Should "Clones" Return? Thread.

[PrinnyFlute]

OIC!11! Well, in any case, I'd choose the highest number of characters with clones. More characters is great, and it should get easier to playtest and balance the game as the number of original characters goes down and the number of clones go up, meaning there'd be a greater likelihood we wouldn't have another tier disaster on our hands.

 

[DonkeySmasher]

hmmm i thought people would go for the middle one

anyway as long as the characters are luigified clones and makes sence (ganandorf to falcon was a mistake) i'm ok

 

[Mckillyou]

Clones are fun Am I the only person who was ever better with Pichu and Roy? And, is that a bad thing O_O

 

[PrinnyFlute]

hmmm i thought people would go for the middle one

anyway as long as the characters are luigified clones and makes sence (ganandorf to falcon was a mistake) i'm ok

I'm all about being able to play as characters I like. Much more than having as many 'original movesets' in the game as possible. So it's probably safe to assume not everyone would agree.

 

[Copperpot]

Shoddy? Dude, no offense meant, but how many games have you been involved in making?

Admittedly, none. But, what does my credibility have to do with this? I'm just offering my opinion like everyone else here.

Also, I don't mean any offense, either. I suppose it's my journalistic writing style taking over. Sometimes I push people's buttons without realizing it.

Sakurai, or any smart game designer that efficiently recycles content, isn't trying to 'trick' people into thinking his team did more work than they did. They're trying to give people the most fun possible with a limited amount of time and money. I think it's safe to assume the majority of Smash sales are just regular gamers who want to play as their favorite Nintendo characters. Honestly, I'd much rather be playing Lucario as a Fox clone this time next year and be happy with it instead of playing an entirely original character that I...just don't care that much about.

I can empathize with you, here. I understand that the most important part of development process is making sure that the game is fun. I don't think that giving Lucario Fox's moveset is going to make him any more of a valid character, though (not a Pokemon fan).

...Ganondorf didn't really make much sense, though.

He's the one that pained me the most to see as a clone.

I had a local game designer visit our program recently, actually, and he said some pretty interesting things. The best quote, though, was along the lines of, 'The thing about making a game is that you're never done with it. You're never really done with it. It just gets to a point where you're out of time and/or money and you give up on it. You give up on it because you know it's good enough and you've gone as far as you can with it.'

Point taken. He sounds like a reasonably smart man, and a lot of what he said plays into media and art in general.

I went to college for Game Design, but it's something I'll never use my degree for. I'm too much of a perfectionist (borderline Obsessive Compulsive) to survive in that field, so I returned to art.

I think the only designers that can take as much time as they want to make games are the really big names that aren't tied to any one console, (so there's not as much rush to make a 'system selling game' like Smash,) and Miyamoto. ...And the guy behind Duke Nukem Forever, apparently.

Agreed. Sometimes you just have to take Nintendo for what it is, a business, and justify the fact that they need to make money like everyone else. I'm not trying to make them out to be the 'evil' corporation that's just after your money, but in reality, they are in a way. It's just boggling to me that they'd sooner shove a game as dominant in the industry as Smash Bros out the door without giving it the fine pollish it deserves.

So, it comes down to what will help the majority of players have more fun; fewer characters, all original, or a larger roster with a handful of clones at the end. We all might have our own opinions on this, but in the end we'll have to see what Sakurai says.

Not much to say. You're nailed it, here.

 

[Doggalina]

They have their place. It is beneficial to two characters with similar movesets and different stats. So, I say, hats off to the new clones and welcome.

I concur. Sure, they should try to get as many original movesets as possible, but, as that deadline gets closer and closer, they should add clones just for the sake of having more characters. Since when were more characters detrimental to any fighting game?

 

[PrinnyFlute]

Admittedly, none. But, what does my credibility have to do with this? I'm just offering my opinion like everyone else here.

Sorry, mate. Didn't especially mean to attack your credibility. I've worked on about four academic projects, so when I hear people talk about 'shoddy' or 'lazy' clones, it gets my fur raised. Me and my programmers were lucky to have a working product in some cases, and if I'd been smarter about stuff like this we would've had loads more assets for the games...

I can empathize with you, here. I understand that the most important part of development process is making sure that the game is fun. I don't think that giving Lucario Fox's moveset is going to make him any more of a valid character, though (not a Pokemon fan).

BLASPHEMER! HADOKEN POKEMON FINDS YOU IN CONTEMPT!

Point taken. He sounds like a reasonably smart man, and a lot of what he said plays into media and art in general.

I went to college for Game Design, but it's something I'll never use my degree for. I'm too much of a perfectionist (borderline Obsessive Compulsive) to survive in that field, so I returned to art.

Yea, when he said it it reminded me of what some of my best traditional art teachers have told me before. (That a work is never really finished, of course, and there's always more to do. Just a matter of finding a good enough place to stop, eventually.)

And I definitely feel you on that. One of the biggest issues I've noticed when making any of my own game ideas with my team in class is that...well, Jesus, it's a team full of college students. They're impossible to wrangle and it always turns out nothing like I had in mind. Because of that I keep thinking it might just be best to go into making smaller games by myself. Just so I can make sure it gets right from the grey matter to the page, yeah?

Agreed. Sometimes you just have to take Nintendo for what it is, a business, and justify the fact that they need to make money like everyone else. I'm not trying to make them out to be the 'evil' corporation that's just after your money, but in reality, they are in a way. It's just boggling to me that they'd sooner shove a game as dominant in the industry as Smash Bros out the door without giving it the fine pollish it deserves.

Ultimately, it's true. (See: DS prints money!) Brawl is a huge Wii title (second only to Galaxy for most, and even more important than that for everyone here, I'm sure,) and the Wii lineup HAS admittedly been skimpy lately. Sakurai gets a lot of respect from his colleagues, and with that he's buying more time than he had with the last two games. But he's not Miyamoto, and I imagine there is a push to get the game on shelves during the big Christmas season this year.

In any case, it once again comes down to the issue of preference. I never much minded clones, and I don't think they represent a lack of polish. Even if he DID have all the time he wanted, I still might hope for him to put clones in so he could get more characters in with his time and, like some have said, offer that fun bit of strategy they sometimes represent.

But then I'm pretty sure Sakurai said something like he's moving away from clones, so I'm probably just swinging at nothin'.

 

[OysterMeister]

I'm all for clones. Always have been, always will be.
But I don't think a large number of new clones will be necessary to get this game out in time or to make it properly balanced.
Because Melee has already been made. I'll explain. Look at a few of the released screen shots, some of the ones that show returning characters in action. Anything look familiar? You may notice that by far and away most of the returning characters in Brawl have almost completely identicle moves to what they had in Melee. Very probably, the only real difference in the movesets of returning characters will be in their stats, which essentialy makes them clones from melee.
This trend would mean that a very sizeable portion of the final roster in Brawl would be re-creations of what we've all seen and played in melee. Considering this, a Brawl roster of 40 original characters and then some clones might not be so far fetched, since about half of that number will be already created content. Add to this the larger, better funded, more experienced team that Sakurai has this time around, and a roster of 40 or so starts seeming more and more possible.


And Ganondorf didn't get screwed out of a moveset by being a Falcon clone, he got INTO a moveset by being a Falcon clone. Otherwise he wouldn't have even been in Melee. That's the thing about clones to remember. They're not shortcomings, they're over-achievements.

 

[DonkeySmasher]

while it is true that returning characters seem to have the same moves remember besides zelda these characters are part of the original twelve therefore they can't make any drastic changes to them

also this game is on a new engine therefore cloning returning characters in melee might skip the making the moveset part but will take considerable time

i for one expect 40-45 characters in which 5-7 of them are clones