Zero Punctuation: Super Smash Bros. Brawl
- Thread starter Yahtzee Croshaw
- Start date
Yeah, yeah, yeah. You and everyone else here.Tumbler360 said:
Guess what. Yahtzee doesn't like having to unlock characters. In respect to Smash Bros., he said so in his review. ..and look: the majority of you regulars here agree with him.
What if everything was available at get-go? What if he had said that because there's nothing to unlock, there's no reason to play the game further than the five minutes it takes to become bored with it? You all would have agreed and said that Nintendo sucks for not giving the players something to play for.
Chances are, most of you people and your posts are just piggybacking Yahtzee and going with whatever he says.
That review is the worst submission thusfar and it appears he spent more time playing Condemned 2 than Smash Bros. This is clear because his review for Condemned 2 was in-depth, smart and quite informative to someone like myself who has been casually interested in playing the game. This week's release was bland, pretty clumsy and not nearly as funny as usual. Roxwuff is right. It appears that couple hours he spent with his drunken fool buddies was not nearly enough time to give him enough reason to make such a review. I didn't take anything from it. (Other than the idea that Nintendo fans are apparently lesser than other gaming fans because they enjoy their franchises. Very nice, Yahtzee.)
Truth be told, one of his final comments made good sense. There are certain games that are just meant to be played for simple fun. To waste time critiquing such games is obnoxious at best.
True, he should have ended his review with that and the "kicking Peach's ass" part.MurmurTwins said:
I was introduced to Zero Punctuation a month or two back when a friend showed it to me, but I only made an account just now. I'm sure you know why.
I usually like Yahtzee's brutal honesty in his reviews, and I feel that for the most part he tears apart every game he comes across, and most of them receive fairly decent if not amazing scores from other reviewers. In other words, games that most reviewers won't dare to criticize (for whatever reason) I can ensure that Yahtzee will speak truth about its flaws.
For this review, this is partly true. He mentioned the flaws with the Subspace Emissary being too long and repetitive and the chores of unlocking all the secret characters (especially since both Sonic and Snake are on the back of the frikkin' box... it's no surprise that they're in the game, even if you stay far, far away from internet forums!) And I'm sure that many fanboys will defend the game no matter what, as evidenced by the plethora of responses in this very thread.
Here, I'll even add a few more flaws to the game: Many "cloned" characters were not removed (and some new ones were added), WiFi lags and requires the persistent Friend Codes, and the game seems to cater to newer characters and looks (Zelda series in particular) instead of the "classical" look of previous games. In many respects Brawl suffered from the same fate that the Pokemon handheld series faced: oversaturation of features to appeal to more and more people, and while are nice touches, don't add anything to the core gameplay. Nintendo knows the series is popular, and many of the new things they tried to put in felt like it was done half-assed. But the game is still good.
My problem with this review is that it makes the game look like utter shit, when it isn't. As others have mentioned, Yahtzee said that he didn't care for fighting games in his review, and many of his complaints seem to hit the genre holistically instead of targeting on this one game. That's the equivalent of saying "Oh, Team Fortress 2 is good/bad, so Halo 3 must be good/bad also."
Brawl is nothing like other fighting games, and if anything is a fighting/platformer hybrid of sorts. The game mechanics are solid, and the argument for button mashing goes for any game that you play for the first time. I've seen many people competitively play the original and Melee, with wavedashing and all that (which I was never really good with... I was never "that player," at least in comparison to my friends), but I've had fun with the game on a much simpler level. Basically, the game can be played either competitively or just for fun, and inclusions of items such as the Smash Brawl are evidence of this, since you can opt to take it out (for competitive matches) or leave it in (just for fun).
Still, the review was good, and had its usual funny remarks, and I enjoyed these parts, but I felt that in comparison to other games, Yahtzee never treated the game as having some sort of value to begin with, instead of just picking at its many faults (which he didn't even pick at completely. I love the game and found stuff that he missed). I like some reviews more than others, but there's always at least one part to every review that I find priceless (I particularly like the "Extravaganza" part) so I don't mind disagreeing here and there. It's just that this is the first review that I disagreed with most of the points.
Feel free to argue with me; I love a good debate.
I usually like Yahtzee's brutal honesty in his reviews, and I feel that for the most part he tears apart every game he comes across, and most of them receive fairly decent if not amazing scores from other reviewers. In other words, games that most reviewers won't dare to criticize (for whatever reason) I can ensure that Yahtzee will speak truth about its flaws.
For this review, this is partly true. He mentioned the flaws with the Subspace Emissary being too long and repetitive and the chores of unlocking all the secret characters (especially since both Sonic and Snake are on the back of the frikkin' box... it's no surprise that they're in the game, even if you stay far, far away from internet forums!) And I'm sure that many fanboys will defend the game no matter what, as evidenced by the plethora of responses in this very thread.
Here, I'll even add a few more flaws to the game: Many "cloned" characters were not removed (and some new ones were added), WiFi lags and requires the persistent Friend Codes, and the game seems to cater to newer characters and looks (Zelda series in particular) instead of the "classical" look of previous games. In many respects Brawl suffered from the same fate that the Pokemon handheld series faced: oversaturation of features to appeal to more and more people, and while are nice touches, don't add anything to the core gameplay. Nintendo knows the series is popular, and many of the new things they tried to put in felt like it was done half-assed. But the game is still good.
My problem with this review is that it makes the game look like utter shit, when it isn't. As others have mentioned, Yahtzee said that he didn't care for fighting games in his review, and many of his complaints seem to hit the genre holistically instead of targeting on this one game. That's the equivalent of saying "Oh, Team Fortress 2 is good/bad, so Halo 3 must be good/bad also."
Brawl is nothing like other fighting games, and if anything is a fighting/platformer hybrid of sorts. The game mechanics are solid, and the argument for button mashing goes for any game that you play for the first time. I've seen many people competitively play the original and Melee, with wavedashing and all that (which I was never really good with... I was never "that player," at least in comparison to my friends), but I've had fun with the game on a much simpler level. Basically, the game can be played either competitively or just for fun, and inclusions of items such as the Smash Brawl are evidence of this, since you can opt to take it out (for competitive matches) or leave it in (just for fun).
Still, the review was good, and had its usual funny remarks, and I enjoyed these parts, but I felt that in comparison to other games, Yahtzee never treated the game as having some sort of value to begin with, instead of just picking at its many faults (which he didn't even pick at completely. I love the game and found stuff that he missed). I like some reviews more than others, but there's always at least one part to every review that I find priceless (I particularly like the "Extravaganza" part) so I don't mind disagreeing here and there. It's just that this is the first review that I disagreed with most of the points.
Feel free to argue with me; I love a good debate.
Being in England, we're yet to gain alliances with whether or not we like SSBB, but your review gave me some new insight into what SSBB will be like. Not to imply i'm going totally by your opinion. I'm not a lemming. Completely.
Also I don't have a Wii.
Also I don't have a Wii.
It is against my religion to read all the posts in a thread this long, but I thought I would just kick this out there:
Does his introduction to this video indicate that if you all bombard him with constant email begging noise, he might now review a JRPG?
Does his introduction to this video indicate that if you all bombard him with constant email begging noise, he might now review a JRPG?
I've been following a few of these discussions and it has struck me that whenever someone disagrees with Yatzee's review, some people tend to belittle him as not understanding the game, shouldn't review games in genres he doesn't like or is just plain wrong. Saying that SSBB is a lot more deep than it would seem at first is all right. A lot of games takes skill to master and that's all right. What I think his point was that unless you master the game its really not fun.
Some fighting games have several stages of skill, where you can be kinda good at it, but still not be THAT GUY. I don't want to be THAT GUY in order to enjoy a game. I don't want to learn every move in order to understand the depth. Stop waving around a vague sense of "gameplay understanding" that can only be attained if you master the skills necessary, then expect everyone new to the game to knuckle down and train hard to be THAT GUY.
I like your reviews and tend to agree with you Yatzee, hope that shines a light in your world.
Some fighting games have several stages of skill, where you can be kinda good at it, but still not be THAT GUY. I don't want to be THAT GUY in order to enjoy a game. I don't want to learn every move in order to understand the depth. Stop waving around a vague sense of "gameplay understanding" that can only be attained if you master the skills necessary, then expect everyone new to the game to knuckle down and train hard to be THAT GUY.
I like your reviews and tend to agree with you Yatzee, hope that shines a light in your world.
Well that's one part of the Smash Franchise that's always been fun without being part of the actual gameplay. The fan service is not just about playing with your favorite character, but to see your character beat the living shit out of another one that you might find annoying and good lord does Nintendo have annoying characters to spare.mspencer82 said:
I would love to see other Smash games with characters from Disney or Bugs Bunny.
One more thing... if Yahtzee had actually went a little more in depth, I'd be interested to know his opinion on some of the others modes, such as:
1) The Coin Launcher
2) Stage Editor/Designer
3) Home Run Contest
4) Multi-Man Melee
1) The Coin Launcher
2) Stage Editor/Designer
3) Home Run Contest
4) Multi-Man Melee
The trick with the "single player" is to actually have a buddy/family member play it with you coop. Yes, you can actually add another player in.
"jahtze, you charismatic stalion"
this review was a biassed cock up!, but people still love you for it, so cheers
loved the peach-brain mashing, hated just about everything else, exept maybe the blatant commercial put in here XD "game traders..-"
to all the whiners, the fanboys, defenders and attackers:
smash can be button mashed, but then again, what cant ? you will get the same effect, your char wil flail all over the place, making you look like a retard, and somone will just pull out your controller til you act like a damn human being.
smash is not hard. jump, atack+ direction, special + direction, 3 fucking variables people!
now, if one were to rant about the simplicity of mind, and the total lack of propper splatter-fest mode, this would be understood, for it is nintendo, and all that is marginaly good about nintendo IS smash, fire emblem, and zelda ( blood idiots called nintendo INC. keep fucking up the 3'd though. )
one should not expect high standing, hight quality, hight graphics, one should look at it in the way it should be judged:
say, your with a girl, on your sofa, and you need a game you both can play without to much problems, smash is your thing!
it contains cuteness!, lack-of-splatter!, and most importantL lack of activity so the girl will most likely end doing something other with you wich is a lot better passtime!
this, is the strength that is smash brawl. otherwise, go back to halo, cod 4, or gears of war or whatnot.
this review was a biassed cock up!, but people still love you for it, so cheers
loved the peach-brain mashing, hated just about everything else, exept maybe the blatant commercial put in here XD "game traders..-"
to all the whiners, the fanboys, defenders and attackers:
smash can be button mashed, but then again, what cant ? you will get the same effect, your char wil flail all over the place, making you look like a retard, and somone will just pull out your controller til you act like a damn human being.
smash is not hard. jump, atack+ direction, special + direction, 3 fucking variables people!
now, if one were to rant about the simplicity of mind, and the total lack of propper splatter-fest mode, this would be understood, for it is nintendo, and all that is marginaly good about nintendo IS smash, fire emblem, and zelda ( blood idiots called nintendo INC. keep fucking up the 3'd though. )
one should not expect high standing, hight quality, hight graphics, one should look at it in the way it should be judged:
say, your with a girl, on your sofa, and you need a game you both can play without to much problems, smash is your thing!
it contains cuteness!, lack-of-splatter!, and most importantL lack of activity so the girl will most likely end doing something other with you wich is a lot better passtime!
this, is the strength that is smash brawl. otherwise, go back to halo, cod 4, or gears of war or whatnot.
You want a game that gets you laid? Viva Pinata.thahat said:"jahtze, you charismatic stalion"
this review was a biassed cock up!, but people still love you for it, so cheers
loved the peach-brain mashing, hated just about everything else, exept maybe the blatant commercial put in here XD "game traders..-"
to all the whiners, the fanboys, defenders and attackers:
smash can be button mashed, but then again, what cant ? you will get the same effect, your char wil flail all over the place, making you look like a retard, and somone will just pull out your controller til you act like a damn human being.
smash is not hard. jump, atack+ direction, special + direction, 3 fucking variables people!
now, if one were to rant about the simplicity of mind, and the total lack of propper splatter-fest mode, this would be understood, for it is nintendo, and all that is marginaly good about nintendo IS smash, fire emblem, and zelda ( blood idiots called nintendo INC. keep fucking up the 3'd though. )
one should not expect high standing, hight quality, hight graphics, one should look at it in the way it should be judged:
say, your with a girl, on your sofa, and you need a game you both can play without to much problems, smash is your thing!
it contains cuteness!, lack-of-splatter!, and most importantL lack of activity so the girl will most likely end doing something other with you wich is a lot better passtime!
this, is the strength that is smash brawl. otherwise, go back to halo, cod 4, or gears of war or whatnot.
True story.
That was awesome, maybe there's hope for you yet. But you realize that whenever you say you expect your fanbase to send you hate emails for something, they all send annoying love emails instead. So that sentence at the end just fulfilled itself. There's a word for that, but I can't remember. On another note, I don't have any idea why people think you're not a reviewer. When was the definition of a review changed? On ANOTHER note, I have no idea why I'm talking like you'll ever read this. If you haven't given up on the comments yet, you're officially crazy.
i know, my friend has it, girls keep pettign THE DAMN BOXFuckYouDad said:You want a game that gets you laid? Viva Pinata.thahat said:"jahtze, you charismatic stalion"
this review was a biassed cock up!, but people still love you for it, so cheers
loved the peach-brain mashing, hated just about everything else, exept maybe the blatant commercial put in here XD "game traders..-"
to all the whiners, the fanboys, defenders and attackers:
smash can be button mashed, but then again, what cant ? you will get the same effect, your char wil flail all over the place, making you look like a retard, and somone will just pull out your controller til you act like a damn human being.
smash is not hard. jump, atack+ direction, special + direction, 3 fucking variables people!
now, if one were to rant about the simplicity of mind, and the total lack of propper splatter-fest mode, this would be understood, for it is nintendo, and all that is marginaly good about nintendo IS smash, fire emblem, and zelda ( blood idiots called nintendo INC. keep fucking up the 3'd though. )
one should not expect high standing, hight quality, hight graphics, one should look at it in the way it should be judged:
say, your with a girl, on your sofa, and you need a game you both can play without to much problems, smash is your thing!
it contains cuteness!, lack-of-splatter!, and most importantL lack of activity so the girl will most likely end doing something other with you wich is a lot better passtime!
this, is the strength that is smash brawl. otherwise, go back to halo, cod 4, or gears of war or whatnot.
True story.
This review was terrible, but not because of your opinion of the game. As you yourself pointed out, there was no real point in your reviewing the game as we all already know whether or not we want to purchase it.
No, the real crime here was the lack of funny. I watch Zero Punctuation because it is hilarious, and while I may not always agree with you on everything in general I don't really care because of the high entertainment value. This week you fell down.
Sure, making fun of people who enjoy playing fighting games a lot and becoming good at them is swell and all, but there really isn't enough to make fun of. A lot of this week was simply you insulting the people who asked you to review the game and, while perhaps somewhat justified, it lead to a very uninteresting, boring video. Swearing and dropping giant letters on people is funny and all, but it isn't THAT funny, and that really was all this video had going for it.
You had some great gags - the repetitiveness meaning you should be able to unlock Bill Murray, and the recurring gag where you killed your multiplayer friends and ate their flesh (though it got a bit old after a while, around the time of THAT guy gag I suppose). And while repitition can be good, in this case, like in SSBB's case, it just didn't pay off and lead to an overall lamer experience. And the Gametraders Rubina thing at the beginning just got obnoxious.
I think you spent too much time rawring about how angry you were at having to review the game, and not enough time actually reviewing/insulting the game and coming up with funny gags. So in the future, don't take requests which you're going to resent if it is going to lead to a video as poor as this week's.
No, the real crime here was the lack of funny. I watch Zero Punctuation because it is hilarious, and while I may not always agree with you on everything in general I don't really care because of the high entertainment value. This week you fell down.
Sure, making fun of people who enjoy playing fighting games a lot and becoming good at them is swell and all, but there really isn't enough to make fun of. A lot of this week was simply you insulting the people who asked you to review the game and, while perhaps somewhat justified, it lead to a very uninteresting, boring video. Swearing and dropping giant letters on people is funny and all, but it isn't THAT funny, and that really was all this video had going for it.
You had some great gags - the repetitiveness meaning you should be able to unlock Bill Murray, and the recurring gag where you killed your multiplayer friends and ate their flesh (though it got a bit old after a while, around the time of THAT guy gag I suppose). And while repitition can be good, in this case, like in SSBB's case, it just didn't pay off and lead to an overall lamer experience. And the Gametraders Rubina thing at the beginning just got obnoxious.
I think you spent too much time rawring about how angry you were at having to review the game, and not enough time actually reviewing/insulting the game and coming up with funny gags. So in the future, don't take requests which you're going to resent if it is going to lead to a video as poor as this week's.
WTF does Yaztee need to go to whatever game trader to get any game? (I forgot the name even if I've been told it in a most demonic tone of voice)
Damn, I would've sent him my copy to keep if he asked. I bought it the same day as No More Heroes, and guess which of the two I played (and wouldn't send to Australia for free)?
Damn, I would've sent him my copy to keep if he asked. I bought it the same day as No More Heroes, and guess which of the two I played (and wouldn't send to Australia for free)?