Unpopular Smash Opinions (BE CIVIL)

[Cutie Gwen]

Oh I do have a bit of a hot take, I guess so this fits. I don't care about Waluigi's role in the game, I'm not gonna be happy if he's in, nor will I be upset about it, it is what it is

 

[Quillion]

The original post where this discussion came from is about people who hate Smash, not people who likes what they played but have issues with the franchise's direction or anything, just that if there's nothing positive for you to say, you shouldn't really be around sites dedicated to it not just cause it'll annoy others with your negativity that offers nothing but being mad, but because you'd be much happier if you log off and do something that makes you happy

Not to turn this into a debate about semantics, but I just think calling an entire franchise awful, on a forum dedicated to it especially, comes off as being in bad faith.

Not only is it rather condescending, it's also arguably outright hyperbole. Outside of coding working properly, there's no hard science to what makes a good video game, and a statement like that implies that Smash has absolutely no positive qualities as a video game whatsoever and that no one will or should enjoy any game in the series, when it's blatantly obvious that neither is the case. That's far closer to gatekeeping than simply pointing out that being on a forum primarily dedicated to something you dislike isn't the best idea.

There are far healthier and more constructive ways to express or discuss your opinions. That shouldn't even need to be said. You don't even necessarily have to explain why you don't like the franchise. Just...say that you personally dislike it, for example. That's entirely reasonable, and certainly far more constructive than just insisting that an entire series with millions of fans worldwide is somehow fully and objectively bad.

Gotta admit, even I'm extremely frustrated that the "critical" side of the Smash fandom is prone to circlejerk venting about how much they hate the series right now instead of discussing solutions to problems.

I feel they're almost as guilty of not wanting to discuss ways to improve Smash's gameplay core as fans who only care about represented characters.

 

[Wario Wario Wario]

I guess this discussion is a good place to talk about my feelings on Ultimate - I guess I'd say that, from my perspective, Ult is - as a game in a vacuum - an unsalvagable idea executed with flying colours. It's doing what it wants to do - being the big game with big numbers that everyone dreamed of as a kid - well, but I just think that's a stupid idea. Most of the complaints I will give about Ult as a game and Sakurai as a designer can be handwaved validly with "it's not made for you" ("you" in the sense of niche/underground retro gaming fans and players with an interest in learning mechanics/gamefeel), "that IS the intention" (unfocused design-by-comittee roster mentality, redundant content) or don't really matter in the first place (for instance, menu aesthetics, the tone of generic music, and lighting engines) - my real problem with Ult, and probably the reason I feel more animosity towards it than Brawl which is a far worse game IMO, is mostly rooted in how the game's marketing treated itself as part of the product experience (and I'd argue effected the wider game design mentality, but that's a little more speculative) and how that effected me, the fandom, other Nintendo games (I've said this before, but compare Arms' launch trailer to Min Min's cameo reveal trailer. It's shocking when you put it side by side.) and the game as a whole; as well as both quality and especially moral gripes with the Ballot's iron grip over newcomer choices (Don't call it "making wishes come true", call it "uncompensated market research for plastic toys"), and how the internet culture surrounding the game treats it like a marketing campaign with a game attached and judges it - positively or negatively - based on what and how many characters are in instead of the gameplay (I am aware of the mild(?) hypocracy). I see games as parts, not their sum - that's why I love Bubsy so much, he's a fun character with a fun world and fun music, even if the sum of each game's parts is lesser - while nuSmash is all about getting that big fat sum on the box but falls apart once reduced to parts, you see Ultimate as a whole and it's this big exciting thing, but under the microscope, split up and given space to breathe, a lot of that content is - to me at least - bland and uncreative, driven by the wants of other interests - fandom or corporate (though let's be real the prior is synonymous with the latter, even if not vice versa) - and not the devs, while held up with blue tack. Perhaps that's unfair on my part, I dunno. Here's a very old post about this whole thing - not sure if I agree with all of the the opinions fully - or at least the specific tone I presented them - but there's a few anecdotes about my experience.

Maybe I'm alone on this, but my experiences with Smash hype weren't really excitement as much as... anxiety. Like, I think I internalised it as "that tingly feeling of hype!" but in retrospect... no, it was anxiety. Fear. Anticipating the worst. Not a remotely positive emotion. The night before a Smash reveal would always feel like death row, and the test screen countdown on Nintendo streams were devistating. The long-winded CGI cutscenes (especially the ones with darker subject matter) didn't help either. The Smash Ultimate reveal I probably enjoyed the most - not was the most happy about, but just had the best state of mind around - was easily Sephiroth, and that's just because I went to sleep before it was announced Smash would be at TGA, woke up, saw the news and just giggled "hey, Sephiroth's in! Hehehe silly puppet man is gone". I was MUCH happier about K. Rool and Daisy, but I wasn't in a positive state of mind at their reveals because of the sheer sensory overload. It's really sad to look back at just how much and what kind of control Smash had over me during Ultimate's lifespan - my sleep schedule is wonky as is, midnight Nintendo Directs filled with anime games I don't care about don't help. I want to really thank ugly booba ladies for giving me that much needed punch of disillusionment and snapping me out of Smash hype once and for all. If I wasn't distracted by Spunch Bop wavedashing in the objectively superior game, who knows what the lead up to Sora could've done to me.

This isn't just about the dissapointing reveals either, the happy reveals took a bit of a toll on me too, possibly even more - I was in a constant caffine-rush-like borderline-euphoria state for days after K. Rool's reveal. NOT GOOD. ****ING AWFUL. The second worst emotional reaction I've ever felt, (first being the times I was put in solitary confinement when I was 14) struggling to think about anything that wasn't evil cartoon crocodiles or feel any emotion other than blissful joy for almost a week. I was also very excited over my favourite retro characters returning as Spirits - there's settling for less, and then there's screeching like a banshee while ascending to a higher plane of reality over transparent PNGs that disable lava floors. Please, if any unsupervised kids are reading this - I beg you, do not end up like teen me and wake up your neighbours over ****ing tumblr_drill_dozer_jill_artwork_fullres (1).webp, no matter how unlikely it may have seemed beforehand that Nintendo would copy and paste old stock artwork from DK: King of Swing into a new game.

The ugly truth about Namco era Smash is that it's an experience, not a game; and, while many people eat that up, I'm not in the target audience anymore - Smash is drifting away from emphasising gameplay and more and more towards hype. I like gameplay and dislike hype, and hype is now the entire Smash brand.

 

[Mario & Sonic Guy]

Just to try to change the subject, I do find it rather disturbing when certain fighters haven't been treated nicely. For one example, when you look at Zelda, she always gets ranked among the worst fighters in competitive play. And even in Ultimate, she didn't get the buffs that she really needs, such as better overall mobility. Likewise, it can feel baffling to see Ganondorf run slower than Little Mac's walking, when there are heavyweights whom can run considerably faster.

And then you have King K. Rool, who also got treated dirty in the mobility department. I've always envisioned him having good air mobility to reference how far he could jump in Donkey Kong Country, but he barely moves faster in the air than the Belmonts in Ultimate.

 

[Guynamednelson]

or one example, when you look at Zelda, she always gets ranked among the worst fighters in competitive play. And even in Ultimate, she didn't get the buffs that she really needs

Sakurai says every character in Ultimate has a win rate close to 50% already, but I think that's taking combined "For Fun" and "For Glory"-esque rules into account.

A lot of slow, heavy characters suck competitively because they're balanced with free-for-alls in mind, so their win rates would've been from that. Likewise, lightweights are meant to excel in 1v1 fights.

 

[Quillion]

a lot of that content is - to me at least - bland and uncreative, driven by the wants of other interests - fandom or corporate

That's just big publisher games in general nowadays, not just Smash.

It's honestly a miracle that Nintendo of all companies keeps EPD's stuff out of that, even if others like Smash and Pokemon fall into it.

I think your problem is that (like people who bash Smash for having too many sword users when they're just the designated "protagonist" weapon in general) you're treating it as a self-caused problem rather than a symptom.

 

[Thegameandwatch]

The one thing that I am not the biggest fan of is the fact that most Brawl mods essentially treat the causal modes as an afterthought with Classic Mode being a notable example of being mostly identical to Brawl but with different stages in most mods I have seen. At least PM has a different event match.

This is especially the case in mods such as PMEX which are casual focused.

 

[Mario & Sonic Guy]

Sakurai says every character in Ultimate has a win rate close to 50% already, but I think that's taking combined "For Fun" and "For Glory"-esque rules into account.

A lot of slow, heavy characters suck competitively because they're balanced with free-for-alls in mind, so their win rates would've been from that. Likewise, lightweights are meant to excel in 1v1 fights.

And unfortunately for Zelda, being slow and light has never been a good combination for her (as evidenced in Melee, Brawl, and Smash 3DS / Wii U). In fact, knowing that she still runs slower than Sheik's walking just adds salt to the wound.

 

[RealLuigisWearPink]

I find it wild how someone can say the most obvious troll bait and cause pages and pages of bickering

 

[Cutie Gwen]

I find it wild how someone can say the most obvious troll bait and cause pages and pages of bickering

I think it's cause this thread naturally invites a bunch of quirky takes that people don't seem to actually believe but rather hold up to go 'look how different I am' making obvious troll posts get the same level of validity as idk, saying your favourite stage to play on as a kid was the Ice Climber stage from Melee. I just checked a couple random pages and came across at least 1 take per page where you could look at it and tell the person saying it doesn't actually believe it

EDIT: For example, I could say they should cut Mario and Link in the next game if we need to have cuts to symbolize a new direction, but I don't actually believe Mario and Link should be cut and am merely joking about which characters are deemed ok or not ok to cut

 

[GoldenYuiitusin]

Here's an unpopular opinion.


....I didn't hate Smash Tour.
Smash Run was definitely the better of the two system exclusive modes, but for what it was, I had some enjoyment in Tour.

 

[Thegameandwatch]

I feel like Mewtwo isn't as guaranteed to return as lot of people think (closer to 65%) and he feels like a weird example of a character who was more popular when he was cut then actually being in the game.

 

[Wario Wario Wario]

I think it's cause this thread naturally invites a bunch of quirky takes that people don't seem to actually believe but rather hold up to go 'look how different I am' making obvious troll posts get the same level of validity as idk, saying your favourite stage to play on as a kid was the Ice Climber stage from Melee. I just checked a couple random pages and came across at least 1 take per page where you could look at it and tell the person saying it doesn't actually believe it

EDIT: For example, I could say they should cut Mario and Link in the next game if we need to have cuts to symbolize a new direction, but I don't actually believe Mario and Link should be cut and am merely joking about which characters are deemed ok or not ok to cut

Speaking personally, if I was joking or trolling with any of my takes, there would be no plausible deniability. I'm not a 4th-dimensional troll, and if I am joking it will be made extremely clear because I'm not good at playing a character. The ONE time I tried to bait and exaggerate my "wacko class clown heel" reputation without making it clear, it got near-unanimously endorsed (The Earthworm Jim Mii costume submission on Infinite). If I dislike an idea, I'll just say it, maybe through a snarky meme way, but not through pretending I do agree, that's just ridiculous.

I will say that I see Smash as a "gag series" and my takes are strongly influenced by that, but everything I post here I do think is, or in some cases did think was, a good idea, even if from that perspective. I've said this before, but as a kid I had internalised a - maybe stupid in hindsight - narrative that Smash is "the Mr. Game & Watch vs. Jigglypuff game", those picks were the real heart of the game, and the likes of Mario and Link were just added because they had to be there, not because anyone would actually play as them - it was - and to an extent still is - hard for me to really understand that someone would enjoy Smash for having iconic characters you'd expect in a Nintendo crossover, acting the way they do in their other games, as opposed to for its quirky oddball spin-off game status.

 

[Among Waddle Dees]

Now I'm REALLY starting to realize how much Ultimate rode on 4's coattails, and it's making me quite upset.

I thought the asset recycling, general selection of newcomers, and the ballot influence felt familiar. But looking back, wasn't the marketing identical, too? Smash 4 had this big crossover presentation for most of its span, and almost all of that marketing push was carried over to Ultimate, in often larger quantities. So basically, we've been sold a single Smash experience within two sets of entries within different console generations! That's... not much better than a standard port at all!

 

[Diddy Kong]

I feel like Mewtwo isn't as guaranteed to return as lot of people think (closer to 65%) and he feels like a weird example of a character who was more popular when he was cut then actually being in the game.

Could have something to do how he was eventually with buffs a great character in Smash 4 and they totally gutted him in Ultimate.

 

[fogbadge]

Now I'm REALLY starting to realize how much Ultimate rode on 4's coattails, and it's making me quite upset.

I thought the asset recycling, general selection of newcomers, and the ballot influence felt familiar. But looking back, wasn't the marketing identical, too? Smash 4 had this big crossover presentation for most of its span, and almost all of that marketing push was carried over to Ultimate, in often larger quantities. So basically, we've been sold a single Smash experience within two sets of entries within different console generations! That's... not much better than a standard port at all!

I can see what you mean tbh

 

[Eremurus]

I wasn’t talking about Eremurus’s post (and FWIW they do seem like a troll just by looking at their account). Sorry if there’s a misunderstanding. The original post I replied to didn’t quote Eremurus directly so I assumed it’s about the trend generally and not that one specific user.

So I am a troll because I don't agree with you on things. Do you always huff your own farts brother?

 

[Champion of Hyrule]

So I am a troll because I don't agree with you on things. Do you always huff your own farts brother?

Dawg why am I the one you respond to in this thread?

 

[Eremurus]

Dawg why am I the one you respond to in this thread?

I don't know, maybe your funny and charming personality is the reason.

 

[Swamp Sensei]

I don't know, maybe your funny and charming personality is the reason.

He originally defended you dude.

Lay off.

 

[AnotherCosmicCrepe]

I hate Ness and Lucas as characters.
Maybe not a controversial or unpopular opinion, but I would rather stick my face in a meat grinder than hear one more PK Fire for millionth time.

Unpopular opinion, I think Little Mac’s KO Punch is a little overpowered. Just about anything can kill confirm into it, and you can use it to make your opponent fear you and change their strategy accordingly, which can mess them up. No idea how one would remedy this, however. (I’m a Mac main so this isn’t being salty about dying at 22% with a 135% lead on a Little Mac with KO punch)

 

[fogbadge]

Unpopular opinion, I think Little Mac’s KO Punch is a little overpowered. Just about anything can kill confirm into it, and you can use it to make your opponent fear you and change their strategy accordingly, which can mess them up. No idea how one would remedy this, however. (I’m a Mac main so this isn’t being salty about dying at 22% with a 135% lead on a Little Mac with KO punch)

try not to double post

 

[Wario Wario Wario]

I've talked about my apathy to Crash as a Smash pick before on this thread - I'd much prefer a boss like Dingodile, Tiny Tiger, or Ripper Roo as a Smash pick really - but I did recently post this about a potential Crash moveset that might fit here

I've been very heavily critical of how a lot of Smash fandom believes that franchise instalments from the year whatever was 20 years ago are inherently more iconic than anything before or after just because it came out when they were kids, but if Crash has to get in, and he can't be kart-bound, the best way to do his moveset is to take from almost-entirely from the Titans games and Twinsanity - got a video timestamped here, Crash's attacks in Titans really show his personality in a distinct way, that I think would make him a lot more worthwhile than a strictly PS1 Crash - obviously I don't think any actual titan mounts should be in his moveset though (god forbid the tattoos)

And now when I saw Twinsanity, what I'm saying is... make Crash a NASB1 Patrick-style grappler with every special as a grab (but make sure his grabs work as well), And give him a gimmick where every move has a hitbox on whoever he's throwing. Using foes as projectiles, Humiliskating on them, whacking them around - hilarious for FFA, adds an interesting strategy to 2V2, and virtually non-intrusive in 1V1.

 

[Eremurus]

He originally defended you dude.

Lay off.

Damn brother okay. Apparently what I said warranted a "trolling" infraction. My bad.

 

[Wario Wario Wario]

Smash needs more moves - not just specials, but as a whole - that don't deal damage. If projectiles can be normal attacks, I don't see why mild healing or ammo refills (frallan moment) can't. I think Smash doesn't exactly do the best job of dissuading casual players from strictly being on the offensive and punishing them for it (though competitive has the scales completely opposite...)

 

[Mario & Sonic Guy]

I think what would be nice is if every fighter was programmed to have Tough Guy, but their knockback-based armor threshold would be set to 0, except for a select few fighters...

• Bowser: 19 KB units
• King K. Rool: 15 KB units
• Ganondorf: 15 KB units
• Kazuya: 14 KB units
• Giga Bowser: 130 KB units

 

[UserKev]

I feel like the tough guy armor belong to top fodders. Tough guy armor on every character would be unfun. Some would even be weird. It's more special when not too many characters are programmed to have it. It'd look cool on Mario. Wario certainly deserve it.