Preface:
I can only claim the following as being opinion drawn from my own understanding of how the smash scenes in different parts of the world work. How I have witnessed it develop, and my interpretation of it. I cannot claim that my account is accurate and true, and invite any and all to correct my errors. I kinda wrote this because I felt like it, not to try and prove anything >.>
1. The Golden Age
If you have not, read this:
http://www.smashboards.com/showthread.php?t=143600
It is an amazing account of 2007’s smash scene written by AlphaZealot. It saw unprecedented growth, spurred along by MLG which is arguably one of the best things to ever happen to the Pro Smash scene. It saw multiple tournaments breaking the 200 player mark, an amazing achievement for a game that was now several years old, and saw the rise of some of the greatest players of its time.
It truly was a golden age in smash, and if you took the impending release of Brawl out of the picture, it looked like its momentum would carry over into the new year and onwards forever.
However, it was two years ago that Nintendo released a famous little trailer with four of its signature heroes (and one borrowed from Hideo Kojima) which promised a new take on the series, destined for release on the Wii. It would bring the Melee Golden Age to a stop, and revolutionize Smash as we knew it.
2. Growth and Balance
With America’s Brawl release, the number of active players soared. I attribute this to the nature of competitive gaming today. As many had hoped for, Nintendo delivered our Nintendo character romp with online play. Now my question to you is this: ‘Where does one go to obtain Friend Codes?’ The answer being online Forums. If you search ‘Super Smash Bros. Brawl Forum’ on google.com, Smashboards.com is the very first result returned and as such is one of the major reasons I believe Smashboards has experienced unparalleled growth within the last year. We can thank Gideon and his early efforts at obtaining domain names for Smashboards. (In fact, I think I remember him saying something about ‘feeling bad’ about taking them all before Nintendo and even considered selling them back to them.)
It’s not just obtaining friend codes either. The nature of video gaming today goes hand in hand with the internet. Even if it’s an offline game, there are countless forums out there that discuss them, and multitudes of gamers everywhere are doing just that.
So imagine the surprise of many a player when they stumbled across www.smashboards.com and found people playing Brawl without items on and bashing Brawl over how non-technical, slow and otherwise inferior it seemed to its predecessor?
The Moderators took somewhat of a hardline approach to all of this. Eventually outright banning debates over which is the better game/is more competitive. Though this garnered some disdain from some members, I don’t believe the moderators did the wrong thing. I mean, look at what happened to the Soul Calibur community for a few years there.
Also, that’s not to say all 08’ers are scrubs either. Some of the most brilliant and dedicated minds have assembled on this forum and regularly contribute to and participate in debate and discussion. These are the people who make up those that perhaps do not care about Melee Vs. Brawl and are only interested in seeing how far we can push Brawl as a game, where so many others have been quick to write it off.
But I digress.
At this time the game is young (It still is, somewhat). Everybody has a shiny new play thing. People are enjoying it. It’s different and maybe a little awkward for those used to the lightning fast pace of Melee. Everybody’s enjoying and even winning with their favorite characters. Everybody began to think ‘Hey, this game is pretty balanced, even more so than Melee’.
People were figuring out new techs every day, users like Jewdo, God-Is-My-Rock, SamuraiPanda and many others, both American and Japanese were discovering new and amazing things. Jewdo did a colossal job of maintaining a thread to house all of these discoveries (which I have now taken over) in the early days, and it seemed like Brawl could really step up.
3. “Wsnake is not a character” – Gimpyfish62
It wasn’t long until Gimpyfish came to the conclusion that Snake was the best character in the game at that point in time. Early tier lists were beginning to pop up, and Snake was beginning to dominate the tournament scene, something that continued for quite a while. People began to recognize which characters were good and which were mediocre. Certain players were beginning to show their dominance as well, though as HuGS put it “We all suck at Brawl, I suck, you suck, we all suck”.
Ankoku’s character ranks reflected Snake’s dominance, and nipping at his heels were a few other characters too, including one Metaknight, who despite being able to combo well, had no kill moves whatsoever.
Though, we all know that certainly changed. As tier lists became much more accurate, we began to see MK and Snake interchange. As time went by, people began to realize just how good MK was, and began to dominate tournaments with him.
4. Ban Metaknight
“Metaknight is too good” for lack of a better way of putting it. I don’t think the majority of people considered MK ban-worthy until the idea was bought up and SamuraiPanda made a thread for it. However, what has spawned from that is probably one of the greatest debates in the history of Super Smash Bros.
This is a fiercely debated topic, and as of now the debate has spread over several threads containing post counts into the many thousands, and even a debate between a number of high profile as a part of Youko’s ‘Show Me Your News’ live podcast.
The whole situation has bought to light a lot of unwanted sides of the current smash scene as well. Ankoku was even forced to remove his character rankings from public view because it apparently was doing more harm than good for the community.
It has bought to light questions of how competitive this game really is and whether the way we are structuring its competitive format is the right way. Some go all the way and question whether this is a game worth pursuing as a competitive game or not. The many people who remain unsatisfied with what Brawl is still hold to that feeling today.
As it stands, the SBR are not in favour of banning MK. I, for one, don’t believe he should be banned either. However, as many will agree, it probably wouldn’t take much more to warrant banning him at this point.
The worst thing about all of this is the ugly picture it paints for some of those caught up in it all and criticized for their decisions, namely, the best players out there at the moment such as Mew2King. Even Azen’s one performance with MK is called out on at times.
5. Player Motivation
Many have said it. Pro Brawl players are driven by the money that comes with the title. At this point, what motivates the smash scene at the moment is something that I truly believe could make or break it. All this talk about players losing money, winning money, splitting money. You’d be forgiven for forgetting about the discussion that should really matter, like discussing the game itself.
Money and Brawl has its good and bad sides. It attracts the best players, and that in turn attracts players who want to see the best players. Although, at the same time, it promotes ideals like ‘Playing to Win’. Though that’s not necessarily a bad thing, it can also promote single sided development of the game. It’s because of that mindset that Overswarm’s ‘plague’ analogy holds true in regards to MK’s dominance. It’s not just MK as a broken character that is to blame, it’s also the nature of players who’s goal is ‘playing to win’.
I’m not faulting those that do, mind you. However, the negative impact of this is that other characters remain under-developed. Without more people attempting to improve other characters, MK will easily remain the number one character. Which is why then, that some are calling for a temporary ban. However, it remains to be seen whether that avenue is one to consider either.
As it is, players are concerned that the game is turning into a game of ‘How do I beat Metaknight’, and even Mew2King himself has taken it upon himself to try and prove that despite popular opinion, MK is not as overpowered as everyone makes him out to be.
6. Projected Outcomes and Speculation
One can only hope that we don’t stray onto a path that would lead Brawl towards a premature death (though some would wish that). As flaws such as Dedede’s infinite are discussed in greater detail, the game begins to lose stability. Even further segregation has occurred with the concept of ‘Brawl+’ which is leading some onto a whole new tangent.
The concept of Brawl+ has its merit. Especially the fact that it is re-invigorating interest in a game in people who had given up on it. Though, people shouldn’t be discouraged by those that think little of Brawl. It warrants merit, and if you like playing it competitively, then to heck with anything else anybody else tries to tell you. (Jam Stunna, your write ups were amazing).
I can see MK staying a relatively unbanned character for a while, but as to whether we’ll ever see him become less dominant lies on the shoulders of those pioneering other characters and as long as we have a NinjaLink for every Mew2King out there, we might see the day where Brawl can be contested instead of debated.
I can only claim the following as being opinion drawn from my own understanding of how the smash scenes in different parts of the world work. How I have witnessed it develop, and my interpretation of it. I cannot claim that my account is accurate and true, and invite any and all to correct my errors. I kinda wrote this because I felt like it, not to try and prove anything >.>
1. The Golden Age
If you have not, read this:
http://www.smashboards.com/showthread.php?t=143600
It is an amazing account of 2007’s smash scene written by AlphaZealot. It saw unprecedented growth, spurred along by MLG which is arguably one of the best things to ever happen to the Pro Smash scene. It saw multiple tournaments breaking the 200 player mark, an amazing achievement for a game that was now several years old, and saw the rise of some of the greatest players of its time.
It truly was a golden age in smash, and if you took the impending release of Brawl out of the picture, it looked like its momentum would carry over into the new year and onwards forever.
However, it was two years ago that Nintendo released a famous little trailer with four of its signature heroes (and one borrowed from Hideo Kojima) which promised a new take on the series, destined for release on the Wii. It would bring the Melee Golden Age to a stop, and revolutionize Smash as we knew it.
2. Growth and Balance
With America’s Brawl release, the number of active players soared. I attribute this to the nature of competitive gaming today. As many had hoped for, Nintendo delivered our Nintendo character romp with online play. Now my question to you is this: ‘Where does one go to obtain Friend Codes?’ The answer being online Forums. If you search ‘Super Smash Bros. Brawl Forum’ on google.com, Smashboards.com is the very first result returned and as such is one of the major reasons I believe Smashboards has experienced unparalleled growth within the last year. We can thank Gideon and his early efforts at obtaining domain names for Smashboards. (In fact, I think I remember him saying something about ‘feeling bad’ about taking them all before Nintendo and even considered selling them back to them.)
It’s not just obtaining friend codes either. The nature of video gaming today goes hand in hand with the internet. Even if it’s an offline game, there are countless forums out there that discuss them, and multitudes of gamers everywhere are doing just that.
So imagine the surprise of many a player when they stumbled across www.smashboards.com and found people playing Brawl without items on and bashing Brawl over how non-technical, slow and otherwise inferior it seemed to its predecessor?
The Moderators took somewhat of a hardline approach to all of this. Eventually outright banning debates over which is the better game/is more competitive. Though this garnered some disdain from some members, I don’t believe the moderators did the wrong thing. I mean, look at what happened to the Soul Calibur community for a few years there.
Also, that’s not to say all 08’ers are scrubs either. Some of the most brilliant and dedicated minds have assembled on this forum and regularly contribute to and participate in debate and discussion. These are the people who make up those that perhaps do not care about Melee Vs. Brawl and are only interested in seeing how far we can push Brawl as a game, where so many others have been quick to write it off.
But I digress.
At this time the game is young (It still is, somewhat). Everybody has a shiny new play thing. People are enjoying it. It’s different and maybe a little awkward for those used to the lightning fast pace of Melee. Everybody’s enjoying and even winning with their favorite characters. Everybody began to think ‘Hey, this game is pretty balanced, even more so than Melee’.
People were figuring out new techs every day, users like Jewdo, God-Is-My-Rock, SamuraiPanda and many others, both American and Japanese were discovering new and amazing things. Jewdo did a colossal job of maintaining a thread to house all of these discoveries (which I have now taken over) in the early days, and it seemed like Brawl could really step up.
3. “Wsnake is not a character” – Gimpyfish62
It wasn’t long until Gimpyfish came to the conclusion that Snake was the best character in the game at that point in time. Early tier lists were beginning to pop up, and Snake was beginning to dominate the tournament scene, something that continued for quite a while. People began to recognize which characters were good and which were mediocre. Certain players were beginning to show their dominance as well, though as HuGS put it “We all suck at Brawl, I suck, you suck, we all suck”.
Ankoku’s character ranks reflected Snake’s dominance, and nipping at his heels were a few other characters too, including one Metaknight, who despite being able to combo well, had no kill moves whatsoever.
Though, we all know that certainly changed. As tier lists became much more accurate, we began to see MK and Snake interchange. As time went by, people began to realize just how good MK was, and began to dominate tournaments with him.
4. Ban Metaknight
“Metaknight is too good” for lack of a better way of putting it. I don’t think the majority of people considered MK ban-worthy until the idea was bought up and SamuraiPanda made a thread for it. However, what has spawned from that is probably one of the greatest debates in the history of Super Smash Bros.
This is a fiercely debated topic, and as of now the debate has spread over several threads containing post counts into the many thousands, and even a debate between a number of high profile as a part of Youko’s ‘Show Me Your News’ live podcast.
The whole situation has bought to light a lot of unwanted sides of the current smash scene as well. Ankoku was even forced to remove his character rankings from public view because it apparently was doing more harm than good for the community.
It has bought to light questions of how competitive this game really is and whether the way we are structuring its competitive format is the right way. Some go all the way and question whether this is a game worth pursuing as a competitive game or not. The many people who remain unsatisfied with what Brawl is still hold to that feeling today.
As it stands, the SBR are not in favour of banning MK. I, for one, don’t believe he should be banned either. However, as many will agree, it probably wouldn’t take much more to warrant banning him at this point.
The worst thing about all of this is the ugly picture it paints for some of those caught up in it all and criticized for their decisions, namely, the best players out there at the moment such as Mew2King. Even Azen’s one performance with MK is called out on at times.
5. Player Motivation
Many have said it. Pro Brawl players are driven by the money that comes with the title. At this point, what motivates the smash scene at the moment is something that I truly believe could make or break it. All this talk about players losing money, winning money, splitting money. You’d be forgiven for forgetting about the discussion that should really matter, like discussing the game itself.
Money and Brawl has its good and bad sides. It attracts the best players, and that in turn attracts players who want to see the best players. Although, at the same time, it promotes ideals like ‘Playing to Win’. Though that’s not necessarily a bad thing, it can also promote single sided development of the game. It’s because of that mindset that Overswarm’s ‘plague’ analogy holds true in regards to MK’s dominance. It’s not just MK as a broken character that is to blame, it’s also the nature of players who’s goal is ‘playing to win’.
I’m not faulting those that do, mind you. However, the negative impact of this is that other characters remain under-developed. Without more people attempting to improve other characters, MK will easily remain the number one character. Which is why then, that some are calling for a temporary ban. However, it remains to be seen whether that avenue is one to consider either.
As it is, players are concerned that the game is turning into a game of ‘How do I beat Metaknight’, and even Mew2King himself has taken it upon himself to try and prove that despite popular opinion, MK is not as overpowered as everyone makes him out to be.
6. Projected Outcomes and Speculation
One can only hope that we don’t stray onto a path that would lead Brawl towards a premature death (though some would wish that). As flaws such as Dedede’s infinite are discussed in greater detail, the game begins to lose stability. Even further segregation has occurred with the concept of ‘Brawl+’ which is leading some onto a whole new tangent.
The concept of Brawl+ has its merit. Especially the fact that it is re-invigorating interest in a game in people who had given up on it. Though, people shouldn’t be discouraged by those that think little of Brawl. It warrants merit, and if you like playing it competitively, then to heck with anything else anybody else tries to tell you. (Jam Stunna, your write ups were amazing).
I can see MK staying a relatively unbanned character for a while, but as to whether we’ll ever see him become less dominant lies on the shoulders of those pioneering other characters and as long as we have a NinjaLink for every Mew2King out there, we might see the day where Brawl can be contested instead of debated.
