The Separation of Melee and Brawl

[Sasha]

Link to original post: [drupal=1512]The Separation of Melee and Brawl[/drupal]



I love Smash.

No, seriously. I LOVE Smash. But the time has come that our community stops being the Smash Community. With so many players - and such different players - representing the different parts of the community, its division is a necessary evil.

The Smash Community needs to split. It needs to become the Melee Community and the Brawl Community.

Granted, due to so much hate by both sides towards the other side, the split has pretty much happened in all but name. Any question within the Brawl Community, such as the ever-so-popular "Should MK be banned?" argument, quickly degenerates into nothing more than "OMG BRAWL IS FOR TEH NOOBZ. YOU ALL WHINE CUZ YOU SUCK LOL" and "OMG IF YOU HATE BRAWL SO MUCH GO BACK TO YOUR MELEE BOARDS."

I'm tired of it.

As can be seen from my post count, I lurk FAR more than I post. All I want to do is read some intelligent debate or some constructive criticisms and ideas about the developing metagame as well as who is helping it grow and how. I enjoy seeing it develop and helping myself and my friends grow as Brawl players. By playing so much with Kirby, I was able to advance my own game and even discover brand new, to me, techniques that I had never seen (i.e. Gonzo's grab combos).

This brings me to my next point. Look how far the game has come in the past year. What did ALL of us think when the game was first released? "What!!! It has no depth! No combos! No AT's! What happened to smash?!?!!!" Now, after people like Gonzo and Mmac have stretched their imaginations to further their characters metagame, there is a CRAZY amount of depth to this game. The depth is VERY different from Melee's, which is also an incredibly deep game.

Why is the metagame different? Why is the depth different?

Because they're different games.

It is because they are different games that they absolutely need different communities. The Brawl and Melee communities may indeed have some overlap in terms of players (myself included) who play both games well and often. But because we play both and do well at both, we understand that they are different and that we cannot compare the two because of how radically different they are.

I get the feeling that I am rambling about peace and love for all, so I'll cut straight to the point.

I move for a separation of the Brawl and Melee communities.

I move for each community to have its own website, tournaments, standards of play, and leaders.

I believe that the ONLY thing holding us back from doing this is the combination of the two sites in Smash World Forums. As I stated earlier, overlap is almost a guarantee, but with the two communities sharing a popular website, the bickering that we have come to see and contribute to will always be the end result.

MLG has already split the SBR into SBR-M and SBR-B. It is time that the entire community was split, not just its BRoomers. Allisbrawl.com is already a solid starting point, but it needs to be common practice in all Brawl and Melee sites to stop this bickering and ban those who lead it.

All in favor...

 

[Cinder]

*applause*

I completely agree...the Melee/Brawl debate is actually starting to get under my skin...I'm tired of watching both sides act immature and blindly attack the other side...

I'll openly admit that I contributed to the problem *cough*...but my Breakin' Brawl was almost a year ago, and I think it's time I stopped being immature about it (besides, I kinda regret not having a copy to hack and play Brawl+ :B)

At any rate, I kinda think of the Melee/Brawl debate as a religion almost...I'm not saying that a videogame is as important as a person's belief in an afterlife, but I've noticed some parallels between the two. I mean, look at almost any religious conflict...you have two sides trying to force their beliefs on one another, right? Both sides insist that their religion is the "true religion" and that the other side MUST convert. Now, look at the Melee/Brawl debate...is it not the same thing, but with videogames? I mean, th entire debate is usually "Melee/Brawl is better than Brawl/Melee, so you should play IT instead"...I know that religion is much more important and serious than a videogame, but through my observations, it seems that some people don't realize that and turn their favorite videogame into a metaphorical "religion"...

Meh, that's how I call it...either way, this debate is starting to get old, even for me...

 

[TP]

I do not agree with you. The bottom line is that you are taking a small issue and overreacting to it. Just don't feed the trolls.

MLG has already split the SBR into SBR-M and SBR-B. It is time that the entire community was split, not just its BRoomers.

This was because each SBR should represent the very best and brightest players of the game. It is no surprise that there are people who are great at one game but not the other.

 

[Red Arremer]

*applause*

I completely agree...the Melee/Brawl debate is actually starting to get under my skin...I'm tired of watching both sides act immature and blindly attack the other side...

I'll openly admit that I contributed to the problem *cough*...but my Breakin' Brawl was almost a year ago, and I think it's time I stopped being immature about it (besides, I kinda regret not having a copy to hack and play Brawl+ :B)

He says, still having a broken Brawl disc as avatar and advertising his "campaign". <.<

As for the rest of your post: I think you take that too far. It's basically trolls of either side who come into the other's subboard and makes threads or posts about how their game is superior to the game played on that subboard.

Even then, I disagree with the OP and a split of communities. Why? Because this is a gaming board dedicated to the Super Smash Bros. series, and some others too (remember the Pokemon Center and the Pit Stop, which is dedicated to F-Zero?).

 

[Amazing Ampharos]

The Street Fighter community didn't split because of Third Strike even though a lot of the Super Turbo players hated it and thought it sucked (disclosure: I agree with them). The thing is, the time has come (and really came a year ago) for our community to grow up and be able to support multiple games even if a lot of us don't like all the games we support. We already kinda did since we "support" Smash 64, but that game is pretty dead so that never was much of an issue. Now it's an issue, and I think we have made progress (the Melee people have mostly stopped posting on the Brawl boards to let us all know how we play a terrible, terrible game).

With TMNT Smash Up! and Tales of Vs. both looking like potential smash styled fighters, I actually think we have an opportunity to really grow ourselves (also, we're pretty much the only hope those games have at ever seeing high level play). It's true this does lead to a "split" of sorts since we should be expecting a lot of our community to have no interest in large portions of what we handle, but it's for the best in the end.

 

[Cinder]

He says, still having a broken Brawl disc as avatar and advertising his "campaign". <.<

Assumptions, assumptions...

I said that because I was in the process of CHANGING my avi...problem is, the server at my school doesn't seem to like me trying to change it, so I'm gonna haveta wait...

Don't make assumptions, especially if it leads to you calling me a hypocrite >.>

 

[:034:]

This brings me to my next point. Look how far the game has come in the past year. What did ALL of us think when the game was first released? "What!!! It has no depth! No combos! No AT's! What happened to smash?!?!!!" Now, after people like Gonzo and Mmac have stretched their imaginations to further their characters metagame, there is a CRAZY amount of depth to this game.

???

Where? You're obviously seeing something I'm not seeing. The level of depth in Brawl increased, sure, as expected. But it's nowhere near the depth that Melee (or even 64) had and still have today. New techniques are still being found for Melee, after what, 8 years? That just proves the insane amount of depth Melee has compared to Brawl.

And before you name things like Diddy's Glide Tossing, Falco's Phantasm goodies, Bowser's grab releases (and in general), Gonzo Combo and what not - they are easy to perform and use in battle, sometimes not even completely necessary to achieve victory. I can do all these with little to no trouble, but I can't do a waveshine in Melee yet.

In any case, I'm against the 'splitting' of the Smash Community. Smash is Smash, whether you play 64, Melee, Brawl or Brawl+, it's all one big thing and we all love the same thing. Yeah, people go out of their way to call the other game 'crap' or troll on the opposite boards but that's all in good nature. People like you are taking the trash talking between the two too seriously. Splitting the community will only lead to more unrest, people won't be a community for the same series anymore. And what, if we all go to AllisBrawl, the Melee people will suddenly stop? That's naïve.

Another opinion I have is that SWF itself, in it's nature, has gone to the dogs because of the Brawl players and not the game itself. This used to be a site to discuss the purely competitive aspect of the Smash games, yet people always go on and on about 'not playing to win', 'playing in time mode', 'playing with items'. A thread on the Wolf boards consisted of the player thinking he was good with Wolf because he got 7 KO's in a With Anyone match. That kind of stuff has nothing to do with the original nature of this site. Which is why the "Melee Community", as you say, is hating on the, as you say, "Brawl Community".

tl;dr: Splitting the community will cause more bad than good.

 

[Amazing Ampharos]

The Brawl community was forced on the defensive from the start. Most of us had only been playing for a few weeks when we were overwhelmed by the whole "Brawl sucks" sentiment. There was actually a constant message of "Brawl has no depth"; isn't it only natural that it would be hard to keep a serious competitive community on message with that? I like to think I've been pretty consistent, but it's not hard to see how people could go other ways.

Also, you mention the items and with anyone and whatnot. I wasn't really around SWF in the early melee days, but I understand that the community seriously addressed issues like these. It was never even really considered with Brawl so those who would naturally be wanting to play like that are probably feeling as though they've been denied due process. I understand why we really can't use items or free for alls in high level play, but then I see large elements of the community wanting to ban stages to a far more extreme extent than was ever done in melee and it gets worrysome... Then we have the movements to ban infinites, planking, and even Meta Knight!

I'm a very serious competitive player who has a very strong preference for Brawl. I'm obviously going to defend my game. The community does have some problems; it's true. However, they aren't hopeless at all, and I think a lot of the issues are issues of outlook which should be one of the easier things to fix.

-The air of constant negativity really needs to end. It's totally useless to go onto a section of the site dedicated to a specific game and say that game sucks. Likewise, being generally dismissive toward any manner of legitimate accomplishment or method of play does more harm that good. A lot of Brawl players have serious problems with just being generally dismissive so I'm not trying to single out the Melee people (though I certainly don't exempt them!). Us vs Them is another component of the air of negativity we could afford to lose. I think progress has actually been made here; we just need to go all the way.

-We need to step back and remember why banning things isn't cool. Even before Brawl came out people were commenting on how Meta Knight seemed way too good and mentioning the word "ban", seriously. Sometimes, things have to be banned; there's no denying that. However, being embroiled in never ending controversies about banning one thing or another does more harm than good.

-Compromise needs to return. This applies nearly across the board. With stage rules you have two different crowds who want radically different things with a fairly small number on either side really looking for a middle path. With melee and brawl, a lot of people are having trouble peacefully co-existing and can't accept hanging out with people who prefer something else (my own experiences in Kansas City definitely support that). The spirit of compromise is accepting not getting the more radical of the things you want and accepting the other side getting their more moderate demands. That means accepting things you disagree with with the reward that the other side accepts some things they disagree with. If everyone in the smash community got a little better at being less absolutist about what they want, I think things would be a lot better overall.

 

[Proverbs]

*applause*

I completely agree...the Melee/Brawl debate is actually starting to get under my skin...I'm tired of watching both sides act immature and blindly attack the other side...

I'll openly admit that I contributed to the problem *cough*...but my Breakin' Brawl was almost a year ago, and I think it's time I stopped being immature about it (besides, I kinda regret not having a copy to hack and play Brawl+ :B)

At any rate, I kinda think of the Melee/Brawl debate as a religion almost...I'm not saying that a videogame is as important as a person's belief in an afterlife, but I've noticed some parallels between the two. I mean, look at almost any religious conflict...you have two sides trying to force their beliefs on one another, right? Both sides insist that their religion is the "true religion" and that the other side MUST convert. Now, look at the Melee/Brawl debate...is it not the same thing, but with videogames? I mean, th entire debate is usually "Melee/Brawl is better than Brawl/Melee, so you should play IT instead"...I know that religion is much more important and serious than a videogame, but through my observations, it seems that some people don't realize that and turn their favorite videogame into a metaphorical "religion"...

Meh, that's how I call it...either way, this debate is starting to get old, even for me...

Which is why all the Melee players should migrate to H4x0RZ.

 

[Cinder]

Which is why all the Melee players should migrate to H4x0RZ.

Halez yay-uh :B

I made a Melee-only site for that reason: avoid the Melee/Brawl debate

Spoiler

well, more to avoid "OMG MELEE IS TEH SUX BARWL IS TEH ROX LOLOLOLOL, but avoid the debate works too

But yeah...Melee =/= Brawl =/= Brawl+...separating the community would be a mixed blessing...perhaps partial separation? Like, having somewhere where the communities can be separate, but a place where they can be together?

Meh, what do I know? My mind's in >9000 places right now ...I'm not thinking 100% straight right now...perhaps going downstairs to the café and getting some food might help...

 

[Heartz♥]

*sigh* Not another one...

Sasha, I admire your desire for "intelligent debates" on the whole Melee vs Brawl bit, but this thread alone contradicts that, because there is always going to be somebody jumping in with mindless and useless speculation.

We've had too many threads like this; the Smash community is NEVER going to change, for the better nor the worse.

I, too, wish people would just shut the hell up and just play what they like, but gamers are always going to make a big deal out of the petty things in competitive gaming, which is why I just play games for fun. These so-called "hardcore gamers" need to drop the controller and face reality.

Don't take this personally, Sasha. There is no need to state that people are ********. We've realized that since Brawl's release. In MY opinion, Smash segregation won't change anything, but if it wants to be done, so be it. Join H4x0RZ for Melee.

 

[Sasha]

It's good that this thread has gotten some attention. Granted, the majority of this blog post was in reaction to Mango's 4-page trolling of the Banning MK Poll 3 thread; however, I would like to make it clear that, now that I have gotten some sleep and such, my point is basically the one that Amazing Ampharos is trying to make.

The Brawl community was forced on the defensive from the start. Most of us had only been playing for a few weeks when we were overwhelmed by the whole "Brawl sucks" sentiment. There was actually a constant message of "Brawl has no depth"; isn't it only natural that it would be hard to keep a serious competitive community on message with that? I like to think I've been pretty consistent, but it's not hard to see how people could go other ways.

Also, you mention the items and with anyone and whatnot. I wasn't really around SWF in the early melee days, but I understand that the community seriously addressed issues like these. It was never even really considered with Brawl so those who would naturally be wanting to play like that are probably feeling as though they've been denied due process. I understand why we really can't use items or free for alls in high level play, but then I see large elements of the community wanting to ban stages to a far more extreme extent than was ever done in melee and it gets worrysome... Then we have the movements to ban infinites, planking, and even Meta Knight!

I'm a very serious competitive player who has a very strong preference for Brawl. I'm obviously going to defend my game. The community does have some problems; it's true. However, they aren't hopeless at all, and I think a lot of the issues are issues of outlook which should be one of the easier things to fix.

-The air of constant negativity really needs to end. It's totally useless to go onto a section of the site dedicated to a specific game and say that game sucks. Likewise, being generally dismissive toward any manner of legitimate accomplishment or method of play does more harm that good. A lot of Brawl players have serious problems with just being generally dismissive so I'm not trying to single out the Melee people (though I certainly don't exempt them!). Us vs Them is another component of the air of negativity we could afford to lose. I think progress has actually been made here; we just need to go all the way.

-We need to step back and remember why banning things isn't cool. Even before Brawl came out people were commenting on how Meta Knight seemed way too good and mentioning the word "ban", seriously. Sometimes, things have to be banned; there's no denying that. However, being embroiled in never ending controversies about banning one thing or another does more harm than good.

-Compromise needs to return. This applies nearly across the board. With stage rules you have two different crowds who want radically different things with a fairly small number on either side really looking for a middle path. With melee and brawl, a lot of people are having trouble peacefully co-existing and can't accept hanging out with people who prefer something else (my own experiences in Kansas City definitely support that). The spirit of compromise is accepting not getting the more radical of the things you want and accepting the other side getting their more moderate demands. That means accepting things you disagree with with the reward that the other side accepts some things they disagree with. If everyone in the smash community got a little better at being less absolutist about what they want, I think things would be a lot better overall.

Unfortunately, making a thread based entirely on this point gets little to no more responses than "Wah. Quit whining." As AA said, the community needs to evolve and be able to grow both separately and together.

I do indeed believe that there needs to be a change to help move things along though. There should be an option for moderators to ban users from specific boards. If people such as Mimic_king and Mango come directly to the Brawl boards just to bash the hell out of Brawl, they should be temp-banned from the Brawl boards.

Just a thought. Unless someone has a better idea?

As to what everyone else has been saying, 1) Go away if all you're going to do is debate Melee vs. Brawl, 2) The post was made to grab people's attention. I'm not altogether serious about permanently putting a schism between the communities. Read this post if you wish to continue any debate/argument.

 

[INSANE CARZY GUY]

Dude the idoits you talked about will go away if you are smarter and show them their errors. It started working for me in the pichu boards and it started to work,

but then I was banned from the melee boards (cries) And even if they throw you out or whatever for trying to help well F*** you I will make my own metagame social group for non-retarted people(not calling anyone retated)

people should give brawl+ it's own forum