a movie or play a game and then write an article about its pros and cons. If they weren't taken seriously, then why waste the money employing them to do just that?

 

[#HBC | Red Ryu]

And only two of the five actually used it in said EVO this year, which (once again) isn't all that bad than it sounds. WHOBOs banned MK, so that doesn't count too much. SKTAR 3 is probably the only national that isn't MK heavy, but previous SKTAR slightly was (fortunately, not too many at top 8). I'm not saying things haven't gotten better for either game, but it still is what it is.

To be fair, Street Fighter is really the only game I've seen more balanced in comp play than Smash in terms of variety.

There are a lot of games much much worse off than smash is.

 

[rawrimamonster]

I hope the last bit doesn't mean he's still making the game super similar to Brawl.

Of course it does, did people really think the game would change that much before release? Sakurai is a very stubborn man. People who actually played it extensively have all said its a faster Brawl with lots of landing lag and stun in certain places, but that still means its another Brawl.