"The Act of Balancing” Sakurai Famitsu Column Translation

[ArikadoSD]

"Bland and half-hearted".

oh yes, posting a bunch of pics definitely proves his point wrong

 

[DaRkJaWs]

Every fighting game ever made has characters that can't be used competitively. They also have 3 or 4 characters that are obviously dominant. Even more recent and design-laden ones. With a roster of 50+ characters, there is literally no chance that anywhere even close to half that number will be viable, unless they're all clones of each other.

I disagree, I think at least half of the roster is viable in tournament, and while each character has matchup problems as long as someone plays multiple characters it should be fine.

 

[Someguyyoulikelydontknow]

"Recently, there was a tournament featuring the top Japanese and American players. In 1v1s, the natural tendency is to use low risk moves to gradually deal damage to the opponent. Smash attacks rarely came out, and the matches were prone to becoming long, drawn out affairs. When considering the variety of ways Smash can be played I think this is a waste, but the winner was certainly decided by skill."

Competitive Smash doesn't have to look this way Sakurai.

I want to know what tournament he watched. Some of the tournaments that I've watched are so fast paced they're almost scary. I was watching a steam of Ranai's Villager the other day, and he was so on point that his Villager looked like it came right out of a fast paced Dragon Ball Z style battle.

 

[Chandeelure]

I just can't understand Sakurai, "a move like Kirby's Stone can be broken to beginners and that's why it's useless"... wat.
EVERY MOVE CAN BE BROKEN FOR A BEGINNER, you can just spam Forward Smash with every character to kill them.

Also, the "people don't use Smash Attacks in tournaments, they only use weak and safe moves, that's not the way I like it"... That's because he made the shield, roles and air dodges freaking ridiculous, everybody can shield everything, that's why nobody uses punishable attacks.

I would love to speak to whoever is responsible for play testing Zelda. I will gladly give you a list of problems to report to Sakurai himself. She has so many blind spots and issues where players simply fall out of moves or they just fail to connect at all... At least F-smash was semi fixed last patch but this still happens on other moves. Instead of fixing issues lets make phantom take extra time to come back when destroyed. Brilliant balancing! I didn't think it was possible to make this move even worse but somehow you did it.

#FixPhantom2015

I guess if you made Phantom actually hit it would be too difficult for a beginner to avoid it. A storable charge for Phantom Slash would help a ton and would require very little coding to be changed (hint hint). I lost interest in Smash 4 after the last patch because its clear to see we won't be getting the adjustments needed for lower tiered characters anytime soon.

You should send a tweet to Sakurai and Nintendo with this video... a lot of tweets.

 

[Castle Maker]

<3 Daddy Sakurai!

 

[DaRkJaWs]

I just can't understand Sakurai, "a move like Kirby's Stone can be broken to beginners and that's why it's useless"... wat.
EVERY MOVE CAN BE BROKEN FOR A BEGINNER, you can just spam Forward Smash with every character to kill them.

Also, the "people don't use Smash Attacks in tournaments, they only use weak and safe moves, that's not the way I like it"... That's because he made the shield, roles and air dodges freaking ridiculous, everybody can shield everything, that's why nobody uses punishable attacks.


You should send a tweet to Sakurai and Nintendo with this video... a lot of tweets.

I agree that air dodging is a little too strong in this game, but rolling and shielding are beaten by grabbing, and I think a lot of players, including many top players, do not grab enough, including pivot grabbing (excluding diddy players of course).

 

[koopahermit]

Furthermore, if I went with what is fair according to advanced players, the beginners wouldn’t be able to keep up. For example, Kirby’s Stone attack probably won’t hit a player above intermediate skill level, but if I made it more powerful, it would destroy beginners.

So would buffing a falcon kick or a forward smash since anything can be considered OP to a beginner.

 

[Chandeelure]

I agree that air dodging is a little too strong in this game, but rolling and shielding are beaten by grabbing, and I think a lot of players, including many top players, do not grab enough, including pivot grabbing (excluding diddy players of course).

Yeah, yeah, I know, but the point I was trying to say is that good shields make Smash Attacks (or any slow attack) useless or at least punishable and that's why people only use fast aerials, tilts and grabs.
Grabs are pretty safe in general, well... except if you are Robin or something like that XD

 

[Mike_Tha_Hero]

Confirmed party game. Haha!

 

[Yomi's Biggest Fan]

Rekt.

 

[MarioMeteor]

I totally agree with you, remember that one time where Samus started punching people with her arm cannon. Or who could forget the iconic scene in Twilight Princess where Ganondorf uses his magical flying kick. But honestly my personal favorite is when Princess Peach slapped Bowser's *** to the moon with a frying pan.

None of the compares to the time Fox butterfly kicked Wolf, or when Falcon started using Taekwondo on Black Shadow.

No, I actually think they wouldn't. Case in point, Dabuz's Rosalina play. He exclusively plays her as a defensive character even though that's far from the optimal or most viable way to play as her. He simply plays that way because he prefers it. It's his natural playstyle, and has been since Brawl. However, because of this, other players play her like that too. This is how many of the top players think when using their characters.

And American players in general are really the main culprits of all of this bandwagoning and only using certain characters. In Japan and Europe, the scene is much more varied and there is much more interesting play and more variety in characters. There's more aggression and it gets results.

So no, the players are not perfect and without blame. Have you ever thought that maybe you are getting wrecked hard for playing aggressively because you simply can't play aggressively all that well?

Rosalina is a very defensive character, what are you talking about? She probably has one of the best defensive game in the game.

 

[THK]

I don't envy him. Smash is insanely ambitious and attempts to cater to as broad an audience as possible.

 

[Fancy]

"Smash attacks rarely came out, and the matches were prone to becoming long, drawn out affairs"
Sakurai you can't design a game where certain moves are more viable than others and expect people not to use those moves over others. Competitive play or not people are going to use the better move.
Other than that I pretty much agree with everything he said. It'll be interesting to see what smash will be like when it's handed to another developer.

 

[90007000]

Balance.

 

[Delzethin]

An article about balancing, full of antagonistic comments? Who would've thought?

 

[The Abyss22]

"Smash attacks rarely came out, and the matches were prone to becoming long, drawn out affairs"
Sakurai you can't design a game where certain moves are more viable than others and expect people not to use those moves over others. Competitive play or not people are going to use the better move.
Other than that I pretty much agree with everything he said. It'll be interesting to see what smash will be like when it's handed to another developer.

I truly agree with you. I think that smash needs a new direction to go into and someone that will bring the true potential out of smash. Don't get me wrong sakurai is an amazing game developer, but he is trying to find a fine line between hardcore and casual and those two can not coexist in a fighting game.

 

[The Abyss22]

I truly agree with you. I think that smash needs a new direction to go into and someone that will bring the true potential out of smash. Don't get me wrong sakurai is an amazing game developer, but he is trying to find a fine line between hardcore and casual and those two play can not coexist in a fighting game.

 

[#HBC | Red Ryu]

I never said any were the best at what they do, nor did I mention bias. My problem with the line of balancing mentioned is that online matches aren't a good source to measure character capability in relation to local play because of lag, and having a few play testers that don't appear to actively go to tournaments and play against other incredibly experienced players detracts from the best possible balance changes. It has nothing to do in relation towards other balances for games. There's almost no interaction with dedicated advanced players that the game could really use.

I'm not counting out the different sources the team uses for its balance changes. Sakurai even says he watched a tournament. I have no doubt of the different sources the team uses to try to limit subjectivity. The problem is that the team could really take feedback from advanced players and incorporate it as the metagame develops over time, and watching streams/recordings/whatever of local tournaments between skilled players goes a long ways over the majority of online matches and its lag.

I do have issues with balance in other games of course. I have my issues with how Olimar was handled in 3.5, and some of Link's changes as well. Spacie favoritism as well. They seem exempt from the guidelines the PMDT has set for other characters. This is just off the top of my head. I seem to not have clarified this enough. I have issues with the balance changes, but it's not the only reason I quit Smash 4. There are other reasons why I no longer find it enjoyable.

It's still good fit overall data. You can't dismiss online entirely when it serves as valid form of collecting data of his it looks on all levels of play.

Sakurai knows this isn't a sole indicator either, he mentioned this way back when he talked about lil'mac. They are listening and looking, that much is certain. Overall gameplay overhauls won't happen, character balance and changes to the cast/stages will.

It's possible we might see an overall change somewhere but I don't see it likely.

If you don't like it, don't force it. I've said it to you and others, like what you will. I got no problem with that.

The issue I had was your call out on his balance design which seemed hypocritical when I consider you mainly play PM when i think their balance and design is objectively worse than Sakurai's.

He is trying to cater to multiple audiences, he is trying to please multiple parties. People forget this.

PM has zero expectations on the casual front, Snash 4 does.

I totally agree with you, but please stop calling it that. It was never actually called Project Melee, even if early on it was clearly referencing such. The only time Project Melee was used officially was when Project M was already taken as a name for something (forget which site), plus it was done by a single person and does not constitute the PMDT as a whole.

I agree about the Melee bias, and think it should rightfully be changed to be less like Melee in regards to certain top tiers (*cough**cough*)

But please stop calling Project M something it isn't, all you're doing is potentially spreading bad publicity instead of rationally criticizing

I will stop calling it that when it stops fighting with itself in design on what it wants to be.

People call it not Project Melee but I can see through that as it is designed. Why use an M? It doesn't mean Melee? Despite the design catered to that? The bias balancing? The terrible mechanics brought back just because it was in Melee?

What am I suppose to expect the M to represent?

 

[Yong Dekonk]

You never played Tropical Freeze then. And lol that you think Metroid has any games on 3DS. You should probably think before you talk bud.

I own both for Wii and Wii U. Enjoyed them but they are barely utilizing the potential of the franchise. And I was referring to both Wii and 3ds games combined. Metroid had four games for Wii. DK had 2 and one of those was that barrel racing one that got terrible reviews. Neither of those franchises had 3DS games. Are you really too blinded by your nintendofandom that you can't see Nintendo isn't trying to develop the DK franchise anymore? Tropical Freeze had Cranky and Dixie whoopty doo it was still a HD map pack for the Wii version. Compared to other original Nintendo characters the DK series is sorely neglected...

 

[C3CC]

There you go. They read online opinions. That's why the Hoo-Hah is no more.

Now everyone shut the hell up about Rosalina and leave her alone before they further nerf her more.

 

[Enderwoman]

Kirby's stone hits players in tournament matches every now and then. It has uses. Mostly edge guarding but it has uses.

what about ganondorf's up tilt

 

[Gawain]

what about ganondorf's up tilt

Now that one I legit can't argue against. It has hit in tournament before though. Its use is disrespect lol.

 

[PootisKonga]

i think [PM's] balance and design is objectively worse than Sakurai's.

He is trying to cater to multiple audiences, he is trying to please multiple parties. People forget this.

I'll concede the latter without question, but the former is highly subjective. Sakurai also made Melee and Brawl, which as we all know have horribly skewed balanced around 8 and 1-2 characters respectively.

PM has zero expectations on the casual front, Snash 4 does.

Because all the cool alternate costumes and stages, as well as Turbo, (Wraparound) Stamina, and All-Star modes are totally only geared for competitive players that will never use them. Plus the possibility of entirely new characters not in any other Smash title is also totally just so that competitive players can get new toys.

What am I suppose to expect the M to represent?

Nowadays it's just M. Not an initial, not an acronym or whatever fancy term you would think, just M. The name's origins don't matter at this point, the past is the past.

 

[The Derrit]

Sakurai's thoughts on Smash

*looks at comments*

"Nintendo doesn't care about Donkey Kong"

*walks out, closes door*

 

[Dr. James Rustles]

"Bland and half-hearted".

There's nothing new or noteworthy that happened in any recent DK game.

 

[Jim Jam Flim Flam]

He used smash games that are slower as an example of how boring and drawn out competitive gameplay is, but he didn't even mention melee. Has he ever watched a high level game of Melee? Mango? Axe? Lucky? Amsa? Those matches are far from drawn out and boring, and the game only becomes more and more fun and exciting as players become more skilled

 

[Jim Jam Flim Flam]

I agree with Sakurai's position here. Smash 4 is basically suited for all general playstyles whether it be aggressive like (Falcon/Mac) or defensive (Rosalina). It's the only Smash Bros game (other than like 64) to really hit the sweet spot of being in between casual and competitive.

One thing that this game doesn't need is being another Melee. People who complain endlessly about the game not being Melee just need to give it a freaking rest already. Smash Bros doesn't have to be Melee to be successful.

I agree that smash can be many things and still be successful, but the only smash game that we have seen really big success in the competitive scene with is melee. Brawl is boring and slow and just **** for competitive, and smash 4, although it is better, suffers from the same problems as brawl when played at a high level. Melee is the only game that is excting, fast, fun, and takes a crazy amount skill, all while having a scene large enough to actually make it a viable competitive game. People love melee, so I can understand why they want another game like it. Personally I would rather have a game almost exactly like melee than a game completely different, because Sakurai is bound to make it intentionally horrible for competitive players.

 

[Solutionme]

"Recently, there was a tournament featuring the top Japanese and American players. In 1v1s, the natural tendency is to use low risk moves to gradually deal damage to the opponent. Smash attacks rarely came out, and the matches were prone to becoming long, drawn out affairs. When considering the variety of ways Smash can be played I think this is a waste, but the winner was certainly decided by skill."

Competitive Smash doesn't have to look this way Sakurai.

That is something that can be fixed pretty quick by increasing shield stun back to brawl values, makes no sense for you to punish a high damage smash attack when you're trying to get the kill at the high percents at the end. I can imagine it would also make shields a bigger commitment, but if he were to do that, he'd have to make dash dancing easier to perform. Literally all he has to do so the game isn't so drawn out are three things in my opinion which is increasing shield stun, slightly nerfing shield regen slightly, and improving dash dancing. Like I can pretty much see Donkey Kong and Ike for example getting balanced without changing them directly since Donkey Kong could land more safely and Ike can just zone you out for trying to shield against him since his moves have pretty decent shield pushback. Also it would allow for more types of frame traps and you wouldn't just repeat the same down throw to uair combo over and over again since grabbing is the best option against shields due to increased shield stun and along with the fact that some moves have shield pushback so an enemy can be forced off a ledge. Also Dash dancing that is easier to perform and more reliable would help characters with poor approach options have an easier time just making their opponents second guessing without leaving themselves open.

 

[Laggalot101]

Because all the cool alternate costumes and stages, as well as Turbo, (Wraparound) Stamina, and All-Star modes are totally only geared for competitive players that will never use them. Plus the possibility of entirely new characters not in any other Smash title is also totally just so that competitive players can get new toys.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but considering the context, I'm pretty sure the point being made was in regards to the game's balancing. Side content like alts or turbo mode don't really have anything to do with balancing.

 

[Casval]

As are most games now-a-days. Kids today give up EASILY with games that are "too difficult" (challenging). I've seen it first hand. It's kind of sad. I tried to get my little 8 yr old 2nd cousin to try out Smash Bros. Melee and he couldn't even do it it :/ . Just kind of gave up before trying.

I think it's the coddling mentality where "every kid is a winner" that gives us games like this, and creates a lot of other problems.

 

[Zoa]

It's still good fit overall data. You can't dismiss online entirely when it serves as valid form of collecting data of his it looks on all levels of play.

Sakurai knows this isn't a sole indicator either, he mentioned this way back when he talked about lil'mac. They are listening and looking, that much is certain. Overall gameplay overhauls won't happen, character balance and changes to the cast/stages will.

It's possible we might see an overall change somewhere but I don't see it likely.

If you don't like it, don't force it. I've said it to you and others, like what you will. I got no problem with that.

The issue I had was your call out on his balance design which seemed hypocritical when I consider you mainly play PM when i think their balance and design is objectively worse than Sakurai's.

He is trying to cater to multiple audiences, he is trying to please multiple parties. People forget this.

PM has zero expectations on the casual front, Snash 4 does.

Of course. I understand. The reasons we've talked about before is why I've dropped Smash 4. I'm not forcing it on myself. No need to worry about that.

I'd just like to point out I'm not faulting Sakurai for trying to please multiple audiences. What I am against is just the methods that determine balance changes. However I can't see online as a good measure for character balance on a highly skilled competitive level. You want as little lag as possible in local play, and this is what tournaments consist of. I guess it can serve as a measure for the intermediate skill players as Sakurai is aiming for that as his primary target audience.

 

[PootisKonga]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but considering the context, I'm pretty sure the point being made was in regards to the game's balancing. Side content like alts or turbo mode don't really have anything to do with balancing.

Perhaps you're right
But balancing to appease casual players doesn't really do any character justice anyway, we had an already debatably low-mid tier character in Little Mac get unnecessarily nerfed super early in the game's lifespan because of complaints by casual and/or scrubby players

 

[Laggalot101]

Perhaps you're right
But balancing to appease casual players doesn't really do any character justice anyway, we had an already debatably low-mid tier character in Little Mac get unnecessarily nerfed super early in the game's lifespan because of complaints by casual and/or scrubby players

In fairness, just the way Little Mac was designed as a character is very polarizing, which I think is has a bigger effect amongst casuals where those relatively quick and powerful attacks and super-armour smashes are much easier to just spam than they are against a more experienced opponent, so it creates a gap more quickly that other characters likely would, not to mention Mac can be a very frustrating character to fight for those reasons. There's also the obvious bandwagoning that required a statement from Sakurai himself that Mac had very poor results online to kill off. And as you said, it was very early in the game's life, I think these kinds of initial reactions are a bit of a given.

 

[ChikoLad]

There's nothing new or noteworthy that happened in any recent DK game.

New? Maybe not necessarily much major.

Noteworthy? DK Tropical Freeze is a really well made, charming game. To say it is "bland and half-hearted" is dumb, it clearly had a lot of love put into it, even bringing David Wise back for the soundtrack.

oh yes, posting a bunch of pics definitely proves his point wrong

The 30+ people who seem to definitely understand why I posted those pics seem to think so, yeah.

He is though. "Go play another game if you want competitivity because I won't give you it" is basically what he is saying. In other words, "F*ck off competitive smashers"

Ok, to be fair, no one likes versing 2-in-1 characters. Does anyone like versing Ice Climbers or Rosalina and Luma? Nope.

I do. It's fun challenge, and she's one of the most unique characters in the game. Fighting her tends to always be a different experience for me. Maybe that's just because I main her though, and am able to predict what all of these defensive Rosalina players will do. This also gives me the upper hand in Rosalina dittos, since I don't always play defensive.

 

[redcometchar]

Bottom line is there doesn't have to be another Melee game. Smash Bros is fine just the way it is contrary to what people say.

It was also fine the way it was. It doesn't have to be anything, the devs can do whatever they want.

 

[S_B]

I feel like SSB4 is easily the most balanced of all the games.

Even characters who suck don't have matchups like Shiek vs. Bowser in melee, for example.

That said, I can't help but believe that credit for this should be given to Namco and not Sakurai, as he claimed he worked harder to balance Brawl and we all know how well that turned out...

Like many here, I wouldn't be sad to see another director tackle SSB instead of Sakurai, one who knows how to balance characters for both casual and competitive play (which is difficult, but far from impossible to do).

 

[Kati]

Well he's not wrong about competitive Smash 4.


Also, Mario is so fun in Smash 4 lol i'd gladly have more of him.

Yeah that mario line reminded me of 64. Mario is very satisfying in 64, and the other characters are quite similar compared to how far they've diverged since melee, and the end result was a balanced and very fun smash title.

Can we just stop making Mario the average (boring) accessible fighter? he's a glass cannon in every super mario game...

 

[Kati]

I feel like SSB4 is easily the most balanced of all the games.

Even characters who suck don't have matchups like Shiek vs. Bowser in melee, for example.

That said, I can't help but believe that credit for this should be given to Namco and not Sakurai, as he claimed he worked harder to balance Brawl and we all know how well that turned out...

Like many here, I wouldn't be sad to see another director tackle SSB instead of Sakurai, one who knows how to balance characters for both casual and competitive play (which is difficult, but far from impossible to do).

64 has the most data supporting "most balanced" title. And it makes sense, as it has the least variation between characters.

 

[JRT Koopa]

Sakurai has spoken. After all, he's the one who created the game. And I'll still play Smash 4 regardless of any balance changes and stick to my same favorite characters.

 

[PhantomShab]

This only re-affirms my belief that Smash could strongly benefit from a new director calling the shots.