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[Makai]

A lot of things have changed since Melee, and each Smash has had to take on different burdens. I like to think that has in someway influenced the direction of the series.

Sakurai should just incorporate a Turbo mode with Melee mechanics. Since it would be out of spite he would make it a $10 DLC add on. It would probably need to be rebalanced heavily since some characters would get fucked over hard lol. That will never happen anyway.

Lol @ people calling Sakurai san a bad game designer now or an idiot. Stay salty as hell over a +10yr old game that is still here for you to play. Sakurai has a fucking awesome résumé. Some fans need to get over themselves, it really isn't that serious guys.

Even though I am a competitive player, I can totally see why Brawl is a better game than Melee for most players. Just watch kids play it. Recovery is way too strict and airdodge suicides happen all the time, That said, I think they should have kept dash dancing and L-canceling as the advanced techniques aren't really the problem. I'm not really worried about Smash 4 because any problems it has can be modded out down the line. It felt fine to me during the Best Buy demo, anyway.

 

[Rentahamster]

Just watch kids play it.

Kids have more fun with Brawl? The kids I've seen had just as much fun with Melee too.

 

[Metal B]

Even though I am a competitive player, I can totally see why Brawl is a better game than Melee for most players. Just watch kids play it. Recovery is way too strict and airdodge suicides happen all the time, That said, I think they should have kept dash dancing and L-canceling as the advanced techniques aren't really the problem. I'm not really worried about Smash 4 because any problems it has can be modded out down the line. It felt fine to me during the Best Buy demo, anyway.

I like your positive view on the game and only want to address parts, which are repeated in other posts.

L-Canceling is a horrible mechanic and another form of terrible game-mechanic as Tripping. While you get punished with no reason with Tripping, you get rewarded without big effort for L-Cancelling, You pressed a button? Great, have a speed up landing animation. There is never a reason not to use L-Cancelling. There is no risk and reward. It is a terrible boring decision and go against the easy accessibility of the game, since a new player can't notice this effect.

Also, which is addressed with Smash 4, some moves are designed to have terrible long landing lag. Shiek's aerials in Smash 4 for example has less lag then in Melee with L-Canceling. Marth's Neutral A isn't as fast as in Melee or Brawl, but know acts as an finisher. Think about, which moves to use at what time, is the point of lagging attacks.It is meant as an parable of end lag of ground attacks. Which is why aerials dominant Melee.

 

[Rentahamster]

L-Canceling is a horrible mechanic and another form of terrible game-mechanic as Tripping. While you get punished with no reason with Tripping, you get rewarded without big effort for L-Cancelling, You pressed a button? Great, have a speed up landing animation. There is never a reason not to use L-Cancelling. There is no risk and reward. It is a terrible boring decision and go against the easy accessibility of the game, since a new player can't notice this effect.

There are some cases where L-cancelling is not in your favor, but on the whole, it's more likely that it will be.

 

[DiscoShark]

But then they added the ability to grab the edge whilst someone is already on it as well as already having auto-sweetspotting and multiple air dodges and you have a massively reduced off-stage game, one of the more unique aspects of smash and where most of the potential for exciting comebacks was found.

This must be common knowledge to everyone else but it's certainly news to me. Wow, can't say I approve of that change.

 

[OmegaSmash]

The thing about L Cancel is that even if its a "bad" mechanic, it's still a needed one. It promotes heavier use of aerials on the stage and low to the ground, makes follow ups and combos possible, and generally increases the pace of the game. What's bad about it isn't the mechanic so much as the execution.

Making it a button press complicates things for novices, which is why it should be automatic on hit. That way, you keep the bonuses of increasing the use of aerials on stage, combos and approaching, but lowers the execution for inexperienced players.

 

[Makai]

Kids have more fun with Brawl? The kids I've seen had just as much fun with Melee too.

Maybe once they get into it. The barriers to entry are higher for Melee for sure. There's also easier control options in Brawl.

This must be common knowledge to everyone else but it's certainly news to me. Wow, can't say I approve of that change.

The way it works is the other character gets kicked off. It was probably implemented to nerf planking without making edgelag super long. I'm in favor of it because I like to do spike edgeguards. It sucks when I fuck up and get edgehogged. :,(

I like your positive view on the game and only want to address parts, which are repeated in other posts.

L-Canceling is a horrible mechanic and another form of terrible game-mechanic as Tripping. While you get punished with no reason with Tripping, you get rewarded without big effort for L-Cancelling, You pressed a button? Great, have a speed up landing animation. There is never a reason not to use L-Cancelling. There is no risk and reward. It is a terrible boring decision and go against the easy accessibility of the game, since a new player can't notice this effect.

Also, which is addressed with Smash 4, some moves are designed to have terrible long landing lag. Shiek's aerials in Smash 4 for example has less lag then in Melee with L-Canceling. Marth's Neutral A isn't as fast as in Melee or Brawl, but know acts as an finisher. Think about, which moves to use at what time, is the point of lagging attacks.It is meant as an parable of end lag of ground attacks. Which is why aerials dominant Melee.

Well, look at it this way. Ultimately, competive fighting games are a display of technical proficiency. Lag canceling mechanics are a standard of the genre and there's a whole bunch in Melee. I see it as a good way to make the game fast for competitive players while still controllable for casual players.

It depends on the character, but I wouldn't say Melee is super aerial dominant. Sure, you may approach with aerials, but footsies are in all fighting games. Even the most airborne character uses tilts in combos and many characters rely on smash attacks for finishers.

 

[Rentahamster]

Maybe once they get into it. The barriers to entry are higher for Melee for sure. There's also easier control options in Brawl.

I don't know about that. Direction + buttons all day long in both games. They have the same appeal to newcomers.

 

[Anteo]

There are some cases where L-cancelling is not in your favor, but on the whole, it's more likely that it will be.

So, in what case I rather have the full lag instead of half (in Melee) or 0 (in 64)

 

[Technosteve]

Like I said in the Smash thread, I don't understand how Melee's controls are "complicated."

wave dashing, jump canceling, double shines, edge grabs

 

[Makai]

I don't know about that. Direction + buttons all day long in both games. They have the same appeal to newcomers.

You fall faster, have to face the right way to grab the ledge, automatically die if you airdodge off of the stage, etc. The recovery game is hard for new players.

 

[Rentahamster]

So, in what case I rather have the full lag instead of half (in Melee) or 0 (in 64)

I'm not sure what you're asking.

wave dashing, jump canceling, double shines, edge grabs

If those were Melee's general control scheme, you might have a point. However, those are not Melee's general controls. Melee's controls are directions, jumps, buttons - which anyone can do.

 

[Anteo]

wave dashing, jump canceling, double shines, edge grabs

wave dashing: Input jump + diagonal air dodge?
jump canceling: Definitely hard but not complicated, just imput jump and then input the other action in the first few frames of the jump
double shines: I'll give this one to you, but if you dont main either Fox or Falco you would never atempt this
edge grabs: what?

 

[Kimosabae]

The funny thing about people discussing L-Cancelling is that most don't seem to be conscious of the fact that the Smash series is the only fighting game that imposes lag on aerial attacks in the first place. L-Cancelling shouldn't be a thing because lag post-aerail attacks shouldn't be a thing.

 

[Benzychenz]

Sakurai can make whatever he wants because it's his game and if you don't like it just play Melee some more~

 

[Dr.Hadji]

The funny thing about people discussing L-Cancelling is that they most don't seem to be conscious of the fact that the Smash series is the only fighting game at imposes lag on aerial attacks in the first place. L-Cancelling shouldn't be a thing because lag post-aerail attacks shouldn't be a thing.

Eh. Smash does a lot of things other fighting games don't do. "Should't be a thing" because another fighters don't speaks nothing on how the elements function and function well in Smash in the first place.

*Edit* Plus, a majority of Smash "clones" have lag on their aerials as well.

 

[ReiGun]

wave dashing, jump canceling, double shines, edge grabs

Things that have no impact whatsoever on casual play nor are things the game expects players to know.

So, looking at the game on just a casual level, what made Melee so difficult that Sakurai felt he had to make the changes he made with Brawl.

 

[ec0ec0]

WTF Sakurai. All of my friends who played Melee were casual gamers and they loved it. No problems whatsoever with the pace and controls. I'm barely more than a casual player myself, but I do have a lot of experience with fighting and action games, so I can say with some confidence that Sakurai is misguided here. Melee's advanced techniques are not a barrier to entry for novice players because novices are unaware of their existence. The supposedly difficult execution of these techniques that, again, novices will never encounter, is no more demanding than what you deal with in lower level competitive play in traditional fighting games. (Breaking throws on reaction in Tekken is harder than almost anything in Melee, for example.)

The reason Melee feels so good to play is that it's fast and the controls are perfectly responsive. Sakurai's efforts to make the Smash series casual friendly have done two things: gutted the competitive scene with no benefit to casual players, and replaced slick satisfying controls that benefited everyone with clunky laggy nonsense that brings down the entire experience. (What is tripping about anyway, if not slapping down players who know what they're doing so that they can be roflstomped by complete novices?)

Sakurai should consider letting other people take the helm, since he's unable or unwilling to recognize how Melee transcended his modest ambitions to make an accessible party brawler. He stumbled on a brilliant formula for a unique fighting game that really did appeal to players of all skill levels, and what did he do? Dedicate himself to dumbing it down. Pure incompetence.

this post needs to be quoted again and again.

and like i have said in other occasions.... sakurai alone didnt make melee. HAL laboratory made melee. Also, the idea that smash bros "needs" sakurai as a director is really stupid. Its nintendo that we are talking about. No game there needs one person in particular. ITS NINTENDO. Theres enough talented people there. I trust nintendo, but i dont trust sakurai anymore.

...and theres so much things that sakurai wastes time into, outside of the basic smash bros gameplay problem... I hate the direction that smash bros is going. All those development time consuming modes in brawl (the subspace emissary, the bosses mode, the...), all those customization character options in the new smash bros (every character having lots of different variations of their special attacks + a lot more), seeing how the iconic moves that represent some characters are useless outside of casual play, more and more "crazy" (very powerfull) items, more and more "crazy" stages too, more... How can all those things have priority over a solid gameplay base!?

sakurai please

edit: seriously sakurai, when developing games, why are you not more like... NINTENDO!? i actually like them

 

[Kimosabae]

Eh. Smash does a lot of things other fighting games don't do. "Should't be a thing" because another fighters don't speaks nothing on how the elements function and function well in Smash in the first place.

*Edit* Plus, a majority of Smash "clones" have lag on their aerials as well.

The first two games had a lag cancel mechanic. That should tell you that there was a conscious ideal for gameplay involving aerial attacks with minimal lag. Considering Sakurai has made comments that he looked to traditional fighters for inspiration when developing those games - it's kinda weird. For whatever reason, the decision was made to add an arbitrary execution barrier to this. For reasons even more obscure, this mechanic was removed completely in Brawl, instead of simply removing the execution barrier, which placed a cap on the gameplay potential.

Which "Smash Clones" are we talking about.

 

[Metal B]

Well, look at it this way. Ultimately, competive fighting games are a display of technical proficiency. Lag canceling mechanics are a standard of the genre and there's a whole bunch in Melee. I see it as a good way to make the game fast for competitive players while still controllable for casual players.

That's the problem for Sakruai. He created the gameplay to have a fighting game, which separates the casual and competitive only by experience and not execution. He doesn't want to create a fighting games for two different audiences, which is why, he sees Melee as a failure for his concept. Brawl was clearly a step away from competitive play and he sounds like, he wasn't happy about this either.
His work on Smash 4 looks like finding the balance, he always attempted for the series. A easy-to-learn action-game with depth and easy accesses to a fighting-game's meta-game. Too many people believe, making something complex is hard and creating something easy-to-learn is easy. It is almost always the other way around.

 

[Dr.Hadji]

, all those customization character options in the new smash bros (every character having lots of different variations of their special attacks + a lot more), seeing how the iconic moves that represent some characters are useless outside of casual play, more and more "crazy" (very powerfull) items, more and more "crazy" stages too, more... How can all those things have priority over a solid gameplay base!?

sakurai please

edit: seriously sakurai, when developing games, why are you not more like... NINTENDO!? i actually like them

You should get ready. Talking to various TOs around the area. Custom moves are going to be part of the tourney scene until they prove to be too much of a burden to keep around.

Also, what is with this strange belief that somehow Sakurai's philosophy doesn't fit Nintendo's philosophy to a T. Low barrier, all inclusive, interesting games. That's Sakurai's Smash and that's Nintendo as a whole. I don't know what development studio or director at Nintendo is going to "hard core" up Smash for you if you don't want Sakurai working on it anymore.

 

[jnWake]

Lol @people wishing Sakurai stops being director of Smash. If you read the Iwata Asks for Brawl, you'll see that they never even thought about considering someone else: Here.

Also, for people that are interested in reading more about Sakurai's philosophy, the Kid Icarus Iwata Asks is very good ( Here ). He talks about Smash in it too.

 

[Fugu]

There are some cases where L-cancelling is not in your favor, but on the whole, it's more likely that it will be.

As another poster pointed out, I'm pretty sure it is never disadvantageous to L-cancel. Peach can float cancel (which is faster than L-cancelling) but you lose nothing by trying to L-cancel anyway.

I like your positive view on the game and only want to address parts, which are repeated in other posts.

L-Canceling is a horrible mechanic and another form of terrible game-mechanic as Tripping. While you get punished with no reason with Tripping, you get rewarded without big effort for L-Cancelling, You pressed a button? Great, have a speed up landing animation. There is never a reason not to use L-Cancelling. There is no risk and reward. It is a terrible boring decision and go against the easy accessibility of the game, since a new player can't notice this effect.

Also, which is addressed with Smash 4, some moves are designed to have terrible long landing lag. Shiek's aerials in Smash 4 for example has less lag then in Melee with L-Canceling. Marth's Neutral A isn't as fast as in Melee or Brawl, but know acts as an finisher. Think about, which moves to use at what time, is the point of lagging attacks.It is meant as an parable of end lag of ground attacks. Which is why aerials dominant Melee.

I think people both overestimate and underestimate the difficulty of performing l-cancels. It's actually pretty easy to do with a character you know how to play, because l-cancelled moves feel quite different than moves that aren't cancelled. But being consistent at it is surprisingly hard, and there are a big number of factors that prevent most players from doing it 100% of the time. For the large amount of people who are somewhere between casual and tournament pro, L-cancelling is interesting but not automatic, which makes its inclusion fine.

Melee contains a great number of tradeoffs that prevent aerials from being as dominant as your post claims they are. In fact, the ubiquity of SHFFL and other mechanics like DJC and ground float (...I play Peach) are indicative of the importance of staying near the ground a lot of the time.

Lol @people wishing Sakurai stops being director of Smash. If you read the Iwata Asks for Brawl, you'll see that they never even thought about considering someone else: Here.

Also, for people that are interested in reading more about Sakurai's philosophy, the Kid Icarus Iwata Asks is very good ( Here ). He talks about Smash in it too.

If Sakurai's actions are anything like his words, he should step down. He doesn't know shit about his best game.

 

[Rentahamster]

As another poster pointed out, I'm pretty sure it is never disadvantageous to L-cancel. Peach can float cancel (which is faster than L-cancelling) but you lose nothing by trying to L-cancel anyway.

If you force a player into experiencing a degree of hitstun that he wasn't expecting because you lightshielded, or if you interrupt his aerial attack, then he can be tricked into messing up his L-cancel input, and then experiencing a hard landing.

But then again, that is more a problem with players doing L-canceling on autopilot rather than paying attention to what they're doing.

We had this discussion before in another thread when I thought that there were never any downsides to L-canceling.

This isn't necessarily true. Sometimes it is beneficial to be stuck in a longer landing animation. e.g. Sheik's hurtbox is significantly smaller after landing from a forward-air than she is standing; she can potentially dodge attacks by not L-cancelling.

Note: this is almost never used at high level and is largely impractical, but I thought I'd mention it.

-----------

L-cancelling has quite a lot of depth to it, and has a very distinct and beneficial purpose:

- You can trick people into missing their L-cancel. By tilting your shield up, lightshielding, or various other timing tricks, you can make aerial pressure on your shield more difficult. The Ice Climbers in particular, who have two shields at their disposal, use this tactic to land shieldgrabs.

- After every L or R input, the player character can no longer tech* attacks on the ground for a 20 frame window. So if a Fox tries to neutral air a Peach, misses, and presses L to L cancel, he cannot tech her down-smash for 20 frames. This means that the inherent risk to every L cancel is the forfeiture of your tech, which makes missing aerial approaches very costly. A relatively new advancement among top level play mitigates this risk by lightshielding every L cancel, which does not trigger the tech window.

- This point is a little bit harder to grasp, but is by far the most important: L-cancelling conforms to the rest of Melee's control philosophy; every attack, movement, etc is documented with player input. This makes Melee flow very well, and allows players to follow extremely complex timing windows with muscle memory. Advanced players use L-cancelling as a timing "marker"; there is a constant number of frames after which they can move after L-cancelling their aerial. In a game with variable jump arcs (fastfalling, double jumping, etc) and next to no buffer (so everything has to be precise), L-cancelling allows the player to internalize timings. Without it, the variable timings of jumps, attacks, etc would make movement out of landing lag very difficult to do frame-perfectly.

*a technique which allows you to get up faster out of a knockdown

[I could go on, and there are more intricacies to L-cancelling and why its a genius mechanic, but this should be enough for now lol]

 

[egocrata]

I am in awe at how many people have really strong opinions abouth this game without having played more than an hour.

You guys are great.

 

[Alchemy]

Sakurai really has no idea how the fuck to design Smash games at this point. No casual player stopped playing Melee because it was too complicated, they just fucked around with free for all with items and had no problems with the game.

 

[Devil]

I am in awe at how many people have really strong opinions abouth this game without having played more than an hour.

You guys are great.

This discussion is primarily about what he said or wrote in articles. You know, like the one this thread is about. There is no need to play the next game in the series to have a different opinion on something that he said, especially about an already existing game like Melee.

 

[TDLink]

Sakurai really has no idea how the fuck to design Smash games at this point. No casual player stopped playing Melee because it was too complicated, they just fucked around with free for all with items and had no problems with the game.

I'm pretty sure Sakurai is the primary person in the world who knows how to design Smash games considering he has designed every single one. These two new ones are still going to sell heaps of copies and all around be fantastic games. Just because it isn't pandering to you and the niche tournament scene doesn't change that fact.

 

[BGBW]

Sakurai really has no idea how the fuck to design Smash games at this point. No casual player stopped playing Melee because it was too complicated, they just fucked around with free for all with items and had no problems with the game.

There's more to Smash then a few mechanics being changed.

 

[Rentahamster]

I'm pretty sure Sakurai is the primary person in the world who knows how to design Smash games considering he has designed every single one. These two new ones are still going to sell heaps of copies and all around be fantastic games. Just because it isn't pandering to you and the niche tournament scene doesn't change that fact.

So the basis of a game's quality is in how much it sells? Not necessarily. SimCity sold boatloads, but it was a horrible game. Yes, people are going to buy Smash 4 regardless because it's Smash.

Does that mean we should revel in the fact that the designers' misguided opinions about game design will, for no reason or benefit, alienate a solid userbase of dedicated players who love the game just as much as others do too?

No, I don't think that is a position that we want to take on the quality of our games. EA is the "all about sales" company. Nintendo is about making games that everyone can enjoy.

 

[Mihael Mello Keehl]

Like all fighting games the best player will win. Alot of people should stop whining changing a few mechanics are not the reason you are gettin your ass kicked.

 

[Fugu]

If you force a player into experiencing a degree of hitstun that he wasn't expecting because you lightshielded, or if you interrupt his aerial attack, then he can be tricked into messing up his L-cancel input, and then experiencing a hard landing.

But then again, that is more a problem with players doing L-canceling on autopilot rather than paying attention to what they're doing.

We had this discussion before in another thread when I thought that there were never any downsides to L-canceling.

Tricking people into messing up l-cancelling is one thing, and I kind of alluded to it in my post when I said that l-cancelling is difficult to be consistent at. Not using it to increase hitstun doesn't make any sense, however, as hitstun isn't affected by l-cancelling; if it was, it'd be kind of worthless, don't you think? The Sheik thing is a really special example, and I'm not really sure I buy that it's ever really a good idea as she could just use the extra time to shield pressure/wavedash/whatever, given that one of the most noticeable traits of l-cancelling is that it makes most aerials plus on block.

To be clear, L-cancelling reduces recovery time upon hitting the ground by half, while hitstun and all other consequences of attacking for the opponent remain the same. As far as I can tell, this is always desirable.

Most competitive players do just l-cancel on autopilot because there isn't really a reason not to. This is compounded by the fact that wavelanding uses the same input and can be thought of as l-cancelling for when you don't do a move. When I'm teaching people how to play Melee (side note: I'm no tournament pro, I'm just better than all of my friends and all of their friends) I basically just teach them to get into the habit of pressing L every time they touch a stage surface.

Like all fighting games the best player will win. Alot of people should stop whining changing a few mechanics are not the reason you are gettin your ass kicked.

Well, it's about the game being dull. The best player won in Brawl (...most of the time, tripping is whatever) but many people, like myself, saw the game as boring.

I am in awe at how many people have really strong opinions abouth this game without having played more than an hour.

You guys are great.

I think most people are providing commentary on his design philosophy, not the game itself. I don't know that the game is bad, but if Sakurai is any good at actuating his vision, it doesn't seem promising.

Does that mean we should revel in the fact that the designers' misguided opinions about game design will, for no reason or benefit, alienate a solid userbase of dedicated players who love the game just as much as others do too?

No, I don't think that is a position that we want to take on the quality of our games. EA is the "all about sales" company. Nintendo is about making games that everyone can enjoy.

I think this is a good point. Nintendo is in a situation here where they don't have to alienate anybody. So... why alienate anybody?

 

[peanutbutterlatte]

Lol @people wishing Sakurai stops being director of Smash. If you read the Iwata Asks for Brawl, you'll see that they never even thought about considering someone else: Here.

Also, for people that are interested in reading more about Sakurai's philosophy, the Kid Icarus Iwata Asks is very good ( Here ). He talks about Smash in it too.

Wasn't Brawl without Sakurai going to be a Melee port with online? Sounds like several characters here would prefer that.

 

[lewisgone]

Hadn't been in here until now, only to see certain people slamming Sakurai as a bad game designer. Not just, "he's made some mistakes", or more accurately, "he's made some decisions I disagree with". Flat out saying he doesn't know what he's doing. The guy has achieved so much in his life, and has a great track record. He made Melee, and he didn't make that game by accident. And Brawl wasn't a mistake either. You may have liked it less, but it wasn't a shit game just because it was slower than Melee, or because it introduced elements of chance. These were the deliberate choices of an extremely experienced game designer to help the huge influx of new, more "casual" players get into the Smash Bros. style of gameplay. I'm not saying he hasn't or can't make mistakes, he has and will continue to, but he isn't clueless. Smash 4 from day 1 has looked to be a hybrid of Brawl and Melee, and is looking to hopefully be able to appeal to all varieties of gamers. If it isn't enough like Melee for you, go and play Melee. The game hasn't, and will never, go anywhere. Smash 4 also isn't out yet...so a lot of this discussion is just paranoia. Saying he should stop directing Smash Bros before the new game is even out is a joke.

I wonder if that competitive player who challenged Sakurai to a Smash game in exchange for design input is a gaffer, because it sure seems that way.

 

[TDLink]

So the basis of a game's quality is in how much it sells? Not necessarily. SimCity sold boatloads, but it was a horrible game. Yes, people are going to buy Smash 4 regardless because it's Smash.

Does that mean we should revel in the fact that the designers' misguided opinions about game design will, for no reason or benefit, alienate a solid userbase of dedicated players who love the game just as much as others do too?

No, I don't think that is a position that we want to take on the quality of our games. EA is the "all about sales" company. Nintendo is about making games that everyone can enjoy.

Not what I said at all. I said they're going to sell a ton AND be of the same high quality all of Sakurai's games have been. Just because it is allegedly not as competitive (which has yet to be proven in any substantial way anyways) as Melee does not mean the game is not going to be a high quality piece of software.

Sakurai doesn't give a shit about the "hardcore tournament scene" because it's an extremely small niche that is so obsessed with Smash that he already knows most will buy the game anyways. Why should he care? The games are still going to be loaded with content that he's poured his soul into and that consists of the same great design principles he has employed in every game he has made. That includes all of the previous Smash Bros. games.

Some people are never going to get over the fact that Brawl was different from Melee, just like this game is going to be different from both of those, and just like how Melee was different from 64 as well. It's okay for each entry to be similar but different. If you want to continue to hold Melee as the pinnacle of the series that's all fine and good. Keep playing it. However, there's nothing wrong with the new game not just being Melee with new characters and stages just because it might not be as competitively viable (or competitively viable in the same way). It not just being Melee 2 also doesn't mean it's dogshit or that Sakurai is a bad designer.

Sakurai is one of the best game developers in the industry. He makes games for those who like video games. He packs his games full of content to keep them busy for hundreds of hours of their lives. He meticulously involves himself with every aspect that goes into his games, including minutia. He actually cares. There needs to be more developers like Sakurai out there. The notion that he is terrible at his job because a small group of people, part of a slightly larger small group of people, who play his games think he doesn't love them enough is frankly preposterous.

 

[Dr.Hadji]

This discussion is primarily about what he said or wrote in articles. You know, like the one this thread is about. There is no need to play the next game in the series to have a different opinion on something that he said, especially about an already existing game like Melee.

And what he said in the article is in reference to a new game that we haven't "even played an hour yet". He frames what he thought about Melee and what he thought about Brawl in a way to contrast with Smash 4. He talks about the relative audiences of each game in reference to Smash 4. The interview is about Smash 4!

Some people in this thread are trying to take these comments about Smash 4 and align them with Brawl's design philosophy. And from there, detail the ways on how Brawl is "objectively worse" or a "failure" in an attempt to discredit Sakurai's comments about a game we're barely even played yet.

 

[Revven]

I wonder if that competitive player who challenged Sakurai to a Smash game in exchange for design input is a gaffer, because it sure seems that way.

It wasn't and the "challenge" was a joke and Sakurai took it that way. The media made it out to be more serious than it actually was.

 

[ec0ec0]

Also, what is with this strange belief that somehow Sakurai's philosophy doesn't fit Nintendo's philosophy to a T. Low barrier, all inclusive, interesting games. That's Sakurai's Smash and that's Nintendo as a whole. I don't know what development studio or director at Nintendo is going to "hard core" up Smash for you if you don't want Sakurai working on it anymore.

The point of this thread is that many believe that that WAS Smash Bros. But its not anymore.

My problem with Smash is not a "competitive" one. Some valuable things about nintendo games for me are:

1. the base of the game is the simple but interesting gameplay centered around my character. The gameplay its simple but responsive, its precise and, not matter the level of the player, you feel that you have the control over your character. The game gives you all you need to control your character. Also, the gameplay is closely related with the pace of the game, another important aspect of nintendo games. The pace cant be too slow.

About what i just mentioned above and my opinion about the gameplay in Smash after melee... you can read again the post that i was quoting when you quoted me. Read it again. I think that Smash (after melee) fails to archive some of my expectations about the gameplay in nintendo games (what i said in "point 1" ). And like the poster of that comment says, the changes made to Smash after melee afected everyone aside from tournament players (myself included as a non tournament player). Again, my problem is not a "competitive" one. I dont need someone to "hard core" Smash for me, at least. I want someone to put AGAIN in Smash the gameplay/controls that i expect from nintendo games.

2. that base gameplay that i mentioned above is, at any given moment (when you are playing the game), the center of the game. If the developers want to add any new idea to the game, its better if it coexists with that gameplay base. Not displace it. The idea is that the gameplay base should be solid/great/fun enough so that maintaining it through the game is actually good for the game.

About that... thats another personal problem that i have with smash bros (and this is NOT one of the points of this thread). I prefer the approach of other nintendo games (for example, mario games) to that "problem" (mentioned in "point 2" ), or the approach that (a least, i thought) Smash had before brawl. I personally dont like the direction where Smash is going in this aspect either... after melee they started adding even more crazy things to the game (crazy items, crazy stages..), things that displace the basic Smash gameplay while they are active. And thats exactly the point of things like the smash ball (at least how it is designed at the moment), to be the center of the battle for a little moment. Still, i dont like what they do to the game. I know, i can put all those things "off", but i personally think that it would be better for Smash in the long run if they spent the development time thinking about how to add new ideas that actually coexisted with the basic Smash gameplay... and thats what i would like to expect from nintendo. I love items, i can play with them, i do, but some of those try to be more than what they should.

(i know that "point 2" has less to do with this thread discussion that the rest of my comment. Its NOT one of the main problems of smash for me. I care a lot more about what i say in the rest of my comment. But its definitely another complain that i have about sakurai)

3. another important aspect about nintendo games is, like you said, those "Low barrier, all inclusive, interesting games". I should be able to play the game, but my little brother should to. And the game should have more to offer to the player, if the player spents time learning the game in an active way.

About that... i think that, after melee, sakurai centered Smash too much in the "casual" (i dont like that word) players. And we have this thread where he says that he plans on doing that again :| Therefore, the game has a lot less to offer to me (a non tournament player) than melee did, while still "offering the same" (not true, but whatever. You get the idea) to my friends (as long as they dont care about learning anything about the game ;p). Its not only that the game has less to offer to me, its also that the franchise lost part of its personality, part of what made Smash Bros. And thats inevitable when you center your game around people that dont care about understating/learning your game, they only care about playing. Then you make the game eassier for THEM (the people that just want to play), and you are basically removing what made your game what it is in the first place. Examples:

- In f*cking Smah you fight in a floating platform for a reason!! You know it. This was even part of the base gameplay of Smash 64 (the first Smash game). I dont need to explain anyone why this was a big part of what made Smash 64 what it was. Now, look at the 3ds tournament of the new smash game... everyone comes back to the stage over and over because theres an hilarious amount of mechanics in the game to prevent you from NOT coming back: low gravity (characters can almost come back just with their second jump, whithout using their upBs), many upBs that cover huge horizontal AND vertical distances, characters auto sweet spot the ledge from both sides and from reaaally far away (like... really sakurai!?), the brawl air dodge prevents the oponent from hitting you off stage, (the NEW one) your oponent cant even "steal" the ledge from you...

-another one: the pace of the game. Another important part of the first Smash game. Same for melee. The pace of that game was fast and dynamic. And i am not talking about the melee vs brawl speed. With the pace i mean how everyone died relatively quickly. The game didnt prevent the player from dying (on the other hand, in smash 4, the game helps you to come back and to grab the ledge as much as possible) and it also didnt prevent your oponents from killing you (on the other hand, in smash 4, mechanincs like stale-move negation reducing the knockback of your moves limit you a lot in how you can kill someone).

just two random examples to show you how f*cking much some of the most known aspects of Smah Bros have changed for EVERYONE (not only the tournament players).

I am not asking for someone to "hard core" up Smash. I dont need melee again either. First, i want smash bros to respect the nintendo philosophy that i love and not be too centered on one part of the player base. I want a game for everyone, like nintendo games. Also, i want the great gameplay/controls that i expect from nintendo games (example: nintendo platformers). Then, i want a game that doesnt renounce to the gameplay aspects that make the smash bros series in the first place. Sorry sakurai :/

(if someone read this and is tired now... i am sorry )

edit: it worked!! the post is there... finally haha

 

[deeTyrant]

If tournament popularity was the most important consideration, then I think we would create a Smash Bros. game that included a multitude of fast moves with complicated controls. However, I believe this is actually the greatest shortcoming of fighting games at present, and that is the reason why I don’t do it.

I think Sakurai is completely wrong in thinking a tournament caliber fighting game needs complicated and fast controls. A tournament caliber fighting game simply needs a high level of depth in order to facilitate player creativity and individuality in a competitive manner, not necessarily complex inputs. While there was and still is a very vocal outcry about several mechanics being cut between the transition from Melee to Brawl, I think the real nail in the coffin was how restrictive and limited Brawl felt.

Despite having a more varied roster I always felt like a lot of the move-sets of characters were very particular and limited to only a few potential use cases, or not useful at all. Which made matches feel far more mundane and predictable. It's still an enjoyable game, but I just feel like Melee is the more interesting game in terms of pure game-play.

 

[Fugu]

Sakurai is one of the best game developers in the industry. He makes games for those who like video games. He packs his games full of content to keep them busy for hundreds of hours of their lives. He meticulously involves himself with every aspect that goes into his games, including minutia. He actually cares. There needs to be more developers like Sakurai out there. The notion that he is terrible at his job because a small group of people, part of a slightly larger small group of people, who play his games think he doesn't love them enough is frankly preposterous.

I don't understand this attitude. He made a game that I really dislike and has made a persona out of discrediting a game that I love and defending the game that I dislike. How is this supposed to make me optimistic?

The standpoint that Sakurai is a great developer and we all need to recognize holds no weight for a lot of people because Sakurai just doesn't seem to understand why people are so fanatical about Melee. If Smash 4 is a dud, all it will do is lend credence to the idea that Sakurai struck gold by accident.

I think Sakurai is completely wrong in thinking a tournament caliber fighting game needs complicated and fast controls. A tournament caliber fighting game simply needs a high level of depth in order to facilitate player creativity and individuality in a competitive manner, not necessarily complex inputs. While there was and still is a very vocal outcry about several mechanics being cut between the transition from Melee to Brawl, I think the real nail in the coffin was how restrictive and limited Brawl felt.

Despite having a more varied roster I always felt like a lot of the move-sets of characters were very particular and limited to only a few potential use cases, or not useful at all. Which made matches feel far more mundane and predictable. It's still an enjoyable game, but I just feel like Melee is the more interesting game in terms of pure game-play.

I agree. Sakurai seems to have imported his attitude towards Melee players from 4chan or some shit, because it always reads like he thinks we bought Brawl, tried to wavedash, and never played the game again. A lot of people like myself invested quite a bit of effort into finding out what the competitive metagame of Brawl would look like. When we discovered that this game that appeared slow and janky was actually just slow and janky, we dropped it.

 

[Huge Succeeded]

this thread is nuts hahaha

 

[ec0ec0]

this thread is nuts hahaha

thats also sakurais fault!! xD

 

[GameGuru59]

just two random examples to show how f*cking much some of the most known aspects of Smah Bros have changed for EVERYONE (not only the tournament players).

You can turn the damage ratio up to partially compensate for those two points. It's not out of the question that they could let us change the gravity to... Maybe they'll add it as DLC if we ask? They added a map to Mario Kart...

 

[Metal B]

The point of this thread is that many believe that that WAS Smash Bros. But its not anymore.

My problem with smash is not a "competitive" one. Some valuable things about nintendo games for me are:

1. the base of the game is the simple but interesting gameplay centered around my character. Its simple but responsive, its precise and, not matter the level of the player, you feel that you have the control over your character. The game gives you all you need to control your character. Also, the gameplay is closely related with the pace of the game, another important aspect of nintendo games. The pace cant be too slow. [...]

This is wrong simply by the fact, that in SSB64 and Melee the point of some characters gets destroyed by L-Canceling and Speed Characters. In previous Smash Games the Speed Characters were always dominating the other ones. Bowser was never designed to be a "full in control character" and the player was meant to play around his weaknesses. The same idea is behind characters like Link or Zelda, which are not known for there fluid movement. Fox, Captain Falcon or Meta Knight are more about control and speed (thanks to there original series), which is why they are designed to feel this way. Just look at Mario to find the most balance character in between those as the standard.
L-Canceling and other Advanced Techniques also played in there hands and made those speed characters dominating the game. Of course there are also other factors, but this is why some characters just can't catch up. Let's not forget, that Z-Canceling was original meant to be a way for the CPU to cheat on higher difficulty.

With Smash 4 Sakurai tries to give those "chained" characters a better chance of fighting back. Aerial fighters now have to think about using the right attack in the air or have to face lag (like characters with lagging ground attacks) and many heavy characters are blessed with super armor. It also gives the aerial attacks more differences points: Finisher, combos, ground lag, auto-cancels etc.

2. that base gameplay that i mentioned above is, at any given moment (when you are playing the game), the center of the game. If the developers want to add any new idea to the game, its better if it coexists with that gameplay base. Not displace it. The idea is that the gameplay base should be solid/great/fun enough so that maintaining it through the game is actually good for the game.

A lot of people like the way, you can create your own rules in Smash Brothers. There isn't a right way to play it and people can have fun with it in any way they want. People love the Smash Series for its options and even if i don't use many of it. There people who love playing "Lasers-only", "Pokemon Battle" or "Switching OFF anything".

I am not asking for someone to "hard core" up Smash. I dont need melee again either. First, i want smash bros to respect the nintendo philosophy that i love and not be too centered on one part of the player base. I want a game for everyone, like nintendo games. Also, i want the great gameplay/controls that i expect from nintendo games (example: nintendo platformers). Then, i want a game that doesnt renounce to the gameplay aspects that make the smash bros series in the first place. Sorry sakurai :/

Your missing the most important philosophies "Easy to learn, hard to master" and "Games for everybody"-. This is what Smash Brothers always was about and Sakruai wanted to archive. He wanted the 30+ guy, who hasn't played a fighting game in years and has no time to learn anything (because of his time consuming job), jump into a game and feel the best parts of it. The meta-game, the thinking and all the stuff, which happens in the head and not only through muscle-memory. Smash Brothers is a very egoistic series of a Japanese man, who wants to fell like a pro-gamer in his youth and take as many people as possible with him on this journey.

This is the reason, he looks so against comparative-play. He wants to break the barriers, which makes it exclusive to only a few people and have anybody plays like a fighting-game expert.

 

[Fugu]

This wrong simply by the fact, that in SSB64 and Melee the point of some characters gets destroyed to L-Canceling and Speed Characters. In previous Smash Games the Speed Characters were always dominating the other ones. Bowser was never desined to be a full in control character and the player was meant to play around his weaknesses. The same with Link or Zelda, which are not known for there moment. Fox, Captain Falcon or Meta Knight are more about control and speed (thanks to there original series), which why they are designed to feel this way. just look at Mario to find the most balance character in between those as the standard.
Again L-Canceling and other Advance Technics also played in there hands and made those characters dominant the game. Of course there are also other factors, but this is why some characters just can't catch up. Let's not forget, that Z-Canceling was original meant to be a way for the CPU to cheat on higher difficulty.

I think you're looking at L-cancelling backwards. If anything, it's an equalizer, and it might be the only thing keeping slower characters viable in Melee. While the two most viable characters in Melee are also two of the fastest, the remainder cover the entire gamut of the speed spectrum:

Fox
Falco
Sheik
Marth

Jigglypuff
Peach
Captain Falcon

Ice Climbers

Dr. Mario
Ganondorf
Samus

The correlation between speed and tier placement is weak. Peach, at sixth, is one of the slowest characters in the game, and most of the top eleven are best described as average in speed.

 

[chaosblade]

This is the reason, he looks so against comparative-play. He wants to break the barriers, which makes it exclusive to only a few people and have anybody plays like a fighting-game expert.

So he wants to make everyone look like a fighting game expert by... removing the depth so nobody does?

If he wants to make the game for everybody why doesn't everybody include tournament level players? Why is Sakurai making changes to the game that don't impact "casual play" at all but hinder the competitive scene? That's not making a game for everybody, it's making a party game and excluding the most dedicated players.

The idea that you can make a game like that and have everyone on roughly equal ground is ridiculous. Someone who plays the game once a month is never going to be competitive against someone who puts hundreds and hundreds of hours into it. Sakurai is never going to realize that goal unless he strips any meaningful fun out of the game, it's a fruitless goal.

 

[Metal B]

I think you're looking at L-cancelling backwards. If anything, it's an equalizer, and it might be the only thing keeping slower characters viable in Melee. While the two most viable characters in Melee are also two of the fastest, the remainder cover the entire gamut of the speed spectrum:

The correlation between speed and tier placement is weak. Peach, at sixth, is one of the slowest characters in the game, and most of the top eleven are best described as average in speed.

Peach is the queen of the aerial approach (in Brawl it is Wario), the Ice Climbers are just weird, Ganondorf has the movement options of Captain Falcon and Dr. Mario is a better Mario (which falls in between). Better then average is already enough to dominate the other slower characters. Better movement options only helps the characters, which already have the better movement. Smash is also about representing different characters and franchises, so we can't just make everybody a fast-character. If you don't build some mechanics into the game to help slower characters, the faster characters will always dominant them (look Perfect Cell vs Ultra Saiyajin Trunks =P ). In Brawl this balance went wrong, making the game too defensive and still having the most agile character dominant the game.

 

[Metal B]

So he wants to make everyone look like a fighting game expert by... removing the depth so nobody does?

If he wants to make the game for everybody why doesn't everybody include tournament level players? Why is Sakurai making changes to the game that don't impact "casual play" at all but hinder the competitive scene? That's not making a game for everybody, it's making a party game and excluding the most dedicated players.

The idea that you can make a game like that and have everyone on roughly equal ground is ridiculous. Someone who plays the game once a month is never going to be competitive against someone who puts hundreds and hundreds of hours into it. Sakurai is never going to realize that goal unless he strips any meaningful fun out of the game, it's a fruitless goal.

Yes, this is ridiculous, which is why is it so freaking hard. Sakurai is very close getting there, which why the Smash Series is so great, sold a lot of copies, has a big fan-base and the biggest thread on NeoGaf!
Most options you hear in this thread are the easy solutions: Either forget the other target group (casual or competitive players) or simply separate both. Combining those is a paradox and makes the series into a masterpiece. This is why, following this stupid idea and almost succeeding makes Sakurai into such a fantastic game-designer!

 

[Ron K]

The funny thing about people discussing L-Cancelling is that most don't seem to be conscious of the fact that the Smash series is the only fighting game that imposes lag on aerial attacks in the first place. L-Cancelling shouldn't be a thing because lag post-aerail attacks shouldn't be a thing.

That is not true for almost every (popular, at least) fighting game. It's slight, but there is absolutely landing recovery.

 

[ec0ec0]

The idea that you can make a game like that and have everyone on roughly equal ground is ridiculous.Sakurai is never going to realize that goal unless he strips any meaningful fun out of the game, it's a fruitless goal.

I tried to explain many things in my big previous post, but this was one of the mais points ("point 3" and afterwards). And i think that i explained it decently there.

Its somethig that i have said in other threads and in other occasions too.

I agree with you. (a lot )

edit: page 11!! wow haha