Still has derivative specials...

[Luco]

Clone also implies that the clone came from an original, and Lucas pretty clearly came from Ness. Where's Greninja's original?

Again, rather then having virtually every move mimic Ness's in some way, they could of made Lucas completely different (and potentially more accurate) instead. But they specifically chose for him to be similar to Ness. Remember when everybody thought he was going to replace Ness in Brawl? Wouldn't of happened if they weren't so similar.

The term does imply that the clone came from an original. But do you think Gunner would have had the same default Nspec as Samus had Samus not been in the game? I realise this is on a smaller scale, however...

I still believe the issue lies in our definition. If we adhere to how the term was originally used, then we can only say characters that have 100% of the same moves are clones. Changing the definition to the way you see it is just as valid as the way anyone else would change it. I believe the line rests between intent and action, and I suspect this is what much of the community believes as well (if you like I can go in depth a little more here). Lucas was certainly made to be similar to Ness in certain aspects, but in plenty others he wasn't. That is why we have the term 'similar', right?

 

[LancerStaff]

I feel like everyone who talks like this has never played the Mother games. You realize moves like PK Thunder / PK Fire and stuff were in Mother 3 right? The only difference is that it wasn't his moves and I'm pretty sure that's because Lucas's character is boring as hell as well as Ness if they were to use their actual special moves from the game. Both characters are support-like characters and that's especially noticeable in Mother 3 when you play Lucas. I guess they could have give him PK Love but that's already his smash attack and some of his aerials, unless you want to make Lucas another character with a Counter like in the game in addition to giving him a Shield / Healing Move to at which point he has no offensive special attacks, so in the end even if he was unique to his character, I can imagine him being boring as hell and possibly even weak if all he can do is take reduced damage from some time and can heal himself occasionally but knowing Wii Fit Trainer, I'm pretty sure it wouldn't even heal that much to begin with.

Also I highly doubt Lucas was based off Ness, and I'm confident the striped shirt / wearing shorts is a traditional protagonist thing for protagonist in the SMT series to emphasize on their youth because the game is all about growing up and maturing as a person. At the end of the day the characters share extremely different stories and personalities and I mean you can keep calling him a clone, I'm not denying that. Oh well I'm done with this conversation because it seems most of the people I argue with haven't even played Mother series yet so it's pointless anyways lol.

Sorry, didn't see this one.

Yes, I've actually played through Earthbound. Looked up enough of the other games to understand where the references come from. It was just an idea for him to have something that closer resemble's his in-game moves instead of mimicing Ness.

What I'm trying to say is, that rather then building something from the ground up, they had Lucas mimic almost every of Ness's moves. Rather then making a completely new design, they called back to Ness and Ninten. It's no coincidence that the characters are similar.

Don't have much to say to the other one.

The term does imply that the clone came from an original. But do you think Gunner would have had the same default Nspec as Samus had Samus not been in the game? I realise this is on a smaller scale, however...

I still believe the issue lies in our definition. If we adhere to how the term was originally used, then we can only say characters that have 100% of the same moves are clones. Changing the definition to the way you see it is just as valid as the way anyone else would change it. I believe the line rests between intent and action, and I suspect this is what much of the community believes as well (if you like I can go in depth a little more here). Lucas was certainly made to be similar to Ness in certain aspects, but in plenty others he wasn't. That is why we have the term 'similar', right?

Miis mostly have cloned moves, but that's different because they take from many different characters. They're something of a Chimera, so to speak.

Not even Dolly the sheep was 100% the same. Nowhere is it specified that you have to be 100% the same to be a clone. And if we're going down this road then one could argue that Dark Pit and Lucina aren't clones just because they're only similar. That's just wrong. "Similar" can be used in place of "clone," but not the other way around as "similar" doesn't contain "clone."

 

[Drippy]

Sorry, didn't see this one.

Yes, I've actually played through Earthbound. Looked up enough of the other games to understand where the references come from. It was just an idea for him to have something that closer resemble's his in-game moves instead of mimicing Ness.

What I'm trying to say is, that rather then building something from the ground up, they had Lucas mimic almost every of Ness's moves. Rather then making a completely new design, they called back to Ness and Ninten. It's no coincidence that the characters are similar.

I mean I think if you mean making PK Fire / PK Freeze / PK Thunder working completely differently instead of just having different physics (his PK Fire just popping them up) then I can understand. I said in another thread if they were going to give him a Lifeup mechanic I'd imagine it to work similar to Wii Fit Trainer's Down B which heals a little bit and boosts his damage or defense (to incorporate Offense / Defense Up too) or possibly the rhythm combo mechanic from Mother 3 but then how would you implement that so it's different from Marth's Dancing Blade. Basically what I'm saying is that it's really hard to incorporate his own PSI moves unless he has a heavy combat user to begin with, I mean assuming he copies from Duster or uses items from the game then he'd just be a very Snake-like character which doesn't fit Lucas IMO and I guess staying true to the game would make him fight with sticks like he does in the game though... I guess that would make him a swordsfighter? Or perhaps stickfighter, I don't know. On the other hand I can kind of see where you're coming, and I assume you're mainly talking about Itoi right now because I doubt Sakurai in stuff had control over the design of Lucas's character, however what Sakura could have done is included alternate outfits that appear in the game if that's what you're talking about as well. Also as I said, I personally would find it very difficult to incorporate Lucas's PSI moves into his moveset while making him a balanced and fun character, like I really don't see anything fun about just healing / buffing myself (which is basically how you actually played Lucas in Mother 3 and that was boring)

 

[Luco]

Miis mostly have cloned moves, but that's different because they take from many different characters. They're something of a Chimera, so to speak.

Not even Dolly the sheep was 100% the same. Nowhere is it specified that you have to be 100% the same to be a clone. And if we're going down this road then one could argue that Dark Pit and Lucina aren't clones just because they're only similar. That's just wrong. "Similar" can be used in place of "clone," but not the other way around as "similar" doesn't contain "clone."

Right, that's fair. But that leaves us with where we draw the line. To be totally honest, I would have no problem with not calling D. Pit and Lucina clones, however the reason I like it is because there is a communal idea that draws the line somewhere between Lucas and these guys. Somewhere around the idea that D. Pit and Lucina were most likely intended to play almost the same way whilst Lucas wasn't.

Your definition is interesting, but I feel as if by your logic you can call Villager a clone of Snake from Brawl ----> UpB is similar, aside from the fact Villager can't control it sideB is similar, downB plants X, when downB is activated again Y occurs to X, up and downtilts are easy, strong and used to kill. This falls under roughly the same category as Lucas and Ness and the most fundamental point of your argument, that a predecessor was necessary for the subject in question, could be argued to be present (I really do suspect a lot of what Villager is based around had stuff taken from Snake). On the other hand, Villager has plenty that was developed to be just for Villager, much like Lucas has plenty of things that were clearly developed for him and not based off Ness. My question to you is where do you draw that line? Where does it become apparent that one character's attributes are clearly based off another's; and how many moves does one need to have that are based off another's to be considered a clone?

 

[LancerStaff]

Right, that's fair. But that leaves us with where we draw the line. To be totally honest, I would have no problem with not calling D. Pit and Lucina clones, however the reason I like it is because there is a communal idea that draws the line somewhere between Lucas and these guys. Somewhere around the idea that D. Pit and Lucina were most likely intended to play almost the same way whilst Lucas wasn't.

Your definition is interesting, but I feel as if by your logic you can call Villager a clone of Snake from Brawl ----> UpB is similar, aside from the fact Villager can't control it sideB is similar, downB plants X, when downB is activated again Y occurs to X, up and downtilts are easy, strong and used to kill. This falls under roughly the same category as Lucas and Ness and the most fundamental point of your argument, that a predecessor was necessary for the subject in question, could be argued to be present (I really do suspect a lot of what Villager is based around had stuff taken from Snake). On the other hand, Villager has plenty that was developed to be just for Villager, much like Lucas has plenty of things that were clearly developed for him and not based off Ness. My question to you is where do you draw that line? Where does it become apparent that one character's attributes are clearly based off another's; and how many moves does one need to have that are based off another's to be considered a clone?

Snake doesn't use balloons, trees, or Japanese grave charms at all, though, and it not a minor visual change like Captain Falcon's fire to Dorfs darkness. There's very loose connections that you're just trying to make for the sake of argument. Snake can act out of his and has light armor, Villager can take just two hits to the balloons and can't do anything out of it. That's a lot more then slower, stronger vs faster, weaker. Snake's missile is controlable, powerful, and he cannot move while it's in use, Villager's Gyroid has a delayed start, cannot be controlled, can be ridden, and can otherwise move while it's out. Snake's C4 is just place, explode. Villager's tree is plant, water or shove people with the can, chop down or chop people. Villager also has to be close. Villager's tree is nothing like a remote mine before customs, and after it's still very loose.

That's about one-hundred times more than Ness and Lucas's differences. Please, you're not going to make any progress going down this road. Lucas is a clone by definition.

 

[Luco]

Snake doesn't use balloons, trees, or Japanese grave charms at all, though, and it not a minor visual change like Captain Falcon's fire to Dorfs darkness. There's very loose connections that you're just trying to make for the sake of argument. Snake can act out of his and has light armor, Villager can take just two hits to the balloons and can't do anything out of it. That's a lot more then slower, stronger vs faster, weaker. Snake's missile is controlable, powerful, and he cannot move while it's in use, Villager's Gyroid has a delayed start, cannot be controlled, can be ridden, and can otherwise move while it's out. Snake's C4 is just place, explode. Villager's tree is plant, water or shove people with the can, chop down or chop people. Villager also has to be close. Villager's tree is nothing like a remote mine before customs, and after it's still very loose.

That's about one-hundred times more than Ness and Lucas's differences. Please, you're not going to make any progress going down this road. Lucas is a clone by definition.

I already have. This is the exact argument I used to explain why Lucas and Ness are not clones. I don't know if you legitimately think Lucas' moves are just about slower vs weaker, stronger vs faster, because that's just not true. Stop thinking the game developers don't know anything about how things are going to be used and look at these things on such a superficial level. You countered it by going into specifics and the only way you have to differentiate our arguments is apparently "that's about a hundred times more than Ness and Lucas' differences." That's just not a solid boundary. I'll also have you know this partially wasn't for the sake of argument, as I've mentioned many times before about how similar Villager is to how Snake used to be in many ways. I'd like to remind you Lucas and Ness share approximately 35% of all their moves (This is including stuff like AD, tethers and taunts, which is applicable in this argument). That 35% is probably the only amount I would say that Lucas is even 'derived' from Ness. I certainly am not going to believe any time soon for instance, that his Usmash was inspired by Ness' yoyo or even that his Nair was inspired by Ness (I don't think the game developers thought "let's continue the theme of turning hitbox here!" as many characters have similar Nairs that cover their whole body, such as MK or Diddy (not sure if he had that Nair in Brawl actually) ). That is less than half their moveset. Of course Lucas was inspired by Ness, this does not make him a clone and you still have not shown me why your definition covers this. You haven't shown me why the boundaries are not subjective. Why do we not draw the line at 50% of the same moveset? How about 75%? This binary line appears to be as invisible for you as our boundaries are for us. It's because of this that I refuse to accept your statement of 'Lucas is by definition a clone' because you haven't proven that your interpretation of that definition is the correct one and I've exemplified why at a specific level Lucas does not come under that definition of a clone. Because what defines 'similar'? Does playing a game competitively make a difference as to where you draw a line (probably)? These are the questions you haven't answered.

Villager's specials are very obviously different from Snake's in many ways. But could they have been derived from him? I don't think it's that large a stretch of the imagination. Your point that my comparisons are loose are the exact same thing I've said to you, so you told me they have to be based off an original. The idea of a Usmash that puts down firework shooters and shoots fireworks could very well have been based off Snake's Usmash. I could argue that even in performance and function they are relatively similar, it's just Villager doesn't shoot a projectile that obeys the laws of gravity.

 

[AirJordans]

This thread is getting ridiculous. Everyone is arguing about semantics at this point. The fact of the matter is, while they are very different for a lot of reasons, that Lucas came from Ness. He wasn't made out of the blue and unless I don't know something wacky about them I doubt they made Ness and Lucas unintentionally similar. Is this a problem? It isn't to me. Whether you consider Lucas as a clone, a new character, a "TRUE" clone, or whatever else. If it is to you, then choose what this means for you (play him or don't). Whatever the case, there will be more clones as well as new characters introduced in the series and you can all rest easy knowing you'll all be getting some of what you want.

 

[Luco]

This thread is getting ridiculous. Everyone is arguing about semantics at this point. The fact of the matter is, while they are very different for a lot of reasons, that Lucas came from Ness. He wasn't made out of the blue and unless I don't know something wacky about them I doubt they made Ness and Lucas unintentionally similar. Is this a problem? It isn't to me. Whether you consider Lucas as a clone, a new character, a "TRUE" clone, or whatever else. If it is to you, then choose what this means for you (play him or don't). Whatever the case, there will be more clones as well as new characters introduced in the series and you can all rest easy knowing you'll all be getting some of what you want.

But friend! Everything is about "semantics" at heart, you know. Interpretation seems to be everything in this world.

Um, but on a slightly less meta and slightly more serious note, the important thing to me is definitely that Lucas is back and I love him, probably in any form they could make him in. I'm so ready for June! :D

 

[Quillion]

But friend! Everything is about "semantics" at heart, you know. Interpretation seems to be everything in this world.

Um, but on a slightly less meta and slightly more serious note, the important thing to me is definitely that Lucas is back and I love him, probably in any form they could make him in. I'm so ready for June! :D

To be clear, I specified that I know he's not a true clone. But he still has derivative specials and that irritated me.

 

[LancerStaff]

*sigh*

There's no such thing as a "true clone." Clone implies differences already. Where is this imaginary line between "clone" and "semi-clone?" How isn't it just an arbitrary definition?