| Hedra42 said: I've been reading the debate between you and Wyrdness and I just want to applaud your informative and factual posts in general in this thread. I didn't know that Brawl dominated the competitive scene for a couple of years, and that Melee was dying out and has had a revival. And with the viewing figures you quoted, the SSB4 figures aren't that bad when you consider its new, and that Melee is enjoying a huge surge of popularity at the moment. "Melee is actually very easy to access contrary to popular belief. It is actually much much easier to acquire a Melee setup than a SSB4 setup (HDTV+WIIU+SSB4+adaptor is well over 400$). Literally everyone has a Wii (or has a friend who doesn't want theirs anymore), and CRT's can be acquired for about $10 at a thrift shop, disc is probably between $30 and $60 depending on where you live." A good point well made, and could become even more influential as the years go by if a new competitive player has to make the choice as to which game he's going to play. It would be a shame if the popularity of a game is dictated by the availability of the setup in this way. (EDIT: - As pointed out by Wyrdness - things may go a very different way in Europe, because of the differences in set up accesibility) "Yeah obviously the top Melee players are Melee minded, and similarly Melee minded players are going to listen. Their voices personally have no impact on me or what game I choose to play competitively. But they will on many Melee players who are considering jumping to SSB4. If a player like Mang0 says he dislikes SSB4, a lot of the people who follow him will be dissuaded from playing it." This I find very sad. Of course, high profile players have a right to state their opinion, and whether intended or not, whatever they say is going to influence many people. But it's the idiots who just won't give a new game a chance, and seem to think that anything that deviates from Melee is immediately substandard, and deserves a subjective bashing without any form of rationalisation that cause the real damage to the game. We've seen evidence of that behaviour in this very thread - calling SSB4 'some new casual bs', 'more casual than brawl', and implying that tourney players who play anything other than Melee are not real tourney players. And I do wonder whether there are elements of the Melee community who may feel threatened with every new iteration that comes out, and feel the need to fiercely defend themselves. What you say about Brawl dominating in 2007 when the Melee scene was weak, and then the problem with Nintendo attempting to ban streams of Melee at EVO a couple of years back, I wouldn't be surprised if that were the case, at least to some degree.
I want to give a perspective from a 'casual' player, and I hope it will be respected by anyone reading it, despite me referring to myself as 'casual'. I have never played Melee, but I've watched a lot of recordings of tournament play, and while my eye might not be as well trained to recognise all the nuances of the game, I enjoy watching it. With Brawl I (and the kids) made use of every feature and mode in the game. Almost always, items were turned on and we just mashed buttons until somebody won. It was fun, a laugh, but that's what casual is all about. SSB4 has changed the way I (and the kids) play Smash. For Fun mode is shunned. Items are turned off when we play. I've noticed that the kids (if playing solo) spend more time 'training' or going one-on-one online than engaging in any of the other features like they did with Brawl. I'm finding myself doing the same. We are becoming more competitive in the way that we play. We find ourselves talking about moves and tactics and trying out new combos, something we never did before. Why? I don't know - it's just that with SSB4 it feels more like it lends itself to exploring and improving your technique than Brawl ever did. Now you could probably point to various technical reasons why that might be so (and I probably won't understand them!) but my point is this: If the way SSB4 has been designed can influence people currently at the casual end of the spectrum to make the transition and become more competitve in the way that they play, then there is potential for SSB4 to be as successful as and co-exist with Melee on the tournament scene. Sadly, there are factors which stand in SSB4's way, and not least is the elitist element of the Melee fanbase who seem bent on not giving it a chance by badmouthing it simply because it is "not Melee". But, like you, I sincerely hope that SSB4 does find its form, and I'm fascinated to see how the game will develop. I've watched recordings of some of the more recent SSB4 tourneys and they're just as enjoyable for me as Melee. |
Yeah you definitely are right about a lot of Melee players fearing change and fearing new iterations. I personally don't mind change. I have tried all the new smash games, including Project M, and I play Melee because it is personally the most fun for me. If Nintendo releases a smash that in my opinion (again only mine, not others) surpasses Melee, I wouldn't hesitate to switch. Saying SSB4 and Brawl are more casual than Melee is an ignorant view among the Melee community and is only perpetuated by the slow and defensive gameplay in those games. Brawl and SSB4 players try just as hard as Melee players to be elite and deserve recognition for it.
This may come off as Melee elitist but in my honest opinion the reason why people are playing on FD, no items, etc. and why for glory mode was created was because competitive Melee has now become a mainstream thing and it has influenced how people view the game. When Brawl came out, Melee was very grassroots and not in the public eye, so people kinda just assumed that items and crazy stages was the way to play the game (that's certainly how it's marketed). But once Melee became popular, people saw the competitive side, tried it, and a lot of people probably found it fun and decided that's how they wanted to play the game. Other people probably tried it and went straight back to having all the crazy items on and stuff because it was less fun, and I have nothing against those people because they can play whichever game they want and the way they want.
SSB4 as a game was designed to be more competitive than Brawl, and most people say it's in between Brawl and Melee which I would argue is false. I think it's more of a combination between Brawl and SSB64 because it has similar shield strength and airdodge mechanics of Brawl but the characters are about as fast as 64 characters, as well as fall speeds similar to SSB64. Though it lacks the ridiculous 0 to death potential in 64, it has the same general pace of 64 (slightly faster than Brawl but still much slower than Melee), combined with the low hitstun and defensive mechanics of Brawl. Of course it also introduces it's own new mechanics like rage and anti ledge-hogging that separate it.
As a casual player, if you are looking to get more into the competitive scene I would definitely watch the smash documentary (though it is very biased against Brawl), and watching Dr. PeePee vs Armada in APEX 2013 or Hbox vs Mango EVO 2014. If you want to get more into SSB4 competitive scene you should probably watch BEAST V since Zero absolutely dominated APEX 2015 to the point where it wasn't really fun.
