Zero Punctuation: Super Smash Bros. Brawl

[Xenoveritas]

Once again, if you really want to, you can turn those things off. If you really want to, you can do the "No-items Unremarkable-blob-vs.-unremarkable-blob on stage floating-platform-in-space", and will get the expected result. (No prize if you know what I'm referring to)

And I'm sure every tournament will. But you'd think that they might make some attempt to make all the Final Smashes on the same level. There's nothing worse than seeing the Smash Ball and realizing that you can't actually use it because your Final Smash is completely worthless - but if your opponents grab it, it's instant death. That's lame.

I can accept a number of the items being cheap kills, that adds some amount of luck to the game, and for party games like this, gameplay requiring luck works. (Sadly that same luck applies to the single player game. There's nothing quite like losing All Star Mode because a bob-omb spawned on your head, no matter how funny it was in multiplayer.) And it's a good thing that you can turn them off, because they get annoying after a while.

It just would be nice if all the Final Smashes were useful, instead of just some of them. Although it is fun to watch a Landmaster get stuck in the terrain, forced to fire its completely useless cannon up off the edge of the screen.

 

[Iori Branford]

I actually didn't find a moment where he was professional and said "What I really like about..."

And I must confess engineering a scenario in which Mario can brutally beat the stupid out of Princess Peach while the crowd screams for blood is very satisfying.

But I suppose if you're hosting the party and have time to prepare you could always...go through the single-player campaign which a surprising amount of work has gone into actually.

 

[PoisonedV]

Although I don't appreciate the rip on Soul Caliber in there...

 

[Dead on Time]

Haha, funny how I wound up commenting when I thought I wouldn't. Reading through this discussion forum has been.. interesting.

In my humblest of opinions, the review did bring up some very valid points about SSBB. It does take a few matches to get used to it and the single player was somewhat disappointing (despite how it was hyped). The Wii-controls were horrendous (forced me to dust off a GC controller) and hell, you could button mash your way out of some situations. But all in all I still found the game pretty damn fun.

Unlockable characters are a staple of the SSB series (see the first few games if you don't know) so I wouldn't see why anybody would complain about that in the first place (lots of fighting games have these; not all but a good portion).

The thing that has popped out throughout this discussion is the complexity of SSBB - can it be qualified as a competitive fighting game? Yeah. Why? Pretty simple.

Being a competitive player (i.e. entering tournaments) I'd have to say that there is enough "complexity" in SSBB to make it a tournament game, with regards to the knowledge you'd have to have in order to play at a pro level. Dash cancelling, edge guarding techniques, move properties and frame-data - all of these are present in the game.

Don't get me wrong; this game is no Guilty Gear XX: Accent Core (for those of you who don't know, it's possibly one of the most complex 2D fighting games out there), but it still has enough quirks to get by as a 'good' fighting game.

Also, I'd like to address the uneducated that 'mashing', by no means, is the way to win in a fighting game. Knowledge and reaction time make the good player. And if you think that 'mashing' will win you a game in SSBB, I'd like to see you try going up against a thinking player first instead of going against other mashers.

 

[Monodi]

hahaha good lord, thank goodness someone else got the good point in the Mother3 spotlight advantage. Cheers.

I love the game and all but I got disappointed that most of the shit I wanted was locked as for Snake and Sonic in the day it was out. But oh well.

Gotta visit those traders

 

[SinofMar]

Oh and while I'm at it the thing that surprised me the most is that it was a multi-player game that you reviewed and that seriously surprised me to the point where I nearly shat myself retarded. If there was one person whom I thought was an anti-social human hater it was you Yahtzee. My perception of reality has been tossed for a loop.

 

[smallharmlesskitten]

WIN YAHTZEE WIN

my friend nearly had a heart attack when i showed him this, shine on you crazy diamond

ps: WIN!!!

 

[Barciad]

Mr Yhatzee has stirred a bloody hornets nest with this one. Standard rule of thumb, if you want to get a big thread going, say something that will really infuriate some whilst leaving everyone else jumping for joy.
I only went into town to see the Palestinian Ambassador, and when I get back the thread was like this. Good work Mr Crosshaw.
Just to reiterate, I have always disliked playing beat em ups for any extended period of time solely for the reason that I have never been any good at them. The arguement that they are essentially the same could aslo be applied, but I get the feeling that this line of attack could be used on practically any genre you dislike.

 

[erock7101]

I knew a shitstorm had been set off when I rushed home from work to see this review and there were already nearly 400 posts (this one will totally get lost in the jetsam and flotsam, who cares). Simply enough, I laughed my ass off. One of the best yet!

 

[defcon 1]

Although I love that game I will have to say

THANK YOU MESSIAH YAHTZEE!!!!

I still hate grinding in order to unlock characters, especially when we spend the first day celebrating, but all we do is unlock characters. And finally someone agrees that Sub-Space Emissary sucked mass amounts of donkey cock(sorry... had to be said) because half way through the game you go through the same BS as before and it's way too long. Everyone thought I was crazy for saying this kind of stuff.

I do believe there is skill required to win and that you're just suppose to have fun with it and not take it seriously. My friends take it way too seriously, look up tier listings and I STILL kick their ass. It's all about skill! Randomness such as items make it more fun, believe me. Ok so they don't hold items in tournaments and only play the Final Destination stage because they can't have any "arbitration." Guess what, the trip event is arbitrary and by their logic this game shouldn't even be admissible in video game tournaments!

However, I can see the screen just fine and every character is pretty well balanced. I thought it was pretty strategic.

 

[blank0000]

You know, I may not agree with him completly, but damn that man is funny.

And now for something comletly different.

As I read the comments here I'm noticing a lot of suspiciously direct criticisms about the game. multiple "yeah......fan boys and bad! this games over hyped, over rated "fanboiiddly iddly I'm cool cause I dont like it" attitude. Though everyones free to have their own opinion, I cant help but feel like some people are just saying this to "good GOD im in for it" appear cool as opposed to honestly thinking along those lines. Taking a direct quote from an amusing line in a review does not justify as critism. I actaully think its somewhat fanboy esk, in a wonderfully ironic sort of way.

I have played SSBB, and in all honesty its a good game, its not just a "fan boys wet dream" and even if it were thats kind of the point,the concept. Is that the only way to view it, hellz to the no! Theirs plenty of reasons to love and hate ANYTHING, its the reason behind the hate that differens a certain reviewer from an over zealos fan.

 

[Lvl 64 Klutz]

I'm usually a defender of unlockables, and love that games put them in. But I agree with Yahtzee on this one, SSBB has a crapload of unlockables that don't require any skill to unlock and is instead an exercise in patience. Finally unlocking that quintessential character doesn't feel like any kind of rewards because there's so many ways to unlock each one.

 

[T0r012]

Wow , he thrashed SSBB. I was expecting him to review it wih his usual viscousness but this is non stop.

I am surprised that the sloppy controler function wasn't mentioned. I just can't get over how poorly the inputs are translated. I though I had gone back to the days of pac-man. I gave over the wiimote - nunchuck thinking that was the cause and went to the wavebird, nope. and when the stepson had a couple of buddies over I volunteered to use the sole wired gamecube controler we still own the situation still didn't improve.



I do have to take exception to the whole button masher being better than a skilled player. No, not for SSBB cause that is true, but for soul caliber

 

[T0r012]

Wow , he thrashed SSBB. I was expecting him to review it with his usual viciousness but this is non stop.

I am surprised that the sloppy controller function wasn't mentioned. I just can't get over how poorly the inputs are translated. I though I had gone back to the days of pac-man. I gave over the wiimote - nunchuck thinking that was the cause and went to the wavebird, nope. and when the stepson had a couple of buddies over I volunteered to use the sole wired gamecube controller we still own the situation still didn't improve.
Couple of days later I come home from work and find my stepson playing soulcaliber2 and think that is odd. We occasionally will dust it off and have a night of battles but to play alone that is strange. So I ask why, "I just got so tired of the slop controls in SSBB that I had to play something precise."

While on the soulcaliber topic , I do not believe that it is a button mashers game. sure it is tons of fun when you are a newbie and playing against other newbies and you are both button mashing. When you get serious with SC2 there is no button masher that can touch you. SC2 does lose a lot of its hilarity then but then becomes more of a serious strategy game.

 

[grinner_88]

That was effing brilliant!

I knew this game was going to be a doddle when Kotaku (or at least I think it was) posted a link to a fan made video which was 5 minutes of some twat trying to pause the game at the best moment to view Princess Peach's underdacks... which I think sums up the game and the general calibre of its fanboys out there.

 

[sfried]

Love the comment on Mother 3 being withheld from us. So true.

That said, yes, unlockable in a multiplayer-first game is a pain.

 

[Magnus Of Weelilplace]

fun review, funish game when there's nothing better to play.

good stuff.

 

[miller483]

what has Brawl for the average non-nintendo fanatic gamer out there?

If you're a not a Nintendo fan (not fanBOY, just fan), then Brawl obviously won't be up your alley.

Use more common sense next time.