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[Snakeyes]

Nothing against you OP, but I wish people did their homework before making these kind of sweeping comments about a certain game.

Wavedashing doesn't make or break Melee; it's nothing more than a movement/spacing tool that is useful in a handful of situations. Sakurai knew about it, and decided to leave it in during Melee's development, as seen here:

Nintendo Power: This is one that a lot of hardcore Smash Bros. fans have long wondered about. Was the ablility to "Wavedash" in Melee intentional or a glitch?

Sakurai: Of course, we noticed that you could do that during the development period. With Super Smash Bros. Brawl, it wasn't a matter of, "OK, do we leave it in or do we take it out?"
We really just wanted this game, again, to appeal to and be played by gamers of all different levels. We felt that there was a growing gap between beginners and advanced players, and taking that out helps to level the playing field. It wasn't a big priority or anything, but when we were building the game around the idea of making it fair for everybody, it just made sense to take it out. And it also goes back to wanting to make something different from Melee and giving players the opportunity to find new things to enjoy.

Melee also had plenty of "official" additions that are much more vital to competitive Smash and clearly show the intent to make the game more intricate.

- The physics were tweaked to make it a faster game overall.
- Dodging was added to give players more defensive options.
- L-canceling (or Smooth Landing, as it was described on the official Smash 64 website) was specifically balanced to cut aerial lag in half instead of removing it completely.
- Directional Influence became much more prominent and useful than in the original.
- The ability to turn items off was made accessible right from the start instead of being an unlockable.

As you can see, a huge part of what made Melee into a legit tournament fighter was purely intentional.

 

[params7]

In Warhawk, the 'backwards spin' in normal flight was a glitch and not intended on developers part, but it turned into a skill of its own. Lot of competitive pilots in the game spent time learning the technique.

 

[Tain]

You do not get to decide the rules that everybody plays by.

Developer intent doesn't matter. The rules being executed by the machines are the only actual rules.

If the rules make for a shitty game, realize that the developers should change them and don't blame other players for playing by the most tangible rules.

If you can get a group of people that agree a game would be better with some clear user-created rules (rules more like "selecting Akuma is banned" than "snaking is banned"), go for it, obviously. Just don't take that outside of your circle and expect strangers to already consider your custom rules "honorable" or whatever.

 

[Poltergust]

Essentially, "broken" tactics will only get banned if they make the game unplayable. And by unplayable, I don't mean one person runs away from the other person the whole match. I'm talking about things that freeze the game, permanently freeze the character, make you completely invincible, etc.

For example, there's a Nova glitch in UMvC3 in which if he DHCs at the proper time during his Human Rocket super, he goes off-screen and no one comes back out. Meaning that the opponent can no longer damage him.

Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=abZm_myNg_E

That stuff would make you lose on the spot if you did it, even unintentionally.

For non-traditional fighters like Smash, some things can become a little iffy since the definition of "unplayable" is in a large grey area. I mean, there are still things like MK's Infinite Cape glitch, but then you have something like planking, which can, if done perfectly, only make you vulnerable for a few frames.

But yeah, general rule of thumb: Is this tactic broken? Exploit it. Does it make the game completely unplayable? Insta-ban.

 

[FallingEdge]

A3 crouch cancelling always made me laugh. Especially watching matches where they cut out a huge chunk of the match due to crouch cancelling.

 

[Gilby]

You've never made a game, have you?

 

[Ragingnight]

And good on them.

how would crossups even work in a 3d game like VF/SC/Tekken? You can't exactly jump over people.

 

[Slamtastic]

how would crossups even work in a 3d game like VF/SC/Tekken? You can't exactly jump over people.

Part of the reason I don't like or play them.

I was showing my support for MK doing such with that statement.

 

[Ragingnight]

Part of the reason I don't like or play them.

I was showing my support for MK doing such with that statement.

I really don't like MK9 approach either. Makes it really hard to determine frame advantange/disadvantage, and tying moves to special buttons get weird effects (meter draining glitch).


I enjoy crossups as long as they are really stupid. P4A, CvS2, KOF have decent crossups. MvC3 and SF4 have really retarded crossups.

 

[mikeGFG]

Anything goes.

 

[Slamtastic]

I really don't like MK9 approach either. Makes it really hard to determine frame advantange/disadvantage, and tying moves to special buttons get weird effects (meter draining glitch).


I enjoy crossups as long as they are really stupid. P4A, CvS2, KOF have decent crossups. MvC3 and SF4 have really retarded crossups.

I can agree. There's advantages and disadvantages to everything, and it's a matter os preference.

I'm sure you can have back to block and still not make crossups a huge part of the game, depending on how you design the air hitboxes. I just remember how annoying they were in SFxT and MvC, but that probably has more to do with converting them into lengthy/high damage chain combos, than the corssups themselves.

 

[ksan]

Community decides rules, usually the rules don't differ that much in different leagues in most competitive games.

Anything goes.

Bug flash on d2 and nuke?

 

[sleepykyo]

I did not know this. It seems to be true though. So I guess the consensus is that it depends on the game?

It depends on the glitch.

how would crossups even work in a 3d game like VF/SC/Tekken? You can't exactly jump over people.

You can jump over them while they're grounded.

 

[Parallacs]

Suprised no one mentioned the Javelin glitch from Modern Warfare 2.

That allowed people to fire off a javalin but not have it leave their body. They essentially became suicide bombers. It totally ruined competitive play for several weeks until IW stepped in.

It was probably the moment that I realized the series was on the decline.

 

[Vaporak]

It is. I'm not really a fan of it. Now that we live in an age of patches, I feel these things should be removed and the game should be played as intended.

I'm curious if I'm in the minority.

Why? If you care about the game being competitive then the only question should be whether or not you still have a competitively interesting game when the bug is being used or not. If it is then using the bug is legitimate, if it isn't then the game isn't worth playing competitively. I'm honestly not seeing where developer intent matters.

 

[muu]

Rocket Jumping may have been unintended but it sure as hell changed the landscape for Quake, both in terms of MP and speedrunning. I think it's tragic that they nerfed the RL so much in Q2.

 

[Justin Timberlake]

It always fascinates me that people actually care about the developer's "intent"...

For me, all that matters is if the game is fun / competitive...once the game is released, it is out of the developers hands

 

[sixghost]

Suprised no one mentioned the Javelin glitch from Modern Warfare 2.

That allowed people to fire off a javalin but not have it leave their body. They essentially became suicide bombers. It totally ruined competitive play for several weeks until IW stepped in.

It was probably the moment that I realized the series was on the decline.

What do you mean by competitive play in this example? There are plenty of unfixed exploits in competitively played games like Starcraft that are just self policed.

 

[Slamtastic]

once the game is released, it is out of the developers hands

The days of dealing with broken shit (should be) long gone. Now we (could) get our games continually moved closer to perfection with adjustments and new content, after release, based on the feedback of the players playing the game.

(If the console makers wouldn't charge so much/limit sizes for patches)

 

[Littlegator]

The days of dealing with broken shit (should be) long gone. Now we (could) get our games continually moved closer to perfection with adjustments and new content, after release, based on the feedback of the players playing the game.

(If the console makers wouldn't charge so much/limit sizes for patches)

Yeah, but imagine the shitstorm that would ensure if wavedashing was patched out of SSBM or snaking out of Mario Kart DS. Patching is possible, but should it be used for this? That's the point of the discussion.

 

[RooMHM]

Games are boring without glitches. HLDM is the best game of all time.
Q3 wouldnt be near as good without trickjumping.

Smart developpers dont act too hard on interesting glitches.

 

[Archon473]

A technique may be called broken when it devalues the competitive aspect of a game, when such a technique erases the validity of any further strategy. Such techniques may cover multiple options while weaker techniques cover fewer options. Broken techniques are easy to execute, require minimal planning (foresight, such as making a prediction as to what the opponent will do), require minimal resources, and are valid options in many or all situations.

Some of the examples listed in the OP are broken techniques. The techniques listed are not always available to players (UMvC3 TACs) and when available may not be the strongest option (SSBM wavedash). Again, broken techniques are always the strongest option and are always available. A better example would be Strider's Ouroboros in MvC1. Because it was easy to trap opponents in orbs on hit or block and always build another bar to repeat Ouroboros, high level MvC1 reverted to Wolverine/Strider vs Gold Warmachine/Strider; there was no reason not to pick Strider second as he was easily the strongest partner in the game and made others obsolete. By rendering other characters invalid, he broke the game.

 

[Coffee Dog]

The reason why Smash isn't competitive isn't because of "the developer's intention" it's because the game is unbalanced as hell and complete fucking joke when played competitively. It's like competitive Mario Kart.

 

[shindoku21]

I think there's a gray area when it comes to sports games because they're supposed to simulate the actual sport. Nano blitz + rocket catch are commonly used techniques in competitive Madden play. In the simulation community, these are called cheese tactics. When I play a sports game, I want to simulate reality (to a certain degree). A nano blitz or rocket catch just does the complete opposite-- but if you're playing in a competitive environment for $$$, it wouldn't make sense to avoid using those techniques...

 

[The Albatross]

I have two countering scenarios:

1) Team Fortress Classic
The standard version of play that existed for a year+ after TFC's release was conservative, capture the flag, with balanced classes. The biggest "hack" of the environment, characters, physics, etc., was rocket jumping... And the people who could pull off a single rocket jump really changed the way the game was played. Then, simple conc jumping changed everything. I remember Conc jumping the enemy elevator after stealing the flag, and being kicked from servers because admins thought that it was cheating -- how could the flag be taken out of the basement of 2Fort without going up the long ramp?

And within a few months of those "exploits" being discovered, the game changed and changed forever. Some efforts were make to curb back, like making bunny hopping much harder to pull off, but they still existed, and the community pretty much came to accept them in competitive play.

TFC "exploits" pretty much made the game what it is, but I don't think that many (or any) were truly intended. Evidenced in that they took out all of the more remarkable exploits for Team Fortress 2.

Yet, another scenario:

2) Madden / NCAA
For sports games, I really think that you should pkay how the games are generally played in real life

 

[Ragingnight]

A technique may be called broken when it devalues the competitive aspect of a game, when such a technique erases the validity of any further strategy. Such techniques may cover multiple options while weaker techniques cover fewer options. Broken techniques are easy to execute, require minimal planning (foresight, such as making a prediction as to what the opponent will do), require minimal resources, and are valid options in many or all situations.

Some of the examples listed in the OP are broken techniques. The techniques listed are not always available to players (UMvC3 TACs) and when available may not be the strongest option (SSBM wavedash). Again, broken techniques are always the strongest option and are always available. A better example would be Strider's Ouroboros in MvC1. Because it was easy to trap opponents in orbs on hit or block and always build another bar to repeat Ouroboros, high level MvC1 reverted to Wolverine/Strider vs Gold Warmachine/Strider; there was no reason not to pick Strider second as he was easily the strongest partner in the game and made others obsolete. By rendering other characters invalid, he broke the game.

you're forgetting red venom

 

[The Albatross]

Suprised no one mentioned the Javelin glitch from Modern Warfare 2.

That allowed people to fire off a javalin but not have it leave their body. They essentially became suicide bombers. It totally ruined competitive play for several weeks until IW stepped in.

It was probably the moment that I realized the series was on the decline.

Yep. MW2 was a great game hampered by months of terrible glitchers ruining it. Some modes were completely unplayable because of it.

 

[Syril]

- L-canceling (or Smooth Landing, as it was described on the official Smash 64 website) was specifically balanced to cut aerial lag in half instead of removing it completely.

I never understood what the point of that was. There's no situation where you would ever NOT want to L-cancel, so it basically means that you just have to press L every time you land from an aerial attack. Why not just cut all aerial lag in half then and forget the button press?

 

[NIN90]

Didn't strafe jumping start as a glitch?

The world is a better place because of strafe jumping.

 

[Krackatoa]

I never understood what the point of that was. There's no situation where you would ever NOT want to L-cancel, so it basically means that you just have to press L every time you land from an aerial attack. Why not just cut all aerial lag in half then and forget the button press?

Because they probably cared about initial aesthetics of the game and animation, not competitive play.

 

[Fugu]

Glitches are assessed largely by the effect that they have on the metagame: If a glitch expands the character and diversity of the metagame, the community generally embraces it.

The same can also be said of character and stage choices, although bannings of those are generally more heavily resisted.

Also, as many have said, wavedashing is not responsible for competitive Melee gaming and is infinitely less significant than L-cancelling, a deliberate consequence of the game's development.

 

[Comet]

Snaking in Mario Kart DS....

 

[Violet_0]

I never want to see wavedashing and snaking ever return in any Nintendo game, fuck this shit

 

[Rentahamster]

Snaking in Mario Kart DS....

Nah. Every character can do it. It raised the skill ceiling without raising the skill floor.

 

[Tan]

Weren't street fighter combos initially a "bug"?

And I wouldn't even call wave-dashing a bug, it's more of an exploit in how the game works. When you air-dodge and hit the ground, you get a little slide. Doing this during the jump start animation just gives you a longer, faster and more advantageous slide.

 

[Justin Timberlake]

I never understood what the point of that was. There's no situation where you would ever NOT want to L-cancel, so it basically means that you just have to press L every time you land from an aerial attack. Why not just cut all aerial lag in half then and forget the button press?

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]

 

[Dingotech]

Snaking in Mario Kart DS....

First thing I thought of.

Was quite enjoying the game online until you needed to break your wrists playing the game in order to be competitive at all. Whilst I could do it after practice like I said it killed my arms and never felt fun.

Never played the game again after that.

 

[Snakeyes]

I never understood what the point of that was. There's no situation where you would ever NOT want to L-cancel, so it basically means that you just have to press L every time you land from an aerial attack. Why not just cut all aerial lag in half then and forget the button press?

Agreed. I don't like the mechanic either and don't think its few benefits justify the higher entry barrier for competitive play, but it is what it is.

 

[Azriell]

First thing that pops to mind is quick scoping in CoD. I don't think it was something that was initially intended, but now it has been adopted as a legitimate way to play. Treyarch made an effort to remove it with the release of Black Ops 1 with the big sway upon scoping in with sniper rifles, showing that they were against it. In Black Ops 2 it's back in full force, and I even recall a prerelease livestream with David Vonderhaar where he's talking shit to a guy on the other team, telling him to "get good, kid" for being in scope for a few seconds. Clearly a change in attitude on the issue.

Always strikes me as a bit odd how the accepted way to play with a sniper rifle is to run around like crazy, and the most effective way to play with an LMG is watch over an area, basically like a sniper, due to the LMGs' long ADS time and terrible hipfire accuracy. Especially when I see snipers jumping and quick scoping midair, and LMG users laying down in the grass, already ADS most of the time. I'm almost too old for this shit.

 

[Archon473]

you're forgetting red venom

He still required pushing the opponent to the corner. He is quite strong mid-screen.

I never understood what the point of that was. There's no situation where you would ever NOT want to L-cancel, so it basically means that you just have to press L every time you land from an aerial attack.

There are many attacks in Melee that do not merit L-Cancelling. Captain Falcon has many combos where he is high enough to recover from his uAir or bAir while airborne; these combos do not warrant L-Cancelling.

L-Cancelling tests the same skill as Teching only in an offensive situation (anticipating a landing animation). It is acceptable as a player to decide this is not a skill worth developing. I tend not to practice a skill that does not translate use outside its original game, but execution requirements and the margin for human error are natural balancing factors important to all competitive games. The potential for error influenced by stress is likewise important.