Spoice
Smash Journeyman
Putting this in Melee's sub forum because it's mostly about the competitive scene, if it's wrong could a mod please direct it to where it should go please.
Quick disclaimer: I respect Sakurai a load and appreciate his contribution to the industry, he's an awesome developer, and I in no way have any true 'anger' or 'hate' towards him, this is simply how I feel about his comments on competitive smash.
It's no secret Sakurai isn't a huge fan of the competitive scene, and since Brawl he's made it his job to make the game more aimed towards casuals. However, there's a couple of things I have a problem with.
1) Sakurai says that wavedashing would create a massive gap between competitive and casual players.......You mean the one that would already be there? Even in Brawl, the (arguably) most casual out of the 4, there will always be that gap between a player like M2K and a 5 year old, even if you take out wavedashing, or l cancelling.
2) Even if the game is competitive, why can't it be a party game? what because there's competitive depth I can't call over mom and dad to sit down, put items on and have a blast? I don't understand Sakurai's reasoning here, because the competitive players will have an edge over the casuals? Again, this will always be the case, he can't stop that, and even with all the depth it has, melee is a great party game, I don't understand his problem here.
3) Sakurai's attitude of "it's my game" sounds a bit childish I think. The way I'm interpreting that is that he thinks because it's his intellectual property, he should be the one to do what he wants with it, which is pretty selfish if you ask me. I just think he needs to be a bit more open minded on how he should go about treating the competitive scene. Don't get me wrong, he has given them some consideration in smash 4, with features like For Glory mode, but then when you have updates that take out DACUS and completely nerfing DI, I feel like he was only putting in those features to make the competitive players feel more welcome, when in reality, he still didn't like the idea of a competitive smash scene.
4) Even after all the loyalty of competitive smash fans, he treats them like second rate guests compared to the casuals. I can guarantee it was mostly the more hardcore nintendo fans that bought and hyped up the game. Go up to any casual gamer and just see if they know what Super Smash Bros is, and if they can name more than one entry. It's the loyalty of the fans that raised $90,000 for breast cancer research, the loyalty that kept Melee alive and thriving for so many years, and the loyalty of the fans that hyped the latest Smash Brothers to the point where it smashed records and caused GC adapters to me scarce, surely that must be sending a sign to Sakurai.
5) How Sakurai has stated that he believes "Melee is the sharpest" and I'm pretty sure he's stated it's his favorite entry in the series, but don't quote me on that. That, to me, is like kicking you when you're already down. He considers it the best he's developed, so why is it he neglects it so much? It seems Sakurai has this idea of creating a game that is so casual and easy to play, it's just a matter of who gets hit the most, he may as well have taken out the percentage feature and put in health bars really.
Do you guys think smash bros is better off without Sakurai, or do you think he can find a compromise? Because the way I'm seeing it, he's stopping at nothing to kill the competitive scene, it's a good thing Game cube games can't be updated, otherwise we'd have a Brawl prequel on our hands.
TL;DR: Sakurai seems to be hypocritical in his statements about the competitive scene.
Quick disclaimer: I respect Sakurai a load and appreciate his contribution to the industry, he's an awesome developer, and I in no way have any true 'anger' or 'hate' towards him, this is simply how I feel about his comments on competitive smash.
It's no secret Sakurai isn't a huge fan of the competitive scene, and since Brawl he's made it his job to make the game more aimed towards casuals. However, there's a couple of things I have a problem with.
1) Sakurai says that wavedashing would create a massive gap between competitive and casual players.......You mean the one that would already be there? Even in Brawl, the (arguably) most casual out of the 4, there will always be that gap between a player like M2K and a 5 year old, even if you take out wavedashing, or l cancelling.
2) Even if the game is competitive, why can't it be a party game? what because there's competitive depth I can't call over mom and dad to sit down, put items on and have a blast? I don't understand Sakurai's reasoning here, because the competitive players will have an edge over the casuals? Again, this will always be the case, he can't stop that, and even with all the depth it has, melee is a great party game, I don't understand his problem here.
3) Sakurai's attitude of "it's my game" sounds a bit childish I think. The way I'm interpreting that is that he thinks because it's his intellectual property, he should be the one to do what he wants with it, which is pretty selfish if you ask me. I just think he needs to be a bit more open minded on how he should go about treating the competitive scene. Don't get me wrong, he has given them some consideration in smash 4, with features like For Glory mode, but then when you have updates that take out DACUS and completely nerfing DI, I feel like he was only putting in those features to make the competitive players feel more welcome, when in reality, he still didn't like the idea of a competitive smash scene.
4) Even after all the loyalty of competitive smash fans, he treats them like second rate guests compared to the casuals. I can guarantee it was mostly the more hardcore nintendo fans that bought and hyped up the game. Go up to any casual gamer and just see if they know what Super Smash Bros is, and if they can name more than one entry. It's the loyalty of the fans that raised $90,000 for breast cancer research, the loyalty that kept Melee alive and thriving for so many years, and the loyalty of the fans that hyped the latest Smash Brothers to the point where it smashed records and caused GC adapters to me scarce, surely that must be sending a sign to Sakurai.
5) How Sakurai has stated that he believes "Melee is the sharpest" and I'm pretty sure he's stated it's his favorite entry in the series, but don't quote me on that. That, to me, is like kicking you when you're already down. He considers it the best he's developed, so why is it he neglects it so much? It seems Sakurai has this idea of creating a game that is so casual and easy to play, it's just a matter of who gets hit the most, he may as well have taken out the percentage feature and put in health bars really.
Do you guys think smash bros is better off without Sakurai, or do you think he can find a compromise? Because the way I'm seeing it, he's stopping at nothing to kill the competitive scene, it's a good thing Game cube games can't be updated, otherwise we'd have a Brawl prequel on our hands.
TL;DR: Sakurai seems to be hypocritical in his statements about the competitive scene.
