FalconPunch
Smash Journeyman
Read.this.now.
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Scar on the Melee vs Brawl debate: What does competitive really mean?
- Thread starter Scar
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Scar
#HarveyDent
lol, Long life span. That's garbage. Brawl allows EVERYONE regardless of character to live to any percent possible unless they died before using their second jump. Honestly, if you don't die from the move itself, you can make it back to the stage.
Gimp kills in Melee are VERY hard to do consistently unless you're playing against someone who is far worse than you. That's the essence of competitiveness right there. You have to use everything, tech skill, mindgames, prediction, reaction, so on and so forth to successfully gimp. The fact that gimp kills can even happen in Melee debatably makes it a more competitive game.
Also, dude I know you're a smart kid just from your posts, but you have no idea what competitive Melee is about. Your posts SCREAM that you've never played the game competitively and simply don't know what you're talking about. You can't argue Melee vs. Brawl if you don't understand Melee at all.
180OP
Smash Journeyman
Wow 321 pages of debate. Well I've been playing brawl for about 24 days now and I've played Melee at a competitively for 2 years prior. Here are my points as to why Melee>Brawl as a competitive fighting game.
1.Melee's Adv techs made the game incredibly deep. I mean the amount of data that was compiled by this community was just enormous. Don't forget the volumes of text accompanied by videos to demonstrate the applications of the techniques. It took MONTHS to learn everything and years to perfect. This seems to missing in Brawl. I don't see anything worth learning except Snake dashing and to dodge after being hit other than that, all you have to know is which moves are autocancellable, which have quick executions, and rolling, lots and lots of rolling.
2.Melee was dangerous. You could be gimped for making mistakes like missing an l cancel. The edgegame was incredibly tense. This gave birth to the video "Combo Breaker". In Brawl, edgeguarding is pretty much nonexistent. If you didnt die from an attack, you will make it back unless you lack the fundamentals of recovering or just screwed up. Where is the danger? Every time people just wait for the opponent to get back, except DeDeDe who probably has the best offstage game. You will never see a combo breaker vid for Brawl. Unfortunate, yes.
3.Combos. Compare a combo video of Melee to Brawls. I mean, I saw an IC Brawl 'combo' video and it was just chaingrabbing(or infinites), wtf? seriously? The problem lies with the very short hit stun which gives no opportunity for a combo. This is why Brawl is so campy and why it works is because of low hit stun. You just hit and run, if you stick around to do a Melee-type combo, you will get hit by your opponent 99.999% of the time. To avoid that, just hit and run then repeat. Compare that to a standard Melee match.
4. AutoLatching? Why? Grabbing the edge shouldn't be a right, it should be a privilege. Totally takes away from dangers posed in Melee. The ledgetech was a huge saver but it had to earned by timing it unlike Brawl where it is fed to you by a silver spoon.
But with all this said, Brawl is still pretty fun. But it was a step backward as a fighter. Almost everything that made Melee great, doesn't exist in Brawl or is in a different, but worse form.
Compare a match like Evo East 2007 PC Chris vs M2K finals to any Brawl match and you will have your answer.
A common slogan or rebuttal is that Brawl is new, and new Adv Techs will come about. No they wont. Even if they do, they will most likely not worth much. Adv techs that made Melee, are confirmed to be gone.
I just hope everyone finds happiness, wherever it may be.
1.Melee's Adv techs made the game incredibly deep. I mean the amount of data that was compiled by this community was just enormous. Don't forget the volumes of text accompanied by videos to demonstrate the applications of the techniques. It took MONTHS to learn everything and years to perfect. This seems to missing in Brawl. I don't see anything worth learning except Snake dashing and to dodge after being hit other than that, all you have to know is which moves are autocancellable, which have quick executions, and rolling, lots and lots of rolling.
2.Melee was dangerous. You could be gimped for making mistakes like missing an l cancel. The edgegame was incredibly tense. This gave birth to the video "Combo Breaker". In Brawl, edgeguarding is pretty much nonexistent. If you didnt die from an attack, you will make it back unless you lack the fundamentals of recovering or just screwed up. Where is the danger? Every time people just wait for the opponent to get back, except DeDeDe who probably has the best offstage game. You will never see a combo breaker vid for Brawl. Unfortunate, yes.
3.Combos. Compare a combo video of Melee to Brawls. I mean, I saw an IC Brawl 'combo' video and it was just chaingrabbing(or infinites), wtf? seriously? The problem lies with the very short hit stun which gives no opportunity for a combo. This is why Brawl is so campy and why it works is because of low hit stun. You just hit and run, if you stick around to do a Melee-type combo, you will get hit by your opponent 99.999% of the time. To avoid that, just hit and run then repeat. Compare that to a standard Melee match.
4. AutoLatching? Why? Grabbing the edge shouldn't be a right, it should be a privilege. Totally takes away from dangers posed in Melee. The ledgetech was a huge saver but it had to earned by timing it unlike Brawl where it is fed to you by a silver spoon.
But with all this said, Brawl is still pretty fun. But it was a step backward as a fighter. Almost everything that made Melee great, doesn't exist in Brawl or is in a different, but worse form.
Compare a match like Evo East 2007 PC Chris vs M2K finals to any Brawl match and you will have your answer.
A common slogan or rebuttal is that Brawl is new, and new Adv Techs will come about. No they wont. Even if they do, they will most likely not worth much. Adv techs that made Melee, are confirmed to be gone.
I just hope everyone finds happiness, wherever it may be.
#HBC | Red Ryu
Red Fox Warrior
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I never said it was needed.
I'm stating these were the changes made to slow the game down and make matches long.
Isn't that what anyone, regardless of skill, should be doing? Shouldn't you try to stay on the stage and not be knocked/thrown off so people don't spike or edgehog you?
But the auto snapping till doesn't affect competitiveness when the tournament and circuit ultimately determine this. The competitive circuit determines who is more skilled, and what kinds of techniques are more favorable. Who wins and who loses shows this. Newbies are not running around with Metaknights and Pits winning every tournament. They can fly forever or recover easily, but they can't fight for crap. The better person will win regardless.
This isn't about newer players it was about the characters. Characters with great snapping, improve their recovery, thats all it does. It makes recovering easier to do as opposed to making edge guarding easier.
Just because there are no/little exploitable glitches at the moment and the game was changed in ways which may have made it easier for newer characters doesn't mean the game lost skill.
If edgeguarding isn't working since killing at 80 or less percentage isn't as effective, try working on fighting the character on the stage getting him higher, then going for the kill.
To be fair, the only experience and knowledge I can hold to my name is owning each game at it's release, having two/three friends who do/did play it competitively, and playing it compeditively for the few months before Brawl's release.
But what he is saying is that some characters don't have the ability to edgegaurd because that requires you to now leave the stage because people auto-sweet spot. This adds more imbalance to an already imbalanced game.
"Just because there are no/little exploitable glitches at the moment"
I fail to see what this has to do with the current argument other than now your are submitting yourself to use horrible n00b-like arguments to make your point. There are exploits, it's called ridiculously sized hit-boxes, chain grabbing, footstool hop spiking, banana stun locking, angel stepping, arrow canceling, that crawl maneuver thing, etc. There are plenty of glitches and exploits in this game. Especially so when you look at Snakes ability to approach like a mad man!
If you want to know who is more skilled in Brawl, you find the guy that can play "Character Select" the best. He or she will hold the key to victory in Brawl.
"Just because there are no/little exploitable glitches at the moment"
I fail to see what this has to do with the current argument other than now your are submitting yourself to use horrible n00b-like arguments to make your point. There are exploits, it's called ridiculously sized hit-boxes, chain grabbing, footstool hop spiking, banana stun locking, angel stepping, arrow canceling, that crawl maneuver thing, etc. There are plenty of glitches and exploits in this game. Especially so when you look at Snakes ability to approach like a mad man!
If you want to know who is more skilled in Brawl, you find the guy that can play "Character Select" the best. He or she will hold the key to victory in Brawl.
Making matches longer doesn't make the game more competitive.
This is true, but RDK was talking about when you are attempting to recover AFTER you've already been knocked off the stage. Most inexperienced players think that getting back onto the stage is the same thing as recovering to the edge, so they tend to overshoot the edge because they're afraid of missing the edge and falling to their death. However, more experienced players understand that recovering to the edge is often a safer bet, unless they know that their opponent knows how to edgehog.
I agree that the competitive scene ultimately determines if the game is competitive or not, but the fact is that the competitive scene can NOT determine how competitive the game is compared to Melee. As stated several times before, many competitive Brawl players have never played Melee competitively. As for Metaknight and Pit, you're completely wrong. You see MK players placing consistently high in most tournaments (or is that just because there are so many of them?). MK and Pit's recoveries can be taken advantage of, especially Pit's up-B when he's trying to recover from below.
Making edge guarding harder to do used to be the responsibility of the person recovering, not the game itself. I fail to see how making every character's recovery easier makes the game more competitive. Which of the following situations do you feel is more competitive?
1) A match in which every time someone is knocked off the stage, one player fights to recover without being punished, and the other fights to punish his opponent's recovery.
2) A match in which every time someone is knocked off the stage, one player airdodges projectiles and recovers with ease, while the other shoots projectiles to add more damage, or just waits for his opponent to get back on the stage.
This is advice that should be given to a n00b. If edgeguarding isn't working, adding more damage and then going for the kill is your only option left, because your opponent is going to get back on the stage regardless. The whole point of the game is trying to take a stock off of your opponent, while keeping the damage you take yourself at a minimum. Edgeguarding helps you accomplish this because if successful, you don't need to get your opponent to 175-200% to kill them. Trying to rack up more damage by fighting your opponent on the stage is dangerous because at the same time he can easily rack up damage on you, especially with the lack of hitstun.
Samochan
Smash Master
Not forgetting that you're staling more of your moves in order to kill the opponent and gain more damage by yourself, and when you finally ko him you're on the KO% yourself and he has all moves fresh, thus meaning easy KO for him cause low% has veeery little hitstun.
Endless Nightmares
Smash Master
Fixed
And frankly, anyone who thinks there's no edgeguarding in Brawl, just plain sucks at the game.
The Halloween Captain
Smash Master
No Nintendo would not release a sequel with worse graphics and less characters. So why should Brawlers look back to a game with less characters and worse graphics?
You cannot exclude the graphics part when deciding between games which is better. Also, more difficult controls, such as for short-hopping and ledge-hogging, do not a better game make. No tripping is a plus, but ATs that would not be known had melee came later would not factor in.
Although my arguement sounded stupid, it was also an attempt to open up criticism so that I can refute the "melee is better" arguements one by one by using the reverse situation to what Brawl is facing - that is - if melee came after Brawl, then would we defend melee so staunchly from Brawl veterans as we defend Brawl from melee veterans?
Jack Kieser
Smash Champion
Oh, no johns, RDK. It's still useful as hell, it's just way, way harder to pull off. You have to put yourself at more of a risk of getting gimped yourself when you edgeguard in Brawl as opposed to Melee, so no one does it consistently, hence people thinking that you can't edgeguard in Brawl.
Reaver197
Smash Lord
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Such a hypothetical argument has no grounding nor place in this thread. It does not do anything to actually evaluate the competitive viability of either game, and would degenerate into a whole bunch of "what ifs" and "maybes" arguments.
Also, your points have nothing to do with actual gameplay and how the metagame works. Did you seriously say that Brawl is intrinsically better in some aspect just because it has prettier graphics? Graphics have no place or part in determining which is the better competitive game. The size of the character roster, while maybe adding some interesting quirks and intricacies to the metagame, ultimately would not factor into how the metagame in general works and operates.
Why should I attempt to edgeguard and risk a stock when I can just spam arrows or f-tilt from across the freaking stage? The risks of edgeguarding outweigh the advantages, especially when confronted with the alternatives.
This is basically the entire metagame of Brawl. Why rush in and get shieldgrabbed when laser camping is much more rewarding?
The Halloween Captain
Smash Master
Actually, from a technical position, Brawl edgeguarding is significantly easier. The characters are more floaty, and no longer need to face the stage to grab the edge. The only problem is that the person being guarded against also has more control and might attack you. This change in perticular made Brawl a much more intense off-edge game than even melee, if done correctly.
Also, Reaver, if melee was made up of squares attacking eachother, with pong era graphics, it would not have developed into a competitive game. The same goes for if it only had one character in the roster. These factors are significant, as much of melee's competitiveness seems to involve how much fun it is to watch.
However, the hypothetical statement was made because I have the impression that most melee support is derivative of a sense of nostalgia amonst its fans, and I wanted to see what would occur if that nostalgia were removed from the debate.
Also, Reaver, if melee was made up of squares attacking eachother, with pong era graphics, it would not have developed into a competitive game. The same goes for if it only had one character in the roster. These factors are significant, as much of melee's competitiveness seems to involve how much fun it is to watch.
However, the hypothetical statement was made because I have the impression that most melee support is derivative of a sense of nostalgia amonst its fans, and I wanted to see what would occur if that nostalgia were removed from the debate.
No, because if you don't want to deal with an edgeguarding game you just airdodge through and move on. Or in Snake's case, recover from far, far out of reach of anyone.
The Halloween Captain
Smash Master
Do you really think its that easy?
What's difficult about pressing R or L once someone appears to be approaching you and is somewhat within range to attack? What's difficult about pressing Up+B with Snake at the soonest possible moment so that you're so high up that nobody will be able to reach you for an edgeguard, and approaches from directly below can be airdodged?
The edgeguarding game is there, but its relevance to the game in general has been... modified.
The edgeguarding game is there, but its relevance to the game in general has been... modified.
But this line of thinking has nothing to do with anything and will get us nowhere. Melee still would have been amazingly deep and fun to watch and Brawl still would have sucked competitively, regardless of release order.
"If Melee consisted of squares attacking each other with Pong-era graphics"? WTF? Stop attacking Melee for what it could have been, and start attacking it for what it is. That's like me saying "No one would play Brawl if it had Centipede-era graphics and limited, 2D movement". It wouldn't even be Brawl, it'd be a completely different game!
Please leave the discussion about games that actually exist. Bashing hypothetical games won't get us anywhere.
thumbswayup
Smash Master
Egdeguarding in Brawl is pathetic. Brawl is a bad game.
The Halloween Captain
Smash Master
Airdodging is like spot dodging - useful, but can easily be punished between the end of the dodge and the next opportunity you are given to dodge.
By the way, I think you are correct about Snake. However, I am a Pikachu mainer, and Snake can almost never dodge through thunder, so I don't see it as much as you.
Also, RDK, melee was awesome to watch, but not at its beginning, so if it came out after or even at the same time as Brawl, it would not have been given a chance. After all, the ATs were what made melee so fast and interesting. My point was that graphics and character roster are important more than anything, when making that silly hypothetical.
Samochan
Smash Master
Ike's edgeguard would be beastly if not for the autosweetspot. Eruption super armor frame edgeguard anyone? Ftilt, fsmash, dair... man he'd be so awesome and yet not broken, but more balanced. But brawl ruined it. ;_;
Reaver197
Smash Lord
- Joined
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- 1,287
Your example is completely inapplicable to this argument, mostly by the fact that the graphical difference between Melee and Brawl does not impact how the game is play nor can be played. Brawl could work with Melee's level of graphics, and Melee could work with Brawl's level of graphics. Humanoid models can be produced, physics can be calculated, and hitboxes can be read in both games.
The only real differences is in their particle effects and textures, nothing which would have an impact on how the game actually works or is played. To somehow try to say that such slight differences have a real, tangible effect on the game's mechanics is almost laughable. Please, do not give theoretical and hypothetical arguments as excuses or evidence for your claims, because they hold no water or relevance.
Also, as for the nostalgia aspect, that is something that you cannot by any means on your part remove them from people's minds by incurring a debate. People are human and are thus influenced always by their emotions. You can keep people in check by telling them if their emotions are too greatly influencing their opinions and judgments, but creating a theoretical debate will not suddenly purge this from the discussion. People will have to look at themselves and keep their own emotions in check in seeing how it influences their thoughts, and I believe this is something that can be applied to more than just the Melee people.
Aesir
Smash Master
>_> Edgeguarding in brawl exists it's just mostly about aggressive edge guarding like attacking them way off the stage stealing their double jumps the like.
Being floaty means recovering is easier, and edgeguarding is harder. Grabbing the edge to edgehog only works when the recovering player tries to sweetspot the edge (Fox/Falco forward B). Edgeguarding is much harder because most characters can simply recover onto the stage rather than the edge and rarely get punished for it. This makes the edgeguarding game in Brawl pointless in many situations because a lot of characters have recoveries that are ridiculously hard to punish.
You can make a fighting game with jaw-dropping graphics, but if its game mechanics are designed for a 5-year-old child to play, it will not be a competitive game. How pretty a game looks does draw appeal, but ultimately it's the gameplay, which depends heavily on the game mechanics, that determines how long you can play that game before you get bored and move on to other games. Your last statement about how Melee appears to be competitive due to "how fun it is to watch" just shows you have no idea what the f**k you're talking about. Melee is as amazing as it is because of how fun it is to play once you learn the finer aspects of the game. Brawl is a competitive game, but that doesn't depend at all on "how fun it is to watch".
Nostalgia is one thing, but if Brawl's game mechanics had been made with the same care that Melee's were, more people would be more enthusiastic about switching to this game. It seems to me you're really reaching for reasons (nostalgia, how fun it is to watch) as to why some people prefer Melee over Brawl. However, we've already given you our reasons, but it seems you prefer to just ignore them because you can't quite grasp the notion that a pretty, brand new game could be inferior to one that is almost eight years old. Please keep your misinformed opinions to yourself, and just enjoy playing whichever game you want.
thumbswayup
Smash Master
I want competitive Brawl to die, now. The last C3 I went to on friday was unbelievably boring. Only amazing people showed up like Azen, Chillin, Forte, Chu etc. and it still sucked ***. No one watched the finals, most of us didn't even know who won until later. Seriously there were 5 Brawl setups and 2 Melee ones (thanks to me and a friend). Holy mother of god, more people were playing Melee than Brawl by the end of the night. Even Tope sat down for an hour to play. It was awesome. The two setups were constantly crowded. There was always at least 8 people playing at all times. ****ing amazing. **** Brawl.
edit- Did I mention? I was knocked out in singles by another Metaknight. Yay. Oh, and it was a Snake who sent me to the losers bracket.
edit- Did I mention? I was knocked out in singles by another Metaknight. Yay. Oh, and it was a Snake who sent me to the losers bracket.
LOL_Master
Smash Lord
lmao, amazing equations rdk
Hurr hurr, Maylay wuz sucha dum gam, den 1 day sum1 aerdodj'd diagonalley inta da grownd!
Demon Kirby
Smash Champion
Just wanted to let you all know that I chaged the "melee vs brawl" tag into something more fitting for the current thread.
Can we go back to intelligent discussion instead of providing more proof that General Brawl is the most stupid forum on this site? Thank you.
Can we go back to intelligent discussion instead of providing more proof that General Brawl is the most stupid forum on this site? Thank you.
thumbswayup
Smash Master
I posted this in another thread, and I'm putting it in here because I feel like it.
The Halloween Captain
Smash Master
If you don't like Brawl tactics, and most of the competitive gamers agree, that day will come.
BIG C
Smash Master
just for the record I have officially changed my opinion on colonel christmas from "Man, this kid is dumb." to "I wanna slap this kid, dumb."
like seriously just
like seriously just
BIG C
Smash Master
just for the record I have officially changed my opinion on colonel christmas from "Man, this kid is dumb." to "I wanna slap this kid, dumb."
like seriously just
like seriously just
Seconded. Also, I want to stick another copy of this .gif on the page for effect.just for the record I have officially changed my opinion on colonel christmas from "Man, this kid is dumb." to "I wanna slap this kid, dumb."
like seriously just
The Halloween Captain
Smash Master
Its a matter of opinion, I'm sure. I'll admit, I really shouldn't talk about melee. Although, you guys have the most intense posts when I'm around, and the discussion is interesting when I look the dumb***.just for the record I have officially changed my opinion on colonel christmas from "Man, this kid is dumb." to "I wanna slap this kid, dumb."
like seriously just
I think where we differ the most is our definition of competitive. I like that Brawl can be both offencive and campy, and is not restricted to the single-focus style of melee. Sure, melee looked great, but it was rediculous. 0-death combos, 5 to 10 imputs per second, how could anyone seriously enjoy a game that fast without tormenting themselves for days learning button combinations?
First off, you don't just look the dumb*ss, you ARE the dumb*ss. We have "the most intense posts" when you're around because your posts are on such an epic scale of stupidity that we're OBLIGATED to try and set you straight.
Now here you go again, despite the fact that you just stated, in the SAME POST, that you "shouldn't talk about Melee". Obviously, your ignorance is such that even the most well though-out posts we can muster here on these forums can't get through to you. DON'T KNOCK IT UNTIL YOU'VE TRIED IT. You see the complexity of Melee as work, and a chore. However, it's anything but that, because it expands your options and deepens the gameplay. If you like the simplicity of Brawl and how easy it is to learn, then go ahead and play Brawl. But don't f**king come in here and make these statements OVER AND OVER AGAIN about s**t you know NOTHING about.
Feel free to stay and read the thread, but for the love of God take BigC's advice.
Jack Kieser
Smash Champion
Here's the thing: some people do view the amount of work necessary to put into Melee as a chore. That's reality. Some people enjoy having to do that much work, some people don't, but don't act as if the technical skill required to play Melee wasn't a barrier. Tech skill is a barrier in Melee, just like its a barrier in MvC2, SF, GG, and any other mainstream-style fighting game. Believe it or not, a lot of people don't like feeling like they are doing work when they play a game, and there is nothing wrong with them looking for a game that doesn't feel (to them) like a job.
Clai
Smash Lord
Variola second'd this, so I third this.
Now about this auto-snapping to the ledge, it compromises edge-guarding how? Yes it shortens the distance needed for a character's recovery to latch onto the ledge, but edgeguarders know this and hopefully they do know how to edgehog. In that case, it comes down to:
- Using a recovery move early, edgeguarder rushes to edgehog and then use an aerial to take advantage of landing lag from the recovery move.
- Waiting for the edgeguarder to edgehog and use the recovery move to catch the edgeguarder when his invulnerability frames run out, but risks the edgehogger coming out with a spike.
- Recovering over the stage to eliminate the above risks, but leaves himself massively open if the edgeguarder doesn't buy it.
Yes, a character trying to recover can airdodge to avoid an offstage attack, but airdodges can be punished, and a character has to use his recovery move at some point.
Just because Metaknight, Snake, and DeDeDe can practically never be gimped doesn't mean that Brawl will never see edgeguarding. It's there, and it will develop.
P.S. Ganonspiking people trying to recover is the sweetest thing in the Brawl universe (that doesn't involve Captain Falcon's unstoppable manliness).
The Halloween Captain
Smash Master
I have ****ing tried melee, and I am aware of how the **** ATs work, and I know how to ****ing use them, even if I chose not to perfect it. I don't think I'll be going away.
Like I said, Jack, the difference between what I consider competitive and what you consider it to be is a matter of opinion. As a long time Pikachu mainer, melee was just painful, partially because of the tiers in practical application with the Falcon chainthrow and Marth's long sword, and partially because I found out about the ATs only a few months after Brawl was announced for December. Since I got immediately better at Smash because of Pika-buffs, especially the one which allowed thunder to pass through high cealings, I am inclined towards Brawl more than melee at this point, although i can recognize Brawl took more technical skill.
You know, its ironic Variola, I feel I'm the one trying to set you guys straight half the time.
Aesir
Smash Master
picking a game because your favorite character is better in it is silly.
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