The Final Nail: Why Brawl Can't Be Blamed for Melee's Problems

[Big Red]

If Brawl had never existed melee would have a much bigger tourney scene then now. No matter whose fault it is. I think this is a good enough reason for people who loved melee to be mad at Brawl.

 

[Reaver197]

Finally, can you judge a man's logic based on the fact that he admitted to being a low-level Melee player? Can you judge a man's ability to think based on his ability to play Smash? I know that obviously your level of play and your committment to Melee (or former committment in some cases) can affect the way you see Brawl/Melee issues, but at the same time saying that he's a low level player doesn't mean he isn't a high level thinker, even if you don't agree with what he says.

Well, does a low level player understand and know as much about the game as a high level player? I would have to say no. There is something to acknowledging when and where one's knowledge and expertise of an area ends, irregardless of intellectual ability. In fact, the smarter one is, I would say it's even more important (and, for me at least, evident) to realize what one does and does not know.

However, I guess this would only really apply if Jack tried to make threads that were based upon a technical and nuanced knowledge of Melee, which he doesn't really. His threads are more about the community aspect of Melee/Brawl and the effects of the showdown between the two games. But, there is the fact that maybe, on some level, having detailed knowledge of both games is necessary or be greatly beneficial.

Anyway, what I'm trying to say is that, someone who posts while having a M2K level of knowledge of the smash games would have more credibility than someone who does not, assuming equal measures of intelligence (which would be hard to determine anyway, especially through a text-based interface such as a forum).

Edit: Totally unrelated, but why is this the "final nail"?

And, Melee/Brawl threads are "on notice"? As in, they'll be more strictly moderated than other threads, or just not allowed anymore?

 

[The_Dark_Zero]

I don't know how I'm going to do it: But I have a feeling. Just a feeling that I'll be important in smash communities history.

 

[Tee ay eye]

Good luck >__>

 

[The_Dark_Zero]

I'll freaking need it.

 

[HoChiMinhTrail]

I don't know how I'm going to do it: But I have a feeling. Just a feeling that I'll be important in smash communities history.

You only play brawl lol.... and just started playing it for that matter. You have a long way to go before u build up any sort of repuation, especially amongst us melee supporters(the heart of the smash community). Although what you can do is get to work on making brawl more accessible to more playstyles other than defensive/camping ones. Therefore i set a wager .... you come up with any universal tech or strategy that allows for a more diverse playstyle in brawl... i will quit melee and play only brawl.

 

[The_Dark_Zero]

Been playing Brawl since release and been playing Melee since 03.

 

[HoChiMinhTrail]

Been playing Brawl since release and been playing Melee since 03.

You only think you have been playing melee since 03... the competitive scene is a whole new beast. But yea brawl.. you have probobly mastered by now.

 

[Reaver197]

I don't know how I'm going to do it: But I have a feeling. Just a feeling that I'll be important in smash communities history.

You're the chosen one who'll lead us to the great smash promise land. Didn't you get the memo?

Spoiler

lol, wtf

 

[The_Dark_Zero]

I've mastered Melee with Ness: And I've mastered brawl with Meta Knight after many long months.

 

[Jack Kieser]

@Reaver: I consider it the final nail because it's (as far as I could tell) the last thing to be discussed. We've already discussed which game is better, which game is more competitive, what competitive means, which game is better (again), and if it even matters which game is better. This was the last relevant topic I could think of, which means that (if I'm right and nothing else relevant is brought up) when this and all the other MvB threads are closed, we'll have addressed every issue and will truly be ready to put all of this behind us and play the games. Mainly a closure thing. And I hope that AZ means that we'll all be closed soon. The sooner the mods decide to have a zero tolerance policy on MvB threads, the sooner GBD will get better.

Oh, and I'm formulating response to the nighttime posts now. They'll be ready in a little bit.

 

[Tee ay eye]

The 11%/89% is from my standpoint. I have seen the community for a very long time, very long. Since 04.

The fact that you may have been in the community since 04 does not change the fact that you're an idiot.

 

[Tee ay eye]

I've mastered Melee with Ness: And I've mastered brawl with Meta Knight after many long months.

 

[The_Dark_Zero]

So, I'm an idiot? From what I've seen there aren't many intelligent people in the community, and I've been to tournies, so don't give me hell on that. I've obviously missed a lot of intelligent people. I just have mostly seen this place gone to hell, thats mostly my reason.

 

[The_Dark_Zero]

so, explain how I failed. Otherwise your part of that 89% ******* part.

 

[HoChiMinhTrail]

so, explain how I failed. Otherwise your part of that 89% ******* part.

No one has mastered ness lol.... he has never done well in major tournies.
Metaknight takes like 2 mins to learn. I used him at my first tournie and made top 5 lol.

 

[The_Dark_Zero]

My meta doesn't focus on brute force, it focuses on screwing up the opponents mind and using good prediction skills. Ness, ok, I went overboard by saying I mastered him, but I am good with him. The only master is simna at this point.

 

[HoChiMinhTrail]

My meta doesn't focus on brute force, it focuses on screwing up the opponents mind and using good prediction skills. Ness, ok, I went overboard by saying I mastered him, but I am good with him. The only master is simna at this point.

wow....... you have shown me the light... THATS HOW YOU PLAY METAKNIGHT!!

 

[The_Dark_Zero]

Was that sarcasm?

 

[Eggm]

Saying brawl didn't hurt the melee community is just naive. You can justify it in your head and with as many big posts and dumb people responding and agreeing with you as much as you want, but the fact is it hurt the community hard.

 

[The_Dark_Zero]

My meta strategy is more than meets the eye. I can predict almost every move the opponent is going to do before they even attempt it, and I let them kill them selves. Its very fun to mess with them...how do they KO them selves? By tricking them into, duh.

 

[Reaver197]

@Reaver: I consider it the final nail because it's (as far as I could tell) the last thing to be discussed. We've already discussed which game is better, which game is more competitive, what competitive means, which game is better (again), and if it even matters which game is better. This was the last relevant topic I could think of, which means that (if I'm right and nothing else relevant is brought up) when this and all the other MvB threads are closed, we'll have addressed every issue and will truly be ready to put all of this behind us and play the games. Mainly a closure thing. And I hope that AZ means that we'll all be closed soon. The sooner the mods decide to have a zero tolerance policy on MvB threads, the sooner GBD will get better.

Oh, and I'm formulating response to the nighttime posts now. They'll be ready in a little bit.

Ah, ok, though I doubt it will be the last thread or topic on the whole MvB thing, lol.

I hope the mods don't start locking every thread that compares Melee or Brawl, or, better yet, makes a separate section/board for that. I think it's a perfectly legitimate (and inevitable, at the moment) discussion that shouldn't be completely censured. Of course, the GBD doesn't deserve being cluttered up all the time by such threads, but it's, at the moment, the only section that it really makes any sense to post such topics in.

However, I'm worried that The_Dark_Zero is doing a good job of trolling your thread, and might get it locked...

 

[Jack Kieser]

Ok, here we go.

@ Yuna: First of all, hi. I was wondering if you'd make it into one of these threads.

The level or length of my play has nothing to do with the topic at hand, and you know it. I don't need to be able to beat M2K in a Marth ditto to see problems in the community.

You know why the Melee scene is dying? Because so many of you are begrudgingly playing Brawl. You don't see this? What if EVERY one of these players, the ones you cite as playing Brawl because Melee is 'dying', switched back to Melee at once? Once you see the answer to that question, you'll know why what I'm saying is the truth. Why did these players switch to Brawl begrudgingly to begin with? Money? Glory? Boredom? It doesn't even matter. What matters is that these players abandoned the Melee scene for Brawl, whatever their reasoning is, and they were not FORCED to do so. Brawl, nor Brawlers, would not have the influence it does now if not for the MASSIVE jump start the Melee community gave it by switching from Melee to Brawl. There is a very simple way to fix all of Melee's problems: by playing Melee.

People aren't hypocrites for merely switching over, they are hypocrites for complaining about the consequences of their actions (their actions being switching over). I switched over to Brawl, but you don't hear me complaining about Melee dying off, do you? No, because I've accepted the consequences of my actions. If I ever want Melee to do better than (or even as well as) Brawl, then I'll switch back because I know that the Brawl community is now big enough to support itself. Sure, match quality would decrease if all the former Melee players left... but do you think the Brawlers care? They'll play whether Melee players do or not because they enjoy Brawl. They don't play competitive Melee exclusively because, for many of them, they didn't enjoy it or weren't good at it. Now, they have a game they enjoy/are good at. So, the Melee players can leave Brawl and it won't hurt them (the Brawlers) at all; ultimately, they could care less, because they've been satisfied.

The fact of the matter is that Melee is not dying (or on the decline, depending on dramatics) because people who NEVER PLAYED MELEE are playing Brawl. Melee is on the decline because MELEE PLAYERS LEFT IT. It is NOT Brawl players fault, and they shouldn't be blamed for it, nor should their completely separate game.

Oh, and this thread was never directed at you. You're always logical and always provide your reasoning for anything. You play both games (as far as I know), so you aren't part of the problem. Don't worry about it.

@MarKO: I guess I'm just not explaining myself correctly. It's not a replacement as in 'Oh, I've thought of something new to replace this', it's a functional replacement, as in 'Oh, we can't use both of these anymore, so now I'll just use this one.' Instead of focusing aerial games around L-canceling and using auto-canceling if possible or when lucky, aerial games are now being focused around timing the attacks so that they 'cancel' upon landing. I think we're just getting wires crossed.

@illboyzeus: READ THE THREAD before posting and you'll sound smarter.

The analogies were not postulated to be a 1:1 match to Melee/Brawl, they were postulated to show that, given enough BS and enough lines of causation, I could attribute blame of something to nearly anything, even to what deserves blame the least.

MarKO and Reaver took care of the rest of your post for me, so thanks guys.

...and it seems I'm all caught up! Sweet; now it's time for breakfast.

 

[The_Dark_Zero]

Trolling? *laughs* No. If I wanted to troll I'd make my own topic.

 

[Sgt. Baker]

Is it the final nail? I think there will be a sequel.

 

[LUVTOY77-ROGUE WIREFRAME]

No one is getting the point tht has been made over and over.

The melee competitors that left the melee tourny for a brawl tourny left the melee tourny. LEFT THE MELEE TOURNY. Did the new Brawlers leave the melee scene? No! And if they did--THEN THEY USED TO BE MELEE PLAYERS. Used-to-be-melee competitors started going to Brawl tournies instead of melee ones, therefore melee's attendance record dropped in tournaments. Is that so hard to understand?
And yes, Brawl, the game, can also be blamed for stealing some of Melee's thunder, but not the people who play it. Unless, of course, they ditched Melee tournaments that they went to routinely. IT is THOSE people who are making the melee competitive scene diminish, and like it or not, it is THOSE people who are able to stop it from diminishing. Not too many new guys are gonna stumble onto the Smash series with Melee in mind-they will be going for Brawl. That said, do you blame those guys? The ones who've never even heard of Melee--you shouldn't because they haven't abandoned Melee in any way.

And the people who ditched Melee tournaments for Brawl ones aren't helping the situation, at all.

 

[Jack Kieser]

Is it the final nail? I think there will be a sequel.

Ha, 'The Final Nail 2' just sounds like a really bad porno...

@Reaver: A separate board would be great, but I doubt it would happen. I mean, GBD is getting better, sure, but there is still hostility, and it can't be good for the community. I don't know; we'll see when AZ takes more action, I suppose.

 

[HoChiMinhTrail]

Saying brawl didn't hurt the melee community is just naive. You can justify it in your head and with as many big posts and dumb people responding and agreeing with you as much as you want, but the fact is it hurt the community hard.

But in the end the melee players, whom which comprised the melee scene, are the ones who hurt the melee community by playing brawl an leaving the scene. The ones who are proving to be the most devestating to the community are the ones who simply play brawl for the money and don't even try to play melee anymore, even if they don't like brawl. Without the melee vets to form a basis and without TOs to host melee tournies... the melee scene in the other regions will continue to diminish. Follow the midwest example if you want melee to live. Host tournies, get the old melee vets excited about the game again, show them that people are still willing to play. As i have seen, the only thing brawl has going for it is the mass amounts of scrubs at the tournies... give the melee players the better game and a well organized tournie scene... and they will come back.

Update, Sakurai Can't Save You Now(2nd melee tournie we are hosting), has an expected attendance of 80+ people coming, yhe last one had 70+... IF YOU BUILD IT... THEY WILL COME!! lol.

 

[Wrath`]

My meta strategy is more than meets the eye. I can predict almost every move the opponent is going to do before they even attempt it, and I let them kill them selves. Its very fun to mess with them...how do they KO them selves? By tricking them into, duh.

Can you predict an RAR with ike? no, all you have to do is spam your little tornado thing, it counters every aproch, you dont need to think when playing meta-Knight

@HoChiMinhTrai: Better hope a random brawl tournie doesn't pop up..

 

[HoChiMinhTrail]

@HoChiMinhTrai: Better hope a random brawl tournie doesn't pop up..

i think there are 2.... i feel sorry for them.

 

[Reaver197]

Ha, 'The Final Nail 2' just sounds like a really bad porno...

@Reaver: A separate board would be great, but I doubt it would happen. I mean, GBD is getting better, sure, but there is still hostility, and it can't be good for the community. I don't know; we'll see when AZ takes more action, I suppose.

Yeah, I don't know either. I mean, if it's a source of hostility, I think it ought to be explored and divulged and understood why it's such a contentious issue for some people, and better alleviate it that way, but such a method is not guaranteed of working. On the other hand, just bottling and covering up the hostility probably isn't going to help either, as it'll fester and buckle if not allowed to vent and still be ruinous to the community.

The more I think about it, the more it seems that we're locking ourselves into a lose-lose situation here. The best thing I can think of is being able to talk with one another until everyone understands one another, and a suitable situation is worked out. I know that supporting both Melee and Brawl at tournaments is such a solution, and a fairly easy and feasible one at that, but for some reason, it just isn't happening. I fear that, as I said before, at the core of this is two different ideologies clashing, which can and will splinter the community unless properly addressed. Maybe, even then, there will be some splitting of the paths, but it will done more diplomatically and peaceably than a hostile sundering.

So, ergh, yeah, I don't know.

 

[Jack Kieser]

If only everyone in this 'debate' were so level-headed, Reaver. If only...

 

[GI Josh]

But in the end the melee players, whom which comprised the melee scene, are the ones who hurt the melee community by playing brawl an leaving the scene. The ones who are proving to be the most devestating to the community are the ones who simply play brawl for the money and don't even try to play melee anymore, even if they don't like brawl. Without the melee vets to form a basis and without TOs to host melee tournies... the melee scene in the other regions will continue to diminish. Follow the midwest example if you want melee to live. Host tournies, get the old melee vets excited about the game again, show them that people are still willing to play. As i have seen, the only thing brawl has going for it is the mass amounts of scrubs at the tournies... give the melee players the better game and a well organized tournie scene... and they will come back.

Update, Sakurai Can't Save You Now(2nd melee tournie we are hosting), has an expected attendance of 80+ people coming, yhe last one had 70+... IF YOU BUILD IT... THEY WILL COME!! lol.

This is a very true statement, Azen, one of the best Melee players EVER, now prefers Brawl over Melee. M2K, says he hates Brawl, but he still plays in tournaments and gets money from it. Now, why would M2K, the maker of one of the most in-depth Melee guides ever, just suddenly go to Brawl like nothing even though he hates it? That's the answer we need to find, what causes the old Melee vets go to Brawl like it's nothing?

 

[Wrath`]

That's the answer we need to find, what causes the old Melee vets go to Brawl like it's nothing?

$$$ cash my friend, just pain old greed and money.

Unless deep inside they do like brawl but dont want admit it..... wich I find unlikely.

 

[HoChiMinhTrail]

To Reaver:

It is generally very hard to host a joint melee/brawl tournie due to time constraints. Brawl singles generally take ****ing forever lol so its hard to put in melee if u also do a brawl doubles tournie. The best method for combining the two has been, from my experience, having a brawl teams tournie(most melee players agree that brawl teams is actually pretty fun) and then having melee singles. Its hard to do this tho.... the brawl people want brawl singles and the melee people want melee doubles. The only way to truely successfully combine them is to have a 2 day event, with each game having its own day. Most TO's don't have the time, resources, or drive to host such large scale events. Most tournies aren't major tournies, but rather smaller ones.

 

[MarKO X]

$$$ cash my friend, just pain old greed and money.

Unless deep inside they do like brawl but dont want admit it..... wich I find unlikely.

It is the cash. However, you have to do a little separation with it.

Now, in some cases, you'll have Melee players that are in communities that only throw Brawl tournaments. If a Melee player has been making money off of Smash for any amount of years to the point they can be called a pro, it's something that they've dedicated their lives to. It's their way of making ends meet. It's the life of a professional Smash player. Those who have no choice but to enter a Brawl tournament because TOs won't run anything else, you can't really blame those guys. You can only blame TOs who don't know any better (or can't do any better) and run only Brawl tournaments.

In other cases, you have Melee players in communities with struggling Melee tourneys. These tourneys are struggling because there's a Brawl tourney around the corner, and instead of people who say that Melee is the better game going to the Melee tourney, they go to the Brawl tournament for money, because it's easier, or whatever the reason. Here, you can blame the TOs, but you can also blame the Melee players that decided to play Brawl instead.

However, you kinda have to calm down the "tone" in which you blame people for this decline in Melee. (remember, that's a general statement, if you've been in a hi turnout Melee tourney lately, then that's great) Brawl has come out, Brawl has taken away from Melee because it's new (I vaguely recall something about Chillindude liking Brawl because Melee was old or something like that), and that was inevitable, even if all of the warnings were to be acknowledged prior to Brawl's US release. However, if Melee truly is the inferior game (I'm officially gonna say the two games are equal yet opposite), then Melee players should make a greater effort to revive Melee.

But blaming Melee players... well, maybe that's not fair to say in some cases... that's the general point of that whole statement.

 

[Reaver197]

To Reaver:

It is generally very hard to host a joint melee/brawl tournie due to time constraints. Brawl singles generally take ****ing forever lol so its hard to put in melee if u also do a brawl doubles tournie. The best method for combining the two has been, from my experience, having a brawl teams tournie(most melee players agree that brawl teams is actually pretty fun) and then having melee singles. Its hard to do this tho.... the brawl people want brawl singles and the melee people want melee doubles. The only way to truely successfully combine them is to have a 2 day event, with each game having its own day. Most TO's don't have the time, resources, or drive to host such large scale events. Most tournies aren't major tournies, but rather smaller ones.

Yeah, I remember speculating that such things would be an issue with a dual-game tourney system. I didn't mean to imply that it was organizer's faults at all. So, pretty much, only the largest and well financed tournaments can afford to have both games running, as you said.

So, yeah, then the people who are clamoring for a dual-game tourney system are just not aware of the realities. There really is a competition between Melee and Brawl over tourneys then.

 

[HoChiMinhTrail]

Marko:

The games aren't opposite. If they were opposites the melee players wouldn't be dominating the brawl scene. The games are very similar, the difference being that brawl only encourages one overall play style, while melee was comprised of many competing play styles and not one dominant one.

 

[Grunt]

No one is getting the point tht has been made over and over.

So basically...
It's M2K's fault.

lol, not really. i got it a while ago.

 

[Zodiac]

ugh, there is NO point in these threads anymore, it is no longer a debate its just members on swf trying to sound cool, my question to all of you is. WHY DON'T YOU JUST LEAVE IT ALONE, if you had, if random threads like these keep popping up the debate will keep limping along, just alive enough to be a thorn in all of our sides. Not just on the boards but at tournaments to, there are even tournaments that have both games and specifically request each side not to bicker with one another. It starts here but its spreads to the tournaments. Keeping it alive by posting things like these is no good.